21 February 2019

Newsletter Articles

Dates to Remember

Principal’s Message

CATHOLIC SCHOOLS WEEK

Week 4 already! We are zooming through the learning experiences and the children seem really engaged. In Week 6 we will be celebrating Catholic Schools Week. It is a time to celebrate and showcase the great opportunities Catholic Schools provide for the children and families in their community.

This year’s theme, ‘Learn, Serve, Belong’ acknowledges the vision for Catholic Schools in the diocese – ‘At the heart of everything there is always Jesus Christ’. This vision is the foundation of the education Catholic Schools offer and is the lens through which everything is viewed – the belief that informs and critiques all policies and decisions.

‘Learn, Serve, Belong’ celebrates the connection to the community, the diversity of learning and the supportive and inclusive environment that students experience as part of their Catholic education

Some highlights of the week will be:

• Tuesday 5/3 - Burning of the Palms Liturgy
• Tuesday 5/3 - Diocesan CSW Mass and Project Compassion Launch – Captains will attend
• Wednesday 6/3 – Parish Ash Wednesday Mass
• Friday 8/3 – School CSW Mass (Year 5), Morning Tea from 9:45am, Open Classrooms from 10am, shared picnic lunch from 11am

Catholic Schools Week is also the official start time for enrolments for 2020. So it would be a great opportunity to invite your friends along and anyone you know who might be looking for Kinder enrolment in 2020.

Check out this video about how different people see learning.

What is learning?

Why not ask your children what they think learning is? Let us know what they think.

CAPTAINS’ INDUCTION

We had our Induction Ceremony and Opening School Mass last week. Thanks to all those that came and celebrated with us. Our School Captains for 2019 are:

We also asked all the Year 6 children to make a pledge that they will be working hard at being good leaders of our community.

Our new capatains

All Year 6 are leaders

New Learning Experiences

At the next P&F Meeting (Monday25/2), Mrs McGann and Mrs Dunn will be demonstrating the amazing things children can learn using simple programming languages and robots. We are asking the P&F to provide considerable support for the introduction of this technology over the coming months. Please come along to the P&F meeting on Monday night for a demo.

OOSH is coming

We are waiting patiently for final “official” approvals for the start date of St Nicholas OOSH. Once we have the OK, things will move very quickly. We will let you know when this time comes. In the meantime, if you intend to use the OOSH either before or after school, you might like to download the application forms, fill them out and send them into school for processing.

Check out this link for more info on St Nicholas OOSH.

School Photos

We will be having school photos on Tuesday March 19. Order forms will be sent home shortly. Parents are asked to return these ASAP.

Play After School

Unfortunately, we ask that parents do not allow their children to play on the playground before or after school. There are inherent risks about unsupervised play which we do not wish to accept.

Also, the riding of bikes, scooters and skateboards (by children and parents) is not permitted in the school grounds. If you come to school on one of these, please walk them to the appropriate parking rack near the hall.

From The Office

Receipts

All receipts are now being emailed to all fee payers. If you have a new email address could you please contact the office and advise of any changed details.

School Fees

Our school fees for 2019 have now been sent home. It would be appreciated if all accounts be paid promptly. As in past years, Resource Fee and Levies etc are billed in total in Term 1. If you would like to manage your account with regular payments please contact Leanne in the office who can help you with a payment plan. Those who are in legitimate financial hardships can make application for consideration by making an appointment to see the Principal.

All extracurricular activities (Dance, Gymnastics etc) will be included on your accounts as they arise so that a closer tracking of payments and receipts can be done. All receipts of payments will be emailed to the primary email supplied by parents through COMPASS.

REC News

Wednesday 6 March (Week 6) is Ash Wednesday the school will be attending Mass at 9am. Ash Wednesday is the beginning of Lent. During Week 6 we will not have a Monday morning liturgy. We will have liturgy Tuesday morning for Shrove Tuesday 5 March, Mass on Wednesday 6 March and Mass on Friday 8 March to celebrate Catholic Schools Week. This Mass will be at 9am. Everyone is welcome to celebrate these events with us.

Plenary Prayer

Come, Holy Spirit of Pentecost. Come,
Holy Spirit of the great South Land. O God,
Bless and unite all your people in Australia
And guide us on the pilgrim way of the Plenary Council.
Give us the grace to see your face in one another and to recognise Jesus,
our companion on the road.
Give us the courage to tell our stories
and to speak boldly of your truth.
Give us ears to listen humbly to each other
and a discerning heart to hear what you are saying.
Lead your Church into a hope-filled future,
that we may live the joy of the Gospel.
Through Jesus Christ our Lord, bread for the journey from age to age. Amen.
Our Lady Help of Christians, pray for us. St Mary MacKillop, pray for us.

Absences

SMS/Email notification of Absence

As part of Our Lady of Victories’ commitment to student safety and welfare, our school has begun notifying parents of their child’s unexplained absence via SMS message & email.

This service provides an SMS / email notification to parents of children who are marked absent from school without explanation once the roll has been checked in the morning.

Where possible, it would be appreciated if parents can notify the school at their earliest convenience regarding a child’s absence.

If a child is going to be absent for the day or is intending to arrive late (e.g. medical appointments etc.), then parents are asked to use the COMPASS APP or call the office to notify the school before 9:30am on the day rather than sending a note afterward.

It is hoped that by providing this service and in partnership with families we can continue to ensure all possible mechanisms are in place to maintain the safety of our students.

Compass App

How are you going with the COMPASS App? There have been many stories of success and stories of the difficulties people are experiencing. With all changes, we all try to get a handle on things quickly. So, if you are still experiencing problems with either the phone App or the computer platform, please let us know, so we can walk through the difficulties with you. It might mean having to stay back after pickup for a few minutes or even coming in a little earlier. Let us know how we can help and we will arrange a time to assist.

We have a couple of “How to” booklets available in the foyer, so feel free to grab one.

Using the Attendance Notifications through COMPASS is the preferred method of informing the school that your child is away. By sending it through COMPASS, it is immediately synced to the class roll.

Schoolzine App

Go to this link to download the Schoolzine App:

You will be able to access the school newsletter there and notifications will come through Schoolzine similar to the old SkoolBag.

P & F News

OLV Hair Scrunchie Packs are now available to purchase for $5 each at our School Uniform Shop. If you can’t make it to the shop on a Thursday Morning, then send your $5 in a labelled envelope via your child’s class note bag.

P&F Annual General Meeting:

Our AGM will be held on Monday 25 February. At this meeting reports will be tabled from the President, Treasurer and Canteen Co-ordinator. All executive positions will be vacated and a new executive elected. It is necessary to have a strong input from as many families as possible at this meeting, so please come along and join in the decision making process of the Association

Pastoral Care News

Speedy and Bobo (chickens) have finally returned from holidays. They had a wonderful time with Debbie, Bailey and Zoe’s Grandma. Thank you for looking after the chickens so well and spoiling them.

Last week our gardeners helped to plant some more shrubs, and vegetables. I’d like to thank Mrs Crandell for the kind donation of snow peas and capsicum. Thanks to Deegan for hs assistance in planting.

Take Care and God Bless
Karen

Class News

Kinder

Kinder have taken home a booklet for Homework this week so that you can help them revise letters and sight words that have been taught in class. A lot of revision is needed to reinforce automatic recognition and the Homework booklet provides for that. So far we have learnt the letter names and sounds for the letters a to e. We have also learnt five sight words. We have been using them to make sentences Eg. Here I am. Practice making sentences at home by cutting out the words on the coloured sheet of cardboard that was sent home. We have learnt the difference between a letter and a number and counted the number of letters in a word. We identified a long/short word and counted the number of words in a sentence. We also wrote our first sentence “I am ______ (Child’s name). In Maths, we have focused on the numerals 1-10. We put them in their correct order and played games to reinforce the concept of number before and number after Eg. the number before 8 is 7. We also practised writing the numbers 1-5. Our Play Provocations are providing lots of opportunities for developing relationships. Sick Bay has been a popular activity this week as well as shopping. I think the items are overpriced Eg. One icecream for $15. Shopping with your child provides opportunities to talk about money in the real world. “You can’t buy that, it’s out of date!”, said one shopkeeper to a customer.

Year 1

In Religion this week we thought about and discussed the other names used to refer to Jesus....such as 'The Son of God', 'King' and "The Good Shepherd'. We illustrated these names beautifully in our Religion books. It has been wonderful to see how well Year 1 have adapted to working independently during reading groups and I have enjoyed listening to everyone read. We have worked on the phonics sounds: 'oo', 'ee' and this week 'll'. Everyone is slowly getting used to writing on lines and making a great effort, particularly in our journal writing sessions. Year 1 have focused on using capital letters and full stops in their writing. In Maths, we have been learning a range of addition and subtraction strategies. These include: mental strategies, using pictures, blocks, dice and number lines. We played some games where we add two dice together to find the total and we were learning to count on from the highest number. In Science, we drew upon our knowledge of the five senses. We took our lesson outdoors and sat quietly to listen for sounds and also draw what we could see or feel. Everyone is showing great enthusiasm for PE rotations and is trying their best!

Year 2

In Science Year 2 have been working on the unit Forces and Energy in Products which has allowed them to complete some exciting experiments such has finding out how strong spaghetti is, creating different ramps and measuring how far a car could travel. Please see pictures attached. This week we like be creating a balloon-operated car. In English we have been working on adding adjectives in our writing. In Mathematics we are working on learning new addition skills.

Year 3/4

Another busy couple of weeks in Yr 3-4. In Religion, we have been reading about the healing stories of Jesus. We talked about the way Jesus cared for the outcasts and always had time for all people whatever their lifestyle or beliefs. We discussed how this is the way that Jesus wants us to live – always being respectful and kind to others. In English, we continue to read “The Tale of Despereaux” by Kate DiCamillo. Despereaux has been sent to the dungeon where the rats live. We have reached ‘Book the Second’ where we are reading about a particular rat named Chiaroscuro. During our grammar lessons we are learning about clauses. In Maths last week, we completed some activities on number patters and simple algebra. This week we are working to learn more about length. On Tuesday we made our own 1 metre ruler to use to measure lengths of objects around the school. Year 4 are learning to use a trundle wheel to measure length. In history, we are learning about traditional Aboriginal shelters and ceremonies. Our Art lessons involve creating 3D sculptures in the colours of Piet Mondrian.

Year 5

In Religion we have been looking at example of Jesus’ leadership in the Bible, and used the story of the Woman at the Well to identify these qualities. In English we have learnt more about our main characters and are seeing the interconnectedness of their lives. In History, we have researched, published and orally presented our answers for the question, “Why did the British choose to settle ….?” We had to read, highlight key words and phrases and then put that information into their own words, something that is a difficult skill to master. For this, we had to learn how to use Microsoft Publisher, which we managed quite well. This will be our preferred desktop publishing software throughout the year so we will get plenty of opportunities to refine our skills.

In Science with Miss Gallagher, we made bottle rockets and this week made a ‘boat’ powered by a rubber band! We have been revising and discussing the need for road safety, the reasons around some of the rules that are in place and ways that they, as road users, can become more safety conscious. Ms McGann and Miss Gallagher are proud of the way we have stepped into the roles of completing the many jobs around the school that need to be done during the week.

Year 6

In Religion we have talked about Jesus’ mission on earth to proclaim God’s Word. We created a strategic plan for Jesus’ mission and looked at his goals, the challenges, ways he could overcome these challenges and then we stated indicators of ways Jesus' mission was achieved. We have also written newspaper articles describing times when Jesus challenged authorities as he carried out his mission. In English, we are studying a really interesting book called, “Playground”. It is the compilation of stories from a number of Aboriginal Elders, telling of their traditional lives, culture and customs. The book was compiled by Nadia Wheatley and is filled with amazing and informative stories and illustrations. In History, we have studied and compared the governments of Australia, Great Britain and the USA and we have highlighted tables to clearly define the similarities and differences of each system. We are also learning about the Federation of Australia and the people and events that led to Australia’s democracy. We are enjoying our Sport activities, as well as the PE sessions three mornings a week. We are going to be so fit by the end of the term!

Congratulations to our School Captains, Vice-Captains and Sports Captains, for 2019, on receiving their badges at Mass last week. They are already stepping up and doing a great job, as are all of Year 6 in their role as leaders of the school. We look forward to a great year ahead!

Sport News

Regional Swimming Carnival

Well done to all the children who represented OLV at the Regional Carnival Wednesday. They swam well, competed fairly and made everyone proud. Well done to: Abbie B, Chloe W, Olivia K, Maree H, Annalise F, Isla W, Gemma M, Georgina H, Isabella E, Jodie W, Zoe W, Bailey W, Ari B, Oscar H, Archie P, Harrison S, Caleb J, Spencer N, Logan E.

We will let you know in our next news who will be representing us at the Diocesan Carnival in March.

Regional Winter Sports Trials

The Regional Winter Sports Trials will be happening soon. We are looking for children who are interested in trying out for Netball, Soccer, Rugby League, Hockey and AFL. Children who wish to trial need to be playing the sport on a regular team basis with a significant ability and be in Year 5 or 6. Those children that have been given forms need to have them back at school tomorrow otherwise they will miss out. Any children who wish to participate in these trials for winter sports should see Mr V.

Tennis Star

Great job Oscar H who participated in the in the Polding Tennis Trials last week. He performed admirably and held his composure well after a disappointing last march for selection. We are very proud of you Oscar. You are a great example of how to play fairly and do your best.

Class Awards