Term 2 - Week 7, 2021

Principal's Message

Dear Parents,

Next week we are once again having a focus on student wellbeing as we celebrate Wellbeing Week. We had our first attempt at this in Term 1 and would like to renew the focus with students for Term 2. Much research has gone into student wellbeing and its link to academic achievement.

Student wellbeing is enhanced by positive relationships, positive emotions, positive health, positive engagement, positive accomplishment and positive purpose. These elements are integral to student wellbeing and flourishing.

Next week students will have the opportunity to flourish through the following activities:

Monday - extra play

Tuesday - morning sing-along before school 

Wednesday - tabloid sports

Thursday - continental breakfast

Friday - Athletics Carnival

Save the date: In addition, we will be hosting a student movie night and parent night on Thursday June 17th from 5:30 pm to 7:00 pm. More information to follow.

We look forward to celebrating and recognising some of the successes of our students throughout the week and giving all of our students the opportunity to thrive. 

Regards,

Nathan Trezise

Principal  

Athletics Carnival - CHANGE OF VENUE

We have had to change the venue of next Friday's Athletics Carnival, as we have discovered the playing fields in Urunga have not been marked out. Instead, we will be holding our carnival over at Dorrigo High School. St Mary's of Bellingen will still be joining us for this event and the canteen will be operating from the Rec grounds and lunches brought over to the High school.

Students will be walking over to Dorrigo High in the morning. After the carnival is finished (approximately 2:15pm) they can be collected from the High School OR they will walk back to school for pick up at 3pm.

New School Website!

We have launched our new school website complete with updated information, pictures, format, and some feature articles of our incredible students hard at work and play! Head over and have a look. You can find dates of upcoming events on the website and learn more about our teaching and learning, and family and school partnerships at Mt St John's. 

Weekly Awards

This week's class awards went to:

Adaline - for trying very hard to follow instructions to complete her activities.

Rory - for trying very hard to complete his work to the very best of his ability.

Darcy - for working hard in spelling lessons to learn your words. Keep it up.

Chloe - for your enthusiastic contributions to our classroom discussions. Great listening and speaking.

Ruby F- for great learning and effort when creating your grid in Maths. 

Zoe - for great learning and showing wonderful effort in your class work.

Holly - for supporting her peers and being tolerant and flexible with them.

Tiernan - for sharing his knowledge on camp, being our tour announcer and telling jokes.

NAIDOC 2021 Colouring In Competition

Hayley and Salena have designed a great picture for you to colour in.

There are some really cool prizes from the NAIDOC merchandise catalogue, like beanies and balls and watches.

Can you please return your completed colouring-ins to Cathy in the office by Friday of Week 8. That is Friday the 11th of June. 

Please remember to put your name and age on the back!

EMU Homework Video Tutorials

Each week, students are encouraged to play some mathematics games at home to help support their learning at school. Our classroom teachers take students through the homework tasks and to assist families to play at home, we are including a video tutorial in the newsletter. 

Kindergarten - EMU Homework (see video below)

Dice Multiplication 

Players roll two dice (e.g. one red and one white). The red dice indicates the numbers of groups to make and the white dice indicates the number in each group. Use counters to make a model of the situation. Each player predicts then proves the total number in their collection. The other players agree or challenge the solution. The player with the fewest items wins the round and earns a point. The first player to score five points is the winner. Imagine one more group. What would your new total be? Imagine one less group. What would be your new total be?

Stage 1 - EMU Homework (see video below)

Snakes and Ladders using two dice.

Add dice and move that number. This is to help develop fluency skills in mental addition, and consolidate their understanding of the directions up and down.

Stage 2 - EMU Homework (see video below)

Number Target

For this activity you will need:

• A piece of paper or whiteboard

• A marker or pencil

• Number cards

Select a number card from the 0-100 pack (if playing along at home, you can just pick the number yourself). Using the number on the card selected, see how many different combinations you can come up with that equal the number on your card. E.g. if your card says 23 you might write that 20+3 =23 and 17 + 6 =23 etc.

If you’d like to make this a challenge you can try to come up with 3 or more numbers that add together to make the number on your card. E.g. 20+1+2= 23 or add another card to the mix so you have a 3 or 4 digit number. 

Stage 3 - EMU Homework (see video below)

Heads or Tails?

This game improves your child's ability to read numbers of any size. First, negotiate how many digits you want your numbers to be; e.g. for 4 digits, deal out 4 cards. You and your child will make a number of your own. Reveal your numbers to one another, ensuring you and your child read them correctly. Flip a coin. If it lands on heads, the highest number wins. If it lands on tails, the lowest number wins. You might like to play the first to 5, or the first to 10 depending on time. To add interest to the game you might agree to swap a  card.

Parish Sacrament of Confirmation Program 2021

This year, the Confirmation preparation program will be parish-based and run over ten weeks  (excluding school holidays) in the parish centre meeting room in Bellingen. 

A child is eligible for the sacrament of Confirmation if they are baptised Catholic, between the  ages of 8 and 15 years, and should be attending Sunday (or Saturday night) Mass every week. Enrolment and Parental Authority forms are available from the parish office and must be  collected before the day of the Parent Meeting. To obtain the forms you will need to bring with you your child’s baptism certificate (no photocopies) plus proof of ID (e.g. photo driver’s license) for all legal  guardians of your child. 

The completed enrolment form (and Parental Authority form) is to be brought to the Parent  Meeting at the Parish Centre Meeting Room on Wednesday 26th May at 7pm. Your child’s enrolment will take place at that meeting. Enrolment forms will not be available at the Parent Meeting. For more information, please contact the Parish Office on 6655 1448. 

The Sacrament of Confirmation will be celebrated by Bishop Gregory on 9th August 2021. 

Parent Assembly Recruitment

Library Day - Wednesday

Library day for all students is Wednesday - please make sure your child brings in his or her cloth library bag on this day. Each student may borrow four books per week. 

School Uniform Items Available

We have a stock of school uniform items available for purchase from the front office. We accept cash, cheque or bank transfer. Uniform prices are as follows:

School hats - $15

School shirts - $25

Skorts - $20

Shorts - $20

Rain jackets - $50

We also have some items available to buy from our 2nd-hand uniform pool.

Canteen

Thank you to today's canteen volunteers, who were Nicola Beckett & Amii Francis. If anyone is available to volunteer in our canteen one or more Fridays per term, please contact our canteen co-ordinator Alicia on 0488 280683. If we have no volunteers available we will have to cancel canteen for that week.

A reminder to place your canteen order before Thursday night each week.

Please note - if you top up your canteen account via bank transfer, the funds will take a week to clear so you will not be able to order canteen immediately. 

Please send your lunch wallets into school and we will keep them here.

Looking After Your Dog and Your Cat

Soon there are going to be free talks on looking after your dog or your cat.  They will be after school on Friday afternoon at Hickory House.

You need to know how to feed you dog or your cat properly so that they don’t get sick, or perhaps should be taken to a vet who is a doctor for animals.  You also need to know how to tell that they are sick. After all, they can’t say “Mum, I don’t feel well.”

Also what to do if your pet is injured, perhaps hit by a car.  Dogs might bite you if you try to help them, other times they will love you even more.

U3A which stands for University of the Third Age has been organising talks on keeping animals healthy.  We have talked about cattle and horses and now it is the turn of dogs and cats.

The talks are free, at 4.00pm on Friday 28th May and 4^th June and will be given by local vet, Monica Darke.

 Friday 4.00pm to 5.00pm at Hickory House, admission free.

For more information, call Nick Wright on 0427 578015.

Messy Church

School Bus Travel

Applications for student travel can now be made online. Apply here 

School Drive Subsidy

The School Drive Subsidy is available for eligible school students where there is no public transport available for all or part of the journey. If you have to drive your child more than 1.6km to a school bus stop, you may be eligible for this subsidy – go to the link below to apply. 

Head Lice

If you notice head lice on your child, please treat his or her hair ASAP and notify the school that you did this. Remember – long hair must be tied back at school.

After School Lego at Dorrigo Library

Working With Children Check

For those parents who are volunteers at school, such as canteen helpers, we need to ensure that you have a current Working with Children (Volunteers) Check. To apply for this check, go to 

COVID Student Attendance

Staff and students exhibiting even mild COVID-19 symptoms should be sent home and are required to produce proof of a negative COVID-19 test before returning to school. 

As per these guidelines, a screenshot of the text message, confirming a Negative result, is all that will be required to return to school. 

Instrumental Music With Hazel

We have music tutor available to teach instrumental music through private tuition. Hazel Buchanan is interested in working with our students. Hazel can teach:

- flute

- clarinet

- saxophone

- oboe

- bassoon

- trumpet

- trombone

- percussion

- bass guitar

The school owns a flute and a clarinet, which are available for families to borrow long-term at no cost. The payments for lessons are billed each term and paid directly to Hazel. An Essential Element Band Book will be supplied by the school too.

Students wishing to learn these instruments can do so in individual lessons or in small groups depending on the instrument chosen. It is hoped that one day, we can start a small ensemble or band for instrumental students to play together. 

If you are interested in taking up this opportunity, please contact Hazel directly on 0458 572 525.

Lessons will take place on Fridays. 

School Bell Times

This year we have modified our bell times.  The current times are as follows:

8:55 am - 11:00 am English Block

11:00 am - 11:15 am Lunch (children sit and eat)

11:15 am - 11:35 am Lunch Play

11:35 am - 12:55 pm Mathematics Block

12:55 pm - 1:05 pm Recess (children sit and eat)

1:05 pm - 1:20 pm Recess Play

1:20 pm - 3:05 pm Other Key Learning Areas (Science, Arts, History etc)

Term 2 School Fees

SCHOOL FEES: Term 2 fees are now due, unless you are paying by regular direct deposit amounts. 

Several payment methods are available; 

• Regular direct deposit payments (see suggested amounts below).
• Lump sum direct deposit
• Cash
• Cheque

If you are planning to set up regular direct deposit school fee payments for the 2021 school year, following are instructions on how to do this: 

Suggested direct deposit amounts (from beginning of February 2021)

1 student - Term 2 - $276.00

       $46.16 per fortnight (x 25 fortnights)

       $23.08 per week (x 50 weeks)

2 students - Term 2 - $483.00

       $81.28 per fortnight (x 25 fortnights)

       $40.64 per week (x 50 weeks)

3 or more students  - Term 2 – $621.00

       $105.36 per fortnight (x 25 fortnights)

       $52.68 per week (x 50 weeks)

If you would like to arrange a regular direct debit payment from your Bananacoast Credit Union account into the school’s account, the BCU Credit Union in Dorrigo will organize this for you.

When using Internet banking, please use your child’s surname as a reference.

Bananacoast Community Credit Union   BSB no. 533-000

Account no. 3282 0430                 Name: Mt St John’s Primary School

GLUE

GLUE: "God Loves Us Eternally" (formerly GFS) is on each Wednesday from 3-5pm at the Anglican Hall. Afternoon tea, games, fun worship and craft. All primary kids welcome, as are newcomers. For more info, ring Gwenneth on 6657 2135. COVID-safe practices will apply.

Nutrition Snippet