Newsletter 29 2023
Principal's Report
Hello to Families and all in the St Joseph's School Community,
On Monday morning we commenced our day with a whole school prayer and assembly, based around Remembrance Day. Students were reminded of the rituals of this service, such as The Ode, The Last Post and observing a minute’s silence. I have spent some time with the Grade 3 & 4 students this week and been involved in their research of a soldier from the First World War. They uncovered some interesting facts and their slide sets are looking great!
Staff have been working to complete all end of semester assessments over the past couple of weeks. Most assessing is complete and we are now working to tabulate and analyse the data collected. This will allow teaching staff to see any areas needing revision and consolidation before the end of the 2023 school year and provide starting points for the 2024 school year. Our dedicated and enthusiastic LSOs, Mrs Lanyon and Mrs Fitzpatrick, are trialling both Minilit and Macqlit in preparation for the implementation of these interventions as the 2024 school year commences.
On Tuesday next week, St Joseph’s School will host two members of the DOBCEL Board for a school tour and morning tea. The DOBCEL Board aims to have board members visit all schools within the Ballarat Diocese within each school year. We look forward to Mr Steve McArdle and Barry Bennett visiting us on Tuesday.
RAK
Today the Grade 3-6 students participated in the RAK Program with presenter, John Broughton. RAK is a radio awareness program which leads students to understand more about the purpose and production of radio programs. Students were even lucky enough to record some material themselves. I can't wait to listen to the finished product!
DREAM SEEDS
Grade 5 & 6 students will be joined by their Charlton College peers to participate in a Dream seeds Program on November 28th from 9:30am. The workshop aims to build aspiration, resilience, and connection for rural students leaving primary school, to better prepare them for secondary school and the challenges they may face. The workshop aims to show young people that they have the capacity to be the leaders of their own lives, irrespective of their circumstances. The program is focused around three main pillars: aspiration, resilience and connection.
SCHOOL ASSEMBLIES
A whole school assembly will take place at 12:45pm each Monday. This makes sense to prepare for the week ahead and to present awards based on the previous week’s work and activities. All members of the St Joseph’s School Community are most welcome to pop in and join in our assemblies.
RELIGION NEWS
Sacramental Program
First Reconciliation will take place on THURSDAY 7th DECEMBER at 6:00pm as a part of the Parish Advent Reconciliation service. Students will be prepared during school time on Thursday 30th November by Mrs Hogan. A notice was sent home to relevant families yesterday. It can also be found on the PAM app. Apologies for the incorrect date on the note which went home yesterday.
If parents have any questions regarding the Sacraments of Initiation – Baptism, Eucharist & Confirmation, or regarding Reconciliation, don’t hesitate to contact Mrs Hogan at the school.
TRANSITION PROGRAMS
Transition programs are an important way of making children feel more confident as they take the step to the next phase in their educational journey. These programs allow children to familiarise themselves, physically, with the new environment and to meet other students and staff members. The details for each transition are noted below.
Kinder to St Joseph’s School
Today we welcomed our three Kinder students for their second transition day, from 10:00 am – 1:00pm. They had a great time and made the best underwater, Rainbow Fish display in the Junior Classroom. Well done, boys!
Two further sessions are planned on 23rd November (9am-1pm) and November 30th (full school day).
Grade 6 to Charlton College
- Year 6 Information Session at Charlton college at 5:30pm
- Year 6 transition day at Charlton College on Tuesday 6th of December.
- We have also prepared a couple of further opportunities for student s to interact; a sports afternoon and a Dream Seeds Session.
Please, don’t hesitate to contact the school if you have any questions or concerns relating to either transition program.
SCHOOL CAMPS & EXCURSIONS
Grade 3 & 4
Grade 3 & 4 students will join their peers from St Arnaud and Donald Catholic Schools, to go on camp to the Pioneer Settlement in Swan Hill on the 27th & 28th of November. Information has been prepared by Mrs Armstrong and shared with parents.
F-2
F-2 students will have a day excursion to the Halls Gap Zoo on Tuesday 5th of December.
Grades 3-6
Grades 3-6 will travel to Bendigo by coach, on Tuesday 5th December, for a Ten Pin Bowling session as part of our Sporting Schools grant allocation.
STUDENT ABSENCE FROM SCHOOL
Under Department of Education Regulations, typically the only acceptable reasons for absence from school are illness and medical or dental appointments that cannot be arranged outside of school hours. In accordance with the Education and Training Reform Act 2006, schooling is compulsory for children and young people aged from 6-17 years. It is a legal requirement that parents contact the school regarding any student absences or lateness.
In the event of any absence or lateness, a note, phone call, text message or email to the school is required. This must be done before 9:30am on the day of absence, explaining the reason for absence on that day.
A reminder that mobile phones and digital devices (iPads, smart watches) are not to used for personal use during school time, other that instructed by staff. If students need to have a phone for after school use it must remain in their bag, or they are welcome to have it stored at the Office during the day and collect it at home time.
Important Dates
November 21st - Year 6 Information Night at Charlton College
November 23rd - Kinder transition #3 9am-1pm
November 27th - Year 5 & 6 Puberty Session #2
November 28th - Dream Seeds Grade 5 & 6
November 27 & 28th - Grade 3 & 4 Camp to Pioneer Settlement
November 30th - Kinder Transition #4 - full day
- Reconciliation preparation day
December 1st - Sports afternoon with Charlton College Grade 5 & 6
December 5th - Juniour Excursion to Halls Gap
- Grades 3-6 Ten Pin Bowling in Bendigo
December 6th - Year 6 Transition day - Charlton College
December 7th - First Reconciliation at 6:00pm
December 10th - Charlton christmas Carols
December 12th - End of Year Mass at 6:00pm followed by a BBQ dinner
December 15th - Students last day for Term Four
Mary Hogan
Principal
Student of the Week
Congratulations
Congratulations to Rosie Fitzpatrick who received an honourable mention for her poster in the recent Grampians Water competition.
Rosie received a certificate, calendar and notepad for her effotrts.
Congratulations, Rosie!
Foundation/1/2 Class Report
Over half way through the final term of 2023, and the Foundation, Grade 1 & 2 students have kept busy with a week of revision, testing and assessments taking place. I’m pleased to see the students have shown growth and developed clear understandings in the areas that have been covered. It’s always useful to use results from testing to see areas in which we can revisit and review and this week we’ve been straight to work with targeted learning goals in both literacy and numeracy. Thank-you again to all our supportive families, it takes a community to raise/teach/guide a child and continued reading and attending to weekly homework tasks is extremely valuable for the continual practice and revision of learnt skills - so that we don’t just learn it and then forget it because we are using the learnt skills regularly. It was great to hear the 'birth stories' of each student in our class this week in preparation for hearing the story of Jesus' birth - some lovely moments shared and the students really enjoyed participating in this with you all on this.
It was nice to welcome our three new Lil’ Joey’s – Elwood, Oliver and Shepherd into the junior classroom last Thursday for the boys first orientation session at school. The three boys attended from 10-11am and participated in a fun, hands on/interactive read aloud story of ‘Wombat Stew’ - an Australian literary classic. The students were involved in ‘creating the stew’ which was enjoyed by all, before participating in 4 learning activities working on: counting, pen and scissors control, creativity & fine motor skill development. We look forward to seeing the boys back this week for their second session from 10am to 1pm. 😊
In our Numeracy sessions, we’ve been building on the addition and subtraction skills that the students have learnt and have been practicing applying these skills to hands-on and written activities. The students have been given independent work booklets with activities aimed at their levels. There have been plenty of opportunities for each student to practice the learnt skill step by step in a small group, then apply it on their own through sums and problems that encourage the certain adding/subtracting techniques (counting on/back, adding/subtracting to 10, doubles/+1) as well as opportunities for gameplay/creativity to reinforce their learning in small peer groups in a fun way.
In our Literacy sessions, we’ve started to view and read decodable ‘Big Books’ as a group in Shared Reading. Decodable texts are great, as they hone in on specific phonemes (letter sound combinations) to read, practice and then explore, in a narrative style text. These decodable texts are a resource that we’ve been lucky enough to acquire through our school’s commitment to the Mini Lit/Multi Lit intervention-based programs and fortunately we now have access to hundreds of decodable texts that are a perfect complementary resource to be used alongside our targeted learning groups sessions working through the ‘No-Nonsense Phonics’ program. Since our school has undertaken the commitment to teaching our literacy sessions in a different way – the structured literacy approach, it’s already been positive to see the students making gains in their understandings and to also be very engaged in the content being taught – they enjoy the learning and are keen to work and develop their skills. Fantastic!
In writing, we’ve continued to work on writing sentences that have a capital letter at the beginning, for names of people, pets, places and branded things, i.e. Nike (Proper Nouns). Although this is something we talk about all the time, it’s easy for young and developing minds to forget the little things, like a capital letter for name - so constant reminders are needed and in just a few weeks, we’ve already seen big improvement here. The students have also continued to develop their information writing skills. Last week, the students each chose an animal to research and have been given the task of writing different paragraphs about topics to do with their animal – habitat, diet, appearance, etc. So far, the students have researched the habitat in which their animal lives and each year level has been given a different goal for what they need to write, i.e. Preps – 2 sentences, 1’s – 3 sentences and 2’s – 4 or more sentences. Each student did a wonderful job at looking up the information, and then choosing the ‘key information’ to re-record themselves on paper. Eventually students will learn to put the writing into their own words, and some students are already up for this challenge; however the learning behind: finding information, then deciphering and finding the key/main points, to recording this down on paper - is already an epic task for young minds. Overall, it’s been great to see how engaged and excited the students are when they recall information that they’ve ‘learnt’ themselves through their research and are keen to share with one another.
Grade 3/4 Class Report
Literacy:We continue our implementation of our Structured Literacy journey this week. Students are receiving a daily review that covers past phonics learnt, grammar focus from the previous week (fact and opinion this week along with connectives) and tap it, map it, graph it spelling strategy practice linked with phonetic knowledge. Students are focusing on learning the phonetic code ‘eer’ and ‘ear’ this week and are revising their handwriting joins. This week, students are reading a narrative text in pairs (paired fluency) and focusing on reading accurately and fluently through practice. In writing, students have researched a soldier from World War 1 and have written an informative biography of these students through an online digital platform, Google Slides.
In Maths this week we are continuing to revise our learning across the year. Students have been revising their knowledge of subtraction, division, addition and problem solving. Students are consolidating their x9 multiplication facts with continuing speed and automaticity. Everyday, students are revising mental maths facts through mental maths practice in their books covering number facts, time, problem solving, shape, location and statistics.
On Monday, we as a school had a special assembly to mark Remembrance Day. Students learnt some of the history of Remembrance Day, who was involved, said the ode and listened to the bugle involved with our prayers.
Grade 5/6 Class Report
Grade 5 & 6
The weeks are quickly slipping by and you can feel the anticipation of change and new beginnings in the air! We are aiming to work our way through November and then have at least one day of more hands on learning activities during the three weeks of December. Student are busy thinking of some activities they might like to engage in, such as cooking and crafts.
TRANSITION
A reminder that there is an Information session at Charlton College on Tuesday 21st November at 5:30pm, which is next week.
Grade 6 students will attend Charlton College for a full day on Wednesday 6th December.
We have arranged a couple of further opportunities for the students to liaise with the College Grade 6 students to assist their transition. They will share a “Dream Seeds” workshop on Tuesday 28th November and have an afternoon of sport together on Friday 1st of December. Please feel free to contact me with any questions regarding transition.
RECONCILIATION
A note has gone home today, and is posted on the PAM app, containing information for those Grade 5 & 6 students who will make the Sacrament of Reconciliation. Please read the information and note the dates.
ENGLISH
Our literacy sessions have continued to centre around assessment and data collection. This is complete now and enables us to revise, both group and individual, areas of need over the next few weeks. Writing tasks have focused on shorter activities involving vocabulary development, proof reading and editing and writing stamina. Students continue to be heard read each morning, are provided reading time and have presented short scripts from “Readers Theatre” to the class, focusing on voice control and expression. We have revised verbs and adverbs.
MATHEMATICS
Students have now completed all their numeracy assessments and we will revise areas of need over the coming weeks. This week students have reinforced their understanding of perimeter and area – perimeter you can use your pointer finger and point to, or trace around, and area covers a surface which you can rub your hand over. The formula for area is LxW. Students were challenged to construct their names in block letters and find the perimeter of their first name. They did an amazing job!
HOMEWORK
The usual homework routine will continue for the next two weeks. Homework Books are due back each Friday and readers to be completed nightly.
Mary Hogan
School Fees 2024
At St Joseph's we have two categories of fees. Family Fees which are charged per family and consist of a Family Fee, a Maintenance Levy and a Capital Levy. The other category is student fees which consists of a curriculum levy, a technology levy and an excursion levy. The fees for 2024 will be as follows:
Family Fees (per family): Student Fees (per child):
Family Fee $860 Curriculum Levy $210
Maintenance Levy $120 Technology Levy $100
Capital Levy $120 Excursion Levy $100 (Prep/1/2) $125 (3/4/5/6)
Parents with a current Health Care Card or Pension card are eligible for Camps Sports and Excursion funding and Diocesan Fee Assistance. Please present your HCC or Pension Card to the office.
School Uniform Price Increase
We are having to increase the cost of some items of school uniform due to increases by the manufacturer. We aim to keep the prices as low as possible but unfortunately these increases are needed at this time.
New prices are listed below:
Windcheaters $22.50
Polo Shirts $20.00
Navy Shorts $18.00
Navy Pants $22.50
Sports Shorts $12.50
Winter Dress $50.00
Summer Dress $40.00
Long Sleeve Polo Shirts $22.50
School Hats $12.50
School Bags $55.00
Lunch Order Bags $10.00
There are always second hand uniforms available for anyone who would like them (free of charge.)
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.
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.