Last week, I got to participate in one of my yearly highlights. I was invited into the Prep classrooms to mark their first 100 days of school.

This has become a very sweet milestone that is an opportunity for our community to celebrate the extraordinary growth that occurs in this vital period at the start of a formal schooling journey.

Our families went all out in costume design. Each student’s interpretation of the “100” theme was inspired. We had multiple versions of 100 stickers, 101 minus 1 dalmatians, and multiple centenarians who were resplendent in their hair curlers while clutching on to walking sticks or Zimmer frames.

I’m sorry Year 12s, but I maintain that Prep is the most important year of schooling!

Regularly visiting the Prep classrooms is a bit like watching a time lapse movie where the otherwise invisible, incremental changes are on full display. They truly seem to be growing in their knowledge, skills and independence in front of our eyes.

Each time I visit, I notice our students' capabilities have jumped forwards. From the nervous and teeny cohort in their shiny and oversized new uniforms, totally dwarfed by their school bags, they are suddenly confident, independent, literate and numerate. They love their Jewish learning and are already thriving in their Hebrew studies. They have formed solid friendships and are developing their emotional intelligence. They seem to particularly love our sport, music, art and Kibbutz programs.

While they are undoubtedly exceptionally cute, I look past this to see them developing their sense of identity and a genuine love of learning.  

The gentle, engaging and productive tone carefully nurtured by our Prep teachers, provides the perfect environment for our students to develop the routines, attitudes and appropriate levels of challenge that underpin learning advancement.

The staff in the early Primary years adopt the Science of Language and Reading (SOLAR) model for literacy acquisition. This is a specialised course which covers the linguistic basis for language comprehension. Since incorporating this program and training our staff in its delivery, we have noticed a significant leap in fluency and sophistication of student literacy.

This is evident to our parents, who after only 100 days, see students for whom the world of literature is already opening up.

At the same time, our students are developing playful automaticity with numbers - counting forwards and backwards. This is the hard early work that builds a strong numeracy core which will serve as the foundation for future more complex learning in mathematics.

I know that our Prep students are exceptionally lucky to receive the most purposeful and developmentally appropriate grounding that will form the basis of their future schooling. Mazal tov on the first 100 days! I look forward to sharing in their learning and development for many more years to come.