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Dear Parents and Carers,
St Joseph's Day
It was great to see the community gather as one community on the feast day of St Joseph, our Patron Saint. The children’s first experience of Mass with the parish this year was a beautiful event. Many parishioners commented that they were very impressed with the involvement of the school children and loved sharing this special feast day with them. We presented the children with prizes for our Annual St Joseph’s Art Competition and had a ball playing games and building in the shade area.
St Joseph's Day Fun Activities
Harmony Day
We followed up our St Joseph’s Day celebrations, by celebrating Harmony Day the next day. It was great to see some of the children wear some traditional dress proudly and celebrating their cultural roots.
Feeling the Love on Harmony Day
Student Pickup Survey
The results are in!!! If you remember, in the last newsletter, I asked all families to participate in a survey about student pickup in the afternoons. We had 151 families vote in the survey. 104 of these have requested that the current arrangements stay in place. Thank you for the responses, this has been the best response the school has seen in a survey. With just over two thirds of the families wanting to keep what we have in place, we will continue these arrangements.
Enrolments Open
2024 enrolments are now open. If you have a child who will be starting Kindergarten (or any other year level) in 2024, please get in contact with the front office so they can give you an enrolment pack. If you prefer, you can email us at admin@kilabenbay.catholic.edu.au and we will book an appointment or send an enrolment pack home with a sibling. If you have friends who want to enrol their children please tell them to get in contact with us. We will be holding an information night soon at the school to showcase our excellence in learning and what a great community we are! More information will be released via Facebook and Compass when we have it.
Important Dates
See "Dates to Remember" later in the newsletter.
Pupil Free Day
Reminder that the school will be having a pupil free day on the 24 April. School will resume in Term 2 on Wednesday 26 April. You will be reminded of these activities throughout the week at a glance Compass post each week.
We are in the process of finalising dates for different events at the end of the year. We will get these out as soon as possible. I know that some of our Year 6 families are planning ahead for their children’s graduation with families, we will let you know as soon as we can.
Communication
The main form of communication is Compass. However, I regularly email parents,
particularly if your child will be receiving and award. I have been told that my emails have been going to the junk mail. Please check you junk mail. If you find an email from me in your junk file add me to the safe senders list so you get it direct. If you would like to contact me directly my email address is:
brad.fuller@mn.catholic.edu.au
Take care, celebrate often and go gently
Brad Fuller
Principal
Positive Behaviour for Learning (PBL)
Our school is a Positive Behaviour for Learning school.
St Joseph’s fortnightly focus for Weeks 10 & 11 will be:
‘I am a learner and let others learn’
This focus helps each child to become an excellent learner.
NAPLAN
We wish to congratulate our Year 3 and 5 students for their perseverance and
determination during the recent NAPLAN assessments.
Attendance
Students must attend school regularly so they can achieve their educational best and increase their career and life options.
Please provide an explanation for any absence your child has. Absences can be explained by "Adding a note" in Compass if it's a whole day absence. Sending an email to admin@kilabenbay.catholic.edu.au or by phoning the school office, or sending your child’s teacher a written note. Please do not add notes in Compass for partial attendance (e.g. if you are attending a medical appointment for part of the day). Partial attendances must be signed in or out on the kiosk in the school reception.
Our school and the Catholic Schools Office (CSO) is committed to ensuring its schools meet NSW Education Standards Authority (NESA) attendance requirements and have in place policies and procedures to ensure regular attendance and a response to non-attendance. For more information on attendance, please view the attached policy.
Thank you
Courtney Porter
Assistant Principal
St Joseph’s Day
On Monday it was lovely to celebrate the Feast of St Joseph with Mass, over at the church, and activities in the afternoon. 3/4 Blue did an amazing job helping Father John lead and celebrate St Joseph! Thank you to Anne Neems for her hard work in organising this Mass.
Since the 10th century, this feast day has been observed as the principal feast day of St. Joseph in Western Christianity and commemorates the life of Joseph: The husband of Mary and earthly father of Jesus. Joseph is the patron saint of the Universal Church, families, fathers, expectant mothers, travellers, immigrants, house sellers and buyers, craftsmen, engineers and working people, among others as well as the namesake of our school.
In the lead up to this day, all students also participated in our St Joseph’s Art Competition. Congratulations to the winners whose artworks are now on display in the school foyer:
K Maroon: Jonathan V
1 Maroon: Adelyn F
1 Blue: Ivanna M
2 Maroon: Juliana J
2 Blue: Emily P
3/4 Maroon: Ruby M
3/4 Blue: Tex L
5/6 Maroon: Mia R
5/6 Blue: Abigail S
5/6 White: Evanna S
St Joseph's Day Artists
Another big thank you goes out to the Sport Captains! They helped me to collect lots and lots of large sticks for the nature play shade activity in the afternoon and ran the old fashioned game rotations. All of the teachers were very impressed with how organised and clear they were when instructing students on what to do. Well done Evanna, Ruby, Sophie and Charlotte!
Harmony Day:
On Tuesday, we celebrated Harmony Week with a morning Liturgy under the COLA lead by Mr Hession. Thank you to Mr Hession and all students involved, you did a great job leading us all! It was a beautiful gathering to remind us that we are all made in the image of God and helped us to remember to honour our uniqueness, our heritage and our cultural and religiously diverse backgrounds - to recognise that everyone belongs!
Lent:
This Sunday will be the fifth Sunday of Lent. On Sunday we will also celebrate the Way of the Cross over on the church grounds. The event will start at 3pm on Sunday 26 March, with students from our school as well as many other schools in our diocese participating. Please come along to support our students and walk the Lenten journey of the Way of the Cross. Afternoon tea will also be provided after.
Caritas:
Please continue to donate any spare change to Caritas over these last weeks of Term 1.
For All Future Generations
Spanning across the six weeks of Lent each year, Project Compassion brings thousands of Australian schools, parishes and supporters together to raise funds for people living in some of the most vulnerable communities across the world.
Each class has a Project Compassion box in their classroom. If you have any loose
change in the car, between the lounge cushions, in that stationary ‘odds and ends’ draw or coins laying around anywhere at home, that is spare change and can be donated to this great cause, please send it in to school with your child/ren to add to their class Project Compassion box.
CariTAP:
One of the fun ways students can donate to Project Compassion is to donate $2 to our fundraiser ‘CariTAP’ and help fill a bucket of water, for either Mr Fuller, Mrs Porter or Ms James, which will be poured over these teacher’s heads at THIS WEDNESDAY!
Feel free to join us under the COLA for assembly and as it will also Welcoming Wednesday.
Project Compassion Stories:
Over the last two weeks the Mini Vinnies leaders have been sharing the stories of people, who have been helped by Caritas, with the other students during assemblies.
Today I would like to tell you about a really inspiring man. His name is Thu and he lives in Vietnam. When Thu was just 12 years old, he stood on a landmine and his leg had to be removed. Despite this, Thu grew up and married, taking loving care of his family. Then, tragedy struck again when his wife suffered a stroke and was unable to walk. Thu needed to help his wife at home and had to support his family alone. At that time, Caritas stepped in to offer Thu a loan to help him start a new business. Today, Thu runs a barber shop. Caritas also helped organise a physiotherapist to help his wife learnt to walk a little. Caritas is a really important organisation and it would be great for us to help by donating to them. Then they can continue to help others in need. Alannah R
Sad News
Many in our community will remember a beloved teacher, Mr Graham Jennings, who taught at St Joseph's for many years. Mr Jennings is enjoying his retirement but please say a prayer for his wonderful mother Veronica who passed away recently, aged 95 years. May her soul and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.
Term 1 dates for the calendar:
- Sunday 26th March 3pm: The Way of the Cross held on the church grounds.
- Wednesday 29th March: CariTAP teachers getting wet at the end of awards assembly under the COLA!
- Holy Week Celebrations in the Church:
o Monday 3rd April 9:30am: Palm Sunday Celebration
o Wednesday 5th April 9:30am: Holy Thursday Celebration
o Thursday 6th April: Good Friday Celebration - children wear sport uniform (Easter hat parade in the afternoon)
God Bless,
Taylor James
RE Co-ordinator
The Library is open during lunch times on Wednesday – Friday. The children love coming in to enjoy books, chess, games and
It is a great social activity for them and it’s lovely to watch them interact with each other and enjoy creating. Students are also able to borrow during these lunchtimes. Students are currently enjoying our Lego display.
Library Borrowing
Library borrowing occurs weekly for students.
Students are able to keep the books for two weeks, although most return them for new ones each week. If students would like to keep books for longer than 2 weeks, we ask that they bring them to the Library and renew them.
Infants borrowing day is Monday.
Primary borrowing is Tuesdays.
All students need a library bag to borrow from our Library. This helps protect our lovely books.
School Library bags are available for $14 for anyone who needs one. Kinder students do not have to buy a bag, as the school will provide them one.
Library Helpers
I am very blessed to have some wonderful helpers in the library. Our Library monitors volunteer at lunchtimes to help organise resources, put books away and keep the Library neat and tidy. THANK YOU to those students.
PRC
The Premier’s Reading Challenge is an initiative by the NSW Government that encourages a love of reading in students from Kinder to Year 9. It is not a competition but a challenge to each student to read widely and enjoy reading. Students are each given an individual username and password to log onto the PRC website. There they can add the PRC books they have read to their reading record. Students who complete the challenge will have their names displayed in the library and the newsletter. At the end of the year they will receive a certificate to show their achievement. At St Joey’s we also like to celebrate with a Pizza Party for those students that complete the challenge in term four. The challenge continues until 19th August.
The PRC Website can be found here:
Students in Infants that are participating in the PRC can count the books read in Library as part of their PRC reading records. This term during Library lessons, students have read the following PRC books:
Kindergarten
I Went Walking by Sue Machin,
Too Many Elephants in this House by Ursula Dubosarsky,
Elephant (Watch me grow) by Dorling Kindersley
Mr McGee and the Big Bag of Bread by Pamela Allen
Year 1 & 2
Mr McGee and the Big Bag of Bread by Pamela Allen
Year 5: Grace S. Kobe J.
Year 6: Naomi D. Mia R. Sienna B.
Book Club
At St Joseph’s we participate in Scholastic Book Club. This provides families with an easy way to encourage your children to read. Twice each term students will bring home a catalogue of affordable and fun books that you may purchase. All money spent through Book Club benefits the school, as a percentage of money raised is given back to the school as reward points for the Library to purchase fantastic resources.
The current Bookclub is due: March 24th
Sora
St Joseph’s has a subscription to SORA. Sora is an eBook and audio book Library. As part of the Australian Catholic Education Network (ACEN) member collection, your child can access eBooks and audio books through the Maitland Newcastle Diocese.
All you need to do is to download the SORA app or go to the website and sign in through the
ACEN membership, then you and your child can enjoy some terrific books on your devices at home.
One of the great features of SORA is the inclusion of a Premier Reading Challenge book section. Graphic novels, Fiction and Non-Fiction books are also available.
Log in and explore today.
If you have any questions about anything in the Library, feel free to send me an email.
Happy reading,
Leah Hannan
Teacher Librarian and ER Teacher
Where has the term gone?! We are finding ourselves in Week 9 already. What a busy and exciting start to the year it has been with lots of learning and lots of fun.
I wanted to share the following information with our parents/carers in our school community:
The Council of Catholic School Parents NSW/ACT has arranged for Dr Justin Coulson PhD to present a FREE webinar on the important topic of Anxiety and Resilience.
This webinar is for parents, carers and staff in NSW and ACT Catholic schools. It will be held on Wednesday 29 March at 7.00pm.
You can register using this QR code
or
Wishing you a happy and healthy week
Mel Dobosz
Pastoral Care Worker
Disco!
It's time to buy your tickets on Qkr! for the Term 1 Disco - next Thursday night. The children have a great time at this very social event. All proceeds to the P & F Fundraising projects:
Easter Raffle!
Tickets for the Easter Raffle were sent home yesterday. Lots of great prizes made from your generous donations! See below for details:
Your generous support helps fundraising for your child/ren's school! Thank you.
P & F Association
Reminder - Special Food Day - Pizza - Wednesday 30 March - Order by Tue 10am on Qkr!
Please note that slushies are available again
But we also have Nippy's frozen cups (kids call them Ice Crushers).
Supply of hash browns is very difficult and we have had to temporarily delete them from the menu. They will be reinstated as soon as supply is available.
Here is the latest menu for your reference. Please send any questions to admin@kilabenbay.catholic.edu.au or call the school office on 4959 1355
Some reminders:
Pre-ordered frozen beverages
Supply Changes
Please note that vegemite scrolls are no longer available but we will trial our own vegemite and cheese rolls - see Qkr to order.
Also now available are bacon and cheese rolls.
Lunch Order Issues
Volunteer Roster
Every helper is so appreciated and we extend our sincere thanks to our wonderful regulars, together with the new volunteers who are just starting out. Although a couple of new people have registered (big thanks!), we will need more people. As with any volunteer position at school you must be registered.
If you are able to offer help, please send an email to admin@kilabenbay.catholic.edu.au and Margaret Livingstone or Susie Doran will help with your volunteer registration.
See below for the Roster for remainder of term 1. Thank you to our wonderful volunteers! Your children would not benefit from all the canteen has to offer without you!!
If you are unable to make it on your rostered day, please either text Tracey or call the school office:
Week 10
Wed 29.3.2023 - Michelle Cherniayeff, Jade Davison
Thur 30.3.2023 - Merryn Compton, Emma Douglas
Fri 31.3.2023 - Sarah Morris, Cheryl Henriques
Week 11
Wed 5.4.2023 - Andrew Edwards, Callan Douglas
Thur 6.4.2023 - Tania Bower, Elise Fitzpatrick
Over the Counter Sales / Recess Qkr ordering
Some healthy snack items are available for pre-order and payment on Qkr for Recess.
If you would like your child to have a recess snack, please place a comment in the "note to staff" section when selecting your item.
Thank you
Margaret Livingstone
and Tracey Ryan-Ward
Unless otherwise stated, the advertisements placed in this newsletter are by independent third parties who have no legal relationship with the Diocese. The activities or services of the advertiseers are not supervised or controlled in any way by the Diocese. The Diocese is not in a position to endorse the advertisers of the services provided and makes no representation about those matters. Accordingly, the Diocese cannot accept any responsibility for the advertisers of the activities or services that are the subject of these advertisements.
We have a number of students who have life threatening anaphylactic allergic reactions to all nuts and eggs. We would like to encourage families NOT to send these food items to school with their children or to ask their children to tell their teacher if they have brought them, so that they can be eaten away from affected children. We also encourage children NOT to share food at school.