Sacred Heart Primary School, Cunnamulla eNewsletter

Principal Report

Welcome back for another term of learning and fun at Sacred Heart. The week kicked off with teachers participating in professional development focused on our school vision…At Sacred Heart, there is a rentless focus on LEARNING and the development of EXPERT LEARNERS.

We began by exploring the ‘attention’ component of the learning process. The first key message explored was, “If you don’t pay attention to something you can’t learn it.” If we don’t get the focus and the attention of our students they won’t get the learning. Teachers reviewed the strategies in which they used to gain students attention. Some of them include, learning intentions, success criteria, connect new learning to prior knowledge, vocabuarly work and curiosity questioning. Our Year 3-6 students have been exploring the topic of attention in their weekly student briefings to ensure they understand the importance of focus and so they know how to be successful learners.

The next concept explored analysed the quote, “we learn what we think about”. Strategies to ensure all our students are thinking and no-one is opting out of the learning include:

Think pair share
Cold call
Choral response
Mini whiteboard quiz
Hinge point questioning
Pose, pause, bounce, pounce

Majority of these routines have been established across all classrooms in Term 1 and will continue to be of focus throughout the year as we want all of students thinking.

The last concept explored was reading fluency. So what is reading fluency? Fluency is the ability to read accurately, at a good pace and with expression. It sounds effortless and natural. At higher levels of the progression, students demonstrate comprehension of a text through confident use of intonation, pausing and accuracy and pace. Combining these skillsl is not often easy for all students and requires some dedicated practice.

This term our students are working on the 3 key components to fluency which include;

Accuracy: This refers to reading words correctly. When a reader accurately decodes words, it lays the foundation for understanding the text.
Rate: Rate measures the speed of word identification. A fluent reader can navigate the text swiftly, maintaining a steady pace.
Prosody (Expression): Prosody encompasses the sound of reading – the rhythm, intonation, and expression.

Teachers have already taken this learning an implemented more rigorous routines around regular fluency practice. The types we have been practicing include:

Repeated reading
Choral reading
Echo reading
Paired/partner reading
Readers theatre
Audio assisted reading
Varied practice

To learn more about reading fluency and ways students can practice at home visit https://fivefromfive.com.au/fluency/evidence-based-fluency-instruction/

Policy updates

A number of the policies that we implement as a school have recently been reviewed. These policies are a part of the enrolment agreement we have with you as parents/legal guardians and are available on the school’s website. If you have any questions about these policies please contact the school office. Updated policies include:

School renewal and improvement policy
Student behaviour support policy
School fees policy
Teaching and learning policy
ICT in Catholic schools policy
Student diversity in Catholic school policy
Enrolment in Catholic schools policy
TCS Privacy policy

Last week we were not only busy learning but also competing in the school cross country carnival! Congratulations to all students who demonstrated good sportsmanship and gave it their best efforts.

A special congrats to our age champions who will go on to compete at the District Cross Country Carnival in Eulo this Friday 26^th April.

Cross Country Age Champions:

2017 Boy – Harry O’Sullivan
2017 Girl – Dakota Ibell
2016 Boy – Ernest Roberts
2016 Girl – Lucy Schmidt
2015 Boy – Lake Wilson
2015 Girl – Charvee Narula
2014 Boy – Noah Spaul
2014 Girl – Kendall McDermott
2013 Boy – Hunter Girlder
2013 Girl – Penny Schmidt
2012 Boy – Jase Mitchell

Photos

Mrs Polly Goodman

Co-Principal

Welcome back prep families! I hope you all had a wonderful school holiday break, but it is so lovely to be back in the swing of things. We started off this week by talking about our easter holidays and drawing pictures to explain the adventures that we got up to. Sharing stories was great fun!

We have certainly jumped back into learning, with a big emphasis on refreshing some key concepts from last term. In English, we have dived back into phonics and learning the letters A, M, S and T. Refreshing their knowledge on those key letter sounds is very important, as we move into forming CVC words and learning to read them. Another aspect of our English unit this term is working towards becoming fluent readers, focussing on accuracy, expression and speed when reading so that we can develop into natural readers. It is very exciting that they are becoming eager to read!

In Math, we are refreshing our knowledge of counting and recognising numbers to ten, but we are extending this term to look at small and large quantities and ordering numbers in a sequence.

In Science, we are exploring a unit on superheroes! The students have already shown such a keen interest and excitement towards it. This term, students will be investigating familiar superheroes. The students will discuss the observable properties of materials in relation to superheroes, for example what materials their outfits are made from and why. They will also investigate how factors affect the way objects move. Students will begin identifying attributes and comparing mass, length, capacity and duration.

This week, the whole school participated in our annual cross country, and we survived! The prep students had to run a very long way, but they all persisted and participated!

We also celebrated a few birthdays this week! We celebrated Harley's birthday as it was during the school holidays and Braxtyn’s on Wednesday. Birthday parties in prep consist of singing the happy birthday song, lights off as the student chooses their favourite song, and then we all have a big dance! Such great fun to celebrate students getting one year older.

Miss Sophie Walker

Prep Teacher

Year 1

Welcome back to Term 2! Year 1 began this term by reflecting on our Easter Holidays with writing and drawing a picture to match.

We have continued to work on our phonics skills by reviewing everything we learnt last year and using retrieval practice to recall what we have already learnt. This term we will be continuing to learn new sounds as well as developing our accuracy and fluency when reading. We will also be focusing on informative texts, the features and structures of these and how they are different to imaginative texts.

In Maths we have continued exploring the concept of number and are working towards recognising, representing and ordering numbers to 120. It was wonderful to see the amount of knowledge the students had retained and were able to recall from last term. We have also begun exploring the concept of addition and what this means. We learnt vocabulary related to addition and introduced the strategy of counting on- which can be used with a tens frame, hundreds board or number line. Over the coming weeks we will exlore other strategies we can use to help us solve addition problems and will move into subtraction as well.

In Religion we have begun looking at God’s plan for Creation. We have explored the first Creation story and sequenced the events from this story. Over the coming weeks we will explore more Old Testament texts relating to Creation and God’s Plan for Creation. This is linked to our integrated unit which focuses on Natural, Managed and Constructed features of local places, as well as animals and their habitats. To support our learning of different types of features in the environment, the Year 1’s embarked on an excursion around town to explore these features.

This week we welcomed a special visitor into our classroom. Miss Darcey Patterson is in her first year of university and we have had the pleasure of hosting her in Year 1. The students demonstrated wonderful Belonging skills when welcoming Miss Patterson into the classroom and have definitely enjoyed having her with us. Miss Patterson has been a pleasure to have in the classroom and we wish her all the best with her future studies.

I look forward to touching base with you all in another couple of weeks.

Miss Ellie Charlton

Year 1 Teacher

Year 2

Welcome back to term 2. This term we begun reflecting on our Easter holidays and sharing our stories with friends. We have been learning about ANZAC day and explored the importance of our ANZAC’s and how our country has been shaped by their actions.

We have continued to work hard on our phonics, spelling and reading skills. We are working hard to become fluent readers. This term we will be working on our accuracy, expression and speed when reading so that we can develop into effortless and natural readers.

In Maths, we’ve begun to build our knowledge of addition strategies, we spent some time investigating addition sums and persisting through some challenging problems. We have also begun learning about measurement. We are looking at using informal units to measure, we had so much fun measuring each other heights using maths blocks.

In Religion, we are investigating God’s promise to his people and how we can continue to follow this promise in our world today.

In our connected unit, we will be eploring First Nations perspectives, this includes looking at rich literature, exploring traditional language, investigating how artworks and oral stories keep history alive.

We survived cross country and all students are to be congratulated on their effort and persistence during their run.

We are all excited to be back at school and look forward to learning new things this term.

Miss Ailie Lewis

Year 2 Teacher

Year 3/4

Welcome back for another term in 3/4! I hope everyone had a relaxing and refreshing holiday with family and friends. The students seemed very happy to be back at school on Tuesday morning and got stuck back into their work.

This term for our connected unit, the students will be learning about the importance of different environments and sustainable allocation and management of resources. They began by completing a pre-test on the water cycle and this work will continue this week.

On Thursday, the students participated in our annual cross country. The students had to run a long way but showed excellent persistence, perseverance and effort. Congratulations to all students that participated and best of luck to our students that will be travelling to Districts on Friday.

On Friday, we held our celebration that was planned by the students as part of their connected unit last term. The students worked very hard creating decorations and displays for their celebration. Thank you to all the classes and family members that attended to support. The students had a lot of fun and enjoyed displaying their hard work.

Just a reminder that students need to bring their library bags on a Thursday and reading diaries on a Friday. Students are required to read each night and record this in their diaries. Thank you for your continued support!

Miss Aimee Bretherton

Year 3/4 Teacher

Year 5/6

Welcome back! I hope you all have had a lovely break and were able to spend some time with friends and family. I have heard from the students that much relaxation, along with some travelling occurred. I was glad to see that the students were able to retrieve all our learning dispositions and, after the excitement of another school term simmered away, all students shift back into learning mode.

We began term 2 working on building our communication skills. We focussed on listening to the ideas of others and expanding upon them. We learnt about the importance of collaboration and how integral communication skills are in our attempt to become lifelong learners.

Starbooks cafe was probably the highlight of last week as we took part in a ‘book tasting’ experience while enjoying a sweet beverage (cordial). We read short passages from 5 different books and wrote mini reviews in our Starbooks menus. By the end of the lesson, we all were able to select a book that interested us most. This led to us being placed into mini book clubs that will be used throughout the term to assist in building our reading fluency and comprehension.

While on the topic of reading, just a reminder that homework will start this week. All students will be required to read at home every night and this is to be recorded in their diaries. Additional spelling and maths homework will be supplied upon request.

In Mathematics we have continued to revise angles and measurement skills. We have also completed some research on ANZAC day and used our visual art skills from last term to create an ANZAC wreath and multimedium poppy artwork.

The students displayed great effort and persistence as they participated in Cross Country and cricket trials last week. Well done to all the students who participated in these events. So much has happened in four days! I look forward to seeing what the rest of the term brings.

Mrs Abby Kindelan

Year 5/6 Teacher

This Thursday 25^th April is the annual ANZAC Day March. We encourage all students to participate in this event as we march as a school. Students are to meet their teachers on the corner outside the Club Boutique at 10:15am for a 10:30am start. Students are to wear their white sports uniform (white shirt, green bottoms, black shoes and school hat). I look forward to seeing you there.

Class Awards

Birthdays

Sacred Heart Choir

Choir has officially started! If you were near the Year 1 classroom at 8am last Wednesday, you would have heard our first ever attempt at our layered melody warm up and our vocals tongue twister, Boom Chicka Boom. We had fun learning how our stance can improve our singing, and we enjoyed practicing some breathing techniques.

Choir will take place every Wednesday morning at 8am to 8:30am in the Year 1 classroom. All students are welcome. We have decided to have a 3-week trial period where the students may come and go. If your child wishes to stick with choir after those three weeks, it will be expected that they attend rehearsals on a regular basis. We look forward to seeing you all there!

Mrs Abby Kindelan and Miss Ellie Charlton

Year 5/6 Teacher and Year 1 Teacher

School SZapp

The school has the SZapp available for down loading. This app is great for finding out what is happening at school. The newsletter goes directly to the app and notifications come straight from school. The instructions are as follows.

Uniform Policy

The school uniform represents the pride we have for our children and our school. A smart, neat and user-friendly uniform encourages the children to take pride in their appearance and in the school. The school uniform requirements:

Hats: Our school policy is ‘NO HAT – NO PLAY’. A green school hat must be worn and can be purchased form the office.

Jewellery: The only jewellery allowed is one set of fine studs or sleepers, a chain with some form of religious significance and watches.

Nail Polish: Nail polish is not to be worn.

Hair: Children’s hair must be neat and tidy. If hair is below the collar it needs to be tied back with appropriate white or green accessories. It is expected that hairstyles reflect the code of dress required by the school. The colouring of hair and unusual hairstyles are not acceptable.

Tuition Fees

At Sacred Heart, we have several payment options for your convenience: Cash, Cheque, ETPOS, Direct Debit and Centrepay. For further details on these payment options please see the school office.

Tuckshop

You can ONLY order Tuckshop on the App. Please down load the Flexischools App.

Flexischools App

The tuckshop uses the App called Flexischools. This will make ordering and paying for Tuckshop easier. Attached are the instructions to download and use the App. Make sure you update your child's class name.

Student Protection

At Sacred Heart the safety and wellbeing of our students is our highest priority. All children should grow up free of violence or exploitation and be able to learn in a safe and supported environment. Schools have a number of specific child protection reporting obligations that are detailed in our Student Protection Processes and Guidelines.

It is a legislative requirement that all non-state schools have at least two nominated staff members to whom a student can report the behaviour of another staff member that the student considers inappropriate. We call these specially trained staff members School Student Protection Contacts, or SSPCs. Each SSPC has been nominated by the principal in recognition of their integrity, approachability and knowledge in the area of student protection. Whilst students are encouraged to speak up to any trusted adult in the school community, it is important that they know they can access these specific staff members at any time should they have worries, queries or concerns. You will have noticed posters throughout the school depicting our current SSPCs. The SSPCs are also published on our school website along with information about our student protection processes. In everything we do at Sacred Heart Primary School student safety is our highest priority, therefore the SSPCs at our school are key personnel in our overall safeguarding processes.

If a student wants to talk to someone about harm, abuse or inappropriate behaviour toward themselves or others, they can speak to a trusted staff member or one of our School Student Protection Contacts (SSPCs). The SSPCs receive additional training and are identified in the student protection posters displayed around the school.

Summary documents have been developed for parents and caregivers about our student protection obligations and our broader strategy for maintaining safe school environments.

Further information on all of the above topics can be found on the Toowoomba Catholic Schools website at the link below:

Embed Link - https://www.twb.catholic.edu.au/parents-and-community/student-protection/

Our Schools Student Protection Contacts are:

Miss Ailie Lewis (APRE)
Mrs Carolyn Crick (Administration Officer)
Mr Jesse Kupper (School Guidance Counsellor)
Mrs Cara Haig (Co-Principal)
Mrs Pollyanna Goodman (Co-Principal)

Sacred Heart Parish

Church Times

Saturday 27th April - Mass @ 5.30pm - Father Peter
Sunday 5th May -Liturgy @ 9am
Sunday 12th May - Liturgy @ 9am
Sunday 19th Mayl - Liturgy @ 9am
Saturday 25th May - Mass @ 5.30pm - Father Peter

2024 Term 2 Week 2