Book Week 2022 - ‘Dreaming with eyes open’
Dear Parents and Carers,
We are all incredibly excited that Book Week is approaching. Each year, across Australia, The Children’s Book Council of Australia brings children and books together in Children’s Book Week through a celebration of Australian children's literature. Book week will provide a wonderful opportunity to have fun together by engaging in a love of literacy. The theme for 2022 is “Dreaming with eyes open.” Exciting opportunities will be planned at St Matthew’s for the celebration of Book Week during the week of Tuesday 16th - Friday 19th August.
Tuesday August 16th: our annual Scholastic Book Fair will arrive. This fair will strictly be a NO CASH book fair. Your children will be given the opportunity to bring home a Wish List with the name and price of any books they may be interested in. Please use your discretion when purchasing these books. You are not committed to purchasing everything on this list. On the back of this list, there will be instructions on how you can pay for your books using an online method. Once paid for, you will be issued with a receipt number. Please write your receipt number on the back of the wish list and return it to school. Your child will receive their books upon handing their completed wish list to me. Parents are welcome to attend the Book Fair with their child/ren after school on Tuesday and Thursday between 3:15 and 3:45pm
Friday August 19th: we will have a performance of the Bremen Town Musicians by School Performance Tours. There will be 2 performances. P-2 (9:15-10:15) and 3-6 (11:45-12:45)
Friday August 19th: we will have our Book Week Dress Up Day, where the students will have the opportunity to parade around the hall. Students may come along dressed as a character from one of this year’s shortlisted books OR a favourite book character OR something relating to this year’s theme. A list of this year’s shortlisted books can be found here.
We want all of our students to have a positive experience during Book Week. Please rest assured that our focus is solely on fun and engaging in a love of literacy together. There is no pressure to buy any costumes.
Therefore, we recommend active involvement of the students in creating their costumes. Please find a range of ideas below that may be helpful.
Using household items
Using, modifying or combining previous dress ups
Coming dressed in casual clothes and bring their favourite book (clothes may be inspired by the wonderful illustrations)
Using face paint to transform into a character
Creating a poster of your favourite book or character (you may like to pin it to a t-shirt)
Creating illustrations on poster/cardboard and wearing as a sandwich board
Wearing a onesie (many characters are animals)
HAPPY BOOK WEEK!
CHRISTINE PENGELLY
TEACHER LIBRARIAN
There are many things happening at lunchtime at St Matthew’s.
This year we have our wonderful library open on Mondays and Tuesdays where the children can choose to play a variety of games such as UNO, Connect 4, they are able to work on a jigsaw puzzle or even read a book (the library is full of them) Mrs Pengelly is very welcoming to all those who come and join in on those days.
On Wednesdays and Friday, we have the Gardening Club that works in the garden behind the grade 4 classrooms and the staff room, where the children learn under the guidance of our Super Gardner Mrs Mazzone. It is a very fluid group and they learn some very simple skills and have assisted in selling the abundance of lemons we currently have on our lemon trees.
On Thursday, we have the Chess Club which is run by Mrs White, where skills are taught and many of the children try to beat Mrs White (none have succeeded so far!)
These clubs are run by teachers who give up their precious lunch breaks to assist and provide the children with something extra or a safe place to be.
On Wet Days which are held in the classroom, the children are provided with a variety of activities that they can take part in such as some board games, computer games (monitored) and of course, they can play good old-fashioned paper games such as ‘connect the dots’ ‘battleships’ ‘naughts and crosses’.
Parents I am sure you would be able to teach your child some paper games you used to play in the classroom too and then they can share them with their classmates.
Parents who have had a recent PSG – Please check your SPAM or INBOX – and please SIGN the Adobe document. There may be 2 areas to sign but at the very end of the document there is a FINAL pop up that says SIGN – if this is not done then the document is not complete.
Thank you
Helen Howden (Learning Diversity Leader)
Many parents are buying their children “Smart Watch” or handing down an old smart watch to them. We do need to remind everyone that Smart Watches that can send and receive calls and messages need to have this aspect DEACTIVATED during school hours. Sending messages in the middle of a class, or at any time of the school day can be very distracting. Either the student is waiting on a message and cannot concentrate on the tasks at hand or they may become somewhat distressed and agitated. If you have an important message for your child/children please ring the front office and these messages about pick up will be relayed to the classroom. So please check that your child’s smart watch is deactivated for messages and calls from 9 am to 3.15pm. The watch will still track their steps and any other health app that you may be using.
When joining the Ritchies Card program you are given the option to nominate your favourite club school or charity (known as Recipients). Each time you scan your card (either physical card or electronic card in the App) when making a purchase at any of our participating stores, the total is recorded to your chosen club, school or charity. At the end of each month, Ritchies will pay your chosen club, school or charity .5% of the total accrued directly into the Recipient’s nominated bank account*.
