27 August 2025

From the Principal

The last Newsletter for Winter!

As Winter sports come to a close; the flowers start to pop up, our days get a bit longer and we lose access to the oval for a few weeks while the Council do an outstanding job of annual maintenance and restoration on the oval. Somethings are always the same!

A big thank you to our families for helping to keep our students healthy during the year. If you’re unwell, please keep that illness away from school. While this is a drab opening for a Newsletter, the end of Term 3 is historically our worst time for illness.  We will continue to focus on hand washing and keeping windows open – they both make a huge difference. With our combined work, and the new build with more space and better ventilation, we are noticing about a 20% improvement in sickness at school currently this year, with our best data for sickness since COVID. A great outcome! Less sickness is always good.

At home, if you can help your children to spend some down time recovering – just being. It would be helpful. With birthday parties, sports and events – a busy life can lead to increased chances of illness. Some time in pyjamas building Lego or reading books can be very beneficial. If you need more books, come get them from the library!

Reading – Comprehension

Earlier in the year, we shared a bit about reading and the importance of reading widely and often to improve background knowledge and vocabulary. We’ve used the model of Scarborough Rope to try and explain our discussion. This term, we discussed what fluency is (Week 2) and what word recognition is (Week 4).

This week we want to discuss what comprehension means and how we can build it.

Language comprehension is a very large concept to attempt to break down. It can be summarised pretty easily though:

Do you get the gist of what you read?

Increasing accuracy of comprehension means that you understand in better detail. As such, you can have basic comprehension and great comprehension. I’m sure if I tried to read things from many of your workplaces or lives, I wouldn’t understand them very well as I don’t have the experiential background. But I might get the general gist of things (sometimes). Importantly, do I know what to do to increase my comprehension of what I am reading if I am stuck? Yes, I do – that is what we are teaching your children.

Comprehension is built upon a few key blocks: Vocabulary, background knowledge and prior reading experience. (As seen in the top of the rope below.) This part of reading is maybe the most complicated.

Comprehension is founded on a wide and rich vocabulary. A vocabulary is the set of words you can confidently use in language expression. The more words students know and can use, the better they are at reading, writing, talking (arguing) and the better life outcomes they generally get. This is why we have stressed the need to read lots, read widely and to talk about words. When you’re young, you learn words from your community; from talking and doing and being. As you get older, you generally increase your vocabulary through one means – reading. This is why we stress the need to read as much as possible and to read at home often.

It is easier to comprehend something if you have some understanding of it – this is your background knowledge. It is much easier for me to understand an intricate written description of catching a crayfish than it would be about how to ride a horse. Simply stemming from my background knowledge (and interests- horses are cool, just not my thing). We can run into a fallacy here though; we don’t simply provide texts and experience based on interests. If we do, we are not extending the background knowledge of our students. Podcasts and documentaries can be helpful here as these both work to extend further knowledge and provide concrete examples of what might otherwise be abstract. It’s much easier to comprehend a text about the beach if you’ve been to the beach, hard if you haven’t. It is why we do see the value in experiences, holidays and adventure. Please don’t think that we simply listen to a few podcasts at school and reading makes huge gains. Listening and viewing are other ways to build your vocabulary, reading is by far the best way (because you get to see the word in print, think about its meaning, its spelling pattern and link it to other knowledge you have about similar spelling patterns).

Finally, your reading experience helps you to read more. Through different exposure to different structures in books or reports or lists or biographies (the list goes on), you start to understand how sentences and paragraphs are constructed to make meaning. When you see more of these, you automatically understand what they look like and then can “read through” them later. For example, understanding that a conjunction (however, therefore) combines two clauses, you can look for both parts to make meaning of. This is some more technical stuff – in short, the more you read the easier it is to understand slightly hard writing.

Our job at school is to mediate the text to the student – we should expose your children to hard writing (for them) and have them work at understanding it. It’s not easy, it should be hard. Conversely, as discussed with fluency, we want your children reading things that they can easily read at home; to practise the skills we are teaching them.

How to support language comprehension at home

Talk about words – find interesting words (hopefully from your reading) and talk about them. Find out their meaning together and talk about them. Build your child’s bank of words as much as possible. Successful later life outcomes can be predicted by the number of words a child knows and uses from a young age.

Do things, and then talk about them. The act of ‘savouring’ and reliving an event through discussion and questioning not only increases wellbeing but can imprint experiences onto long term memory, boosting your background knowledge

Read a variety of things. Reading poems, weird and wacky things and old-fashioned books or items are a great way to explore different type of language structures that your children might encounter later in life.

See you all soon – Courtney

Sun Smart Policy – Hats

From September 1 students will be asked to always wear a hat when outside at recess, lunch, PE etc.  School hats are available to buy from the Office for $10.

The 2025 School Satisfaction Survey

We want to hear from you, as input from families is very important to help us inform our school-planning and decision-making. Every year the Department for Education, Children and Young People conducts a School Satisfaction Survey to find out what your child(ren)'s school does well and where it may improve.

We would be grateful if you took part in our online survey about Cambridge Primary School.

The survey is open from Monday 25 August 2025 until Friday 19 September 2025 and should take about 5 minutes to complete.

Each family should nominate one person to fill in this survey for their child(ren).

Take the online survey by clicking this Link, or pasting it in your browser: https://nam.dcv.ms/PpJndsboQ1

The survey is carried out on a secure website and all responses are anonymous and confidential.

All families in this school received the same survey link and no identifying information is collected. A summary of the survey results will be provided to schools.  Responses from individuals or small groups will NOT be disclosed to any Department for Education, Children and Young People staff.

Please contact your school if you require any assistance.

Thank you for taking the time to fill in this survey.

Father’s Day Stall – Wednesday 3 September

Mark your calendars and get ready to celebrate Father’s Day with us on Wednesday 3 September. Gifts will range from $1 - $6. Please send your children to school with some cash and a bag. We look forward to seeing you at the stall and helping you find the perfect way to say “thank you” to the remarkable men in your lives.

Let’s make this Father’s Day unforgettable!

Cambridge Swimming Carnival 2025

Our Cambridge Swimming Carnival, for all students from Grade 3 to Grade 6, will be held on Thursday 18^th of September at the Hobart Aquatic Centre from 10am – 2pm. All students will be transported to and from the pool via bus. The day promises to be a fun day full of action-packed races and novelty events, with spectators being most welcome.

We’ll need lots of help to make the day a success. If you are available to help on the day, that would be fantastic, and we thank you in advance. Could you please give your name to the school office or James Dudgeon.

A program of events including specific events and times will be released via Schoolzine closer to the carnival.

Silent Disco Friday 29 August

A reminder that there will be a Silent Disco this Friday, August 29, with the theme SPACE!

We will transform our school into a galaxy of fun and music! Students are invited to come dressed in their most stellar attire—as an astronaut, alien, or a sparkling star, your creativity is the limit.

This event is not just about having a cosmic time; it's also in support of the Make-a-Wish Foundation, helping dreams come true for children in need.

Students are asked to bring 5 Coins for the event - all monies raised going to Make-a-Wish. There will be 3 sessions during the day for our different aged students. Monday to Wednesday Kinder Families are invited to drop off for the Kinder Session.

Kinder/Prep 11.10am – 11.55pm
Years 1-3 – 12pm – 12.45pm
Years 4-6 – 1.25pm – 2.25pm

Cambridge Book Swap Shop

Over the past few weeks, Cambridge families generously donated books for our Book Swap Shop and we were blown away by the number and the quality of contributions. A huge thank you to everyone who took part!

Our Kinders did a wonderful job sorting the books, setting up the shop, and even running the register on shopping days. It was lovely to see so many books find new homes and to watch the joy on the children’s faces as they chose their favourite books.

We still have plenty of books available, so we’ve decided to keep the shop open! It will now be known as the Cambridge Community Library. Families are welcome to donate or borrow books over the coming months. You’ll find the library set up in the Kinder front room, come along and enjoy!

Classes had some amazing Book Week activities. Here are a few photos from the Gr2/3 Book Week Hot Chocolate Reading afternoon.

2025 Young Archies Exhibition

This year we have received an amazing 555 entries from across 54 schools and colleges.

These artworks are now on show in the Hobart exhibition.

• Address: UTAS School of Creative Arts & Media, Hunter Street
• Exhibition Dates: Thursday 21 August – Friday 5 September 2025 (including weekends)
• Opening times: 11.00pm-4.00pm

Can’t make it to the Hobart exhibition in person? All portraits can be found in our online galleries:

• 2025 Young Archies – Kindergarten & Prep Category
• 2025 Young Archies - Year 1 & Year 2 Category
• 2025 Young Archies - Year 3 & Year 4 Category
• 2025 Young Archies - Year 5 & Year 6 Category
• 2025 Young Archies - Year 7 & Year 8 Category
• 2025 Young Archies - Year 9 & Year 10 Category
• 2025 Young Archies - Year 11 & Year 12 Category

Following the Hobart show, a touring exhibition of the 2025 Young Archies Awards prize recipients will visit Launceston and Burnie. Head over the Young Archies Awards page for more information.

Voting for the People’s Choice Award is now open. The winning portrait will join the other prize winners on tour. VOTE HERE for the 2025 People's Choice Awards

Mountain Bike Magazines

We are looking for mountain bike magazines for the Library and the 5/6 classrooms. If you have any old ones lying around, please drop them off at the Office.

Assemblies in Term 3

Assemblies are held in the MPR and start at 1.40pm. All are welcome to attend. This term’s remaining Assembly will be on:

Friday 12 September

Crossing Officer Vacancies

After School Netball for Gr 3/4 and 5/6

Let’s Celebrate!

Community Notice Board