Newsletter Term 3 Week 2

Principal's Message

Dear Parents and Families,

I have come back feeling refreshed and ready for the term after the opportunity to attend a spiritual pilgrimage to Ireland with fellow principals from our diocese over the break. A big thank you to Jason, Mardi and our senior leadership team who all stepped up and did a brilliant job running the place in my absence. This morning it has been lovely to catch up with the children and hear their stories from the holidays and to hear how excited they are about the upcoming school disco and the Olympic Games.

Hats off to our Specialist Staff
We are all about sharing the good news stories here at St Mary’s and showcasing all the fabulous things your children experience as part of daily school life.

Last week we shared a snippet into specialist classes on our socials. If you haven't had a chance to see the amazing variety of experiences your children have at Italian, STEM, Music, Drama, PE or Art - why not check out this short video out today.

School Surveys
One way for effective school improvement to occur is the participation in the Insight SRC School Surveys. Staff, students and parents are invited to participate in the survey, which will be made available from the beginning of Week 3 this term. Please take the time to participate and provide feedback, to support the future direction and improvement of our school. More information to follow.

Flying Start and 2025 Enrolments
Our final sessions are coming up this week on Thursday & Friday and we certainly have a great little bunch of 2025 students in the making based on the preschoolers who have been in for Flying Start.   We have had strong interest in this very successful program with a few spaces still available in each group for any preschooler in our district to come along this week and see what happens at ‘big school’. Just ring the office to find out how to register your child. A reminder that 2025 enrolments are open - forms can be collected from the office or emailed home.

Check out the fun last week!!!

History Box 
This term the Foundation - Year 6 children will be learning about events that have shaped our Australian history. To compliment their history units we welcome back Barry and Cynda, who run The History Box Incursions program. The History Box conducts onsite history programs complete with very engaging “hands-on” activities that teach children a great deal about the past as they participate in the program. Cyn and Baz are always a popular addition to our incursion program with the students really loving the chance to dress up in clothes from yesteryear, engage in old fashioned games or learn more about colonial life. The History Box will be here Monday – Wednesday with parents welcome to attend any workshops. All sessions will run in the gym.

NAPLAN
Our NAPLAN results arrived last week and it was wonderful to see how well our Year 3 and Year 5 students did across all key curriculum areas.  Yet again our students scored strongly in all key areas and our results indicated we are well above the national and state benchmarks in literacy and numeracy. This is a great credit to all our teachers and to Mrs Hall who so ably leads our curriculum teams. We are looking forward to sharing our results with you once families have had the opportunity to read their child's individual reports. NAPLAN results will be posted families of our Year 3 & 5 students together with information on how to read the new report format this week.

School Disco - Friday, July 26th
Always huge on the calendar, the St Mary's School Disco has returned and takes place this Friday  July 26th at the Jubilee Centre at St Mary MacKillop College. With DJ Jayden Graham onboard, we are looking forward to seeing some amazing dance moves from the kids! Lots of information has been shared with families and if your child is attending please return the permission form by this Wednesday, July 24th.

Last year the disco was a big success and this year is looking to rival it for fun and great music. We have enough parent helpers for the Junior Disco however still need parent helpers for the Senior Disco to assist with supervision and packing up. All parent helpers will receive more information later this week via email.

Times:
Junior Disco
Foundation - Year 2: 4.45pm-5.15 pm 
Senior Disco
 Year 3 - Year 6:  5.45pm-6.30 pm

Kate

"Never See a Need Without Doing Something About It"
Mary MacKillop - Sisters of St Joseph Foundress

Key Dates

Monday July 22 - Wednesday July 24
History Box incursion
Thursday July 25th
Division Boys Netball
Division Girls AFL
Thursday July 25th & Friday July 26th
Flying Start session 4
Friday July 26th
Assembly 12.25pm - 5C
School Disco
Casual Dress Day (no theme/no donation)
Wednesday July 31st
100 days of School - Foundation
MacKillop College Transition Day 2
Friday August 2nd
Assembly 12.25pm - 2T
Casual Dress Day (Green & Gold/Olympics theme/no donation)

Wellbeing with Mr Prockter

Hi Everyone, 

This one is for all the Dad’s …and mothers too of course, but really it is for anyone who works with toddlers, children, teenagers and young adults. I came across this podcast at the end of last year and found it really helpful. I am a parent of 3 young kids myself and all of us as parents are trying to figure out this parenting stuff continuously as it never finishes! I hope you can enjoy some of the podcasts as much as me and I would love your feedback around it as well. 

Have a great week! 🙂

About How Other Dads Dad

Hamish Blake chats with other dads he really admires (and whose phone number he had relatively easy access to) about their approach to dadding, and in the process hopefully learn a little, steal some of their hard earned wisdom and help us all dad a tiny bit better.

How Other Dads Dad is a bit different for Hamish - The chats are long form, intimate and unafraid to ask the big questions about dadding.  They are also equally comfortable in not providing any answers to these questions. Every dad Hamish chats to has a different approach and their own unique experiences that have shaped their dadding - what they all share though, is desire to do great by their kids and strive to do better.

Hamish has dabbled in television, radio, writing and podcasting over the last 20 years, but perhaps his most relevant experience to this podcast is being the dad to two young children.  He is no more qualified to talk about any of this stuff than the next dad who wanders past a microphone.  But he does possess a sincere passion to learn from all the great dads he has met both professionally and personally over the years, and thought that other dads might also benefit from listening in.

The podcast is co-produced by Tim Bartley - a longtime collaborator of Hamish’s, and father to 4 young kids.  If you are wondering why the website is a bit light on, remember how many kids Tim has and then imagine how much time he had to learn how to make a website.

Hame & Tim really hope that this little DIY podcast can help give dads of all persuasions a few useful insights that can help them on their ‘dadding’ journey, whatever that looks like.

And of course, extra big special heartfelt thanks to all the dads who came on to chat with Hame and share their stories.

Thanks for listening! From Hamish

RE with Mrs Davies

As we journey through the month of July, it is a wonderful opportunity to seek God’s guidance, blessings, and protection for the days ahead. This mid-year point is a perfect time to reflect on the first half of the year, thank God for His faithfulness, and ask for His continued presence and provision. A prayer for the month of July helps us align our hearts with God’s will, seeking His wisdom and strength to navigate the coming days with faith and confidence.

PE with Miss Clark

State Cross Country
Last Thursday Mia H competed in the State Cross Country Championships in Melbourne.  To qualify, she had to make it through the School, Division and Regional competitions.  To make it this far is a great achievement.  The conditions were very tough with an incredibly wet and muddy track to run on. Mia came 49th out of 90 runners in her 3km race which is an amazing achievement and should be extremely proud of her efforts. Many thanks to the Hirst family for transporting Mia down to Melbourne and supporting her during her race.

Division Girls Football
With the popularity of women's AFL taking off, St Mary’s will have 40 students participating in the Division Girls Football carnival on Thursday the 25th of July at the Swan Hill and Tyntynder ovals.  The girls have been split up into three teams and are really looking forward to participating against other schools in the area.  Best of luck girls and we hope you have a great day. 

Division Boys Netball
For the second year in a row St Mary’s has 9 Year 6 students competing in the Division Boys Netball competition on Thursday the 25th of July at the Tyntynder/ Swan Hill Netball courts. The boys have been working extremely hard by training at lunch time with our Regional girls team to best prepare them for the competition.  We wish the boys the best of luck and hope you all enjoy the day.

Athletics Sports Carnival Volunteers
To run a successful event, it always takes great volunteers. Over the coming weeks, I will be sending out expressions of interest to assist with the St Mary’s Primary School Athletics Carnivals.  The dates are as follows;
Senior Athletics (Years 3-6) at Ken Harrison Reserve - Thursday, August 29th
Junior Athletics (Foundation-Year 2) at St Mary’s Primary School oval - Friday, September 6th 
If you are willing to help out at either of these, please save the dates. More details to follow.

Gymnastics After School
The after school gymnastics has proven to be a very popular program with all 24 spots now full. If your child was successful in getting a spot in the program, a confirmation note will be sent home. Those students who were unable to get a spot will be put on a waiting list if any students pull out. The gymnastics after school program will start this week on Thursday and run for four weeks.

@2 Murlong Before & After School Care

The Out of School Hours Care program, @ 2 Murlong, is operating out of the gym hub and provides before and after school care for school age children in the Swan Hill area. Please express your interest via the following link;

https://prodadmin.myxplor.com/enrollment/index/dHdBOThsSW9JeHUxYTEwaHNxZlMrdz0

News from the Office

Working with Children Check
A reminder to bring your Working with Children Check with you if you are coming on to the school grounds for volunteer purposes. 

Student Absences
Just a reminder that if your child is absent from school, you need to let the office know, preferably via PAM, prior to 9.25am.

Book Club - Issue 5 orders close Monday August 5th
Scholastic Book Club Issue 5 has been sent home. We will not be accepting cash payments for orders. Please order online following the instructions below. This is the link for LOOP, which will allow you to make an online order and payment; 
https://mybookclubs.scholastic.com.au/Parent/Login.aspx If you are not registered for LOOP, click on the link above and create a new account.  You will need to enter your details, add children and select our school (typed as is here); St. Mary's SWAN HILL
If you have any questions or are having trouble with the LOOP ordering system, please contact the office via email office@smswanhill.catholic.edu.au

School Beanies
Winter is here so now is a great time to purchase a school beanie.
Available on CDF Pay for $15.

News from the Canteen

Volunteers Needed:
We are always on the lookout for volunteers in our school canteen. You just need your VIC WWCC. Volunteer hours at 11.30am-1.30pm. Please email office@smswanhill.catholic.edu.au if you are able assist

Ordering from the canteen:
Recess and lunch orders are placed online only via CDF Pay. The orders close at 9.30am each day, so it is recommended you place your order the night before. Our canteen is a very busy, so late orders will be offered limited options. Please contact the office if you need help with CDF Pay.

https://smswanhill.cdfpay.org.au

Just a reminder to sign in at the office when you are on canteen duty

Student of the Week

Happy Birthday!

What's happening in 3Y?