Term 2, Week 2, 4 May 2023

Principal Message

Dear Parents, carers and members of the St John's community,

Welcome to Term 2, which is looking like it will be a very busy term, but one of much enjoyment for all. It has started off with plenty of action, whilst we welcomed our Kindy and Stage 1 students back to school last Wednesday, our Stage 2's and Stage 3's jumped on a bus early to attend camp at Coff Coast Adventure Camp. I was lucky enough to attend along with the Mrs Bottle, Miss O'Leary and Bernie. The theme of the camp for our students was building realtionships as well as resilience; and we definitely achieved this. Some notable activities were the zip line, commando course, survivor, dreamtime stories by the fire, visit to Bongil Bongil National park and and learning about bush tucker. Our students were beautifully behaved and had a great time! Thank you to Mrs Bottle and Miss O'Leary for their fantastic organisation of the camp. 

On Monday, we had our Cross Country Carnival at Brunswick Heads. Thank you to Miss McEvoy for her organisation of a fantastic carnival and for the parent helpers who were able to assist on the day. We were blessed with beautiful weather for our carnival and the students put in 100% effort - well done!

Please see below some important dates and notices for the coming weeks.

2023 School Annual Improvement Plan

It is my pleasure to share with you the 2023 St John's School Annual Improvement Plan (SAIP). Data collected through the Parent, student and staff Tell Them From Me (TTFM) Surveys in 2022, as well as student learning data, have informed our direction for this year. I welcome any feedback or questions that you may have.

To view the 2023 SAIP, please click on the link below. 

Tell Them From Me - Parent Survey

We will be inviting students (yrs 4-6), teachers and parents to provide feedback on their experience of our school using an online survey. The surveys are an important part of our whole school evaluation and planning process.
 
We would like to invite you to complete the Tell Them From Me (TTFM) Partners in Learning survey. As we value the role of parents and carers within our school community we would greatly appreciate your feedback. The information you provide will be used to maintain our commitment to working together in partnership to further improve student learning and wellbeing at St John's.
 
The survey is anonymous and will take approximately 20 minutes to complete. The Survey closes on 13th May. You are able to access the parent survey on your computer or mobile device by using the URL below:
www.tellthemfromme.com/sjp23

Upcoming Dates

Please find below a list of dates savers below of events that are occuring this term. 

• Friday 5th May - Zone Cross Country 
• Tuesday 9th May - School Photo Day
  
• Friday 12th May - Mother’s Day Morning tea followed by whole school Liturgy at 9:05
• Friday 26th May - National Sorry Day
• Friday 26th May-Sunday 3rd June - National Reconciliation Week
• Wednesday the 31st of May - 9:30am whole  school Mass Pentecost stage 3 leading 
• Monday 5th June-Friday 9th June - St John’s Catholic Schools Week
• Saturday 10th June - Old and Gold Festival @ Bruns
• Monday 12th June - King’s Birthday Public Holiday
• Tuesday 13th June - Student Report Cards completion of Drafts due
• Tuesday 20th June - Thursday 22nd June - St John’s External Review
• Tuesday 27th June - Student Report Cards released to Parents
• Thursday 29th June - Last Day of Term 2
• Friday 30th June - Pupil Free Day (Staff PD Day)
  

School Equipment Provision

From the start of term 2, the school will provide all sports equipment required for playtimes. This means that students are no longer required or allowed to bring any of their own sporting equipment to school from home. There are great advantages to this by way of equity and fair play. We have received some school handballs which have the school logo on them and they will be available for students to borrow from the office - Tundra with the staff on office duty, will have a borrowing system in place. 

We appreciate your support with this measure. Thank you!

Kind Regards, 

Dave Bermingham

ANZAC DAY 2023

Cross Country 2023

Assistant Principal

Transition to Term 2

It was wonderful seeing so many students, families and staff participate in the ANZAC Day March and Ceremony Thank you to all who braved the unpredictable weather to join us in this community commemoration. I was very proud to stand alongside the wonderful students of St John’s as we marched to the Cenotaph. Congratulations to those who represented our school so respectfully.

Week 1 was very quiet at school without our S2 and S3 classes present. Clearly, they had more exciting things to do and it has been interesting to hear of the variety of experiences that they all enjoyed participating in. The students have mentioned many highlights but different activities appealed to different students. Everything from the commando course, zipline, fencing, high ropes and the very scary-looking zorb ball featured in their favourites when I asked them about camp. Thanks to the staff who generously gave up their time to plan for and supervise this experience. A lot of effort goes into providing such a diverse, rewarding experience for our students. 

Thanks too to the staff who remained and ensured our K-2 students had a smooth transition after the holidays. It was fun to have so much space to play. 

REMINDER

Story Dogs is a reading support program where selected children read to an accredited dog and its handler. An information letter is attached. All children are being sent the consent form so they can visit "Sailor" for a short period or for a longer one-to-one session.  We have selected Year 2 to be our first students to participate in the new Story Dogs program. The teachers have selected 5-6 students to be regular participants but, if one or more are away, it is great to have consent to include other children. Information and permission forms were provided earlier via COMPASS. Please sign and return the consent form to the class teacher ASAP so that your child can be involved.. Story Dogs will start next week.  Only students with parental consent can participate.

LEADER OF PASTORAL CARE & WELLBEING

Children who can self-regulate are equipped to thrive at school!

Welcome back to term two one and all. I have been on leave recently caring for my wife who has had double knee surgery. She is making slow and steady progress with her recovery. It is such a pleasure to be back at school this week. To see the smiling faces of the children engaged in their learning or enjoying the company of others during the play breaks. This week I’m writing about self-regulation. A key attribute for all children to develop as they grow through towards maturity. In this article I’ve used a lot of material from Michael Hawton’s Parentshop website.(more about Michael below)

Children who are better at self-regulation perform better at school than their non-regulated peers and, when teachers provide these so-called 'self' regulators with prompts to figure things out, self-regulators thrive even more.

Well, what makes a self-regulator?  According to a Psychology Today blog in September 2015, the term "self-regulation" in the emotional space is the ability to manage emotions in challenge situations. To have what’s known as ‘frustration tolerance’, being able to cope with a little discomfort and difficulty. In the learning space self-regulation is commonly used to describe the strategies of planning, monitoring and reflecting on one's learning. If they get stuck on a task they know what to do next.  In other words, they can become the agent of their own learning by getting better at wrestling with feelings of giving up or its opposite, to pursue a solution.  They can outwit their feelings to give-up by coming up with alternative problem-solving strategies.

In a book called, Teaching Backwards, the authors refer to how teachers have helped students to become better self-regulated learners.

One teacher provided the children in her class with a 'stuck tree'.  It's a wall-chart which the children are asked to refer to if they feel stuck.  It says, 'If i get stuck I can ask a friend for advice, I can 'mindmap' it, I can write down the question in a different way.  They key here is knowing how to take charge of one's own "stuckness" and overcome it.

Another teacher uses a metaphor called "The Pit" to help learners to plough through a difficulty of getting started on a difficult project.  She wants her students to feel comfortable with feelings of confusion and anxiety with starting any new project and  to look for ways to use a process (in this case, The Pit) that can help students to persevere.

And, finally, another teacher shows her students how to design a step-wise chart, to show how projects like building a paddle-pop bridge or writing a story book, require steps to be broken down and sequenced to achieve the end result. By  asking students to identify which steps come before others and by identifying what they have to do at each step, "they know exactly where they're going and what they need to do to get there!" This something we can do at home too. In so many instances a child can complete a task independently is it is broken down into steps.

The million dollar question is…What can we do as parents to build those self-regulation skills in our children?

"Helping children become resourceful by asking them to self-regulate, to manage resistances (or stuckness) and by reducing their negative self talk can help them to get better at solving problems.  When  parents give children prompts and ask questions, to work out what to do next, we are effectively coaching them to solve their own problems then self-regulators increase their success rate." When children do solve problems it’s important to celebrate their achievements and let them know how well they’ve done. This will give them greater confidence when they next face a challenge.

I have used information in this article from - Michael Hawton, MAPS  website Parentshop. Michael is a local psychologist who has worked for many years now with parents and school programs building student resilience and tackling issues such as childhood and adolescent anxiety.

Parent library. We have recently purchased some new books for our parent library around managing anxious behaviours in children. If you’d like to check them out or want to talk more about promoting self-regulation in your child, please see me.

Best regards, Greg Flint

Leader of Mission

Important Information - Sacramental Program 2023

Sacrament of Reconciliation - St John’s Church Sunday the 4th of June at 8:00am

Prior to this date we will hold four Reconciliation Learning sessions for Parents/ Carers and students involved in the Sacramental Program. 

Tuesday 9th of May St Johns Primary School at 5:00pm

Thursday 18th of May St John’s Primary School at 5:00pm (please note this date has changed from the original date set in term 1) 

Tuesday the 23rd of May St John’s Primary School at 5:00pm

Tuesday the 30th of May St John’s Primary School at 5:00pm

Project Compassion

Thank you to all of the families that helped organise Project Compassion fund raisers last term. Both Shrove Tuesday and St Patricks Day were very successful and the St John’s community raised $450. This money will be sent to Caritas Project Compassion. If you have any Project Compassion Boxes at home please return to Tundra Snape at the front office. 

This term we will focus on raising money for St Vincent De Paul. We will begin this by forming a Mini Vinnies student lead group. These students will come up with some creative ideas on how to fundraise. 

SCHOOL INFORMATION

SCHOOL PHOTOS

School Photography Day: TUESDAY 9 May 2023

School photography day is coming up soon. Group and portrait photographs can be purchased by returning the order envelope with your payment to our photographer on school photo day. Envelopes have been sent home. Extra envelopes are available from the office.

Online at www.advancelife.com.au and enter the online order code : M18 RFW CN

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU"

Our Birthday people:-  

Mia, Malakai, Alariah, Samara & Penny

Book club

Book club order forms for Term 2 have been sent home this week.          All orders on line or back to school by Wednesday 10th May

Chromebooks for Sale

We have some old school stock (5 years old) of Chromebooks. Both white and Black laptops are available to purchase for $50. Laptops have been reset to factory default and include a charging cord. Please see Tundra in the office if you wish to make a purchase. 

Piano Lessons

Piano lessons in 2023  at St John’s, during school hours and after school.
Enquiries please call Daniel Holland 0401 071 667