We acknowledge the traditional Aboriginal custodians of the lands, waterways and skies of the Bunurong Peoples of the Kulin Nation where we gather, learn and grow at Aspendale Primary School.

We pay our respects to past and present Traditional Custodians and Elders of all nations,  and their ongoing cultural, spiritual and educational practices.  

We extend this respect to all Torres Strait Islanders and any First Nations peoples who learn or visit these grounds. We thank you for sharing and caring for the land we are learning on.

New version of the Acknowedgement of Country
Above is an updated Acknowledgment of Country that has been written in consultation with staff, students and members of our community. We recieved positive feedback and approval from our friends at the Bunurong Land Council in 2023. 



Aspendale Primary School commemorated Reconciliation Week.
We understand that for many members of the APS community, this is a challenging time.

Reconciliation Week is a time for all Australians to learn about our shared histories, cultures, and achievements, and to explore how each of us can contribute to achieving reconciliation in Australia.

Now more than ever, these conversations are important to be having. 

As a school, we commemorated the week by focusing on developing our sense of community and connections with a whole school event. 

Our School Captains made a video during camp to commemorate the week. It starts with our school's Acknowledgement of Country. You can watch the video here. 


Thank you to Gus, Surina, Warren & Edie for helping create the video. You all did an amazing job understanding the purpose of the week. 

APS in China:

The team have continued their amazing adventures in China. This weeks highlights being going to school at our sister school Xuri Jingcheng Primary School, visiting the zoo and meeting the host families. There was a special moment on Wednesday evening when many of our students were featured on the Australian and Chinese News. They are currently on the train from Nanjing to Shanghai.

Read on in the newsletter to hear an update from the team along with many photos of their journey.

Year 3’s take action:

While the year 3 students were working on their Unit of Inquiry about access to equal opportunities, Bella and Ruby decided they wanted to help Yarrabah School, because Bella’s mum works there, and they knew that the school needed more resources for the wellbeing area.

They decided to create a lemonade and cupcake stand to raise money. On a warm Sunday in August, they set up their stand in their street and sold so many cupcakes and cups of lemonade! They made over $170!

Ruby and Bella had a meeting with the Yarrabah Principal, Matt Harris and handed over the money they had raised.

The Yarrabah community was super grateful, and the kids are excited to use their new equipment.

Thanks Ruby and Bella for being proactive and taking action for such a great cause!

Fundraisers in Term 4:

Planning and organising is underway for three fundraisers for term 4:

• Mangoes
• Tea Towels
• Colour Fun Run

These fundraisers will collectively contribute towards the updating of our drink taps around the school. So please take part in one, two or three of the fundraisers.

Please keep reading the newsletter for further information on the Mango fundraiser and the Tea Towel fundraiser.

Further information about the Colour Fun Run will be shared in term 4.

First Aid Officer Role:

In exciting news, we have employed a First Aid Officer! Sienna Koop started with us on Monday 15^th September. Please make Sienna or Miss Sienna (as the students will call her) welcome when you see her around the school.

Sports Colours Day:

Don’t forget to wear your favourite team colours tomorrow for our Sports Colours Day…it is looking to be a great morning. The parade will be on The Courts, starting at 9:15am, followed by rotation sports activities. Gold coin donation towards State Schools Relief is appreciated.

Assembly and End of Term:

Tomorrow we will hold our end of term assembly in the courtyard at 2pm before students will be dismissed for the holidays at 2:30pm.

Have a safe and enjoyable holidays. See you all back on Monday 6^th October for term 4.

Kind regards,

Amelia

Dear Parents and Families,

The annual Sports Colour Day is back for term 3 at Aspendale Primary School. Students come dressed in their favourite sports team colours and bring a gold coin donation for State Schools Relief. This will be help in the morning with a parade and footy kicking comp to follow. Looking forward to seeing all the students dressed in their outfits.

Da ja hau , 

Hello from Nanjing! 

We have just said goodbye to our sister school and what a week it has been! We climbed mountains in 37 degree heat, met our homestay families for afterschool activities, saw pandas, sloths and capaybaras at the zoo, stopped and ate amazing food every day. 

We have experienced Chinese poetry class, English class, PE class, woodwork and two maths classes- one taught by our very own Ms Fletcher or should we say 冯老师! 

It is a world first for Aspendale to have shared a teacher vs. Students game in China. Xuri Jingcheng Primary School joined us for a soccer game and it was a delight. The result of the game is still debated.... but as it was a friendly, we have decided to call a draw. 

Our students have made friends with our sister school students exchanging greetings and lots of waves as we walk around. We have felt a bit like celebrities as we walk up and down the 6 levels of Xuri JingCheng Ps. We shared games like rock, paper, scissors and skipping. We also learnt a cool treasure hunt game that we hope to play back at APS. 

Our visit would not have been possible without Ms Ma- who explained, translated and shared our jokes with all the teachers and students between schools. 

It was pretty sad to say goodbye to Xuri Jingcheng PS at our farewell assembly. Mr Pearce did us proud with a speech in Mandarin. 

A few of you may have seen us on the news! We were lucky enough to be invited to a welcome ceremony where Jacinta Allen, the Victorian premier, made a guest appearance. With outstanding behaviour and pride, APS students sung Click goes the shears and taught the premier to use robots. 'Click goes the shears,'has a special meaning in the relationship between China and Australia as it speaks to the trade in the wool industry. We were also on the Chinese news! 

We have one more stop before we head back to Australia and that it is Shanghai. Thank you so much to our families who have supported us from a distance! We will see you all soon. 

PRICE Day

On Thursday 16^th October we will be holding our annual PRICE values day. Our teachers have nominated activities they are passionate about, and students are currently putting in preferences for the activities they would like to undertake on that day. Each student will participate in 3 activities during the day.

Positive Behaviour for Learning

Over the last couple of weeks we have handed out many badges to students from Years F-3 for achieving 100 tokens already this year. Tomorrow at assembly we look forward to awarding badges to students in years 4-6 who have achieved this.

We have also had many students across the school redeeming their tokens for a variety of ‘treats’. Pictured below is Ruby from Year 2 being teacher for the day, and one of the year 2 classes wearing slippers for the day. We look forward to many more redemptions occurring, and badges being handed out in Term 4.

Plastic Bread Tags Needed

Please continue to send in your plastic bread tags to school. We are continually in need of more tokens and replacements for those that get broken. These can be dropped at the office or given to classroom teachers.

Please use the QR code or the link below for the online store: expressions.com.au/fundraising-schools/ovJFSnqu8VFnhrKZNCx4