Dear Parents and Carers, 

Students today have extremely busy schedules, with ever increasing responsibilities at school and at home. Many kids, especially adolescents, are going to bed later and later and are at risk of sleep deprivation. This affects three areas of a child’s development: psychological, physiological and psychosocial. All three are essential to a child's growth, learning ability and overall wellbeing. Sleep is vital to a child’s overall health and is as important as diet and exercise.

Sleep also strengthens a child’s immune system and supports their ability to function properly on a daily basis. Children who do not get enough sleep show increased levels of aggressive behaviour, are less attentive and are much less active. Trying to catch up on sleep on weekends is not the answer and can still lead to severe sleep deprivation.

Ensuring our student’s health and wellbeing is operating at the optimal level, it is essential that you monitor their sleep. If you think that your child isn’t getting enough sleep, there are certain signs that you can look out for:

• Being grouchy and irritable during the day. 
• Having trouble getting to sleep. 
• Sleeping late in the morning. 
• Overactive behaviour. 
• Regularly falling asleep outside of his/her usual sleep times. 

Sabbath Week

As is our custom Week 7 of each term is set aside as our Sabbath Week. This means that there are no meetings and no homework. We don’t count reading as homework so that should continue every night. Perhaps you could change it so that parents do all the reading. Another idea is to turn off technology and play a board game – so many mathematical skills to be used!

Father’s Day

Thank you for coming along to our Father’s Day breakfast. Special thanks to the Yr 3/4 parents for helping out. We could not do what we do without our wonderful parents.

Yours sincerely, 

Julie Wiley
Principal.