Newsletter Thursday 16th February, 2023

We the staff of St Patrick’s acknowledge the traditional owners, the Kulin nations, of the land on which we learn and play.

We pay respects to the Aboriginal Elders, past and present, who are our teachers.

We thank them for taking care of children and country for countless generations.

Good afternoon parents, carers and guardians,

Next week marks the beginning of Lent as we celebrate Ash Wednesday and remember the sacrifices that our Lord Jesus made for us. This year, the teachers are speaking to the students about how we can have a change of heart. We know that Christ made the ultimate sacrifice for us so that we could live on to spread his message of love. It is important that the students understand that these sacrifices can hopefully pave the way for a new and brighter direction and look to how they can be the positive change for all.

Can you believe we have reached the end of week 4?? And already so much has happened. We have had our beginning of the year mass and our captains with their badges. The students were so well behaved and remained reverent throughout the mass.

Last Friday, our Foundation students went to mass for the first time with the parishioners and they enjoyed the celebration with Fr Paul. Fr Paul commended the students on their behaviour as did many parishioners.

Next week, our year 2s begin their swimming lessons for the next 2 weeks. We will also be seeing the implementation of NAPLAN for our 3s and 5s in the next few weeks so school is off to an incredible start. As a staff we are promoting our Whole School Approach to Positive Behaviour Support (WSAPBS) and it has been so pleasing to see the students respond well to this. The students move safely through the school, they look out for one another and are able to articulate and demonstrate our values of Respect, Safety, Co-operation and Resilience!

A HUGE thank you to all parents for the support of the school as we implement new changes around our classroom opening times. I understand that with any changes made, this may cause concern for families especially at the beginning of a school year, however the positivity with which these changes have been received is heartening. This is always my hope and dream that school and home will work together to ensure the best outcomes for our students.

Shrove Tuesday

This will take plae on Tuesday next week. The students will be eating pancakes and learning about this lenten traditiion in thier classrooms. A note has been sent to all families informing you of the ingredients in the pancakes, jam and butter we are purchasing for the children. If your child has an allergy to any of these products, please feel free to prepare your own pancakes and send them with your child to school to enjoy with their classmates.

Heatwave

Tomorrow the forecast temperature for Pakenham is set to be around the 39-40-degree mark. The school will be monitoring the temperature at 11am and decide around if the students can go out to play. Generally, once the temperature is over 34 degrees, we will keep them inside.

Also there will be no assembly tomorrow due to the heat.

Take care and God Bless

Meg

PARENTS PLEASE TAKE NOTE

Parents are NOT to use the student’s toilets. If in the event, you are needing to use the toilet, please approach the school office. Due to Child Safety regulations, no adult is to be using the toilets allocated for students. Parents will be approached by staff and given a reminder if we see this. Thank you for your understanding.

NAPLAN 2023:

All year 3 and 5 students will be completing NAPLAN testing, below is a list of those dates:

Wednesday 15^th March - Writing

Thursday 16^th March - Reading

Monday 20^th March - Maths

Tuesday 21^st March - Conventions of Language

Changes to the school timetable

Due to changes in our school timetable, please note the change of time that our classrooms will be open in the mornings.

Students can still be dropped off at 8.30am. Please do not drop off any earlier than this.

The gates will open 8.30 - students will gather in the colonnade to be supervised. Please do not leave your children UNSUPERVISED! The children are not supervised outside of the school premises.

8.40- Specialist teachers and leadership on duty- Children are to leave their bags outside their classrooms and they can then move to the basketball court with a teacher.  

8.50- Classrooms will open and children will move off the yard and head into class.

Please note, this does not mean that parent cannot enter the classrooms. They are still able to drop off their child/ren to the classes and pop in and say hello. Please remember however, this is the time that the students will begin to be getting settled for the day, so any conversations that need to be had with your child’s teacher, must be arranged at another time suitable for both parties.

Accessing your PAM accounts 2023

Due to an upgrade to our Parent Access Module (PAM), all parents will need to reset their password before regaining access to your PAM. Your user name remains the same which is your email address. You should have received an email asking you to reset the password for PAM.

If you have any concerns, please contact Alex in the office on 5943 9000 or ataylor@stppakenham.catholic.edu.au

School Uniforms

At St Patrick’s, it is important to highlight to students the message around respecting our school uniform. The uniform represents our school and is expected to be worn with pride. Please be aware that I will approach and ask students about their uniform and will follow up with parents if necessary.

Please write a note to your child/ren’s classroom teacher if there is an issue with the inform for a particular period of time.

Some reminders:

• Socks- are to be ankle socks; white for girls and grey for boys
• Students are to wear black shoes and NOT (black) runners. Runners may be brought to school for your child/ren to change into for the playtimes;
• Girls are permitted to wear the school (Summer) dress or the school shirt and grey shorts
• Boys wear the grey shorts in Summer and the long grey pants in Winter (they may choose to continue wearing the shorts.)
• Sports uniform consists of the polo shirt with the school logo and the green track pants or green unisex shorts.
• School sports jacket is optional in the cooler months.

Homework

After careful consideration and referring to long held research, the students of St Patrick’s will no longer be completing homework.

John Hattie who is a well renowned professor of Education and Director at Melbourne University Research Education unit, has completed many detailed studies on the effect that homework has on student outcomes. His finding is this:

‘Homework in primary school has zero effect.’ 

Instead we will continue to encourage all families to read with and to their children at every available opportunity.

Your children will continue to bring home books each week from school and they will continue to visit the school library on a weekly basis.

There are many opportunities for incidental learning to occur. This may happen whilst shopping, cooking, completing jobs around the house, during sports activities and just spending quality time together as a family. The other powerful tool is for families to reinforce any learning they have undertaken through these incidental learning opportunities that present themselves every day.