March 12th, 2024: Newsletter #6
- Acknowledgment of Country
- Week 7 Prayer
- From the Principal
- NAPLAN
- Project Compassion
- Lunch time workshops
- Scholastic Book Club
- School Photos
- School Athletics Carnival
- FIRE Carrier Meeting- Thursday
- Maths at St. Johns
- Learning Walks
- Student News
- Around our School- Week 6
- Student Awards
- Happy Birthday
- Parents & Friends Social Group
- School Sponsorship
- Emmanuel College
- Star of the Sea Bulletin
- Upcoming Events
Acknowledgment of Country
St. John’s school community respect and honour Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Elders past, present and emerging. We acknowledge the stories, traditions and living cultures of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples on this land and commit to building a brighter future together, working together towards a reconciled Australia.
Week 7 Prayer
From the Principal
Welcome to the 7th week of term.
Lions Eye Health Program: This week we are fortunate to have the Lions club provide Free Vision screening for students in Foundation, Grade 3 and Grade 6 on 14th March, we welcome this important service to our community.
Learning Walks: These great events are back on again soon, with specific focuses on our Little Learners program and our exciting Maths program. Check out the flyers further on in this newsletter.
Condolences: As a community our thoughts and prayers are with Rhiley Stewart and his family following the death of his Grandmother Trudy- may she rest in peace and may the Stewart family be comforted by the love of our community.
We look forward to the week ahead and hopefully, I will see you at the Dash friday night, Ben.
NAPLAN
The NAPLAN testing window opens this week Wednesday 13th March to Monday 25th March. Over this time our Year 3 and Year 5 students will participate in Reading, Writing, Language Conventions (Spelling, Grammar and Punctuation) and Numeracy tests. All of the tests take place online via computers except for the Year 3 Writing test which is handwritten using pen and paper.
The information gained from these tests is used by our school to help us identify priorities for our school improvement plan. We also use it along with our school based assessments to help identify next areas of learning for children and cohorts.
Project Compassion
As we've written about previously, Caritas is one of the Catholic Church's charities and throught the Season Of Lent, it operates Project Compassion which is its main fundraiser for the year.
Project Compassion draws on the works of former Bishop Oscar Romero who challenged people to "Aspire not to have more, but to be more". Project Compassion allows us to focus on the works of Caritas around the world and in our own country, it is also a time for us to collect small change, place it in the Project Compassion box and donate it to people across the world such as the ladies spoken about in the article below.
Lunch time workshops
We are hoping to gather some beads or Lego for our next round of student workshops (these run at first lunch on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday and are open to all students). If you have any spare at home and able to donate, that would be greatly appreciated.
Scholastic Book Club
Catalogues were sent home to families last week. Orders are due by Thursday 14th March and must be placed online only.
What is Book Club?
Book Club provides families with an affordable and convenient way to access the best in children's literature to encourage leisure reading. Book Club brings the magic of reading to families by curating the catalogue in age-appropriate sections with a huge variety of excellent quality, affordable books, providing regular access to books for the home via your school to build good reading habits and contributing learning and literacy resources back to schools.
Catalogues were sent home to families last week. Orders are due on Thursday 14th March and must be placed online only.
School Photos
Annual school photos were taken by Arthur Reed Photos last week.
To view the images of your child and order photos, you will need to first register online.
1. Go to https://order.arphotos.com.au and enter the 2024 image code for your child (from their personalized flyer)
2. Tap on ‘Add another child’ to enter the image codes of any siblings
3. Fill in your email and mobile details and then review all details before confirming your registration That’s it! When 2024 photos are ready, you will be notified by email and SMS. Even if you registered last year, it’s important that you do it again each year using your child’s new image code to link their photos for the current year with your contact details.
To ensure you are ordering school photos for the current year, please wait for notifications that 2024 images are online before placing orders. In the webshop you can view photos and customize your photo package; Choose ANY layout, ANY image and purchase multiple digital image downloads.
All photo orders will be sent directly to the address you provide when ordering. REGISTER ONLINE NOW to be notified when 2024 school photos can be viewed and ordered.
If any you have any issues with the registration or ordering process, please contact Arthur Reed's customer service team directly for assistance on 03 5243 4390.
School Athletics Carnival
What a fantastic day we had last Wednesday at our School Athletics Day The weather was beautiful and everyone showed amazing participation and sportsmanship. Congratulations to Gold house who took out the overall house champions for 2024. Well done to the following students who were the overall age champions.
5/6 Boy - Layker A, 5/6 Girl - Sommer D, 7 Boy - Rhiley S, 7 Girl - Portia D, 8 Boy - Arlo B, 8 Girl - Sophie C, 9 Boy - Harry M, 9 Girl - Isabelle C, 10 Boy - Harley J, 10 Girl - Lottie S, 11 Boy - Jaxon B, 11 Girl - Imogen G, 12/13 Boy - Jacob D, 12/13 Girl - Charlotle S.
The District Athletics will be held on Monday 25th March at Brauerander Park and the teams will be announced this week.
FIRE Carrier Meeting- Thursday
As mentioned previously, St. John's is commencing the process of becoming a FIRE (Friends Igniting Reconciliation through Education) Carrier school. We will be inviting students and parents/grandparents/carers to join our working group so that we can develop this initiative together. Any member of our school community is welcome to come and meet with us (Jan Madden and Kristie Prendergast) on Thursday 14th March at 3.00pm to discuss our vision and ideas for the year. If you would like more information please email either Jan or Kristie.
jmadden@sjdennington.catholic.
Maths at St. Johns
Maths at St. John's is evolving- it is collaborative and engaging. These changes are happening in the Grade 3-6 area and many of these thinking principles being implemented in grades F-2. We encourage you to have a read through this flyer and invite you to come along to our Learning Walk on Monday 18th March at 9.00am where we will walk through this learning in action.
Learning Walks
This year at St. John's there have been several changes to how Maths and Literacy are taught. We would love to invite you to attend a learning walk to see these changes in action and witness the students engaged in their learning.
Learning Walk - Maths: Monday 18th March at 9.00am. Our Maths Learning Walk will take you through our Grade 3-6 classrooms and chat about why we have made some changes in our Maths teaching.
Learning Walk - Literacy: Thursday 21st March at 9.00am. Our Literacy Learning Walk will take you through our Grade Foundation-2 classrooms and chat about why we have made some changes in our Literacy teaching.
For any questions or to let us know you'll be coming along, please email Ben - principal@sjdennington.
Student News
Indy was licensed in Tailem Bend last week and just ran her first competitive national event which saw her win the first three rounds in Mildura on the weekend! Consistency was the key and she beat some very experienced drivers. Indy placed an “unofficial” runners up at the national event. She reached speeds of 86kmh over the 1/8th mile. Huge achievement for her first national event!
Around our School- Week 6
Student Awards
Happy Birthday
Happy Birthday to Levi B, Greta G, Franklin R, Reggie M and Rosa D who celebrate their birthday this week, we hope you have an amazing day!
Parents & Friends Social Group
Our AGM is quickly approaching on Tuesday 19th March at 7.00pm with all positions needing to be filled.
This group organises all fundraising and social events for the school community and is made up of a variety of parents. This variety helps us to provide feedback to the Principal regarding a range of topics from school uniforms to play equipment.
It is always great to see new faces and I would encourage all families to try and get along to a meeting throughout the year. The group meets monthly and it is a great opportunity to have a say on things happening in your child's school.
At the AGM we’ll be hoping to fill the following roles;
President (Currently held by Malynda De Bono) Vice President (Currently held by Amber Serra & Ali Fechete) Secretary (Currently held by Jen Milne) Treasurer
Nominations for these positions will be taken at the AGM. Should you have any queries regarding these positions then please feel free to speak with the incumbent person or if you would like a role description then please speak with Ben van de Camp.
Dennington Dash- Friday!
Dennington Dash will be held this Friday 15th March. A great opportunity to get out and run/walk with friends while raising money for the school.
IT’S TIME TO REGISTER using the QR code below.
Get your sporting club involved for a competitive race or bring your friends and family along for a social stride. All welcome to come along and help raise funds for our school.
There are some great prizes to be won on the night including winners of each category and raffle prizes. Raffle tickets were sent home with each family last week so check those bags! Tickets are to be returned to school by Thursday 14th March.
We are on the lookout for volunteers to help with marshalling during the event. There is a post in the facebook group asking for volunteers. Please comment if you are able to help out or reach out to Kate Cuzens.
Dennington's Day Out
This year's Dennington's Day Out will be held on Sunday 10th November. Our DDO committee has now finalised the new look 2024 Corporate Sponsorship Proposal. We are now inviting any existing or new school family businesses to consider sponsoring our major school fundraiser for the year. For further information or to discuss the corporate sponsorship packages below please contact ddo@sjdennington.catholic.edu.
We thank you in advance for your consideration & support.
Emily McGennan & Rebecca Bagg
Easter Raffle
Raffle tickets will be sent home with each family next week. Tickets are $2 each.
We also kindly ask that each family donates an Easter related item for the prizes. These can be taken directly to the office.
Tickets are due back Monday 25th March. The raffle will be drawn on Thursday 28th March (last day of Term 1)
Cake Raffle
Each week on a Monday, families are rostered on to bring in a cake which will then be raffled and drawn out at assembly. All funds raised throughout the year will be donated to the Good Friday Appeal the following year.
All students will have the opportunity to buy a raffle ticket for 20c each Monday with a limit of five tickets per student. The Johnnies will make a P.A announcement at first lunch, calling all students who wish to purchase a ticket, to the Library.
The following families are rostered on next week- Monday 18th March:
Burchell (Charlie), Bushell, Cahill, Cain and Campbell.
Please drop your (store purchased) cake into the front office with your child's name written on top.
School Sponsorship
A big thank you to O'Brien's Electrical, Joinery by Jarrod, Fry Painting and Carry on Travel who sponsor our school!
Would you like to advertise your business in our school newsletter? Businesses can advertise for only $100 a year and will have a business card sized listing in every school newsletter.
Please contact parents@sjdennington.catholic.edu.au for more information.
Emmanuel College
Star of the Sea Bulletin
Sunday Mass is held at 10.00am at St. Pius X Church. School families are always welcome.
The Parish office can be contacted on 5562 2231 and this weekends bulletin is featured below. Other information and contact details can be found on the Star of the Sea South West Coast website: https://www.ballarat.catholic.org.au/parish/southwestcoast/
Upcoming Events
Friday 15th March: Dennington Dash.
Monday 18th March: Sacrament of Reconciliation, St Pius X Church at 6.00pm.
Monday 18th March: Maths Learning walk at 9.00am
Tuesday 19th March: P&F Social Group AGM and first meeting.
Thursday 21st March: Literacy Learning walk at 9.00am
Monday 25th March: District Athletics at BrauerAnder Park.
Wednesday 27th March: DDO Dinner Meeting at the Cally Hotel.
Thursday 28th March: Last day of Term 1, finishing time 2.20pm.