Newsletter #15 May 26
Principal's News
Dear St Paul's families,
Welcome to this week's update. It was lovely to experience some rain yesterday. Whilst we would have liked more we must be grateful for what we can get at the moment.
CATHOLIC EDUCATION WEEK: This week we recognise 200 years of Catholic Education in Australia. Whilst we officially celebrate Catholic Education Week at this time, as a wider community the Catholic schools in Sunraysia will be coming together at a later date to formally celebrate our achievements. In my opinion, Catholic Education Week is every week. It is all the little things we do on a daily basis with our children that highlights what we are on about and what we offer for our community as a whole. It also reminds us of our links with our parish community.
CONFIRMATION: For those of you who attended one of the many masses over the weekend to witness a number of our children receiving the sacrament of confirmation, it certainly reaffirmed our commitment to our faith. It was lovely to see all the children on Friday last week as they prepared for their sacrament with the retreat here at school. Due to Covid restrictions last year it meant we were unable to celebrate the sacraments. This resulted in 120 children across the district receiving the sacrament of confirmation over 5 masses. A very special thank you to Fr Matthew, Sr Helen and our RE leaders - Jess Freeman and Narelle Simms, for their contribution.
INTERSCHOOL SPORTS: I spent most of today with some of the senior students competing in the interschool sports for soccer and Ms Parker was with the netballers. I don't often get the opportunity to watch the children play together in team based events. We certainly have some very talented children here and it's a wonderful opportunity for them to showcase their skills outside of the classroom. Thank you to the parents who came along for the day and the staff who assisted.
TEACHING VACANCY: This week we will be advertising for a new Phys Ed Teacher to commence Term 3. Mrs Mitchell has informed me that she will be relocating to Nowra , NSW, and teaching at Nowra Anglican College. There will be a formal opportunity to farewell Mrs Mitchell before she leaves at the end of term. Mrs Mitchell has been involved in St Pauls for a long time with all her children having attended here as well. I wish her luck in her new appointment as she continues her educational journey.
ENROLMENT INTERVIEWS: Our enrolments for 2022 conclude this week and I will begin the process next week of finalising our Foundation enrolments before letters are sent out. If you have not made an appointment to meet with me, please do so asap. There are limited number for next year in Foundation.
LOST PROPERTY/SCHOOL UNIFORM: The weather is cooling down considerably, which means we have a large collection of school clothing that is not labelled. Please check your child's clothing and label it appropriately so that we can return the item to them .
Congratulations to this week's awards winners for following our school norms.
BEE MILESTONE AWARDS: Tolini Vave, Zac Scott, Faye Ratcliffe, Arianna Ram, Issac Puleio, Tuan Nguyen, Fletcher Heagarty, Maddilyn Gibson, Zach Garland, Kalasia-Rose Fonua, Victoria Finocchiaro, Sofia Echanes, Amber Echanes, Ella Dunn, Zeke Dedman, Tiarna De Maria, Emrys Clifford, Rocco Circosta, Eliza Campbell, Milika Ahotaeiloa
HIVE MILESTONE AWARDS:Aisha Smythe, Ruby Slimmon, Joseph Santos, April Nyabonda, Jett Johnson, William Hogan, Oscar Hissey, Angela Harris, Amaya Fangatua
Have a great week everyone and remember,
Keep the Faith!
Vince Muscatello
Senior News
We had a great week last week in MAPPEN. Students participated in a MOCK Election and learnt about preferential voting. On Thursday guest speaker Ella Beard spoke to the students about the ‘School Climate Strike’ that she is part of organizing. On Friday students worked on developing a website based on an issue that want to bring attention to.
Mock Election
Ella Beard - Guest Speaker
GRADE 6 STUDENTS VISIT TO ST JOSEPH'S COLLEGE
Parents should drop their child off directly at St Joseph’s College (entrance in Twelfth St) by
8.45am. They can be collected by parents at the end of the day (3.20pm). The college will provide
a BBQ lunch for all students. Student are to wear casual sports clothes and runners. Please advise Ms Tracy
Aston if your child has any food allergies via email taston@sjcmda.vic.edu.au or phone 50188034.
The day will conclude at 3.20pm.
If your child is not able to attend St Joseph’s College on the day due to illness, please contact St
Paul’s office via usual method.
Please ensure you have given consent for this day on SIMON Everywhere.
Middle Unit News
What a week we had last week! Thank you so much to all our visitors who came to our Mappen Expo. The students were so excited to share their learning with you. It was fantastic to see what the students were able to research and include on their posters. This was the students' first independent research project for the year - they should be very proud of themselves.
Below are some photos from each stage of our research assignment.
Stage 1 - Researching
The start of the journey - learning about biology.
Sophia & Akesa researching their chosen animal.
Lilly & Charlotte researching African Elephants.
Stage 2 - Creating posters and/or dioramas
Stage 3 - Mappen Expo (presenting)
This week in Numeracy we started a new learning cycle. Students are learning about multiplication. Learning your times tables can assist greatly in solving multiplication problems. It would be great if you can practice these with your children at home.
In our Literacy time we have started developing our skills in writing narratives. We are exploring what happens when we experiment with language choices and when we manipulate our word choices. At the start of the week we watched a video clip about floods and read Jackie French’s book ‘Flood’. The students are using this as inspiration for their own story.
In Religion next week we are exploring things that are sacred to us. Can you please discuss what the word sacred means with your child and we invite students to bring in something small that is sacred to them.
This might be a small object or it may simply be a photo of something sacred that has happened (e.g. a holiday). We ask students to bring their special thing in on Monday and we will send them home once students have had a chance to share them.
Junior Unit News
Welcome to Week 6!
What a busy and fun week we had learning about Geography during our Mappen Unit last week.
The students had a marvellous time exploring their place in space, learning all about Mildura and what we have in our local community. Towards the end of the week we learnt about some of Mildura's agriculture and how it is influenced by our unique weather. Mrs. Thurman brought in a packet of sultanas for each student which were donated by Sunbeam. Thank you Mrs. Thurman and Sunbeam Foods for our surprise treat!
Another highlight from our week, was exploring photos of Mildura's iconic wall murals. We discussed the different images displayed in the wall murals and their importance to our local community. We then created an image that represents Mildura for us. These images will be displayed in the students learning journals that will be available at the end of the term.
The students wrapped up their learning by creating a new service for Mildura. The students were asked to plan their creation but also give details as to why our town needed this new service. They then used an array of materials to bring their service to life! The students created zoos, aquariums, extra banks, combined emergency service centres, theme parks and many more interesting services. The students had a wonderful time creating and showcasing their hard work and should be really proud of their amazing efforts.
Thank you to all the families who could come to share in their children's learning.
Next Friday, the 4th May, the Junior Unit will be hosting a Liturgy of the Word at 9:15 am in the Hall. It would be lovely for families to join us in our celebration.
Foundation Unit News
The Foundation Unit are learning the "Magic 100 words". We are hoping they will have some fun while learning these words. They are 100 frequently used words that make up an average of half the words found in reading and writing. We are asking parents to support their children at home and encourage them to read and learn the words. We have set up a rainbow display in the Foundation Learning Area. When the children learn each list of coloured words they will receive a certificate and they will be able to write their name on the rainbow colour that matches the colour of the words learnt. Hopefully our rainbow will be full of names in all of the colours to show our growth in reading.
Yesterday the Foundation students were lucky to have lunch with their Buddies. They enjoyed spending time with them while eating their lunch.
Religious Education News
Technology News
eSafey Advice for Parents
It is very concerning when young people are exposed to any content that scares them or plays on their emotions. The internet and social media are an unfortunate source of this type of content. You may have heard about "chapstick" challenge, a dangerous trend circulating TikTok and going viral on the internet. This was not the first, nor will it be the last, online “challenge” or phenomenon to target our children with potentially harmful consequences.
Research shows 81% of parents hand their child an internet-connected device by the age of 4, so active parental engagement and oversight of a child’s online activities is critical from the start, to help ensure they are prepared for what they may encounter. As young people often do not have the maturity or judgement to cope with confronting content online, it’s important to guide and instil critical reasoning skills, so they are aware that not everything they see or receive online is real.
We encourage parents to co-view, co-play, ask questions about the games and apps they are using, and let them know you are there to support them if they are upset or uncomfortable about anything they see online.
For more information about this type of esafety concern and others, we will be hosting a "Cybersafety: raising kids in the digital in a digital world" information evening for parents on 15 June @7pm. The evening will be facilitated by Martin McGauran, a teacher and education consultant specialising in cybersafety and Carley McGauran, a child psychologist.
Until next week, remember - technology is just a tool, what matters is how we use it.
Mrs Simms
Languages - Italian News
During recent weeks the Middle & Senior students have started a new topic learning about seasons and weather in both ITALY and AUSTRALIA - Students reflected on why the different seasons change throughout the year depending on whether you live in the Northern or the Southern hemisphere.
Students learnt the vocabulary for the Italian months and this was followed by a class discussion about the present day calendar, which has origins back to the Roman times. Have a chat with your child - you might be surprised to hear how many months were included in the early Roman calendar.
Here are some impressive work pieces completed in our Italian classes this week. Please enjoy ...
Grazie - Signora Ghidinelli
Middle Unit - M1
Middle Unit - M 2
Middle Unit - M9
Middle Unit - M10
Arts News
Last week was MAPPEN week across the school and on Monday, the middle unit began their learning about "Endangered Animals" in The Arts. M1 created spectacular sea turtles, M2 produced extraordinary elephants, M9 painted terrific tigers and M10 drew glorious great whites.
Here are some pictures of the children in creative action, come in and visit the middle unit to see the finished products on display!
MAPPEN art
Hands Up Mallee
A lot is being reported in the media at the moment regarding Social Media and Bullying, please find below a few tips that you can talk to your children about and check their settings and continually have safety conversations with them about being safe online and most importantly, be a good online role model for them.
Here are some practical tips to help your child use social media safely:
- Set your profile to friends only – The default setting for many social media sites is to share all information publicly. You need to change the setting to share only with friends.
- Use strong passwords that are easy to remember, but hard for others to guess. Learn how to make a strong password at: http://www.staysmartonline.gov.au/computers/set_and_use_strong_passwords
- Don’t share passwords with friends. Children do this a lot as a sign of trust between friends, but problems can occur when friends fall out.
- Think before you post – Would I want the whole world to see this? Even when I’m an adult? Once something is online, it can’t ever be completely removed.
- Think before you click – How do I know this is safe? Never click on links in emails or on social media sites. They may download a virus to your computer or be an attempt to get your personal information.
- Don’t connect with people you don’t know in real life. People aren’t always who they say they are. If you do connect with someone new online, NEVER agree to meet them face-to-face without a trusted adult present.
- Don’t put personal information that identifies you on your profile and don’t post information about other people without their permission. This includes photos that reveal identifying information (eg. a school uniform).
- Disable geotagging and avoid behaviours that reveal your location (eg. “checking in” on Facebook).
- Tell a trusted adult straight away if you see something online that bothers you, or if someone is bullying or harassing you.
Breakfast Club Roster | ||
Friday: 28th May Sione M Ruby O | Monday: 31st May Prabhnoor P Arianna R | Wednesday: 2nd June Zac S Gurman S |