Welcome to our 40th birthday year, there is so much to celebrate this year and we encourage you to attend our upcoming Community Spirit meeting online on Thursday 20 Feb at 7pm to discuss how we will celebrate our big year.
We have had a wonderful start to the year and over the summer break there was so much going on. All carpets and floors were cleaned requiring lots of furniture to be moved! Also due to the reduction in classes at the Rockingham campus, Orla moved back on site into the old Turtles room and Turtles moved into the old Dugongs room.
We are delighted to inform our application to run a Child Care Centre from the Rockingham site Penguin’s classroom was approved by the Education and Care Regulatory Unit of WA (ECRU). We are still finalising the last requirements by the City of Rockingham and hope to commence this service for our families in term two. We are also really pleased to have Lauren Ton return to teach in this new centre once it commences. In the meantime you will see building works as we create a new entry to the Penguins toilets enabling these children internal access to the bathroom facilities from their classroom and some further upgrades to the Koolangara Garden.
Sadly we farewelled Di Edmonds who resigned from her teaching role at the end of the year and thank her for twelve years of amazing teaching and also for undertaking the Program Coordinator role last term. Di has been such a support to so many staff during her time with us and has taken on multiple practicum students inspiring them to undertake Montessori training. Di has also been instrumental in preparing and delivering many of our Parent Education sessions over her years with us. Di will be greatly missed and we look forward to seeing her back to assist with staff training in the future, as this certainly is one of her passions and great strengths, ensuring authentic Montessori practise continues not only at RMS but for all. Congratulations goes to Jodi Kerslake for winning the Principal position at Kerry Street Community School which was established by our founding principal Liz Sugars.
A warm welcome to Michael Watson in his role as Program Coordinator for the Maambakoort subschool and Manyin (seal) advisor. Michael comes to us from his last position as Associate Principal at Coastal Lakes College in Lakelands and with twenty four years’ government secondary school education experience. Michael commenced the AMI 12-18 Diploma in August and along with Michelle Langley, completed four weeks of face to face training in Sydney throughout January. We welcome to the Adolescent Program staff Kaitlyn and Sarah who moved from the Rockingham Primary School site to join the AP team as Education Assistants and we welcome Clare McCaskie back to the school following her year in Germany. Clare has joined the AP team as the Maarmong (whale) advisor and resumed her Program Coordinator role at the PK Primary School site along with covering Kara DOTT.
We are so thrilled to have Venus return from her leave and welcome Lani to the Janda class at the Port Kennedy Primary School site for two days per week this term in a job share role with Venus. Mooja class now has Nicola in a full time teaching position and the Dolphins class welcome Manmeen Kaur as their new teacher. We also welcome Katherine Vickers as the two day per week Education Assistant job sharing with Regan in the Starfish class at the Rockingham site. West Coast Montessori Early Learning Centre also welcomes Bec Scrivener as the Bandicoot class teacher. In our Administration team we welcome Kate Brown to the Enrolments Officer role and the Port Kennedy receptionist/admin officer.
Over the next month West Coast Montessori will have fencing installed in the playground area to enable classes to open their doors and expose the children to the new outdoor classroom spaces. This will greatly expand their classroom sizes and mean many more practical life jobs will be available for the children. Internally the two Children’s House classrooms will be receiving new shelving in March and a second order of Montessori equipment will arrive which will enable the children who have now had a full year of Montessori experience to extend their learning into all areas of the Montessori curriculum. We are delighted that many families who would normally have left the centre to attend kindy, have now decided to stay on as they have seen the enormous benefits for their children in a Montessori setting. We are also excited that with this retention brings older leaders in the classes who can guide those children transitioning into these Children’s House classes and this has a flow on effect across the entire centre.
For our Port Kennedy Primary School site we have now sourced some Out of School Hours Care options for families. Please contact Kate at Enrolments@rms.wa.edu.au to gain further information. For our Rockingham Primary School families we are delighted to have the PCYC now offering OSHC, for details please see the pcyc website here: https://www.wapcyc.com.au/rockingham-basc
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