What a week!  The spread of the Covid-19 virus is rapidly changing the environment in which we live.  I have been communicating nearly on a daily basis with families this week, as have staff, so I hope you have had a chance to take in all of the changes that are happening at St Joseph’s. 

There will also need to be changes in keeping with social distancing requirements, how visitors/parents access staff and our school.  You have been so accommodating with adapting to the many changes and I thank you for your continued support. 

The best way to contact teachers is via email or phone.  If you have to come into school we ask that you do not come to the staffroom or into classrooms, but rather present to the office.  You are still welcome to discuss issues with your child’s teacher in person, we will just enforce social distancing. I know that our school is small, but we do need to make sure that these protocols are now in place, the health and well-being of students and teachers is vital.

I would like to take this opportunity to sing the praises of my staff who are currently putting in countless hours of preparation above and beyond what they normally do or what is being expected of them.  I am not sure that it is fully understood the extra pressure and expectations on teachers in our country at the moment, and the way in which all of my staff have embraced these challenging times is nothing short of amazing.  Whilst we need to transition to a different form of learning, St Joseph’s is well and truly on the way and I am so pleased with the learning that has been prepared for all students.  Whilst there are many predictions about what the future will hold for schools ie whether they will remain open, we will use the next three weeks to iron out any glitches that may occur.  I again thank you for your patience whilst this is happening.  Any questions regarding your child’s learning staff and myself will be happy to answer, however if you are taking a little time to get familiar with the online platform that is quite OK, I am confident that our students will make the transition easily.

Another gentle remind that I must have in writing if you are keeping your child at home till the end of the term.  Office staff will contact you today if you haven’t already done so.

Stay safe and have a great week.

Kind Regards,

Kirsty Beavan

We are witnessing a new way of life at the moment with COVID-19. In this time of uncertainty may we pause and take some time out for prayer and reflection.

I read a positive post that reminded families about all the things that you can still do while staying at home with your children. Take the time to play games with your children, read, cook or complete farm work with them. Enjoy the time to be just able to be together and acknowledge all the things we can be grateful for – especially our health and the resources we have in our community to ensure we are cared for.

During Lent the students have been following the personal stories of people who have benefitted from our donations through Caritas Australia. Shirley from the Phillippines, trained to become an indigenous health worker and is now able to support her family and community. Phany from Cambodia joined a Caritas program to learn more productive farming techniques and water management to combat drought. Viewing these personal stories certainly opens our eyes to the challenges others face in their daily lives and enables the children to see how their donations can make a difference.

Thank you for the support given to the Easter Raffle organised by Year 6. All money raised will be donated to Caritas Australia. The raffle will be drawn on Tuesday 31^st March, so if you would like any tickets please pop your money into an envelope with your family’s name written on it. Tickets are 50c each.

Our preparations for Holy Week and Easter will certainly be different this year, both for our school and parish, with the cancellation of Liturgies and Mass. I have some Prayer Services, for families to celebrate Holy Week at home, that I will copy and leave out for families to collect when you pick up your school packs. In the religion folder on your child’s google classroom I have added some links for Stations of the Cross and an Online Mass that you might like to access. At this stage the links are not working so I have put them here for families that might like to use them.

Online Mass: https://www.catholicvoice.org.au/mass-online/

Stations of the Cross: https://media.loyolapress.com/assets/lent/stations-eng/stations-eng.html

Caritas: https://lent.caritas.org.au/#blank

Yesterday was the Feast of the Annunciation. This feast day marks the visit of the angel Gabriel to the Virgin Mary, during which he told her that she would be the mother of God.

During the week ahead let us ask Mary to watch over our families and our wider community by saying her special prayer – the ‘Hail Mary’.

Take care of each other this week.

- Liz Murray

PUPIL FREE DAYS - TERM 2

Due to the current climate, pupil free days for Term 2 may change due to a cancellation of Professional Development days the staff were attending.

We will notify all parents by email once we have this clarification.  Thank you for your continued patience.

Thank you to the Robson family who over the past few weeks have sent in boxes of apples for the children.  We really appreciate this kind gesture.

On Monday there will be Maths kit available for each family that contains many things such as counters, playing cards, paddlepop sticks, dice etc that can be used for many of the warm up activities that teachers will set for warm up activities.  There will also be the next week’s schedule which will be emailed to parents and put up on Google classroom for students in Yrs 2 – 6. 

Please let your child’s teacher know if you would like a hard copy of some of the activities.  At this stage we are asking parents to pick up these packs and activities and we will just be planning for a week at a time.

St Joseph’s will have devices for those Kindergarten/Yr 1 students who are at home accessing remote learning and do not have access to a device at home.  It will be a requirement that a device loan agreement will be signed.  Please contact Mrs Beavan if you would like to utilise a school device.

At the end of last week the decision was made by Education Ministers to not proceed with NAPLAN in 2020.  The decision was made to assist school leaders, teachers and support staff to focus on the wellbeing of students and continuity of education, including potential online and remote learning.

Further, the impact of responses to the COVID-19 virus may affect the delivery of NAPLAN testing, including the operation of centralised marking centres and the implications for nationally comparable data if an insufficient number of students are available to do the test.

Kindergarten and Year 1 students have had a busy few weeks. In STEM we practised how to code beebots and moving them around on different mats.

Kindergarten and Year 1 have been learning about Measurement. Through practical activities they are discovering the important big concepts such as measuring objects from the same starting point and no gaps or overlays as this can impact on the final result. On Wednesday they discovered that the smaller the unit of measure they used, the more of that unit they needed. The children compared their results to see if they were measuring accurately.

Today the students made their own tape measures using their handprints and footprints as markers. They had to measure their longest jump. Great conversations occurred when some of the smaller children had more foot markers than some of the older children that had jumped a greater distance. Why was this so?

In Art, we investigated the different colours made from red, blue and yellow ice cubes.

In Maths this week Years 2,3,4 are focusing on fractions. They completed a learning activity called ‘Grandma’s Quilt’ where they had to produce a quilt by creating squares that demonstrated quarters in a variety of ways.

The students enjoyed the ‘Make, Say,Write, Do’ model – creating the quilt, discussing the different combinations they created, as well as drawing and labeling the quilt squares in their books.

Nicholas with his fabulous publication of a non fiction text - Alligator Snapping Turtles

Media leaders Gypsy and Matilda will be interviewing students for the Student Spotlight, where we will learn more about our students at St Joseph's.

This week Ainslie is our Student in the Spotlight.

Who is in your family?

Lauren (Mum), Chris (Dad), Sidonie (sister), Tilly (dog) and Jill (Nan).

What are five words that describe you?

Smart, energetic, sporty, joyful and kind.

What is your favourite part about school?

Reading and writing.

What is your favourite game to play at school?

Handball.

What do you like to do on the weekends?

Play prodigy and sleep in.

What do you want to be when you grow up?

A part of the S.W.A.T force.

Reminder - Western Region Swimming Harden

If you have not paid for Western Region Swimming held at Harden please forward to the school $10 per child.

SZapp allows you to stay connected with St Joseph's and to view and access school newsletters and notifications.

SZapp has a fantastic option which allows you to fill out your children's absentee notes.  This automatically sends an absence note to our office email address.

Download the app using the following instructions, if you have any queries please don't hesitate to contact the office. 

Keep up to date with events happening at St Joseph's via our electronic school calendar (please note dates can be subject to change).