St Colman's School Mortlake eNewsletter

Our Weekly Prayer

Heavenly Father,

As I enter another week of my Lenten journey, guide me to the path that leads to you. Fill my heart with gratitude, patience, strength, and peace as I strive to become the-best-version-of-myself, honestly admitting my shortcomings and sins. As I renew my resolve each day to become a better person, let me hear your voice in the deepest reaches of my heart. Give me rest in you. Help me to accept others, showing them your great love instead of casting judgment. Stay with me through the busy days this week and remind me that when I need comfort, solitude, wisdom, or guidance, I can always turn to you.

In your name I pray,

Amen.

From the Principal

Dear Families,

What a great day we had on Friday turning up to school in our PJs. While this was a fun day, it was a Social Justice event that highlighted an important issue in our society, homelessness and those that have to sleep rough each night. Homelessness can be a deeply isolating and stigmatizing experience. By raising awareness, we can help to create a more empathetic society that is better able to support those who are experiencing homelessness. Through our gold coin donations we raised $38.30 which will be sent to Melbourne City Mission to help support the work they do with some of the most vulnerable members of our society.

This week we welcome back a relaxed and refreshed Rosie O'Connor from her three weeks Long Service Leave and we thank Michelle Bourke for the care she took of our Middles whilst Rosie was away.

Read on to find out what else is happening in our school community. It is always a good idea to familiarise yourself with the key dates section of the newsletter. Please feel free to contact me at any time with any questions, concerns or suggestions you may have.

Have a great week.

Kind regards,

Janet

Key dates for the Diary

Term 1

March 15th-March 27th NAPLAN Testing Period

Monday 20th March Aberlea Visit- Middle room

Tuesday 21st March World Down Syndrome Day- wear ODD socks

Parent Teacher Interviews- 3:30-5:30

Thursday 23rd March SAC Meeting @7pm

Monday 27th March Young Leaders Day, Melbourne

Tuesday 28th March School Photo Day

Holy Week Liturgy at St. Colman's Church @ 12:15

1pm- Official blessing and unveiling of our Undercover Area and Artwork followed by a BBQ lunch- ALL INVITED

Wednesday 29th March Lions Eye Health Program FREE screenings

Monday 3rd April Jane Lee starts Long Service Leave

AFL Positive Start Clinic

MRC Taster Day- Seniors to attend

Tuesday 4th April District Aths in Camperdown

Wednesday 5th April- Foundation children attend school on Wednesday

Thursday 6th April Last day of Term 1- Assembly, Easter raffle drawn and Easter Egg hunt at ????

Tuesday 25th April ANZAC Day

Wednesday 26th April First day of Term 2

School Closure Dates 2023

Term 2: Monday 24th April (Compliance)

Thursday May 4th Warrnambool Cup Holiday

Term 3: Monday 14th August (Catholic Social Teaching)

Tuesday 22nd August (Literacy)

⭐️ ⭐️ Student Achievement ⭐️ ⭐️

Last year, Remy completed a piano exam and received a very high result for it. On Sunday, she and a number of other students who did exams last year were honoured with an Encouragement Award at a ceremony in Kew for their efforts. This is the first time I’ve had a student from St Colmans receive the award, which is given to students across the country who show potential on their instrument and to encourage them to continue with music. Well done Remy!!

Melanie Pocknall

Instrumental Music teacher

2023 Sacramental Program

Our Lady of Mercy Parish is implementing some changes to our Parish based Sacramental program that will take effect this year.

As of this year, all three sacraments (Confirmation, Reconciliation and First Communion) will be celebrated by children in Year 3. However, our Sacramental Program has been greatly affected by Covid-19 for the past two years. This means that there will be children in Years 4, 5 and 6 who will also need to celebrate some, or all, of these three sacraments.

A COMPULSORY parent/carer meeting will be held on Wednesday 26th April at either 3:30 in Mortlake or 7pm at St. Thomas’ Terang, so please keep this date free. More information will be sent to families next week.

I recently sent out a Google Form for you to complete if you would like your child/ren to participate in the program this year. If you haven’t had a chance to complete it yet, please click on the link below to do so ASAP. Thanks!

Sacramental EOI Form

Parent Teacher Interviews (PTIs) & Program Support Group meetings (PSGs)

Term 1 Parent Teacher Interviews will be taking place tomorrow March 21st from 3:30-5:30. These ten minute meetings with your child's teacher(s) are designed as a first term check in on how your child has settled into the year and talk about any concerns and goals for the coming term.

If you haven't already, please book your interview time ASAP

Families of children who are on a Personalised Learning Plan are invited to attend a Program Support Group (PSG) Meeting on April 4th or 5th. These 20- minute meetings are held during the school day and will be with your child's classroom teacher and Janet (as Learning Diversity Leader). If you are required to attend a PSG you DO NOT need to attend a PTI as well. You will receive a text from the school if you need to book a PSG meeting time instead of a PTI. Any questions about this please contact Janet.

Please book your interview online through PAM.

World Down Syndrome Day

This Tuesday March 22nd is World Down Syndrome Day (WDSD). We encourage all members of our school community to wear bright socks tomorrow to show our support for people living with Down Syndrome.

The theme of WDSD this year is With Us Not For Us and this message is key to a human rights-based approach to disability.

DSi is committed to moving on from the outdated charity model of disability, where people with disability were treated as objects of charity, deserving of pity and relying on others for support.

A human rights-based approach views people with disabilities as having the right to be treated fairly and have the same opportunities as everyone else, working With others to improve their lives.

Holy Week Service and School Celebration

On Tuesday 28th March, everyone is invited to share with our school community in a couple of special celebrations. We will begin by participating in a Holy Week service with Fr. Gary at the church from 12:15pm. We will then return to school and Fr Gary will officially bless and 'open' our Undercover Area. We will also unveil the commissioned artwork that the children completed last year with local Indigenous artist Emma Stenhouse. We will acknowledge and thank Emma for her help creating this magnificent painting and we have also invited representatives from Acciona to attend so that we can thank them for their grant that made this project possible.

We will then enjoy a BBQ lunch together. It would be great to see as many members of our school community as possible there to join in this celebration of some of our most recent projects.

Lions Eye Health Program (LEHP)

On Wednesday March 29th, we welcome back members of the Warrnambool Lions Club who will be conducting FREE vision screening tests.

Members of the Lions club have been specifically trained to perform 4 vision screening assessments including:

Visual Acuity - using a Lea 3m -15 line Symbol Chart
Colour Vision - using a Quick 6 - Basic Colour Screening Book
Depth Perception - using a Stereo Fly Screening Tool
Spot Vision Screener - State of the art portable machine designed to screen for Myopia (near sightedness), Hyperopia (far sightedness), Astigmatism (blurred vision), Anisometropia (unequal refractive power), Strabismus (eye misalignment) and Anisocoria (unequal pupil size).

All children in Foundation, Year 3 and Year 6 will have the opportunity to be tested. However, if your child isn't in these grades and you have concerns about their vision, please complete the attached form and return it to school by this Friday March 24th and they will be screened also.

LEHP_Parent_Guardian_Consent_Form_.pdf

Welcome to Grace

Last week we welcomed Grace Nicolas to our school community. Grace has commenced her role as Pastoral Care Worker through the School Chaplaincy Program. Grace will continue to work with the students that Clare Jehu was supporting last year. This FREE service is available to all students in our school, therefore if you have concerns about your child’s social and emotional wellbeing this may be something you could consider accessing. Parent Teacher Interviews are the perfect opportunity to discuss your concerns and all teachers will have an information about the referral process and a brochure on Pastoral Care in your School available for you.

CCV_School_Pastoral_Care_brochure_Feb_2022.pdf

Easter Raffle

This year we ask all of our families to support our Easter Raffle. All families are asked to donate an Easter gift (egg, book, chocolate etc) and sell raffle tickets for $1 each. All donations will be given away as prizes, so the more donations we receive, the more prizes we will have. Raffle tickets will be sent home later this week. Please drop your donations off at the office. The raffle will be drawn at our final school assembly for the term (Thursday April 6th)

Aberlea Visits

As part of our Social Justice Program and community engagement activities, we will be commencing regular visits with the residents from Aberlea. These visits will provide the children with a valuable learning experience that can help them develop important social skills and build empathy for others. These visits are always appreciated by the elderly residents and helps decrease any feelings of social isolation they may be experiencing

Unfortunately in these Post-Covid times all visitors to Aged Care facilities are mandated to produce a negative RAT before entering the premises.

If you agree to your child’s participation in this activity, you can either give your child a RAT in the morning of the visit and write their name and date on the test and send it to school with them. Alternatively, we will do the RAT here at school before they go. Aberlea will provide us with saliva tests which are less intrusive than the nasal ones.

The Middles visited today and it was another rewarding experience for everyone involved.

Middles visit to Aberlea

NAPLAN 2023

NAPLAN is due to continue this week. Students in Grade 3 and Grade 5 will participate in four tests in the learning areas of writing, reading, language conventions (spelling, punctuation and grammar) and numeracy.

Below is some information regarding NAPLAN for parents. If you have any questions regarding this please don’t hesitate to contact the school.

Project Compassion

During the Ash Wednesday mass, Father Gary spoke of the importance of using Lent as a time to help those less fortunate than ourselves. He encouraged us to get behind Caritas' Project Compassion. As a school we have Project Compassion boxes in all of our classrooms to encourage children to donate money and we will also be supporting Project Compassion through several fundraising initiatives.
One of these ideas is to sell Zooper Doopers each day for 50c. Our Year 6 school leaders will be selling them daily and all money raised will go into the Project Compassion box.

2023 Footy Tipping Competition

It is not too late to jump on board and support this community project.

Our Footy Tipping Competition is ready to go. This year we will be running the comp through the ESPN app/website. Please hop onto www.footytip.com.au to join the "St. Colman's 2023" competition. Entry fee is $20 adults and $10 school aged children.

Details below but if you need help to regisiter please come into the office and see Jane or Janet for help.

Redevelopment of Mortlake Community Health Consultation Meeting

Please find attached information regarding the application for Mortlake Community Health redevelopment. As part of this process there will be a community consultation meeting on Tuesday 21st March @3pm at the Health Centre on Boundary Road, Mortlake. If you are passionate about the direction the Community Health centre is heading in, and how the service can better meet the needs of our community, then this is your opportunity to be part of the consultancy process. Everyone is welcome to attend.

Mortlake CHS Redevelopment.pdf

School Advisory Council

We would like to introduce you to our SAC members for 2022-2023. Lily Convery-Oborne (Chair), Jo Wallis, Alison Greig, Michelle Lehmann, Jo Dolling, Zion Palmer, Sophie and Nick Allen, Rachel Baulch, Rosie O’Connor (School rep), Janet Cain (Principal) and Fr. Gary Jones (Parish Rep)

These people are the voice of the parish and parents in the school. If you have any questions or anything that you would like raised please contact one of these people.

The SAC meets twice a term and we thank these people for agreeing to be a part of this group that provides an essential link between the school and its families. Our next meeting is Thursday 23rd March.

Award Winners

There were no award winners last week due to the short week last week.

Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday to Zac D who is celebrating his birthday this week!

Mercy Regional College Open Day- This Wednesday.

All senior students will be bussed to McAuley Campus in Camperdown on Wednesday. They will be touring the school from 12pm -1pm. Parents are invited to meet us over there so that they can tour the school with their child.

TMFNC Auskick and Net Set Go

Auskick Registration

Net Set Go registration

Out of School Care

A reminder that during 2023 we have access to Out of School Care, supplied by TheirCare, at Mortlake College. Registration is made via the TheirCare website. https://theircare.com.au/

Many of our students have already begun to use this program and the feedback from both parents and children has been overwhelmingly positive. Everything has run seamlessly so far, so if you are considering sending your children to Before or After Shool Care, you can be assured that this program is extremely easy to utilise.

Their Care also offers School Holiday Programs. See flyer below for some fun holiday activites to keep your kids busy!!

Feel free to contact the office if you have any questions about accessing TheirCare or use the contact details at the bottom of the flyer to contact them directly.