Dear Parents,

Last week I attended the Gippsland Catholic Primary Principals Conference. One of the discussion points that we are seeing in all schools is the number of students with anxiety. At times these anxieties seemed to escalate on the school yard where students struggle with negotiating, taking turns and conflict resolution. With the global COVID Pandemic and lockdowns, have our children forgotten how to play?  

One of the ways we can help children manage these concerns is to ask them good questions about their worries:  what makes them the most anxious, what they are worried about in particular, how we can help them and what their plans might be to manage their problems/anxieties. We need to teach our children the skills to deal with problems for themselves.

Asking gentle questions about their worries helps children learn to communicate about and manage anxiety - and helps us as parents/caregivers know how to support them.

But unfortunately, there are some things we do when we ask questions of anxious kids - which can make things worse.

For example - asking questions in an anxious or stressed way.  Children notice anxious body language and stressed vocal tone - and this increases their anxiety.

We can't stop ourselves acting stressed or worried in front of our kids entirely.  But when they come to us to tell us their worries, we should try to take a deep breath, silently tell ourselves "it's okay for kids to worry" and try to show a caring, curious but CALM front.

This shows them (with our body language, facial expression and tone of voice) that their worries are not terrible, they are manageable and we will work through it with them (or find time later to work through it with them, depending on the time of day).

See the attached tips sheet about common mistakes we can make as parents when asking questions of our children.

Thankyou for your support for this week’s swimming program, unfortunately the weather hasn’t been kind to us but the students have shown great persistence and resilience! I have had a few questions this week in regard to why schools need to run swimming programs, please see below information as to provide some further clarity. 

Swimming and water safety is included in the Health and Physical Education Curriculum from Foundation to Level 10. This means that schools must ensure that they are implementing a swimming and water safety program that meets the requirements of the curriculum. The Health and Physical Education curriculum includes four focus areas with specific reference to swimming and water safety which schools are required to teach

• Fundamental movement skills (FMS) = Develop foundation movement and skills to enable students to participate in a range of physical activities. E.g. Floating and moving the body through water.
• Safety (S) = Practise behaviours and skills to keep themselves and others safe in and around water.
E. g. Sun safety. use of protective equipment and first aid.
• Lifelong physical activities (LPA) = Understand that swimming can enhance lifelong health-related fitness and wellbeing.
• Challenge and adventure activities (CA) = Participate in challenging swimming activities in a range of contexts. E.g. Triathlon. diving. water polo.

Parents are reminded that students should not be sent to school if they are unwell. Like all schools we are facing staff shortages and we all need to work together to keep our community safe. As a school we will;

• Do everything we can to maintain continuity of face-to-face learning including the increased use of casual staff.
• Continue to make localised staffing decisions to ensure appropriate supervision can be maintained.
• Not be able to guarantee particular staff for any cohort and student grades may be split or not have their regular teacher for a class.

At the beginning of next week our specialist lessons for all students will change.

Performing Arts and Visual Arts | Wednesday

Performing Arts: Mrs Holly Hatch

Visual Arts: Mrs Sara Harris

Physical Education and Japanese lessons | Friday

Physical Education: Mrs Rachael Williams

Japanese: Mrs Susan Taylor

Term 2 will finish for all students on Wednesday 22^nd June. Thursday 23^rd and Friday 24^th June are professional practice days for our school staff. 

Semester 1 reports will be sent out via PAM on Friday 24^th June.

Please be advised that due to the upcoming Queen’s Birthday public holiday, all Beleza retail stores will be closed on Monday 13th of June.
We’ll return to our regular trading hours from Tuesday 14th of June.
Please note that our Head Office will also be closed for the public holiday. Should you have any enquiries on that day, we encourage you to email our team at beleza@beleza.com.au and we’ll follow up as soon as we return.

We’d like to apologise for any inconvenience that this may cause, and would like to wish everyone
in your School Community a safe and enjoyable long weekend!

Kind regards,
Beleza School Uniforms

Thank you so much for supporting our School, especially through fundraising.
This term, we are running a Billy G’s Gourmet Cookie Dough fundraiser to raise money for our school.

Billy G’s Gourmet Cookie Dough is an exciting fundraiser, made by an Australian, family owned and operated business. There are ten (10) dough-licious flavours to choose from, including the most popular Choc Chunk and Caramel White Choc.

You can also create your own cookie magic with a NEW Golden Classic flavour – the base of the Billy G’s secret family recipe.  Add Hundreds & Thousands, macadamia and white chocolate, anything you like: the sky is the limit on what you can create! There is even something for your special furry friends, with a cheese flavoured Doggie Dough!  Billy G’s Gourmet Cookie Dough is exclusive to fundraising – so stock up!

Get started! Cookie dough orders must be placed online using the online platform. Create your child’s profile by visiting australianfundraising.com.au, and follow the instructions in the order form. Orders are now open, so make sure you get rolling and create your online fundraising page today!

How do prizes work? Every student who sells a tub will receive an incentive prize for their efforts! But why not aim higher? The more tubs you sell the more prizes you will receive! There are 12 prizes up for grabs, so why not set your own fundraising goal and aim for them all? Prizes are automatically ordered at the end of our fundraiser based on the number of tubs you have sold.

Family and friends are your greatest supporters, so make sure you ask them for support. You will reach your fundraising goal in no time!

Win a $10,000 JB Hi-Fi Shopping Spree! Our highest tub seller will go into a draw to win a $10,000 JB Hi-Fi Shopping Spree. Plus, every student that achieves all online virtual badges will win a Billy G’s “You’re One Awesome Cookie” Bag Tag.

Want to aim even higher? Australia’s highest tub seller will scoot away with a Razor Prize Pack valued at $3,000. How exciting!

Happy fundraising,

More to the Spirit

Theologians, writers and artists have sought to encapsulate the unknowable Trinity with three leafed clovers; ice, water and steam; daughter, mother and wife and many other images. The Rubliev icon of the three seated figures is a much loved and useful image of Trinity. Beautiful and evocative as it is, our religious art, both eastern and western, mostly reflects a static pyramidal structure with a male Father God at the top, perhaps alongside the other persons, and everything else beneath the clouds.

But there is more! Jesus tells the disciples in today’s gospel, “I still have many things to say to you but they would be too much for you now. But when the Spirit of truth comes he will lead you to the complete truth.” (John 16:12-15). Opening up fully to the Holy Spirit promised to us by Jesus; embracing a fully Trinitarian thinking (what Thomas Aquinas saw as God’s art) we find a more spiral, circle and flow than pyramid. (Richard Rohr, The Divine Dance).

Pope Francis passionately writes of the Spirit fully engaged with and in us and everything: “The Spirit of God has filled the universe with possibilities and therefore, from the very heart of things, something new can always emerge” (Laudate Si 80). The Pope quotes St Thomas Aquinas, “Nature is none other than a certain kind of art, God’s art, impressed upon things, whereby those things are moved to determinate end. It is as if a shipbuilder were able to give timbers the wherewithal to move themselves to take the form of a ship.” (St Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae ). The Spirit of God is in the swirl of everything. “Throughout the vast sweep of cosmic and biological evolution, the Spirit embraces the material root of life and its endless potential, empowering the cosmic process from within.” (Daniel O’Leary, An Astonishing Secret).

Deacon Mark Kelly

An Information evening will be held on Wednesday 13^th July 7.30pm Marian Room (attached to St. Joseph’s Church Warragul; enter car park from Bowen Street) for those who want to find out more about the Catholic faith, what Catholics believe and why, expressing an interest in becoming a Catholic, or an Adult Catholic who has not received the sacraments of First Communion or Confirmation.  If you know of someone that may be interested, please bring them along to this session.

For more information you can contact:
Fr. Peter Slater: 56231642
Fr. Confidence: 56231642
Joan Robertson Coordinator at St. Joseph’s Parish Office, Warragul: 56231642
Deacon Mark Kelly at Marist Sion College: 56235944 or 0427748646.

Unfortunately, the mental health of young people has been significantly impacted by the pandemic. As many families settle back into pre-COVID routines, there seems to be a pervasive sense of optimism about what lies ahead.

Unfortunately children and teens are not immune to what is now being termed the “psychological pandemic”. Young people are at risk of not achieving the primary demands of developmental tasks such as procuring independence, identity formation, as well as obtaining and maintaining peer relationships. What kids need most in the current environment is support, understanding, empathy and encouragement from caring adults. They live up or down to the expectations we set for them.

If there is a panacea to the adversity caused by the pandemic, then it is the building of resilience. Resilience is the capacity to face, overcome, be strengthened and transformed by adversity. Never before have parents needed the skills, the knowledge and the strategies to build resilience in their children as much as they do now. There are 7 integral and interrelated components that make up being resilient that can help young people thrive and develop healthy coping strategies.

This Special Report explores the “7 C’s of Resilience” and includes suggested strategies on how adult carers can best facilitate them. We hope you take a moment to reflect on the information offered, and as always, we welcome your feedback. If this raises any concerns for you, a loved one or the wellbeing of your child, please seek medical or professional help.

Here is the link to your special report https://stangelawarragul.catholic.schooltv.me/wellbeing_news/special-report-building-resilience-post-pandemic

During our daily Numeracy lessons, our clever little Foundation students have been learning about the ‘Count All’ and ‘Count On’ mental addition strategies. We have been representing and solving simple addition problems using a wide range of concrete materials. These hands-on learning tools have helped consolidate our knowledge of addition. We have been learning to ‘lock in’ the largest number and ‘count on’ the smaller number to find how many we have ‘altogether’.  Some of our favourite activities so far have been using dice, dominoes, decks of cards and of course our trusty fingers!

Homegroup B have been consolidating our ‘Count On’ knowledge and trying some new strategies such as using our tens fact and doubles knowledge to solve addition problems. We have also been using the ‘Count Back’ strategy to help us solve subtraction problems. Just like Homegroup M and H we have been using lots of concrete materials and playing games such as Domino parking lot, Rock-paper-scissor friends of tens and Spot the Spider  to help us develop these strategies.   

Over the last few weeks of this term we will be learning about the value of Australian coins and notes, finding totals and how much change may be given during a purchase. As part of this work, the students will be setting up ‘St. Angela’s Shop’ in the classroom and making their own price labels for items in the shop. To coincide with our consistent approach to our school values, we will begin to reward the students with ‘coins’ each time they follow the school expectations. They will collect their earnings in a ziplock bag in the classroom. At the end of the week they will be able to spend their money in the school shop, choosing from small items such as pencils, erasers, pads of paper, hair accessories, etc. They will need to find the correct amount to buy an item or calculate how much change they will need back. This will give them a real-life experience and purpose for their learning on money.

The students in Homegroup TP and L have been exploring different ways to collect, display and understand data sets. The students have been creating open survey questions and posing these questions to their classmates to collect data, using this information to construct data displays such as bar graphs, pie graphs and line graphs. The students have been learning to understand the importance of the features of a data display such as a clear title, x and y axis, categories and the even spread of numbers, the features that make a graph easy to interpret. The students have done this by comparing a wide range of data displays and discussing similarities and differences. 

The senior students have enjoyed learning about striking and fielding games in Physical Education this term. Some questions they have had to consider when playing are; where should you place the ball to score the most points? How can the fielders get to the ball quickly? What is a good fielding position?