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- Prayer Focus
- The Principal's Report
- Celebrating Our Faith
- Learning Together
- Parish News
- After School Speech and Drama
- Term 4 Student Activity Statements
- Sunshine Cafe
- 2021 School Travel Applications
- Tune in to Mental Health Month
- Student Awards
- PBS (Positive Behaviour Support)
- Sport Spotlight
- Sharing Our Learning
- Creative Corner
- What's On Next Week ...
- Advance Dates for Your Diary
- This Week's Notes
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Hi everyone,
With already two weeks of learning completed this term, time is going quickly! We have had a settled and focused start to the term and are looking forward to sharing lots more learning across the term.
It is a particularly big term for our Year 6 students and our beautiful preschool friends who will be joining us in preparation for Kindergarten in 2021. Please look out for our communication as it comes to you so that you are aware of all that is being planned and adapted over the term.
Swimming Carnival change
Due to the challenges of COVID on running a Swimming Carnival, we have made the decision to move this event to Term 1 2021. As we also normally hold trials for Zone in Term 1, this will allow students who will be competing at that level to have more time to practice over summer in preparation. We are also hopeful we will then be able to have more students involved and a big hope that parents will also by then be able to attend. The dates and details will be shared with you as soon as possible.
Transition to school - Kindergarten 2021
A note will come home to families next week to outline the ways in which we are transitioning this term. We are so excited that we can welcome children to our school for a brief time to feel what it will be like for them. We also have further strategies to help with the time between now and the start of 2021 to keep in touch.
Year 6 Graduation events
A note for Year 6 families will come home shortly, letting families know what the current preparations and plans are to celebrate Year 6. Please check details carefully each time we communicate so you are up to date with where we are at.
Year 6 Camp
We wish our Year 6 students and staff the best as they complete preparations for Camp which is next week. There has been a great deal of organisation behind the scenes to provide a successful and fun experience for students, which they have very much been looking forward to. We can’t wait to share some of the stories and photos with you.
Other great activities planned for Term 4
With the year that has been 2020, there are many more things to look forward to for Term 4. Here are just a few….
Life Education Van, Socktober, Year 5 Leadership preparation and voting for 2021, Year 5 Retreat, Summer Sports Trials, Year 6 Orientation for Highschool.
Our Fit Staff!
Each year in St Agnes' Parish, there is an initiative called “Spring into Summer”, where staff of Parish entities are asked to donate to a fund that supports students in our Parish. This year there have been monthly challenges organised to promote and make it more interesting. We had a number of staff make teams of 5 to take on the first challenge, which was climbing Mt Kosciusko - this entailed each team member climbing stairs across October to add up to the amount it would be to climb Mt Kosciusko. The winners across the whole Parish were one of our staff teams. Congratulations to the team, Mrs Hough, Mrs Blundell, Mrs Hoitink, Mrs Ucdereli and Mrs Kelly. The challenge for November is for each team to take enough steps each day to add up to completing the Camino Trail. We are finding some of our staff are a little competitive….
Principal
Our Year 4 team led the school in prayer to commemorate the Feast day of the recent Pope John Paul II on Thursday. Thank you Year 4 for a lovely prayer service.
Nathan Porter
Assistant Principal Mission
Bus Safety
Many of our students travel on a bus to and from school. Over the next few weeks we will share some simple safety tips to ensure your child is safe on the bus.
BOOK WEEK
This week we celebrate the Children's Book Council of Australia’s (CBCA) annual book week. Each year since 1945 the CBCA has brought children and books together across Australia through CBCA Book Week. During this time schools and public libraries spend one glorious week celebrating books and Australian children's authors and illustrators. This week some of our classes explored a few of the shortlisted books for this year.
Kindergarten, Year 1 and Year 2 participated in some special activities to celebrate our love of books. They all read the short listed book "Three" by Stephen Michael King. This is a heartwarming story about a grateful little dog with three legs. After listening to the story the students wrote about what they loved best about the book and drew a picture. Kindergarten also read the funny story Goldilocks and the Three Koalas, made finger puppets and acted out the story. They also recreated the front cover of the book. The students pictures and stories are displayed in the classrooms.
Today each of the K-2 classes did a gallery walk around the classrooms to share their work.The drawings will be judged and a winner will be selected from each class. We look forward to sharing our winning entries with you next week!
UNSW ICAS Results
Some of our Primary students recently participated in the UNSW Global ICAS Assessments. ICAS Assessments are designed to recognise academic excellence, students are assessed on their ability to apply classroom learning to new contexts using higher-order thinking and problem-solving skills.
This week we would like to congratulate the following students for their achievement in Mathematics and Spelling:-
Mathematics |
Gene Smith (Year 4), Erin Little and Tahlia Van Den Boom (Year 6) awarded a Distinction Amara Crutcher (Year 5) awarded a Credit Riley Tattersall (Year 4), Aaron Biju (Year 5) awarded a Merit |
Spelling |
Kiara Tattersall (Year 6), Siya Modi (Year 4), Gene Smith (Year 4) awarded a credit Aislinn Suveesh (Year 3) awarded a Merit |
Jeannine Ucdereli
Assistant Principal Learning and Teaching
St Agnes' Uniform Store Price Lists and Trading Hours
New Mass Schedule and booking system
- Phone the Presbytery on 6583 1024
- Book online via the Parish Website (go to Mass Times then click on the 'Book into Mass here' button and follow the prompts)
If you can't make it to Mass in person, why not join Bishop Greg Homeming who celebrates Mass at the Carmelite Monastery in Goonellabah, at 8:00am each Sunday via live stream on the Lismore Diocese YouTube channel (click here to view the site).
Important change for next week
Due to Year 6 camp, after school drama for Year 4-6 will be held on Monday instead of Wednesday for next week only.
Term 4 Student Activity Statements
Student Activity Statements were sent home this week. We would appreciate it if parents/carers could finalise these amounts by the end of Week 5. If you would like to discuss your account please contact myself or Mrs Tess Koning on 6583 3848.
Antoinette Smith
Administration
Birthday Buckets
Birthday Buckets have been very popular this week with multiple orders and lots of excited children coming to collect them to share with their classmates for their special day.
How much do they cost?
Just $10.00 per bucket.
The bucket will be decorated for your child’s birthday and collected during the day as directed by the teacher to share with their class. The buckets are reusable and will need to be returned to the canteen.
How do you order them?
They can be ordered via Flexischools on the day you would like your child to share them or can be ordered in advance. Alternatively, if you don’t use Flexischools, you can call the school office to order directly from the Canteen.
Term 4 Menu
There are a couple of small price increases on the new Term 4 Menu. These are necessary as some suppliers have increased their prices but I have kept them as low as possible. New items have also been added to the menu. These include a large meat pie and a junior sausage roll which have been requested by many of the children this year. There are also new flavours of Frozen Yoghurts to try out and they are Mango/Watermelon and Blueberry/Cookie Dough. These items can all be ordered through Flexischools.
LUNCH ORDERS
The canteen is operating as usual and lunch orders can be placed via Flexischools or by dropping them in the basket on the counter each morning.
Don't forget you can order online by 8:30am- it's so easy!!
- Download the Flexischools app from the App Store or from Google Play.
Note: for iPhone and iPad please select ‘Allow’ notification - Click “Register Now” to create account
- Top-up your balance
- Start ordering immediately
- Alternatively Go to www.flexischools.com.au
VOLUNTEER NOTICE
We are still unable to have volunteers in the canteen at this stage until further notice.
Kim Goldie
Canteen Coordinator
2021 School Travel Applications
Applications for student travel in 2021 opened on Monday 12 October 2020. Students who have changed school, changed address, repeated a year or have received an expiry notification from Transport for NSW should reapply and/or update their details. See below for details.
Tune in to Mental Health Month
The theme for Mental Health Month this year is 'Tune In'. So what does this mean and how can we do it?
Click on the below image if you wish to read more on Mental Health Month.
KM | Blake Yewdall | Karla Lucas | Grace Gluckstern-Hill |
KS | Harvey Porter | Oscar McHugh | Alexia Lynch |
1R | Angelrose Sefin Vallooran | Archie Rex | Kingston Shooter |
2S | Annetta Yewdall | Lilly Chapman | Rhys Cutler |
2T | Jacob Gluckstern-Hill | Jack Cunneen | Makayla Johnson |
3D | Tomas Butler | Zada Robinson | Laila Thorburn |
4B | Siya Modi | Noah Dowd | Bronte Gawith |
4F | Billy Stapleton | Jesse Leslie | Millahni Moore |
5G | Cooper Waterhouse | Sienna Edwards | Jack Cremins |
5H | Ysaac Nieva | Storm Hardy | Cooper Grant |
PBS (Positive Behaviour Support)
New Flowchart for Behaviour
Last term, we introduced a new flowchart to map out the line of consequences for behaviour. This term, we are officially operating using this new format.
Behaviour Focus
To start our term, we are rewarding students who demonstrate ‘Ready to Learn’ behaviours. These behaviours can get a little dusty after the holidays but it doesn’t take much to refresh ourselves to get back into the swing of things. Ready to Learn behaviours are important to ensure we get the most out of our learning experiences. They include: paying attention, concentrating, watching the speaker, listening, raising our hand to contribute, trying our best etc.
Reward Play
Reward Play is a reward offered to all students who continually follow school expectations and demonstrate our school values. Reward Play will be scheduled throughout the term on a fortnightly basis. We hope to reward all students for positive behaviour choices.
Sports Star of the Week
Congratulations to James Hiam in Year 6!
James has consistently been a model sportsman who displays leadership, resilience and perseverance in all areas of PE and sport.
Surf Life Saving
On Thursday Year 2, 4 and 6 participated in a Surf Life Saving education program. Below are some photos and stories from some of our students.
Today James from life saving taught me that the flags mean in between you can swim or surf. The red and yellow mean swim and the black and white mean surf. Rips mean the water is moving out to sea. If you are caught in a rip you should swim sideways but if you aren’t a strong enough swimmer relax and call for help and put up your hand. I can’t wait to go to the beach.
Isla Schneider-Smith - Year 2
Today James told us about safety. We learnt about black and white flags. They mean surfers stay outside of the black and white flags. Then he told us about red and yellow flags. He told us about shark alarms. James is good at explaining and I hope I see him at the beach.
Lilly Smith - Year 2
Today a lifeguard came to our school, his name was James. He told us about ways to stay safe at the beach. He said that the red and yellow flags mean that you can swim in between them. There are shark alarms. When the shark alarms go off it means that there is a shark nearby. Now I am excited to go back to the beach.
Hayley Ylias - Year 2
Today James from the surf lifesaving club came to our school. He talked about signing for dangerous events, what to look for when you’re at the beach, who to look for help if you are in trouble/need help. James also talked to us about the equipment they use to save people.
Charlee Maher - Year 6
Mr Lynch’s Basketball Skills Club
All students are invited to attend Basketball club to learn new skills and build confidence.
NRL
Students in Year 5 and 6 are invited to represent St Joseph’s Primary School at the NRL U12s Tackle Rugby League All Schools Gala Day which is to be held on Tuesday 10th November at Stuarts Park, Port Macquarie. The note has been emailed and all registrations need to be in by Wednesday 28th of October.
Tennis
Last week we welcomed Greg and Hayden Alchin from Port Macquarie Tennis Club. Each week, all classes will spend 40 minutes learning new tennis skills. We look forward to watching their progress.
Please note, some classes have changed timeslots for Tennis Hot Shots. The updated timetable is below for your reference.
Shining Stars of the Week
And the Oscar goes to…Isla Dalton (6MH) and Peyton Harris (6MH)
For their extensive research and passionate delivery of their Year 6 debating speeches.
Creative Arts Lunch Clubs
The Creative Arts Lunch clubs are back this term. We look forward to seeing all old and new members! The timetable is:
Tuesday Lunch 2 |
Week 1 - Year 6 |
Primary Dance Club |
Wednesday Lunch 1 |
Week 1 and 4 - Year 2 |
Infants Art Club |
Thursday Lunch 1 |
Even weeks - Year 1, Odd weeks - Year 2 |
Infants Drama Club |
Thursday Lunch 1 |
Year 6 only |
Primary Drama Club |
Christmas Celebrations
As we were uable to hold a whole school concert this year, we are working towards sharing our Christmas celebrations and performances with you at the end of the term.
Yours in Creative and Performing Arts
Leah Toole
Infants Art Club
With Sarah McKinnon on maternity leave, Mrs Stapleton will be continuing Infants Art Club this term. It will be held during Lunch 1 starting at 11:15am on Wednesdays in the KS class room. Due to COVID-19 restrictions we will need to have one grade per week. Please see the below timetable.
Week 1 | Year 2 |
Week 2 | Year 1 |
Week 3 | Kindergarten |
Week 4 | Year 2 |
Week 5 | Year 1 |
Week 6 | Kindergarten |
Week 7 and 8 | No Art Club due to Intensive Swimming |
Weeks 9 and 10 | To be confirmed |
Have a look to see how much fun Infants Art Club had this week!
Week 3 - Term 4 2020 |
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Monday |
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Tuesday |
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Wednesday |
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Thursday 29th October |
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Friday 30th October |
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Week 4 - Term 4 2020 |
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Monday 2nd November |
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Tuesday |
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Wednesday |
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Thursday 5th November |
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Friday 6th November |
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Week 5 - Term 4 2020 |
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Monday |
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Tuesday |
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Wednesday |
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Thursday 12th November |
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Friday 13th November |
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Week 6 - Term 4 2020 |
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Monday 16th November |
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Tuesday |
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Wednesday |
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Thursday 19th November |
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Friday 20th November |
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Week 7 - Term 4 2020 |
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Monday 23rd November |
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Tuesday |
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Wednesday |
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Thursday 26th November |
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Friday 27th November |
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Week 8 - Term 4 2020 |
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Monday 30th November |
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Tuesday |
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Wednesday |
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Thursday 3rd December |
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Friday 4th December |
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Please note these dates can change from time to time due to unforeseen circumstances and we will endeavour to advise you of any changes at the earliest possible opportunity. Our school Google calendar can be accessed via this link for additional advanced dates -
For your convenience 2021 school term dates are listed below. They are also located on our website. Click on the words “TERM DATES” on the home page.
TERM 1 2021
School Administration Day (Pupil Free) - Wednesday 27th January 2021
Year 1 to 6 Maths Assessment Interviews - Thursday 28th January and Friday 29th January 2021
Kindergarten Best Start Interviews - Thursday 28th January to Wednesday 3rd February 2021
Year 1 to 6 commence classes - Monday 1st February 2021
Kindergarten commence classes - Thursday 4th February 2021
Term finishes – Thursday 1st April 2021
TERM 2
Term commences - Monday 19th April 2021
Term finishes – Friday 25th June 2021
TERM 3
Term commences – Monday 12th July 2021
Term finishes - Friday 17th September 2021
TERM 4
Term commences – Tuesday 5th October 2021
Term finishes - Friday 17th December 2021
Other Holidays in 2021
Australia Day – Tuesday 26th January 2021 (Public Holiday)
Good Friday – Friday 2nd April 2021
Easter Monday – Monday 5th April 2021 (Public Holiday)
ANZAC Day – Sunday 25th April 2021
Queen’s Birthday – Monday 14th June 2021 (Public Holiday)
Labour Day – Monday 4th October 2021 (Public Holiday)
Christmas Day - Saturday 25th December 2021
Boxing Day - Sunday 26th December 2021