Term 1, Week 3, 2021

Principal's Message

Dear Parents,

We are once again working in a year with COVID guidelines and restrictions. We would normally be holding a welcome BBQ around about now to meet together as a community. However, due to our current restrictions, we are not yet able to hold events like that. As a result, we are offering one to one parent teacher meetings. This will allow parents to connect with the class teachers. It will allow our new teachers to meet the parents of students in their class. Information and booking forms were sent home earlier this week. I strongly encourage all parents to make a time to meet with us so that we can learn more about each and every child that we have at our school.

This week, we also sent home Pancake Day ordering forms. Next Tuesday 16th February, we are celebrating Shrove Tuesday at school by having pancakes for recess. We will use this day as an opportunity to fundraise for Caritas. Please return your order and money by Monday.

Next Wednesday 17th February is Ash Wednesday, which highlights the start of Lent. Lent is a season in the church where we are encouraged to turn back to God. Through the practices of prayer, fasting and almsgiving we are able to shift the focus from ourselves to Jesus and others. This is the learning the students will undertake at school during Lent. 

We will be having an Ash Wednesday Liturgy at school in the afternoon. We will endeavour to offer a Zoom link for parents to view this liturgy.

Finally, I came across this advice from Michael Gross, a leading parent educator in Australia. He calls it a ‘Simple formula for parenting’.

Show kids how to behave.

Keep pets to develop nurturance and responsibility.

Be the adult in the parent-child relationship.

Cultivate good manners.

Build character daily.

Catch kids being kind, gentle and strong.

Establish healthy habits early.

Stick to routines.

Have fun.

Eat together every day.

Focus on excellence, not perfection.

Spend individual time with each child each week.

Expect kids to change.

Keep an adult-only place at home.

Admit it when you’re wrong.

Choose time and place to deliver big messages.

Keep the meal table free from arguments.

Prepare for tomorrow the night before.

Expect children to help.

Encourage siblings to apologise.

Send kids to school with breakfast, a kiss and a smile.

Celebrate success as a family.

Spend time in nature together.

Let go.

Regards,

Nathan Trezise

Principal

Zone Swimming

Yesterday, Harry, Ava and Lacey represented MSJ at the Zone Swimming Carnival in Maclean. Congratulations to these students for representing our school proudly! Thanks to Kim Brady for organising this event.  

Stop Motion!

Students in stage 3 are learning about filmmaking - specifically, stop motion this term. This week they engaged with modelling some characters out of plasticine and experimented using the stop motion app on the iPad. Some key learning from students:

"It is more complicated than I first thought, it takes a lot of time to get the detail and only 5 seconds of footage" - Lacey

"We need to adjust out lighting so it doesn't flicker" - Holly

"Our second try was so much better" - Ava

"My iPad needs to be still next time and you need more than one frame to slow it down, especially when there is detail in a character's face." - Cash

Keep an eye out in the coming weeks to see some of the finished projects for this unit of study!

Stage 3, if you are practising at home, remember to use the resources on our Google Classroom to assist with different techniques and for inspiration. 

Aleasa Kermode

Assistant Principal

Stage 3 Stop Motion

Term 1 Swimming Program

Swimming lessons are held each Friday. Swimming is a compulsory part of the PDHPE curriculum. Students will need to bring swimmers, a towel, goggles, a cap and a sun shirt for their lesson. There is no cost for swimming lessons, as the school covers the pool entry fees and payments to the swim teachers. Swimming lessons will take place each Friday in Term 1 at the following times:

Stage 3 at 1pm

Stage 2 at 1.40pm

K - 2 at 2.20pm

Students will walk to and from the pool. Please note, K - 2 students are to be collected from the pool at the end of the day each Friday as their lesson will finish at 3pm. Due to Covid regulations Tracey has asked that parents pick their children up from outside the pool. K - 2 students catching buses will be supervised at Dorrigo Public School by our staff. 

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.

School Bus Travel

Applications for student travel can now apply online. A new

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.

Soccer Registrations Open

The Dorrigo Highlanders Football Club is now taking registrations for Miniroos, Juniors, Intermediate and Senior players in the 2021 North Coast Football season.  Player registrations are also needed to fill a Mixed 14s team.  Register online at www.playfootball.com.au with your Active Kids Voucher.  The NCF season for community club football begins Saturday 13 March.

Canteen

Thank you to this week’s canteen volunteers, who were Michelle Wright, Amii Francis & Alicia Miller, and our muffin-baker Cathy Marsden. 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.

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.

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. 

Updated 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)

Weekly Awards

This week's class awards went to:

Keira Turner - for completing all tasks at a high standard.

Ryan Beaumont - for being a great learner by completing all his tasks.

Piper Boutell - for the fantastic effort you have put in to all our activities so far. Keep it up.

Ethan MacDonell - for sharing the amazing knowledge you have on dinosaurs. Great team work.

Mia Gilbert - for being engaged in your learning, and wonderful work in Maths!

Kyrin Miller - for helping your classmates learn in class and during sport.

Zoe Beckett - for working responsibly in all areas and ensuring tasks are completed accurately.

Cooper Colley - for demonstrating perseverance when modelling claymation characters.

Term 1 School Fees

SCHOOL FEES: Term 1 school fee accounts have been sent home. Term 1 fees are payable by Friday 19th March, 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 2020 school year, following are instructions on how to do this: 

Suggested direct deposit amounts (from beginning of February 2020)

1 student - Term 1 - $326.00 (includes $50 resource fee per student)

      Terms 2, 3 & 4 - $276.00

       $46.16 per fortnight (x 25 fortnights)

       $23.08 per week (x 50 weeks)

2 students – Term 1 - $583.00 (includes $50 resource fee per student)

        Terms 2, 3 & 4 - $483.00 per term

       $81.28 per fortnight (x 25 fortnights)

       $40.64 per week (x 50 weeks)

3 or more students – Term 1 - $771.00 (includes $50 resource fee per student)

       Terms 2, 3 & 4 – $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.

Banancoast 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.

Family Fun Day at Dorrigo Golf Club