St Anthony's School Term 2 Week 8 2022
Principal's News
Welcome to our Week 8 newsletter! I cannot believe that we are officially down to our last 11 days of the school term. It is at this time of the term when we all start to feel the effects of wintery mornings and long weeks! We also have quite a lot of sickness about at the moment!
We still have a number of active Covid cases throughout the school as well as a nasty flu. Please keep your child at home if he/she is unwell to avoid the spread of nasty germs.
Teachers are well and truly in the thick of finalising Semester One reports. These will have a different format this year as they are being generated through our Sentral system and will be uploaded to the Portal in the last week of this term. We will notify you via the Parent Portal once these are available. There will be no paper copies of reports provided to parents.
Pizza & Disco Evening
It was lovely to finally gather at a school social event on Friday evening to enjoy our Pizza and Disco evening. Thank you to our small, consistent and passionate band of parent helpers who ensure we can offer these events each term.
PPF Meeting - All Welcome!
At our next PPF gathering on June, 14th at 6.30pm in the staffroom we will have discussion around our Term 3 event and if we can continue to offer such important opportunities of engagement if we don’t have the personnel to commit to ensuring they come to fruition. When we work together, these events don’t take a lot of organising but do tend to burn out the small group who do the work each time. We would love to see some new faces on Tuesday!
Bullying
We are highly aware of the insidious nature of bullying and recent nationwide initiatives to rid this cowardly behaviour which are well worth government funding. Throughout each term as a whole staff, we spend considerable time talking to students about the issue. Educating our student body regarding what bullying is and is not, is key. The Daniel Morcombe curriculum is mandated in our Toowoomba Catholic Schools system and linked to the health curriculum and the 3 R’s - Recognise, React and Report are steps we teach to encourage students to take a stand against bullying or any behaviour where someone’s safety and wellbeing is jeopardised. As I often say to students, we need you to help us by being extra eyes and ears as we can’t be everywhere all the time and the true nature of a bullying behaviour is that it is often out of sight of teachers.
“Is there bullying at this school?” is a common question raised at enrolment interviews. I can’t promise any parent that there won’t be a case of bullying here at St Anthony’s and a message we promote strongly is that we are all responsible for our own actions. The only person who controls my actions is me. Trust me if I had a magic wand and could control everyone else’s actions, I would probably be out of a job! When you have 260 students on one campus all interacting with each other in the classroom and playground, we are bound to encounter conflict and we do. We’re not here to blame or judge personal circumstances or various home environments, but here at St Anthony’s we expect students to follow our St Anthony’s Way and abide by explicitly taught social behaviours and if these are not adhered to then there is a consequence. While I can’t guarantee safety of a school free of incidents, what I can promise is that we will never ignore bullying that is reported to us and that as a strong and supportive community we will do all we can to ensure that every student at the school will feel safe.
A St Anthony’s Behaviour Support Plan exists at the school and is regularly reviewed. Like all behaviours, I believe they should all be dealt with on an individual basis. From my experience here we have not experienced any severe cases of bullying. More commonly we experience name-calling and teasing that can escalate as parties attempt to have the last word in an argument. Adults too have been guilty of not checking out the facts. People, young or old, love a story. Whether or not the facts are true often does not matter as much as sharing the story with whoever will listen. This can and does cause people great harm. All of us have a responsibility not to participate in tearing down someone else’s reputation. We implore students all the time to report immediately if there is an incident. It is much easier to deal with facts in a timely manner than trying to recall the events of an historical incident. Far too often, teachers only hear of it after a long period of time has passed and as a result, it is very difficult to resolve the issue. The more knowledge I gain regarding the development of the young brain, the more I have come to believe a child who says ‘I can’t remember’.
The vast majority of disagreements, perceived relationship issues etc. can be resolved fairly simply if those who can make a difference are informed. It is always better to deal with issues before they go too far. Please encourage your children not to be reluctant to share their concerns at school and at home.
We also urge students in the first instance to be resilient. That is, some stuff you just learn to put up with – life and people are not always fair, if however, a pattern develops, and the next skill they need is to be assertive. To learn to say, calmly and directly, “Stop I don’t like that, give it a break!” If then, the perpetrators continue, the inappropriate behaviour needs to be reported.
Everyone needs to expect respect. This is a core element of our beliefs here at St Anthony’s and is central to our school culture. All of us have a part to play, especially those who witness people being treated unjustly. This will lead to encouraging kids to be courageous and call out inappropriate or poor behaviour, especially behaviours that are directed at those who can’t stand up for themselves.
CCTV Cameras
In the coming weeks, we are installing 9 CCTV cameras around the school. The intent of these is to be able to monitor activity on the school grounds outside of school hours, but this will also give us extra eyes for around the school during school hours as an extra safety measure.
I am more than happy to discuss any matter pertaining to any students here at St Anthony’s at a mutually agreeable time. When dealing with consequences for children, we refer to our guiding policy regarding this in the best interest of all parties and the facts that we have been able to obtain. We make a decision at a school level regarding the consequence for behaviour misdemeanors here at school. We don’t seek input from parents regarding this consequences for behaviour. We make the decision based on the whole story from all involved parties. When your child is relaying his/her version of events there is always another side or several sides to the story also.
As the majority of our students follow our expected behaviours day in and day out, there is acknowledgement of this also. Our new SAW (St Anthony’s Way) tickets are proving very popular and students are abuzz sharing the various reasons these have been awarded in both the classroom and playground. We do a class draw at Parade each Monday from the class SAW award bucket and these then all go into a major prize draw at the end of term.
Playgrounds - Out of Bounds - Before and After School
Just a reminder that students are not permitted to play on the playgrounds even when supervised by a parent. Once the school day is finished, students either go straight to the Stop, Drop & Go or leave the school grounds with their parent straight away.
The playgrounds are not supervised by school staff in the afternoons and from a health and safety and insurance perspective, they are not to be used.
Until next newsletter……God Bless!
Louise
APRE News.....
St Anthony’s Feast Day
On Monday we celebrate the feast of our Patron Saint, St Anthony of Padua. A famous quote from St Anthony is “Actions speak louder than words, let your words teach and your actions speak.” Even though St Anthony lived in the 12th Century, his words still resonate! St. Anthony is well known for his great preaching ability, his knowledge of God’s Word and his love of the poor. Perhaps we can’t all teach and preach like St. Anthony, but we can live out Jesus’ message in the way we look after and treat those around us whether at school or at home. We can be people of action! We will have a whole school mass at 12pm in the church and families are invited. During the celebration at mass, we will present the St Anthony’s Day Awards for one student in each class. Each year on St Anthony’s Feast Day, teachers think about what makes St Anthony special and who in their class tries hard to live their life in the best way they can.
Spirit of Catholic Education Award
Every year during Catholic Education Week the Queensland Catholic Education Commission conducts a ‘Spirit of Catholic Education Award’. The awards recognizes individuals or teams who are making an outstanding contribution to the life of their school community. This year Mrs Terri-An Nolan was nominated. She is a very deserving nominee for this award as everyone who has anything to do with her will no doubt be aware of her drive and commitment to going over and above for not just the students in our school, but for the whole community of St Anthony’s. Terri-An has been particularly nominated for the Aunty Joan Hendriks Reconciliation Award which acknowledges individuals creating positive change for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students and staff and/or developing improved understanding of Indigenous cultural heritage in Catholic school communities. Terri-An leads this space within St Anthony’s with a goal to create safe, vibrant and engaging spaces for Indigenous students whilst promoting their voices at St Anthony’s. Terri-An’s passion, initiative and commitment has helped to shape the role of Indigenous Perspectives Facilitator, that she holds within our school. We congratulate Terri-An and wish her all the best in the final stages of the award process.
Parish Family Mass
Thank you to those students who attended Parish Family Mass last weekend. It is always so lovely to come together and celebrate the community of St Anthony’s in this way. Thank you to the students who helped in leading the celebration through singing, reading, carrying candles and taking up the offertory. Your presence within the parish is greatly appreciated.
Mini Vinnies Winter Appeal Fundraiser
Don’t forget to make the most of the final few Monday’s of term and purchase popcorn cups to support the St Vinvent De Paul Winter Appeal.
The Mini Vinnies group are also calling for donations of warm clothes in these last two weeks of term. As the weather gets cooler and you begin to pull out your winter woolies, please consider donating to the Winter Appeal any items that are in good condition but may no longer be useful to your family.
Middle Leader
Reporting in Semester 1 – A-E Definitions
All Catholic schools across the diocese use these definitions of the five-point scale to explain an A – E grade, based on Australian Curriculum guidelines. Please see these guidelines below. They will also appear in your child’s Report Card.
Teachers base their judgements around student work in relation to many components of learning. Assessing a student’s English knowledge will include their reading, writing, viewing, speaking and listening skills. Assessing a student’s Mathematics knowledge will include their number and algebra sense, statistics and probability and measurement and geometry.
In my experience parents are often most interested in where their child’s marks are situated in relation to where they are expected to be and what effort level has been applied in each subject area.
If your child is awarded a C grade it means they are meeting the expectations of the curriculum for that learning area and year level. You can see that the terminology in the definition repeats the word ‘expected’ and uses the phrase ‘typically’. Students who are awarded a C grade are consistently demonstrating that they are working at the desired level for that year level and subject.
If your child is awarded a D grade you can see that the explanation repeats the word ‘developing’ and uses the phrase ‘beginning to transfer’. Teachers will consider that a child who requires support in some way from the teacher to access the curriculum at the expected level will fit into this category.
A small percentage of students will receive an M grade that is not reflected in the above definitions. An M is generated when a student’s curriculum has been modified to reflect their level of skills and understandings, which is different to their year level peers. Parents and guardians of students who receive an M will be aware of the year level their child is accessing as they will have spoken with their child’s teacher around this. However, the five-point scale is still used to assess these students. Therefore, they may receive an M with the A-E grade reflected for the Year level they are working towards. For example if a student was awarded an M ( C for Year 1) it would mean that this student is working towards a different year level curriculum than their classroom peers ( Year 1 is listed) and when their work was assessed against that curriculum they were awarded a C.
When looking at a student’s overall grade, their effort mark can be the factor that gives you a much more realistic idea around how your child has progressed this semester.
All students will be on different paths in terms of their progress against the curriculum, however all of them have direct influence over their effort mark. A student who may have been awarded a D in a subject area but an A for effort shows that they are giving their all and doing their best. A student who receives a C for a subject area and a C for effort may suggest that there is room for improvement should they improve their effort in that subject.
If you require further explanation of these guidelines, please do not hesitate to speak with your child’s teacher.
Prep SR & TF
We have been super busy in Prep! We are now learning 2 numbers each week. We will be attending our 1st Mass Friday and the Preppies are very excited about this. We are also going to attend the St Anthony’s Mass on Monday, 13th June with the rest of the school and we are looking forward to it. Winter is here-please ensure your child has winter jumper and long pants.
Siobhan and Tracey
Yr 1 ED
We have had a very busy couple of weeks in Year 1 finishing off lots of work tasks for reporting. In English we have written a report on an Emu. This was challenging but everyone is really improving their spelling and writing skills. It is also great to see everyone moving along in reading skills. Learning sightwords has been a strong focus and this is helping students to gain some fluency when reading. Keep practicing at home. Borrowing from the library and daily reading is really important. In Maths we have been working hard on addition. We have looked at some strategies to make adding up easier, which are things like double numbers. These are great things you can practice at home to improve fact knowledge and fast recall.
This week we are finishing some projects in HASS and Technology. One of these is making a musical instrument. This project will use the knowledge they have gained in science but provide them with the skills to use that knowledge to design and create something that will make sound.
We have a number of sniffles and coughs in our class. We hope that everyone stays well and look forward to the holidays for a well - earned break.
Yr 1 KS
Year 1 has been investigating “Light and Sound” in Science. As part of this investigation, we have looked at how musical instruments make noise. As a result, we designed and produced our own musical instruments – they did a great job and enjoyed “making some noise” together with the instruments – perhaps we will leave the music to Mrs Spalding though!
Kathleen.Spencer@twb.catholic.edu.au
Yr 2 BH
This week we have been finishing the last of our assessments for the term, before heading into the final two weeks of learning.
Thank you for getting your children to school on time and ready to learn! It’s often a really difficult thing to do but it makes such a difference to how our day turns out. So, thank you!
This week we come to the end of our English Unit all about Rascal the Dragon. It’s a series of books for early readers by Paul Jennings. We had a wonderful time learning all about a cheeky little stray dragon who finally found a home with Ben and his dad. Ask your child all about the stories and maybe even sit down together and read the books when they come home from the library. You’ll enjoy it!
Thank you for the bottle tops so far. Please keep them coming; we’re into the hundreds at last!
Mrs Hair
“It’s worth remembering that it is often the small steps, not the giant leaps, that bring about the most lasting change.” - Queen Elizabeth II
Barbara.Hair@twb.catholic.edu.au
Yr 2/3 VN
Welcome to Week 8! It has been a busy fortnight preparing for Report Cards and ensuring all assessment is starting to wrap up. Students completed their persuasive texts and I was extremely impressed with how all students used correct structure and high modality words to convince their reader. In Math we finalised our work on time, fractions, measurement and patterns and we have gone back to number and place value to fill some gaps that were evident in Term 1 testing. Last week and for the rest of this term, in Science, we will focus on mixtures. We will investigate how mixtures can be combined for different purposes.
Dates:
Library- Wednesday
St. Anthony’s Day Mass- 13th June- Mass at the church at 12:00pm
Prep – 2 Athletics Carnival- 15th June. Year 2 will be from 12:20pm at our school oval (more times to follow)
Year 3-6 Athletics Carnival- 23rd June at O’Quinn Oval (Year 2 will remain at school)
Yr 3 RM
It's been a busy few weeks in 3RM. In English we have been learning about parts of speech and clauses. In Maths we have been working on subtraction with regrouping. This has been a tricky concept for children to grasp, so some extra work at home might be helpful. In HASS we have continued to use our detective skills to compare places over time.
Yr 4/5 PK
Week 8 is here, and we are busy starting to finalise all our units of work. Students have been busy writing procedural texts and building our comprehension skills in English. Maths has seen us connect our decimal knowledge with money and we have been creating simple financial plans. I encourage, if it is possible, to involve your child in any incidental home lessons around money and budgeting. The extra exposure is very welcome as it is certainly becoming difficult for students to work with ‘real’ money in what feels like a cashless society at times. In addition to our core subject areas, we are getting excited to conduct, film, edit and produce an interview with a selected member of our school community. We have enjoyed engaging in interview and filming techniques.
Last week, students performed incredibly well in our Prayer Assembly based around Reconciliation Week. It has certainly been a jam-packed couple of weeks.
Until Next Time,
Mrs Kingsford & 4/5PK.
Peta.Kingsford@twb.catholic.edu.au
Yr 5/6 TN
What a crazy fortnight it has been in 5/6TN. We have finished our class novel of Rowan of Rin and the students have LOVED IT!!! It was also rather exciting to see how many of them were excited about the fact that they had read a book from cover to cover. Now I am enjoying reading the students character profiles and seeing their creative sides as they draw what they believe a scene from the story would look like. Next term we will be changing direction again in Literacy and looking at all things ‘Information Reports.’
Our classroom hasn’t been very full this week as the weather is getting colder and the flus are getting nasty. Please remind your child that they can always access Teams from home and have a range of online subscriptions that they can access to keep them busy while they are tucked up in bed recovering.
Until next time, keep warm.
Mrs Terri-An Nolan
Yr 6 LW
There has been a change of pace in Year 6 recently, as we've begun working on assessment pieces in most subjects. With most of us working on an English research assignments, we are learning a lot about Asian animals. We’ve completed our technology unit – the constructed birdhouses were numerous and of various designs and sizes! In maths we are still working on time – and this week we’ve been focusing on time zones before exploring timetables.
We still have a busy few weeks ahead of us as we count down towards the end of term. Perhaps this snippet will help us stay on task.
"It's not about perfect. It's about effort. And when you bring that effort every
single day, that's where transformation happens. That's how change occurs."
Mrs W
Leigh.Winters@twb.catholic.edu.au
Yammer Group
Have you ever looked at the ground under your feet and seen a track or a mark? This week during Yammer Group the students were asked to pair animal footprints to their owners. The students were encouraged to speak about the tracks and use describing language to give clues to each other.
Last week as a school we celebrated Reconciliation Week. Students across the school were given the opportunity to participate in a poster competition. These lucky three winners will be announced at assembly next week. As a school the class were also given the story ‘Sharing’ by Aunty Fay Muir & Sue Lawson to read. This beautiful story is all about how we share, how we care for Country, how we care for each other. It is a gentle reminder of all the ways sharing makes us stronger.
Shortly after we return from the holidays we will as a school once again celebrate NAIDOC Week. Big ideas are in the works at the moment, and I would love to have some of our wider community to be apart and share their knowledge and skills. If you would like to be apart of our celebrations or feel that you have something that share, please send me an email.
Until next!
Mrs Terri-An Nolan
Jennifer Fenn - Guidance Counsellor
St Anthony's Outside School Hours Care
Our Outside School Hours Care (OSHC) services provide the opportunity for children to grow and develop their social skills in a leisure based environment nurtured by our Catholic ethos.
The services offer a combination of before school, after school, Pupil Free days and vacation care led by a team of qualified educators. Our educators work with all children to create fun and recreational experiences so that a child’s wellbeing, learning and personal development are a priority. The services provide a variety of indoor and outdoor activities to support the diverse interests of all children.
St Anthony's OSHC Toowoomba
Phone: 0458 937 154 or 0458 897 293
Email: ANTcare@tckc.qld.edu.au
