Friday 15th November ~ Issue 35

Child Safety Statement

School Values

Treat others the way you would like to be treated.

Respect Our School - Hormati Sekolah Kita

Do Your Best - Lakukan Yang Terbaik

Help Others to Succeed - Bantu Teman Untuk Berhasil

Important Dates

Term 4

November

Monday 18th November - Wednesday 20th November - Grade 5/6 Camp

Tuesday 19th November  - Prep 2025 Transition Day ~ 9:30am - 11:30am

Friday 22nd November - Assembly

Friday 29th November - P/1/2 Excursion

Friday 29th November - 3-6 Swimming Carnival

December

Friday 6th December - Assembly

Friday 6th December - Christmas Parade @ 6pm

Tuesday 10th December - 2025 Orientation Day

Friday 13th December - Junior Athletics Carnival (Prep - 2)

Sunday 15th December - End of Year School Mass and Gr 6 Graduation @ 10.30am

Wednesday 18th December - Last day for students

ADVANCE NOTICE 

Wednesday 29th January - First day of 2025 school year for Gr 1-6

Thursday 30th January - First day of 2025 school year for Preps

Tuesday 11th February - PUPIL FREE DAY - all staff at Structured Literacy PD

From the Principal

Dear Families,

This week we were delighted to welcome our 2025 Preps! They were a very settled group, many waving their families goodbye within minutes of arriving! We look forward to seeing them again next Tuesday.

On Monday, we acknowledged Remembrance Day with a ceremony at school and with our school captains and I attending the service at Melville Oval. Luella and Sineth represented us beautifully by laying a wreath at the Cenotaph on our behalf.

Yesterday, Catherine, Chris and I attended an information session on Structured Literacy. We will be starting to learn about this way of teaching reading and writing in 2025 and will share our learning with you as we go along. It is very exciting!

Next week our 5/6s will be on camp at Rose's Gap. This is such a wonderful experience for our students and I am so grateful to our staff and parents who will be in attendance. It is a very big ask for them to leave their families to look after the children and for that I thank them.

Our Christmas Parade is fast approaching! A huge thank you to all who are offering their help, it is greatly appreciated. There is still time if you haven't!

Have a wonderful weekend, shared with those you love,

 Terrielynn

Catholic School Culture

MASS TIMES – 2024                                                 

Hamilton: Saturday 6pm and Sunday 10.30am                                    

Dunkeld: Sunday 8.30am                  

Glenthompson:  Sunday 8.30am

Penshurst: Sunday 8.30am

May the God of love be with us.
May our lives be continual, giving and receiving of love with our God,
our friends, and with all whose lives we touch.
May God's love in us light fires of faith and hope,
and may the fire grow and burn deeply and inflame the earth.
May the blessing of love and friendship be with us always.

AMEN

Congratulations!

Congratulations to our staff member Vicki Pierce as she and James welcome their third grandchild, Lilly. Another beautiful little one to love! 

Learning and Teaching

School Wide Positive Behaviours

School Wide Positive Behaviour Support is:  A multi-tiered framework for establishing the social culture and behavioural supports needed for a school to achieve behavioural and academic outcomes for all students.

For the next two weeks at St Mary’s we are working with our students on the following:

RESPECT -  use people's names

SAFETY - play games in a safe and responsible manner

                                                  RESPONSIBILITY - own the choices you make

Icy Poles

As we are in Term 4 and heading into the warmer weather, our Grade 6 Student Councillors will once again be selling icy poles at lunchtime on Fridays.  These will be $1 each and will be sold each Friday until the end of the term.   

Assembly Award Winners

Award winners from our assembly last Friday were Aidan Bobin, Adhvik Sarvothaman, Tyler Fitzsimmons, Obie Sherlock, Cooper Lynch, Seb McIntosh, Jaxon Sparrow, Charlie Burrowes, Emmett Sutherland, Annabel Peach, Sophie McRae, Cameron McInnes, Luella Causer, Deklan Wilmot, Xavier Wolfe, Beau Plush, Pippa Richards, Adhil Aneesh and Naethan Joseph who were all displaying the value of Do Your Best. Congratulations! We are very proud of you all.

Sports Catch Up

Saturday Morning Netball

Saturday Morning Netball continues this Saturday. Grade 5-6’s are playing at 9:30am, and our Grade 3-4’s are on the court at 10:30am.

Grade 3-6 Swimming Carnival

Thank you to families in Grades 3-6 who have returned their swimming carnival notes. I have sent messages to families who I’m chasing up, so if you haven’t heard from me this week, nothing to worry about! I will be in contact shortly with those families who have offered assistance on the day with a role. Thank you so much for your willingness to help, we can’t organise and run events without your support.

Junior Athletics Carnival

This will be held on Friday 13th December at St. Mary’s. We will begin at 11:30am, and it will finish at approximately 1:30pm. Families are welcome to attend this event, and our Grade 6 students will be running each event. There is no help required from families for this event.

Dates for your Diary

Saturday Morning Netball: Continues this Saturday @ Pedrina Park

Grade 3-6 Swimming Carnival: Friday 29th November @ Monivae Pool

Grade 3-4 State Hooptime: Monday 2nd December @ State Basketball Centre, Wantirna South

Grade 5-6 State Hooptime: Tuesday 3rd December @ State Basketball Centre, Wantirna South

Junior Athletics Carnival (Prep - Grade 2): Friday 13th December @ St. Mary’s

Latham Wishart

lwishart@smhamilton.catholic.edu.au

Library News ~ Book Fair Wrap Up!

WOW! Thank you so much for your overwhelming support of our Book Fair this week.  Our school receives a commission on all sales, which we can then use to buy more resources for our school, so thank you so very much!

All orders should now be filled.  There are a number of items that need to be reordered; that has been done today.  These will be delivered to school before the end of the term.  

Thanks again - happy reading!

Tania Stevens

Parent Access Portal (PAM)

PAM will be released in the coming weeks to all our families - please keep an eye on your inboxes.  I have attached the PAM manual for you to read.

Wellbeing

Child Safety - SchoolTV Special Report

"Social media influencers often present a highly curated and filtered version of their lives, showcasing only the positive aspects. This can create unrealistic beauty standards, success and happiness for children. Constant exposure to this may lead to feelings of inadequacy, low self-worth and dissatisfaction."

Dr Emma Woodward

This Special Report from SchoolTV (see link below) is a highly relevant one at the moment, with all of the conversations regarding a possible social media ban for under 16's in the media.  Influencers can be found on all platforms, from gaming videos on YouTube to beauty influencers on TikTok.  These influencers can have a dramatic effect on our children and it is important to have open and honest communication with our children so as to help them become responsible online citizens who can confidently and safely navigate the online world.

Tania Stevens

Leadership and Stewardship

2025 Planning

As a staff, we are preparing for 2025 and looking at plans for next year. One of the changes that you will see is that homeroom teachers will now be teaching all things Library, instead of this area being looked after by a specialist. We have been very spoiled over the last two years to be able to fund five specialists to allow our teachers planning time, giving them an hour more than the award. A huge thank you to Kerry Stevens and Tania Stevens who have brought so much to this area over many years and have supported our teachers in this space too. Our four other specialist areas will continue with Hannah Black as our Art teacher, Vicki Fitzpatrick teaching Indonesian, Tania Stevens moving into the Performing Arts area and Elise Gordon returning from Maternity Leave to step into the PE role. Aren't we lucky! All the other areas will be announced in the coming weeks.

Community Engagement

Garden Gurus

St Mary's Christmas Parade

Community Events