St Mary's Newsletter

In Sunday’s Gospel we are reminded that it is important to remember that our life on earth is short and in the time that we have, we should prepare ourselves for our eternal life with God.  When life is difficult, remember that Jesus is always with us and will always give us what we need when we turn to him in prayer.

Monday is the start of Catholic Migrant and Refugee Week, with Migrant and Refugee Day being on Sunday, 25 August.  The Church has been celebrating the World Day of Migrants and Refugees since 1914. It is always an occasion to express concern for many different vulnerable people on the move; to pray for the challenges and increase awareness about the opportunities that migration offers.

For 2019, Pope Francis has chosen the theme “It is not just about migrants” to show up our blind-spots and make sure no one remains excluded from society, whether a long-time resident or someone newly-arrived.

The Year Four class will be reading at the 10.30am Mass on Sunday.  All are welcome to attend.

This week is National Science Week.  This year’s theme is:  Destination Moon:  More Missions, More Science.  St Mary’s had a drone visit on Tuesday – thank you to Mr Grant Steiner.  The Year Five class visited Merredin College and partook in many Space related activities and they also tried dehydrated ice-cream!  Thank you to Mrs McCormack who organised many great Science activites for the students to complete in their STEM time!

Throws and Jumps will be held for all students from Year One to Year Six on Monday, 19 March starting at 10.00 am.  I look forward to seeing all of you there supporting your children.  

The School Board has been busy reviewing the St Mary’s School Fee Setting and Collection Policy.  The policy outlines practices and procedures in relation to the setting and collection of school fees.  School Fees form a part of the school’s income and enable us to provide the students with quality resources, learning opportunities and a wonderful learning environment.  I have attached the policy for your information - I particularly ask families to read the section on Fee Collection.  Changes to the policy will not come into effect until 2020.  

I wish our Performing Arts troupe all the very best for their performance in Perth on Wednesday evening.  This is a very exciting opportunity for our students and I thank Mrs Criddle for undertaking this endeavour.  I will be in Perth cheering on our performers and will be away from school on Wednesday and Thursday.  Mrs Riethmuller will be responsible for the school in my absence.

For STAFF this includes but is not limited to:

 Listening to students needs

 Following students interests

 Surveys (i.e. bullying, whole school survey)

 Having a safe and engaging classroom environment

 Going through pastoral care at staff meetings  

 Recording issues/meetings with parents in SEQTA 

For PARENTS this includes but is not limited to:

 Participating in surveys to provide constructive feedback to the school

 Attending protective behaviour and/or similar workshops

 Acknowledging and making use of the Open door policy at St Mary’s

 Reading policy documents on the school website (inc Code of Conduct)

 Not approaching other children with issues/concerns 

For STUDENTS this includes but is not limited to:

 Survey

 Having Protective Behaviours as part of the curriculum

 Using the ‘Helping Hands’

 Establishing positive and respectful relationships with staff

 Having the Buddy Bench 

For VISITORS/VOLUNTEERS this includes but is not limited to:

Reading policy documents on the school website (inc Code of Conduct)

Not approaching children directly but going through the classroom teacher 

God Bless and have a lovely weekend with your families. 

Ms Adriana Coniglio

Principal

Mrs Hannah Herbert 

Religious Education Coordinator 

Please see below the Tuckshop Menu and Roster for Term Three.  

Thank you to those parents/caregivers that have volunteered their time to enable our Tuckshop to run. 

If you are unable to attend your shift, please organise to swap with someone else on the roster.

Please note that non parents (grandparents and other caregivers) are more than welcome in our tuckshop however will be required to provide a current Working With Children Check.  If you have not done so already can you please provide a copy to the office when you sign in for your shift.

In Religious Education the Year Four students are preparing for the Sacrament of Communion. They are exploring the events of Passover and The Last Supper and have created dramatic reenactments of both events. This week, the Year Four students are working on understanding the Liturgy of the Eucharist and will give oral presentations to the class explaining their understanding of this component of Mass. 

We have had an exciting start to Term 3 with a new teacher and student joining our class! We spent some time getting to know each other and writing recounts about all the fun things we did on the holidays. 

In Mathematics we have been working hard, measuring and comparing objects using informal units such as blocks and popsticks. We even had a go at measuring ourselves! We were excited to create our bar graph and discover who the tallest person in our class is. 

In English we have been exploring narrative texts and discussing setting, characters and plot of fairy tales. We have had lots of fun creating our own fairy tale characters and cannot wait to write a fairytale of our own!

We had many varied and interesting activities for Science Week.

Grant Steiner came and gave us a demonstration of his drone to the whole school.  The Year Six class then had Grant talk to them about how drones are used in a variety of industries.   

The Kindy Class learnt about rockets and constructed a paper rocket.  The Pre-Primary investigated the moon and the NASA website to view the gallery of images of the moon.   

The Year One and Two Classes learnt about Space travel and exploration.  They explored the history of space flight.  Then they were asked to design a step by step plan of how they would imagine they could get to the moon! 

The Year Three and Four Classes looked at satellites and how they evolved.  Then the Year Three class were asked to design a space probe and construct it using recycled materials.  The Year Four class used the Minecraft app to design and build a rocket. 

The Year Five Class were asked to design and construct a space probe using the K Nex education packs.  Then they were asked to build a space probe using the Minecraft app. 

The Year Six Classes were asked to look at images of NASA's Earth Science Satellite Fleet showing what might be crowding and causing traffic issues in space.  They designed their own and then collaborated in a group to design a group solution.  Then they used the MicroBits to code their design and present it to the class.

On Monday the 12th of August, the Year Five class went to Merredin College to celebrate Science Week. They went to Mrs Last’s class and participated in a range of activities with some of the Year Eight students related to the theme of Science Week, ‘Destination Moon: More Missions, More Science.’ 

Firstly, students put on some Virtual Reality glasses and got to retrace the steps that Neil Armstrong and the crew took when they went on their journey to the moon. When the rocket landed on the moon, they only had about 20 seconds of fuel left! 

Next, Mrs Last taught students the difference between meteors, meteoroids and meteorites. They even got to dig through clay for a real meteorite and tektites! 

After that, students learnt a little bit about rockets and got to go out to the oval to fly their own mini rockets and watch Mrs Last and the Year Eight students launch one of the Year Ten student’s rockets that they had made. 

When the students returned to the classroom, they watched some movies about what it is like to live in space. Did you know that astronauts eat a lot of dehydrated food because it lasts longer and can’t get mouldy? Mrs Last was kind enough to give each student some dehydrated ice cream to try! 

The Year Five class would like to thank Mrs Last for organising such fun activities, the Year Eight students for helping complete the activities, Mr O’Neill for driving the bus to and from St Mary’s and Mrs Walsh for accompanying the class to Merredin College. It was such a fun two hours and student’s hope they can visit again one day soon! 

The St Mary’s P&F are hosting a Sausage Sizzle for lunch at the Faction Athletics Carnival on Friday 30th August 2019.  Please complete the order form below and return with money to your classroom teacher by Friday 23rd of August 2019.  Please feel free to also order for younger siblings/parents/family/friends attending the carnival. There will only be limited numbers available to purchase at the carnival. 

Please note that tea/coffee and morning tea WILL be available to purchase for spectators. 

You can now enrol your children in VacSwim swimming lessons for the October school holidays.  

With swimming pools and beaches a big part of the Western Australian lifestyle, it’s important your children are safe in the water. 

Programs are available for children from five to 17 years and cater to all skill levels – from beginners to those doing their Bronze Medallion. They are being offered at pool venues across the State. 

Enrol your children in VacSwim now at education.wa.edu.au/swimming