Two weeks ago, I attended the Principal’s SILOAM Retreat.  One area that we looked at, which supports the CE’s 2019 focus, was HOPE.  There was some keen insights into Hope and its power. Below I have placed a link to an advent article that was shared at the retreat, which challenged me, asking me the questions; am I like John the Baptist,  St Paul or Vedran Smailovic and do I have the courage to hope?  

https://www.cssr.org.au/_uploads/fckpg/Bulletins/2411.rtf

This is a challenge for everyone in a constantly changing and complicated world.

School Survey
Just a reminder that you have been sent a link from the company ‘Survey My School’.  This company is commissioned by CE to provide parent, student and teacher input for the direction of our school.  If you can find 10 minutes to complete it, it would be much appreciated.  

Community Champion
We have a new section in our Newsletter titled Community Champion.  This is to acknowledge people from our community who make our school a great place.  Keep an eye out for someone, or possibly yourself, in our Newsletter.

Communication - Teacher emails to parents
Your classroom teacher has or is in the process of establishing a regular fortnightly email to you (Mrs Stilling is using the app See Saw for her communication to parents). These emails assist in keeping you in the loop about what is happening at school and is another valuable avenue of communication that is being developed between our parents and teachers.  Please don’t forget that communication is a two way street and if you find a piece of information that is helpful or interesting, don’t forget to fire an email back to acknowledge the teacher on a job well done.  These small gestures/emails make the world of difference to our profession, but are often overlooked.  When someone notices the hard work that teachers do, it means the world to our staff. Who, after all, are parents and/or have families just like you.

SILOAM
As mentioned in my introduction I attended a Principal's Retreat at the end of Wk 1.  This gave me the opportunity to celebrate Mass with my peers and complete some professional learning on what it means to Hope in a modern world. This was a great overnight retreat that expanded my ideas on my own faith.  

School Community Council Communication
Beginning in Wk 9 of this term you will begin to see a regular SCC news piece going into our Newsletter.  This article will be published in the next available newsletter following the Wk. 3 and Wk. 8 council meetings of each term.  The idea of this article is to give the community a clearer understanding of what occurs at council.

Writing Teachers, Teachers of Writing K-6 – Pilot Program
Writing Teachers, Teachers of Writing is an action research project focussed on growing the capacity of teachers to improve their writing and their teaching of writing.  

Yesterday our 3/4 team members, Leah Malpas, Katherine Eastick, Gabie Brewer and Nina De Rosa participated in a CE funded pilot program at our school.  If this model proves successful, the CE will look to roll it out to other CE schools.  The feedback we have received from the four teachers was all positive with elements of the program already being implemented into the classrooms. 

A special thanks to Mrs De Rosa who has coordinated this PL experience for our school.

Katherine Eastick
Congratulations to Mrs Katherine Eastick of 3/4CA who is expecting her second child in 2020.  We wish Katherine, David and Lachlan all the best for the future addition to their family.

Maths Club
Wednesday Maths club is almost full.  There are only two spots left.  If you would like your son or daughter to participate, please email me a request.

Staff List Update
If you need to contact a staff member, please refer to our website as we have placed all the teachers’ names and emails with their associated classes. The link is located under the 'Our School' tab.

SJV Feast Day
A big thank you to all the teachers, children and our parent helpers for their fantastic participation during our SJV Feast day.  Special mention goes to Mrs Thomas who prepared a wonderful Mass for our school, Mrs MacDonald, who with a willing team, prepared some amazing croissants and other treats and Mrs De Rosa who coordinated the amazing STEM activities that everyone saw on Facebook.  What a great day!

Trivia Night
Pen an ‘A’ in your diary for this Friday night.  ‘A’ of course, stands for AMAZING.  The Year 1/2 team of parents have worked tirelessly to make this event fun for everyone.  If you don’t know anyone who is coming, please come along anyway and meet new people, there will be a table ready for you! Tables close tomorrow so ring up the school, send an email and jump on board. 

Grandparents’ Day, Book Parade and Learning Journeys

We are looking forward to welcoming lots of parents and visitors to the school on Thursday 22nd August to celebrate Grandparents’ (and other special people) Day with a Book Parade followed by Learning Journeys, a Liturgy and morning tea.

The timetable is as follows:

Have a great week.

Peter Rodda
Principal