T3, Week 5, 2022

Dear Families,

Each term every student in Catholic Education SA undertake the Classroom Pulse Check-In Survey. This is a simple survey for children to identify how they are travelling at school, what their worries are and how their well being is generally. Classroom teachers then have instant access to their student’s data and can check in on them an ensure they are okay. We are now beginning to see a longer term picture of our students, especially useful in this time of Covid 19. Please keep in mind the information we receive is based purely on children’s responses to questions. At any time if you have concerns about your child’s health and wellbeing, and feel that it is warranted, let your child’s teacher know so that they can help support your child and your family.

We welcome two new children this week: Cooper in Year 3 and Charlie in Reception. We welcome you and your family to our community and hope your time with us is full of learning, fun and friendships!

On Monday of this week we had Greening Australia come and work with our older children, digging holes and planting native grasses, shrubs and bushes in the north east corner of the school. In this area we do have an indigenous trail or path and these new plants add to that natural environment. Some of the existing plants had seen their time or had unfortunately been trampled on over time. We thank Deb from Greening Australia for supporting us with this project.

Also this week we celebrated ‘Book Week’ with lots of children dressing as their favourite book character. The whole idea behind this is to simply raise the awareness of the importance of books and of reading for everyone, but to also have a bit of fun along the way. Thank you for supporting your child to dress up but please remember that it is never expected to be a costly exercise. We prefer things to be simple, cheap and preferably from a dress up box at home! I encourage every parent to read a story to their children every night – even if it is a Year 6 child! While we did take lots of photos, unfortunately we could not find many where every child in the picture had permission to be placed in our online newsletter.

With Covid and other factors, our School Board has not been able to meet as regularly as it might. I am keen for us to get our School Board up and running again and have planned for a meeting in Week 8. The School Board has a governance role and works in partnership with the school community to develop policies, promote excellence, support the school administration, protect children, monitor buildings and grounds development and maintenance, exercise financial management and ensure compliance with legal obligations.

The Board meets twice per term and I am looking for some parents from the community who might be interested to find out more about the role. Please catch up with me in the yard if you’d like to have a chat about it.

Next week our students will begin a ‘Master Mover’ dance program organised by Mr Maglai. We look forward to seeing lots of great dance moves, fun and smiles from our children in each of the sessions.

Also next week we are holding an induction session for people who wish to volunteer in our school. This will be held on Tuesday 30 August at 2pm. If you are a volunteer, or would like to be a volunteer in our school, I urge you to come to this session.

I wish all the Dads a very happy Father’s Day for next Sunday, 4 September.

We look forward to our Principal, Mr Platten returning from overseas next week. Thankfully his return coincides with Spring time and hopefully he brings some sunshine with him to help dry out the school oval!

Working in Partnership

Peter Mercer

Head of Campus

‘The poor need help today, not next week.’ ~ Catherine McAuley

Sacrament Program  

This year Stella from 3/4 SS and Eugenio from 5/6 AT have been preparing to complete the Sacraments of Initiation. In September, they will celebrate the sacraments of Confirmation and First Eucharist. As they continue their preparations, I ask that you keep them in your prayers. 

Catholic Schools Open Week 

This week is Catholic Schools Open Week where we continue to reflect on the theme ‘Raising Hearts and Minds’. During staff prayer one of our teachers, Ms. Sam took the opportunity to reflect on how we raise hearts and minds at St. Mary Magdalene’s School. She shared that we… 

• actively promote a sense of belonging and inclusion to anyone who joins our community  
• make sure every child knows they matter and are all unique individuals with different gifts 
• work in partnership with families and outside services to provide as many learning opportunities as possible  
• instill values and teach lessons that are ingrained for life  

Student Learning in Religious Education 

Students in Year 5/6 AT have been exploring different ways to engage in prayer. Across the school week they have been looking at variety of ways to pray including praying through song, meditation and learning traditional prayers. They have also written their own prayers to use in different prayer opportunities throughout the year.

Every Wednesday we gather with St. Thomas More students and staff via Microsoft Teams, to pray together. A different staff member each week leads this prayer and this week Miss Maiello spoke to us about Gratitude. Students and staff are ready at 9am every Wednesday morning, waiting for prayer to begin. A highlight each week is seeing each other on the screens. Each week the staff member leading prayer shares an action for us to complete throughout the day. This week, Ms. Maiello asked us to think about what we are grateful for and to work on showing kindness in our interactions with others. 

 Catholic Charities Brochure 

Today your child will bring home a brochure providing information about the agencies supported by Catholic Charities. It outlines their work in the community supporting the vulnerable and disadvantaged.  

On Wednesday 24^th August the school had a day of celebrating books! We had a parade where all the students and teachers showed off their Book Week costumes. The children then spent the morning visiting all the other classes where they listened to the teachers read a favourite book and then completed a fun activity.

We took lots of great photos and the children all looked to be having a fantastic morning working as a community and parading for everyone to see their fantastic outfits.

A big thank you to all the families who got behind this fantastic day by helping their children to dress up and celebrate all things books. Thank you to the parents who were able to join us for the parade. We even had a big T-Rex picking up his daughter at the end of the day!

Mrs Gosling