Our Explicit Improvement Agenda

Student Voice and Agency

Planning for Improved Student Learning - key focus in Mathematics

Welcome to the 2024 School Year and celebrations of Learning

We warmly welcome you to the beginning of the school year.  It is fantastic to have our students back at school, ready to begin another year of learning and growing.  We especially welcome our Foundation students and congratulate them on the way they have settled into school life and routines.  They have been amazing in being able to find their way around and getting ready to start their day of learning. In this week’s newsletter our Foundation students share their thoughts on beginning school.  Congratulations to all students on the way they have established learning expectations in their classrooms as part of our Learning to Learn inquiry focus and our Whole School Approach to Positive Behaviour Support [WSAPBS].  Students have embraced agency in their learning and creating their classroom spaces to fully optimise their learning opportunities.

We warmly welcome Fr. Michael Willemsen to our Parish and our new staff members Claire Knight (5CK), Ciara Nelson (3CN) and Joshua Kippen (6JK).  We welcome all staff back to the 2024 school year and feel so blessed to have such a dedicated and committed staff who worked during the holiday period to ensure the beginning of the year went smoothly for our students and families.  

Our explicit improvement agenda focus in 2024 will focus on embedding:

• Student voice and agency
• Planning for improved student learning - key focus in Mathematics.

We are very much looking forward to the year ahead, celebrating our student’s learning, growth and achievements. 

Student Feedback

We are very excited to introduce a new initiative this year to acknowledge and make visual our student feedback in our school community.  Each week we invite all staff to contribute positive feedback on student learning behaviours and achievements that have been noticed and celebrated throughout the week.  Please see the Student Feedback section of this week's newsletter to see  all the amazing things our students have demonstrated or participated in the past weeks - congratulations and thank you.

The Resilience Project - TRP

Class teachers and specialist staff have been busy over the past week becoming familiar with - The Resilience Project.  As mentioned in previous correspondence, TRP is an evidence based program which will complement our existing Wellbeing initiatives and includes key focus areas to explicitly teach emotional literacy, connection, purpose and kindness under the GEM framework - Gratitude, Empathy and Mindfulness.  Students are provided with a TRP journal and there is a dedicated time each week in our students’ timetable to focus on TRP and our students’ wellbeing.  

Year 6 Student Leaders

The 2024 Year 6 Student Leaders were presented with their badges during our beginning of the school year Mass last Thursday morning.  Our warmest congratulations to our 2024 Student Leaders, we know they will be exemplary role models in our school community:

• School Leaders Alyra and Jovan
• Faith Leaders Dior and Jayden
• Learning Leaders Tiffany and Jeremy
• Environment Leaders Sophie and Adam
• Eden House Leader Romeo
• Portland House Leader Leo
• Penola House Leader Hanisi
• Fitzroy House Leader Milania

Shrove Tuesday, Ash Wednesday and the season of Lent

Please refer to Religious Education section in the newsletter for information on Shrove Tuesday (13 February), Ash Wednesday (14 February) and the Season of Lent (including class Project Compassion).  

Permission eforms were sent out to all families via PAM this week and must be completed by TODAY if you wish your child to participate in the pancake eating next week.  Unfortunately children who do not have a completed permission form will not be able to participate.

Student Learning Conversations (Parent Teacher Interviews)

The beginning of the year Student Learning Conversations will be held on:

• Wednesday 6 March, 2023 from 3.40 pm - 6.20 pm
• Thursday 7 March, 2023 from 3.40 pm - 6.20 pm

The purpose of this time is to acquaint yourself with your child’s teacher and for your child to share their learning data, goals and strategies for the Term.  As a school we value the opportunity for students to be active in their learning, to meet with parents and to establish a positive working partnership for the 2024 school year.  More information will be sent home to parents regarding the booking process for the Student Learning Conversations in the coming weeks.

Newsletter

The newsletter is published weekly each Thursday afternoon.  We strongly encourage you to subscribe to the Mary MacKillop SchoolZine App to receive the newsletter, school information, updates on school events, alerts and emergency information.

We look forward to an exciting year of learning and working in partnership with you.