Dear Parents and Carers,

Carols in the Park – congratulations and thank you to everyone who turned out for the Carols in the Park last Sunday evening – you did a fantastic job!  The fact that you chose to give up part of your weekend to do something for the community is greatly appreciated – well done to all.

End of Year Mass/Yr. 6 Graduation – our celebration Mass to farewell our Yr. 6 students on Tuesday evening was a lovely send off to those who are moving on from Yr. 6.  It was a lovely culmination to your time here at St Joseph’s.

Thank you also for the organisation of a terrific dinner after Mass, it was a terrific way to conclude the evening for the children.  Thank you to Mrs Metcalfe and Ms Hughes for your efforts to arrange the evening for us.

Presentation Night – our presentation night will be tonight at 6:30pm.    Children are to wear their summer school uniform to this event.

Due to the current predictions of rain, we will be holding this year’s presentation in the Library.

We look forward to seeing you all this evening.

Semester Two Reports - The final reports for 2018 will be available tomorrow.  There will be an opportunity for you to meet with your child’s class teacher if required. 

Children of all ages take their cues from their parents, so your reaction to their school report can affect the way they see themselves as learners and as people. When you open the school report do you look for strengths or weaknesses first?

The challenge is to focus on strengths rather than focus purely on areas that need improving. Take into account your child’s effort and attitude to learning. If the report indicates that effort is below standard, then you and your child have something to work on. If your child is putting in the required effort, then you can’t ask any more than that regardless of the grading. Broaden your focus away from academic performance to form a picture of how your child is progressing as an individual in a social setting.

The skills of independence and cooperation are highly rated by employers these days so don’t dismiss these as unimportant.

Please make use of the online booking system to make an appointment time to speak with your child’s teacher. Bookings can be made on the School Interviews website:

https://www.schoolinterviews.com.au/code

Our code is j4rpe

Yr. 6 Ipads – all Yr. 6 children need to have their ipads at school tomorrow (14/12) so that they can be decommissioned.  Please remember to save any files/pics to another place before then.

Thank you to those families who are keeping us informed about absences, illnesses and changes to daily routines.  As always, this information helps to keep the days running smoothly.

Please continue to talk with your children about having enough to drink and eat to enjoy their day at school, as during this week some of the children have been eating their lunch at recess time.

Library – Borrowing has now concluded for this year. It’s time to start looking around at home to find and return any extra library books that might be hiding around your home.  Check in those out of the way places such as under the bed, behind the couch, on the kitchen bench, school library books often turn up in some very unusual places…  This week we’ve had a number of books handed in which is terrific to see.  In terms of overdue books, our best result for this year, was an item that had been on loan for 604 days.

Please feel free to keep returning any “extra” books that you find at home.

School Fees – Now is the time to finalise any outstanding payments for 2018.

Thank you to those families who have already paid the fees for this term.  Thank you also to those who are keeping us up to date with making payments, this is very helpful.

If your family is experiencing difficulties paying school fees, please make contact with Therese Clancy at school for assistance.  There are a number of options available to assist when people are experiencing financial challenges.

Calendar - You might notice that our newsletter calendar has clicked over to 2019 – we are already in the planning stages for next year, and dates that we have available have been included. Please note that there may be some minor changes.

We are also updating this information on our school website and adding it to the news feed.  The site can be found at

https://www.stjosephsgrenfell.nsw.edu.au/

Now is also a good time to start to use the Schoolzine app as we are continuing the transition to this app in 2019.  Instructions for the app have been included with this newsletter.

Excess furniture – we have some excess furniture that we are happy to offer to you as an extra desk at home for a donation.  These are available for you to look at tonight.  If you would like a desk (or two) please label it with your family name so that this equipment is spoken for.  We ask that they be removed from school by the end of this week.

Information for 2019 – at this time of the year, for our children, there is often angst or concern about moving into a new class.

We are a small school and that also creates challenges around staffing.  Our staffing remains the same for next year.

We are also looking to make best use of the particular skills and interests of our teachers.

Class structures for 2019 are as follows:

K/1 – Mrs King

2/3/4 – Mrs Heath & Mrs Best

5/6 – Miss Schneider

Mrs Heath will also work specifically with each class in Maths.

We look forward to continuing to see excellent progress for all of our students.

Plans are also underway to update furniture and create learning spaces that are both inviting and flexible.

Sincerely,

Therese Clancy

Principal

REC News

In case you were thinking that we have forgotten about our Mission Day for 2018, don’t worry, we haven’t. Our Mission Day will take place next Monday the 17^th of December. Although later than usual, perhaps having Mission Day during Advent is a good way to help the students think about people who are less fortunate than us and the ways in which we can assist others through donations of time, clothing, gifts and money.

Please have your child/children bring any coins you can spare for this worthwhile cause. It is amazing to see how much all those silver coins can amount to when so many people contribute what they can. If your children are going to be away on that day, please consider sending the coins to school on Friday of this week. All donations will be gratefully accepted!

Leslie King

Classroom News – Year 5/6

Term 4 is always busy with a variety of learning and preparation for the following year.

In English this term, students have enjoyed studying persuasive text through debating.

We have continued our writing and students have produced a variety of texts in English and other Key Learning Areas.

Mathematics has focussed on a Money Smart unit of work which allowed students to work with percentages and budgeting.

In Science, the students have been studying digital technology. Understanding digital game design process and purpose has allowed an opportunity to analyse existing games and replicate or build on their functionality and game play to create a new digital game. Students are also creating their own game using Hopscotch or Scratch, which are coding applications.

The graduation Mass on Tuesday night was lovely. We all enjoyed dinner at the Bowling Club after Mass. Well done to the year 6 students on completing your education at St Joseph’s School.