Newsletter, week 9, term 1, no 4, 2022

Principal's Report

Dear Parents & Carers,

Apologies for this newsletter being a little late. This is due to having our swimming carnival and a closure day on the dates that we would normally put it out. As we are now at the beginning of Week 10, this will be our last newsletter for term 1. We will begin sharing a school newsletter again in week 2 of term 2. Please keep an eye out for this as all student achievements, awards, birthdays etc. for the remainder of this term and the start of next will be shared then.

On Friday March 25th we held our annual Swimming Carnival. It was a fantastic day and wonderful to have so many parents, family members and friends join us. It is this kind of day that makes our school community so special and strong. There are many people to thank as days like this take a lot of planning and preparation. These include the parents and friends who helped with time keeping and other jobs, the BBQ cooks and servers, the parents who swam in the parent/staff/student race, the staff and especially our students whose participation and enthusiasm made the day such a success. Special mention needs to go to Kieran Mays, our PE coordinator and primary organiser of this event. Photos of the Carnival, the winners of each event and the age champions can be found on our Facebook page and a little further along in this newsletter. Congratulations to Green House who were the overall winners on the day and well done to everyone!

Last Monday the staff came together for a professional learning day where we began the process of preparing for our School Review. The review happens every five years and is an opportunity for us to reflect on the successes of the previous five years and to look forward to ways we can continue to improve our school. A huge thank you to the parents who catered on the day, providing us with a delicious home cooked morning tea and lunch. 

In week 8, our Year 5 & 6 participated in World Maths Day. It was an opportunity to dress up and engage in fun activities designed to encourage and promote mathematical thinking. I believe that, at one point at least, our world ranking was looking very good! Thank you to Maryanne Leslie for coordinating and leading this event, her enthusiasm about maths is undeniable and infectious. Congratulations to our students on their participation and success on the day. 

On Wednesday of week 8, we held our first School Advisory Council (SAC) meeting for the year. It was great to be able to meet in person again and have the opportunity to  discuss how our school is going from a community perspective. This is certainly very helpful to me in my role and an experience I always enjoy. The names of the SAC members are included in our newsletters and they are always willing to act as your representatives, listen to your concerns and share your ideas.

This week our Year 3/4 students are heading off to Swan Hill Pioneer Settlement for the first camp we have been able to have for a long time. It is always exciting to see our students enjoying extra curricular activities like camps but even more so now as it has been a while since they’ve been able to do so. We wish them all happy and safe travels and look forward to hearing about their adventures and sharing a photo or two when they return.

Of late, we have been noticing some unacceptable behaviour among our upper primary and secondary students. Our staff work extremely hard to offer our students the best possible education they can and to provide a safe and happy learning environment for all. It is really important that students who engage in disrespectful and disruptive behaviour at school realise that they not only have an effect on their own learning but also on the learning of those around them. For these reasons we are focussing our efforts on reminding our older students of what we expect from them. Families with students in this area of the school will have received a letter outlining our approach and we would really appreciate your support in this matter. 

As we move into the last week of term we look forward to the many exciting events that Easter brings with it. These will include our annual Easter raffle & hot cross bun drive. Lots of sweets and treats to be had there! We would also like to take time to focus on the work we have done during Lent, with particular emphasis on our fundraising efforts for those who are less fortunate than us. Our effort this year will conclude with a Caritas Crazy Combinations day this Friday. This is an opportunity for our students to have a little fun seeing who can be the worst dressed person in the school, but as I mentioned, also provides an opportunity to raise funds and remind ourselves that others are not so lucky.

Easter is one of the most significant events in our faith and we will take the time to remember the sacrifice made and the joy of the risen Christ in a liturgy next week. The liturgy will take place at 10am this Friday 8th April in the school gym. It would be wonderful if parents could join us to celebrate this special occasion.

In conclusion, on behalf of myself and all the staff at St Mary’s, I'd like to offer my sincere thanks to each of you for the contribution you’ve made to our school this term and we wish you all a happy, safe and holy Easter and school holiday period.

Kind regards,

Andrea Welsh

Religious Education

This week as part of our Lenten work, we will hold a ‘Crazy Combinations Day for Caritas’ on Friday April 8th. This fun day will involve a gold coin donation. Students are encouraged to wear mixed up clothes; they can also have crazy, coloured hair! Keep an eye out for more information early next week on how you can support this fun day. 

When you come into school have a look at the class lenten prayer display in our bus area. Students are remembering how they can reflect and provide help to others during lent. 

On Friday April 8th we will hold a whole school Easter liturgy at 10am in the gym. Parents are welcome to attend. Our school captains will lead this liturgy.

Over this term classes have been attending Mass. Everyone is welcome to attend at these masses at  St Mary’s Church, on Thursdays at 9:30am. We will continue this again in week 2, term 2. 

Almighty and ever living God, 

you invite us deeper into your world, your people, your Lent.

May this time be one of outward focus;

seeking you in those we often ignore. 

Help us live a Lent focused on freedom, generosity, and encounter. 

Give us hearts hungry to serve you

and those who need what we have to give.

- Author Unknown

SWPBS

At St Mary's we use a school wide positive behaviour approach to improve social, emotional, behvioural and academic outcomes for children and young people.  Over the past term we have noticed a decrease in the level of respect student are showing towards each other and staf.

This week we will be having a behaviour blitz on being respectful.  This includes using manners, following instructions, completing work, looking after equipment, including others in play and allowing others to learn.

Please take this opportunity to discuss with your child the importance of being respectful and making the most of their class time to learn.

Primary School

Foundation

Foundation students have been working hard and learning a lot of new things at school. So far we have learned four sounds in InitiaLit; /m/ for Maggie Mouse, /s/ for Sammy Seal, /t/ for Tommy Tiger and /a/ for Andy Ant. Students showed their abilities to name the learned sounds, write the sounds and use the sounds to read and write words. This week we began a new sound, /p/ for Poppy Princess! 

In maths students have continued to practice their numbers up to 10 and started using pictures to show data in graphs. They discussed questions such as their favourite vegetable and what pets they have. 

The books we have looked at recently are There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed the Sea, Food, Grandpa and Thomas and Bogtrotter. We enjoyed creating sandcastles out of sandpaper last week to match our story Grandpa and Thomas. 

Year 1/2

All our Year 1/2 classes have now attended Mass in our Parish church. We have joined together with another class to take part in the Thursday Mass and be part of our Catholic community. As part of our Religion unit we have been looking at how Caritas Australia helps those who are in need of extra help. The money we put into our Project Compassion boxes helps them set people up in simple businesses, provide water for communities and help them set up sustainable agriculture.   

In English we have been looking at how sentences are made up of verbs and nouns and need a capital and full stop. For maths some of the practical aspects have been time and money, so if you can help your children with the use of these at home, that would be most helpful.      

Year 3/4

Year 3/ 4 LC/SM would like to thank all of the school community and parents for coming to watch their play at Assembly last Friday. We appreciated those parents that could come and watch the play and the rest of the school for being so encouraging. Students in 3/ 4 LC/SM should be proud of the effort and courage they showed, their play was very successful.

In Reading and writing we have been exploring the features of a narrative. We have heard many interesting picture story books that evoke our imagination of the setting and characters.

In Reading and writing we have also been exploring the features of a persuasive text. A persuasive text is used to persuade the reader to believe the authors opinion. The author does this using emotive language and evidence. The students will write their own persuasive text expressing their own opinion.

The teachers in year 3-4 are preparing for our camp in week 10. We are off to Swan Hill Pioneer Settlement for a few fun days exploring how people lived in days gone by. More information will be sent out with your children soon.

Homework this year will be sent out on a Tuesday. Students need to bring their homework book back to school on Manday and hand in to their Maths teacher. Their Maths teacher will send out homework on Tuesday. 

Please remember to read 10-20 minutes each day with entries made in student’s reading diaries. Diaries are to be brought to school each day to be sighted and signed by the teachers

Year 5/6

It’s been go, go, go in the year 5 & 6 unit. In the last two weeks we have finished off our swimming lessons in anticipation of the Swimming Carnival on March 25th, had several students swim at the regional level, celebrated St. Patrick’s Day, attended mass in class groups, taken part in World Math Day, completed online Naplan practise tests and talked by video link with some Richmond AFL players. All of this on top of our usual classroom learning.

In Reading we have been looking at the important relationship between text, images and multimedia elements such as video, music and sound effects, while in Writing we have been working on writing a persuasive text. The Year 5 Maths class have been learning about decimals, fractions and time and Year 6 have been looking at decimals and money. In Science we continue to explore micro-organisms such as fungus and moulds and in Humanities we have been exploring the roles of the 3 levels of government in Australia. RE has been all about commitment and we looked at what we are committed to and how we show our commitment. Overall, it has been a busy fortnight, but very rewarding and we are all looking forward to the Swimming Carnival on The 25th.

Digi Tech

The prep students have finished their learning on how to be safe online. We have had some great discussions on not using our real names. We learnt about different emotions and and that if we feel worried when online we should go and tell a trusted adult.

Art

The Foundation students are understanding the primary colours. They can say what they are and have made artworks that show these colours. They just finished their artworks about the colour red and are following instructions for their blue artwork. They are going to draw Stitch for the colour blue.

Year 1/2 have completed their abstract artworks and are now looking at the artwork of Paul Cezanne to understand what ‘still life’ means in art. Their focus will be apples on a table with a table cloth.

The year 3/4  students should be very proud of the artwork that they have now finished. Which was based on Vincent van Gogh’s Sunflowers. They are now looking at the artwork of contemporary Australian artist, Pete Cromer, who makes beautiful collage artworks of local flora and fauna.

Year 5/ 6 students are completing their two point perspective city scapes, the effort of some students has paid off and the work being produced is excellent. Their new artwork is based on the work of Friedrich Hundertwasser, an Austrian born artist who’s landscapes are so colourful and very fluid and organic.

Specialist

PE

In PE we’ve started our next unit - soccer! Years 3/4 and 5/6 have been learning a new game called long ball. Year 1/2 have been having fun playing continuous soccer. Foundation has been showing off their skills during ‘station rotations’ using the inside of their foot to kick the soccer ball.

Secondary

Year 7/8

Students MUST bring headphones or earphones to school every day. Year 7 will require them for NAPLAN testing. Please make sure your child has their own set. 

On Monday Years 7 and 8 students participated in an online chat with the Richmond Football Club, Nathan Broad, Noah Balta & Tyson Sonsie & as a whole school versus other schools in our region, We Won the Kahoot and will receive a fantastic Richmond Prize.

English

Year 7 completed a practise online NAPLAN test on Friday. This is to prepare the move from paper to online testing.

Maths

In Year 8 Maths we are about to revise Indices and we are up to Maths Mate number 7. Students competed in the annual World Maths Mathletics Day in week 8.

In Year 7 we are beginning to prepare for the NAPLAN tests next term. We have begun working on strategies to identify important information and using different functions on our calculators.

Science

In Year 7 science this week we are continuing our learning on Classification and the Five Kingdoms  and in Year 8 we are studying Cells and preparing slides to view under the microscope.

PE

During PE, we have been learning how to play tennis including forehands and backhands and have also played lots of mini games including the learned skills.

Health

In Health for both 7 & 8’s they are coming towards the end of their units and will be completing their Post Test and Unit tests demonstrating what they have learned throughout the term.

Humanities

In Humanities for both 7 & 8’s they are coming towards the end of their units and will be completing their Post Test and Unit tests demonstrating what they have learned throughout the term.

Technology

In technology we have enjoyed making Pizza’s and would like to thank Mrs Garreffa for bringing in her thermomix pizza oven to cook the Pizzas.

We also made some tasty sausage rolls and last week we made chicken burgers.

Parent Access Module (PAM)

PAM provides you with information on a range of areas relating to your child's education, including medical information. 

ARE YOU USING PAM?

If you have not so already, please download the web app and log in. If you have misplaced your username and password please contact the school office.

It is important that we have updated medical information for all students. e.g Medicare no, Doctors name and phone no.   Medical information can be updated on PAM.

Are you contact details up to date? 

Important information is sent out via sms and email.

Please contact the school office to make sure we have have your correct details or contact details can be update on PAM.

SKOOLBAG

Please note that we are no longer using SKOOLBAG as a form of communication. We recommend you delete the St Mary's School Robinvale SKOOLBAG app as we will not post any further information on it.

Individual teachers will continue to use Class Dojo or email you if they need to get in touch. 

All school communication will come via notes, email, Facebook or PAM (including SMS).

ST PATRICKS DAY

Thanks to all staff and students who celebrated St Patrick's Day. It was great to see so much green around the school. The green Jelly cups were also hit, raising over $200 to support Project Compassion.

This Friday 8th April is the last day of Term 1.

We will be dismissing our students at 2.30pm.  All buses will be collecting students early, with the exception of NSW buses.

We encourage Parents who have children who travel on the NSW buses to make arrangements for an earlier pickup if possible.