St Pat's News

May 20, 2020

At St Patrick’s Parish Primary School we hold the care, safety and wellbeing of children and young people as a central and fundamental responsibility of our school.

From The RE Leader - Annie Forrest

From The Principal - Peter Sanderson

Dear Parents, Parishioners, Carers, Staff & Students,

Congratulations

We send our congratulations to the Parkinson family (Kirsty, Xavier, Matthew, Eliza, Caitlyn and Rebecca) on the safe arrival of Claire Theresa on Friday 8th May.

Return to Onsite Schooling

We have received extensive advice from the Catholic Education Commission of Victoria regarding the phased return to onsite schooling. To ensure the health and safety of all in our school community and comply with the guidelines regarding physical distancing and hygiene, quite a few measures will need to be taken. 

Students in Foundation, Year 1 and Year 2 will return to school from Tuesday 26 May. 

To support all school staff to prepare for this transition, Monday 25 May will be a pupil-free day.

All other year levels will return to school from Tuesday 9 June.

For those students (Yrs 3-6) who cannot be supervised at home, the existing model of onsite schooling will remain in place during the two-week period from Tuesday 26 May to Tuesday 9 June. The current process that we are using to enable parents and carers to indicate the days or part-days for which onsite schooling is required, will continue for this two-week period.

All students in the year levels returning to onsite learning are expected to attend school. Schools are not expected to provide a home-based learning program for students in these year levels, or in specialist schools, where parents elect to keep these students at home, except where this is based on medical advice. For those families, please contact us so we can make an appropriate plan. This same approach is being taken by all Catholic and government schools in Victoria.

If your child is ill or is feeling unwell, they must not attend school. They must remain home and seek medical advice.

Staggered Finish

In an attempt to avoid large gatherings of adults, we have devised a staggered dismissal process. Students being picked up will be dismissed in their house groups so that siblings come out together. They will be dismissed in 5 minute intervals. We will have the opportunity to practise it with smaller numbers before all classes resume on 9th June and there may be some tweaks along the way. We do ask for your patience and cooperation with this. 

  • Parents will be expected to remain in their cars and leave as soon as they have their children on board

  • 3:00pm Classes dismissed

    • Bus travellers and students walking or riding home gather in the hall

    • House groups gather in designated areas - MacKillop(3/4) Polding(F/1) Samaritan(1/2) Winnen(Library)

  • 3:05pm MacKillop (Green) House led out through carpark door to front of school

  • 3:10pm Polding (Yellow) House led out through carpark door to front of school

  • 3:15pm Samaritan (Blue) House led out through carpark door to front of school

  • 3:20pm Winnen (Red) House led out through carpark door to front of school

  • 3:25pm Bus travellers and students walking or riding home are led out through 

side gate

Knowing when your children will be dismissed may help you to time your arrival for pick-up.

Hand Hygiene and Cleaning

To support the health and wellbeing of all students and staff, our school will continue an enhanced cleaning routine and will encourage frequent handwashing.

Students will be expected to practise hand hygiene before and after each learning block and before eating. This will be closely monitored by staff and will be a teaching focus in the early days of our return.

We have received Enhanced School Cleaning Guidelines from the Catholic Education Commission and have engaged our cleaning contractor to undertake an extended routine cleaning of the school environment.

Staggered Breaks

You will have read in media reports that some schools are having to consider staggered breaks. This is to avoid large numbers of adults congregating in the staff room. We have established a number of drink and food preparation areas for staff to use and identified larger spaces for them to spend their break times so, at this stage, it has not been necessary to stagger breaks.

Report Writing Day

Friday 29th May is a pupil-free day. This is to enable teachers to work on Semester 1 student reports. Reports will be available to parents through PAM from 4:00pm on Friday 19th June. There will be some changes to the reporting format in light of our remote learning this term. These changes will be shared with you in the coming weeks.

Attendance Records

Please remember that we are still required to keep attendance records of students whether they are working at home or at school. We will mark every student present unless notified by parents through PAM that their children will not be doing school work because of illness or other reason on that day.

Enrolments 2021

The period for accepting enrolments for our 2021 Foundation classes is Monday 1st June to Friday 19th June. We had planned to have a Parent Information Evening on Tuesday 26th May at 7.30pm. This has been postponed until further notice. If you know of a family considering enrolling their child at St Patrick’s, please direct them to our website or to call the school for information.

Kind regards,

Peter Sanderson

Principal

2020 Pupil Free Days & Public Holidays

Monday May 25 - Pupil Free Day - Staff preparing for Face to Face Learning

Friday May 29 - Report Writing Day

Monday June 8 - Queen's Birthday Public Holiday

Thursday August 6 & Friday August 7 - Staff Personal Development 

Tuesday November 3 (in Lieu of May Race Day) - Melbourne Cup Public Holiday

Sporting Schools - There will be no Sporting Schools for Term 2.


Term 2 Learning

Term 2 Learning

The link to our Home Learning Portal can be access from the school website, Skoolbag App and by clicking on this link: Home Portal Link .

If your child is unable to attend online learning virtually, at home or on-site, we are asking parents to use PAM and enter a Parent Notified Absence by 9am on the day the are not attending.


On-Site Learning

If your child is attending on-site learning they are to enter via the office. All other doors will be locked. We ask that parents please do not enter the school. There will always be someone in the office area if you need assistance, please phone or email the school.

Wellbeing - Antonia Balmer

We can not thank our parents, carers and grandparents enough for all the support they have given to our home learning program. We are certainly in unprecedented times. Be kind to yourselves. It is ok if you have become frazzled. I came across this visual picture this week which may assist you when you are struggling to find supportive words.

Child Friendly News Sites

With so many changes taking place across Australia, it may be important to encourage parents/teachers to engage their children through 'kids friendly' news as a distraction from COVID 19. 

kidsnews.com.au/news

abc.net.au/btn/

Year 5/6B News

Within our remote learning program we have been learning about the 3 levels of Government. We have focussed on Federal Government, State Government and Local Government. Here are some examples of the remote work we have been doing.


By Hannah McCrohan

School News

St Patrick's would like to thank Alexo's Pizza & Bistro, Port Fairy for generously donating some pizza vouchers. These pizza vouchers are used for prizes for some grades weekly challenges during quarantine. The students are certainly trying their hardest to win a pizza voucher during the weekly challenges now.

Winter Uniform Orders

If you require any winter uniform for your child for when school resumes, please order through CDFpay and when your order is ready for collection we will notify you.

If you were waiting on a winter tunic they have arrived.

Canteen

There will be no canteen during Term 2. Canteen may resume in Term 3, this will be reassessed once decisions have been made regarding parents being allowed inside schools and food handling within schools is given the go ahead.

Bookclub

You can still order from Scholastic Book Club through the LOOP and have your order sent to your house. If you have not used the LOOP before you will need to set up an account. Click on the links below.

LOOP 

CATALOGUE

This button takes you directly to PAM for Absences, School Activities, Reports, Learning Conversations, Numeracy & Literacy Interviews

School Community News

Port Fairy Consolidated School - Before and After School Care

The Port Fairy Consolidated School will NOT be providing before or after school care. They will notify you once it is operational again.

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