Newsletter 20, 21st November 2024

Principal's Report

Hello to Families and all in the St Joseph's School Community,

I was so impressed with our current Foundation and Grade 1 students for the enthusiastic and friendly way they welcomed our 2025 Foundation students when they arrived for their first transition day last week. Smiling faces, kind waves and encouraging words were shared. William, Ethena, Tessa, Sophia and Wyatt enjoyed a fun morning focused on the book ‘Piranhas Don’t Eat Bananas’ and left with homemade piranhas in hand! They will join us again tomorrow for another Transition visit, while Grade 6 will head to Charlton College for their next Transition day next Wednesday 27^th November.

Yesterday we welcomed Puna Mohan and her parents, Sujeesh and Rakhi, to St Joseph’s School. Puna is settling in to the Junior Room and I know they will feel the warm welcome from all in our community. Puna has enjoyed meeting her classmates and was busy in the Art Room when I popped in to visit her yesterday afternoon.

We are on the look out for a new classroom teacher to join the St Joseph's School staff. Please help us to spread the news far and wide and hopefully we can secure a quality teacher before the end of the 2024 school year. With our growing enrolments, especially in the Junior Room, we will move to a variation in class groupings in 2025 - Foundation & Grade 1; Grade 2/3 and Grade 4/5/6. F-2 and 3-6 will still join together for the afternoon sessions. 

This Sunday the Catholic Church celebrates the Feast of Christ the King. This is the last Sunday before the liturgical calendar turns to prepare for Christmas Time with the season of Advent. Interestingly, the Feast of Christ the King Feast was initiated in 1925 by Pope Pius XI as a response to the spread of secularism in the modern world and to remind the world of Christ as Creator.

Loving Father we praise you:
For the beautiful sun,
For the rain which makes things grow,
For the bush and the paddocks,
For the sea and the sky,
For the flowers and the birds,
And for your gifts to us.
Everything around us sings with joy.
With all you made we sing for joy too!
Amen.

Job Advertisement

Graduation and End of Year Mass

St Joseph’s Graduation & End of Year Mass is on Tuesday 17^th December at 6:00pm It is hoped that all our families will attend this special celebration to give thanks for our school year and farewell our Grade 6 students.  Families, friends and parishioners are warmly invited to this special celebration. Students are not required to wear school uniform and can just wear neat casual clothes. There will be a shared tea in the Multi-Purpose Room following Mass. If for some reason your family is unable to attend, please notify Mary as roles and readings will be allocated prior.

Classroom Kris Kringle

Staff and students have asked if they can run a Kris Kringle gift-giving in their classrooms.

This involves each child drawing out a random classmate to buy a gift for. The secret is kept, and students have a fun time trying to guess who their secret Santa has been. The maximum spend for buying gifts is $10.

Wrapped gifts can be brought to school from Monday 16^th December and will be shared on the last day, Wednesday 18^th December.

Participation is not compulsory – please let your classroom teacher know if you want to opt out.

Time for Christmas Carols

Christmas carols have begun to radiate from the classrooms! Rehearsals are underway for the town Christmas Carols which will be held at REX THEATRE on the evening of Sunday December 8^th. Please contact Mary if your family is unable to attend the town carols.

Students will also visit the Nursing Home to share some carols and have been invited to sing at the Probus Meeting in December. Wow!

AUSLAN

In exciting news, teaching staff begin their work next week, in preparation for implementing Auslan – Teachers as Co-Learners in 2025. Lauren Gould, Languages Education Consultant from DOBCEL will work with staff on Tuesday afternoon. The Auslan language will gradually be implemented over the 2025 school year.

Important Dates

November 22 - Kinder Transition session 10am – 2pm. Bring snacks and lunch.

November 27^th - Gr 6 transition afternoon at Charlton College. Students will be dismissed from the College at 3:15pm.

November 29^th - Kinder transition session 9am – 1pm. Bring snacks and lunch.

December 6^th -   Kinder transition session 9am – 3:10pm. Bring snacks and lunch.

December 8^th   - Town Christmas Carols at the Rex Theatre (time to be advised)

December 11^th   - Grade 6 transition day at Charlton College. This is a full day at the College with lunch provided.

December 13^th - Singing at Probus luncheon

December 16^th – Singing at Nursing Home

December 17^th - End of Year /Graduation Mass at 6:00pm

December 18^th   - Last day of school for students.  

Students of the Week

Foundation/1/2 Class Report

This term is flying by and we have had some exciting things happening in the P/1/2 room. We had our excursion to the Discovery Centre which was full of experiments and fun experiences! The students learnt about gases and liquids and how a solid turns into a liquid.
We welcome a new family to our school this week. Puna has joined our P/1/2 room and has been welcomed by all. We hope Puna enjoys her new journey with us at St Joseph’s. 
Have a great week! 
Ms Brown 

Grade 3/4 Class Report

Students had a lovely time away at camp on the 7th and 8th of November. Some great memories and friendships were made with St Joseph’s and St Mary’s students. 

In the past fortnight students have been completing end of year testing in preparation for upcoming reports. Students have also been revising their skills in reading, writing and general Mathematics. They have been working on consolidating their learning and addressing any areas of need that they may have as a group and as an individual in classroom sessions. 

In Literacy we have been revising phonetic knowledge in our reading, writing and spelling. Students have been practicing their reading fluency, pace and accuracy in a variety of group, whole class and individual tasks. Students have been working on descriptive writing activities to support their narrative writing. Students have enjoyed sharing these stories with their classmates. 

In Maths, we still continue to work daily on mental maths strategies along with our multiplication and related division facts. Students have been revising the concept of division, including short division with 2-5 digit numbers. Some Year 4 students have been working with remainders in these activities/sums. Students have also been working on addition and subtraction revision with carrying over and borrowing. Students have been applying this knowledge to work with problem solving questions. 

Homework and spelling words are due Friday. 

Grade 5/6 Class Report

The Grade 6 students had their first transition session last Wednesday. We ventured to Traveller’s Rest with the Grade 6 students from Charlton College, for lunch and some ‘get-to-know-each-other’ type of activities. Stacey, from the East Wimmera Health Promotion Team, talked about the importance of a healthy diet and students then made their own wraps! Emily from Swan Hill Headspace took the students through a number of activities, identifying student strengths, some goal setting and partnered work.

Students have completed all the mandated assessment tasks for the school year and we will move to some less structured learning for the last three and a half weeks of the year. This will cater for some student choice, collaborative work and open ended learning tasks. We will continue to consolidate specific skills identified in individual assessments.

Students have spelling sheet and a maths sheet for homework which are each Friday.

Mary Hogan

Child Safety

The care, safety and wellbeing of children and young people is a central and fundamental responsibility of Catholic Education. St Joseph’s School is committed to strengthened practice for the protection of children in line with the Victorian Government child safety reforms.

Child Safety - digital images

Taking Photos/Video Footage
As we begin a new year a reminder to parents and family members to please ensure, when at school events, to take photos or video footage of your child/ren only. Please do NOT post photos of children, other than your own, at school events or wearing school uniform, on personal social media pages other than your own. Thank you for your cooperation in using social media respectfully helping to keep everyone in our school community safe online.  

Community News

Acknowledgement of Country

We acknowledge the Dja Dja Wurrung people as the Traditional Owners and Custodians of this land.  We pay respect to Elders past, present and emerging. We thank them for sharing their cultures, spiritualities and ways of living with the land, in this place we all now call home.