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Homework
Thank you to families who provided feedback by completing the homework survey. This week our School Advisory Council and staff will meet to discuss the feedback from the survey. We will review our current policy, taking into consideration the feedback provided from parents.
Sex Ed 4 Schools
Information about the years 3-6 Sex Ed 4 schools program will be sent home to parents via Operoo. We will be offering a parent information session, via zoom to support parents in understanding what the program is about. The program students participate in covers the Victorian Curriculum requirements.
There will be no school for students on Friday 7 June. Staff will be working on site on analysing student wellbeing assessments and learning more about high impact teaching strategies to support student wellbeing.
Student Reports and Parent/Teacher/Student Meeting
Semester 1 student reports will go home on the last day of term, Friday 28 June. Meeting with teachers regarding semester 1 student progress will take place on Wednesday 17 and Thursday 18 July. Information regarding booking times with your child’s teacher will be sent home the week beginning 17 June.
School Calendar
Please note that on occasion we may need to change events published in our school calendar. We endeavour to give families notice if this occurs. On an odd occasion an unrelated event may have been published. We apologise for any inconvenience or confusion. There is sometimes a delay with google publishing or removing incorrect information in our website calendar. Thank you to families who have alerted us regarding any inconsistencies in dates and events.
End of term 2
Students will finish school on Friday 28 June at our normal time 3:20pm.
New Staff Member
I am delighted to inform you that we have employed Holly Burke to replace Alana Tavcar while she is on maternity leave. Holly will teach year 1/2AT in term three and four this year. Holly’s first day will be Monday 15 July. At this stage, Alana’s last day will be Friday 26 July. This will allow optimal time for both the staff and students to transition to the new staffing arrangement.
Holly is an experienced teacher who has worked in Catholic schools in Victoria and the Northern Territory. She also has experience working in the United Kingdom and New Zealand. We are very excited to welcome her to our school. Holly is a passionate teacher, who will continue on with the great work Alana has already achieved with the class.
We have organised a welcome morning tea for year 1/2 AT parents to meet Holly. This will take place at 11:00-11:30am in the staffroom. We know our school families will join the staff in welcoming Holly to our school community.
Year 6 Confirmation
Congratulations to our year 6 students on receiving their confirmation. Year 6 students from our school joined St Peter’s students and were confirmed by Bishop Tony Ireland. I would like to acknowledge and thank Father Jacob and our Parish for supporting families, students and staff with this milestone event. Thank you to Carmel Donlon for her leadership and coordination with the parish and St Peter’s staff. We were very proud of our students.
RELIGIOUS EDUCATION NEWS
National Sorry Day- Sunday, 26th May
National Sorry Day, officially the National Day of Healing, is an event held annually in Australia on 26 May commemorating the Stolen Generations. It is part of the ongoing efforts towards reconciliation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians.
We acknowledged this important day as part of our Monday morning gathering on Monday, 27th May.
“Sorry is the most important word because it has great meaning in our community,
it means having empathy and compassion and understanding.”
Christine King, Stolen Generation Alliance, 2008
Confirmation- Year 6 Students
Congratulations to our Year 6 students who celebrated the Sacrament of Confirmation on Sunday, 26th May.
Eucharist 2024- 10.30am Sunday, 25th August
All eligible students will celebrate their First Eucharist on Sunday, 25th August.
Detailed information and an Enrolment Form was sent home to eligible families.
Please return the enrolment form to school by Thursday, 6th June.
Important dates for your diary:
Eucharist Family Workshop- 6pm Tuesday, 16th July (Learning Hub)
Presentation Mass- 10.30am Sunday, 4th August (St Catherine’s Church)
Eucharist Reflection Day- 9.00-3.30 Wednesday, 7th August (Learning Hub)
First Eucharist Mass- 10.30am Sunday, 25th August
Classes attending Parish Mass- 10am Wednesday
Families are welcome to attend.
Wednesday, 5th June- 3/4JB & 3/4DK
Wednesday 12th June- 6MR & FMH
Wednesday 19th June- 1/2AT & FJH
1/2AT Family Faith Night- Wednesday, 12th June
Year 1/2 Baptism Faith Night
Wednesday, 12th June
The Year 1/2 parents/guardians and children are invited to a Family Faith Night focusing on the Sacrament of Baptism, on Wednesday, 12th June. During the evening there will be various activities that you and your child will participate in together.
It would be appreciated if you could bring a memento from your child’s Baptism to this evening. It could be a stole, clothing, gown, candle, photo or another special item. Children that have not been baptised are welcome to attend. You can bring along a special childhood memento to share with the group (special baby toy, baby photo, baby clothes, memento from birth etc). We particularly ask that you keep this a secret from your child until it is time during the evening to share this with them.
The session will take place in the Learning Hub between 6.00 and 7.00pm. The expectation is that all students attend with at least one parent.
Please contact me by phone or email if you have any questions or require clarification.
Carmel Donlon- Religious Education Leader
Email: carmel.donlon@scmoorabbin.catholic.edu.au
Here are the next four GEM chats for the next two weeks. I especially like the emotional literacy GEM chat this week on how we can bounce back from a not so positive experience. Teaching our students strategies to bounce back from an experience is an important part of building their resilience. You might like to make a list of the ideas and strategies shared by your family to reflect on and refer to in the future.
The following snapshot comes from the TRP (The Resilience Project) family newsletter activities.
Working on gratitude helps us to be thankful and appreciate what we have in our lives, rather than focusing on what we don’t have or what we want. When we practise being grateful, we start to scan the world to look for positives – this only takes 21 days! Practising gratitude every day increases our levels of energy, and helps us to feel happier and more focused, determined and optimistic. It even helps us have better sleep, lowers levels of anxiety and depression and we are less likely to get sick. So many benefits – let’s all try to be grateful for the things and people in our lives every day!
Whole Family Activity:
Gratitude Scavenger Hunt
- As a family create a scavenger hunt list of things that make you happy or you are grateful for, you can make your own list or use the examples below:
- Something that makes you happy
- Something you love to smell
- Something you enjoy looking at
- Something that is your favourite colour
- Something you like in nature
- Something that is useful for you
- Each member of the family uses the list and has to find as many things as they can.
- You can hunt for things inside or outside, or both. You can hunt for real things, or you can also do this using magazines or photos.
- After a set amount of time hunting, come back together, have a look at what each person collected and let them explain why they are grateful for each item.
Family Habit Builder:
Every night at dinner, have each person talk about their favourite thing about that day.
FMH Learning Assembly
Last week the Foundation students were very excited to share some of their literacy learning with their parents and grandparents. To show how we are using the Little Learners Love Literacy program we ran a mini lesson to showcase the processes we use each day in the classroom. The students used their whiteboards and magnets to make words and then manipulated the words by deleting and substituting other letters to make new words. The students did a chitter chant where they read the letter, said the most common sound, read the matching character's name and as a visual and kinesthetic prompt they used the cued articulation cue for the letters. Each of the students then shared what they loved about some of the activities we have completed across the term.
We celebrated the birthday students for the term, happy birthday to Hendrix, Rian and Matilda. We awarded three certificates to the following students:
Matilda for her fantastic sounding and blending
Kihayl for his wonderful work in maths
Rian for the fantastic giraffe he designed and created during STEAM.
We concluded the assembly with the students teaching their guests how to play some of the literacy games we enjoy doing during our literacy lessons. Thank you to the FMH parents for their continued support in working in partnership with myself and the students to create a wonderful learning experience on the day.
1/2 Learning Assembly
The year one and two students had a wonderful time last Monday presenting their learning assembly to their parents, friends and family members. Throughout Term 2, students have learned about the features and how to construct a procedure text. They have published their procedure texts about:
‘How to Make Fairy Bread’, ‘How to Make a Balloon Rocket’, and ‘How to Make a Paper Helicopter’ and set up stations to teach their visitors how to make or create, following the steps that they had written.
The year one and two students loved sharing what they have been learning about procedure texts and hope that their special visitors had as much fun making and creating things with them as they enjoyed giving instructions.
I had so much fun at Camp Rumbug. When we got there, we headed to our rooms where I realised there were 12 PEOPLE in my room. I got a bit scared how loud it might get but we ended up managing our noise.
One of the activities we did was the giant swing - which was my favourite activity. You were pulled up by your classmates then released off the steep hill. This one was probably also the scariest activity.
Another activity we did was the flying fox. We walked up to a high platform and then were released over the lake at a big height. The reason this was fun was that you could race another person which made the activity a bit more exciting as you wanted to go much faster.
At night we had an activity called Splash! where we had to win a bunch of games to get items to protect a water balloon from a high drop. If your water balloon survived like our group's one did, we got to throw it at Ms Hall! It was funny when Ms Hall got attacked by balloons and got wet.
Camp has taught me how to be organised and keep my space neat. Now, I know how to pack and use my time wisely. Overall I give camp Rumbug a solid 9/10.
By Lachie, Year 6
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Honestly, I don’t think people really appreciated Camp Rumbug for how much fun it was, but I’d say, it’s the best camp I’ve ever been to. I also loved the food. The butter chicken was pretty solid and the naan bread was MOUTH WATERING ?.
On the 2nd day, we did the Flying Fox and it was THE BEST. We got to zip down a zipline over, and get this, a whole lake, so we made sure nothing was in our open pockets.
The final day was maybe the best day of camp because we did the giant swing and aeroball. For the giant swing I sang “Gangsta’s Paradise” as I was released from a high height. Some people kept on singing on the way down, other people screamed mid-way through their song ?.
Honestly, it was the best so I gave Camp Rumbug a 9.2/10.
By Lachlan, Year 6
Our Confirmation Day
I was so excited for my Confirmation day. I was happy and chose Anastacia to be my sponsor, she is so nice and is always there for me. I got a beautiful necklace from Anastacia and some other really nice gifts - I was very lucky. All my family were at church for me. After the ceremony Zoe & I celebrated dinner with our families together at BigPig LittlePig. It was very yummy. Zoe & I got to share our beautiful cake together. It was a really nice day.
Analia C, Year 6
Last Sunday it was finally time for my confirmation. I had chosen my beautiful sister Ella as my sponsor and she made the day very special for me. I got to wear a very pretty dress that I had been looking forward to wearing for a very long time! I was spoilt with presents and love by my family and friends and got to celebrate with them all afterwards at BigPig LittlePig with Analia’s family as well. We both got to share a delicious cake and have some yummy food. It was a very special day.
Zoe A, Year 6
Scholastic Book Club Issue 4
And that's a wrap for the 2024 Friday afternoon inter school sports for the Grade 5 and 6 students.
The last few weeks we have played different schools, both at home and away. Each time we hit the netball courts we all improved so much. As a team, we learnt it’s not all about winning, it’s also important to have fun and work as a team.
There have been weeks where other schools may have played stronger than we did but we all walked away knowing we tried our best. We have also been fortunate to have some Grade 4s join us. Well done to everyone for your hard work over the last few weeks. We now have the Lighting Premiership for both Netball and Football to look forward to. Big thanks to Ms Patto & Mrs Renehan for cheering us on each week. Go St Caths.
Football Report
It has been a pretty tough time for our football team but in true St Caths fashion we have never given up and continue to hold our heads high.
We have scored some goals but never enough to beat the opposition. We have definitely improved over the last 5 weeks and we look forward to competing in the Lightning Premiership.
A huge thankyou to Peter Kokkalos, Jaimee Hall and Paula Hamilton for coaching and supporting us.
Susan Pattinson
PE and Sport Coordinator
Kingston Council: WOW- Walk or Wheel to school
Kingston Council staff have worked with staff, students and parents ( surveys & consultations) to develop the ‘St Catherine’s Primary School Walk & Wheel Route Map’. A copy of the map will come home for each family this week. The council has also donated a drink bottle which will come with your child this week.
The suggested routes to school map has been designed to help encourage students to walk, bike, scoot, skate or park and stride safely to school.
There are 2 more designated days for the Golden Boot award where classes are adding & averaging up the number of students who WOW to school.
- Thursday, 6th June
- Friday, 14th June
The Golden Boot award will be awarded to a class in week 10 by our Year 6 Leaders.
We are hoping to do this again in Term 3 and 4 in order to embed the routine of walking or wheeling to school. With more students travelling actively to school, this will reduce the amount of cars on the road and traffic congestion during busy drop off and pick up times.
Holy Trinity Parish Bollywood Night
For more information or to book tickets, scan the QR code
P & F Mural update
We are making progress with our mural project with the next workshop scheduled for the 17th of June. This should be the last one before we can give a full brief to the artist about what belonging represents to the students and families of St Catherine's. The same students have been working on this theme since late last year, with two new foundation students joining the project this year. The next workshop will consist of the students and their families so we are excited to see what they come up with. Completion of the work is expected by the end of term 3. Watch this space!
P & F Meeting - Tomorrow night
The Parents and Friends committee is meeting tomorrow night - at school at 7.30pm. It's a great way to contribute to your school community - all are welcome!
Uniform Shop
