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| DAY | DATE | EVENT |
| Friday | 6 December | Welcoming Morning Tea with Mr Moroney - Principal 2020 10.30am |
| Friday | 6 December | Final Infants Assembly for 2019 2.30pm |
| Monday | 9 December | Infants Water Fun Day (Years Kinder - 2) - school Primary Swimming Carnival - Bradbury Pool (Years 3-6) |
| Tuesday | 10 December | Year 6 Farewell Mass and Disco starting at 5.30pm St John's Church and Campbelltown Catholic Club |
| Thursday | 12 December | Carols under the COLA 6pm - ALL Welcome |
| Friday | 13 December | Thank you Morning Tea 10.30am in the hall |
| Wednesday | 18 December | Last Day of Term for students End of Year School Mass 9.30am Leaving circle - Year 6 and other students who are leaving St John's. |
| Wednesday | 29 January 2020 | Students return to school for 2020. Term 1 commences for Years 1-6 |
Dear Parents and Carers,
Last Sunday 1 December, we entered the season of Advent, a time of expectation and preparation. Advent also allows us the opportunity to reflect as we await the joy that Christmas brings. As the year comes to an end we look back with gratitude on the lives that we lead. Gratitude is the virtue of being able to receive and give thanks.
Gratitude is something that helps to define goodness. It also helps us to develop in maturity of our faith. We are mature to the degree that we are grateful. Theologian, Ron Rolheiser, writes about gratitude. He describes gratitude as an element that leads us to mature discipleship. He goes on to describe the essential components that we should be recognising as we are mature in our discipleship.
The first of these is Forgiveness. Sometimes the greatest struggle that we can have as mature people is to forgive. To forgive those who have hurt us, forgive ourselves for our own shortcomings, and forgive God for seemingly hanging us out to dry in this world. The greatest gift we can give ourselves is to not allow ourselves to die with a bitter, unforgiving heart.
Secondly, we need to Live in Gratitude. To be a saint is to be powered by gratitude. We need to be gracious always. By being at peace with God, by praying and by recognising the holiness in others we live in gratitude.
Next we need to Become ever-wider in our embrace. We grow in maturity when we are able to define and recognise those whom we may have previously discriminated against, have been less compassionate towards, as people who are warmed by the same sun as us and who God loves just as much.
Finally, we need to Stand where we stand and let God protect us. In the end, we are all vulnerable, contingent, and helpless both to protect our loved ones and ourselves. We cannot guarantee life, safety, salvation, or forgiveness for ourselves or for those we love. Maturity depends upon accepting this with trust rather than anxiety. We can only do our best, whatever our place in life, wherever we stand, whatever our limits, whatever our shortcomings and trust that this is enough, that if we die at our post honest, doing our duty, God will do the rest.
As we approach the end of the school year, we need to take time to reflect on the goodness that the year has brought to our school community. We look back with much gratitude and look forward to 2020 with much hope.
Organising School Uniforms for 2020
The wearing of the school uniform is an outward sign of the respect that a student has for themselves and the St John’s school community. The St John’s school uniform serves as an outward sign of what the school stands for, and the correct wearing of uniform is an indication of students’ pride in being members of the school community. At St John’s, we believe that the wearing of a school uniform reduces the social inequities that may be evident in a community that does not enforce a standard uniform. This assists in respecting the dignity of each individual by reducing social class barriers. It helps to unite the students and create a sense of pride.
Joggers that are predominantly white are to be worn for sport and fitness. They must be predominantly white and may be lace up or velcro. No slip on ‘Raben’ type shoes, indoor soccer boots or coloured joggers are to be worn. Pictorial examples of appropriate joggers are shown here.
What is an appropriate haircut for school?
Recently, I have noticed several students who have haircuts that are not appropriate for school. I have been revising the Parent Handbook and within the uniform section of the handbook, I bring to your attention the following regarding haircuts for both boys and girls. Parents are required to support the expectation as we head into the new school year.
HAIR -
- The emphasis is on ‘neat and tidy’
- Shoulder length or longer hair for girls is to be tied back with school coloured ribbons
- No bleached / dyed hair
- Extremes of haircuts are not permitted, e.g., undercuts, long fringes with short on top, tracks, shaved, words, lines etc., are unsuitable
- The emphasis is on evenly cut hair. Hair must be neatly groomed (combed or brushed) away from the student’s face. To reduce the transfer of head lice, hair that is collar length or longer is to be plaited, braided or tied back with hair accessories. Long hair not tied up could be ‘unsafe for the student and likely to result in a risk to health and safety of students and others’.
Hair should not be dyed un-natural colours during the school term. Inappropriate hairstyles (e.g. inappropriate words, shapes, stripes cut into the hair could ‘negatively influence the normal school operations’ and are therefore not permitted.
Staffing - 2020
The staffing process is currently continuing and we are hoping to have this lengthy process completed by next week. Following this I will be able to communicate staff and class allocations with parents. A full staff list for 2020 will be published in the Week 10 newsletter.
Semester 2 Reports
Beginning this semester all reports will be issued via Compass. Semester 2 reports will be available to parents starting from Monday 9th December.
There will no longer be hard copies of reports distributed to parents.
Next Monday 9 December reports will be released to Kindergarten, Year One and Year Two via the COMPASS app at 10am
On Tuesday 10 December reports will be released to Year Three and Year Four via the COMPASS app at 10am.
On Wednesday 11 December reports will be released to Year Five and Year Six via the COMPASS app at 10am.
Last week, Catholic Education Diocese of Wollongong recognised those members of staff across the Diocese who have given a significant time of service to Catholic Education with the Lighting the Way Awards ceremony. A number of St John’s staff were recognised for their length of service. We congratulate the following staff -
- Mrs Vicki Stolzenhein
- Mrs Manuela Brticevich
Congratulations also to Mrs Michelle Korny and Mrs Sharon Burnett who were nominated for a Teaching Practice Award and an Outstanding School Support Officer Award respectively. We are so proud of the high quality of staff who support student learning and wellbeing at St John’s.
Swimming Carnival 2019
Thank you for your support in needing to reschedule the 2019 St John’s Swimming Carnival to next Monday 9 December 2019. This decision was made due to the amount of smoke in the air and poor air quality.
A decision will be made next Monday morning as to whether the carnival is able to go ahead. If the carnival needs to be cancelled then a notification on COMPASS will be sent out to all families.
If the carnival is not able to go ahead, we will not be able to reschedule it again. Unfortunately, the carnival will be cancelled and only the 100m and 50m competative swimmers will be going at another pre-arranged time. If this is the case, these students will be notified individually with the details.
Many thanks to Mrs Jillian Crescini and Mrs Angela Marshall who have put in many hours to the planning and organisation of the carnival.
Thanks for your ongoing support with these arrangements.
Welcome Morning Tea – Mr Paul Moroney
We would like to warmly invite all parents to a Morning Tea to welcome Mr Moroney to St John’s as Principal from 2020. We look forward to welcoming Mr Moroney as Principal next year.
Morning tea will be held this Friday, 6 December at 10:30am in the school hall.
We look forward to seeing you there.
Mrs Jane Webb
Acting Principal
Congratulations to the following students who have received a Principal's Award.
100 Stickers
| Jonathon Yaqo | Ricky Bohocki |
| Alexi Sen | Sienna Caruana |
| Oliver Gardner | Eziah Faavae-Eli |
| Xavier Clarke |
50 Stickers
| Vanessa White | Kristina Pham | Sebastian Cano |
| Byron Enguix | Arabella Dunk | Luka Ribicic |
| Kristie Nguyen | William Stephens | Stella Barbaro |
| Hunter Raymond | Isaiah Moothoo | Luke Saunders |
| Nathan Laurinaria | Charita Khamphon | Brianna Blake |
| Nina Jacob | Claire Quilala | Lucy Gabriel |
| Annaliese De Malle | Tate Fitzpatrick | Petal John |
| Jocelyne Croaker | Asha Davidson | Clare Da Silva |
| Harrison Brown | Elijah Boyd | Amelia Noble-Murray |
| Hermione Kieu | Rosie Houston | Faith Chilufya |
| Kaitlyn Cooke | Fernando Inostroza | Ethan Pradhan |
| Elias Butler | Annalise Wickert | Sophy Wang |
Congratulations to the following students who received the Good Samaritan Awards this week:
KB - Utsaha Gurung1B - Kaitlyn Cooke
2B - Nia Leota
3B - Brandon Blake
4B - Tessa Simon
5B - Mia Oribello
6B - Lucas Dempsey
SCHOOL FEES 2020 – NEW ARRANGEMENTS FOR PAYMENT BY INSTALMENT
The Catholic Education Office and its system of schools are in the process of a business transformation. Part of this transformation involves a new administration and accounting package being rolled out to schools. As you would be aware our school has been introducing Compass as our administration system over a period of time. It is now fully functioning together with a new web based accounting system called Technology One.
This will allow for school fees in 2020 to be invoiced centrally by the Catholic Education Office under advice from schools. Additionally, families will still be offered the opportunity of paying their school fees by regular payments over the school year as is the existing practice. However, the new system also allows for instalments to be calculated and advised to families with a Schedule of Payments and the dates that they are due. This replaces our current process of School Fee Agreements and the necessity for families to calculate their own payments.
Please note, families may elect to pay school fees by instalment under the following terms and conditions:
- The family must complete a Request to Pay School Fees by Instalment and present a separate request to each school in which their child/children are enrolled.
- Families may have only one instalment frequency. If the family has multiple accounts due to children at different schools, they may only elect one payment frequency eg fortnightly in both schools.
- The instalments must pay the school fee account in one school calendar year with an end date of the first week in December.
- On receipt of the Request to Pay School Fees by Instalment, an Instalment Schedule advising dates and amounts, will be generated by our accounting system and forwarded to the family by email so that payments can commence.
- The Request to Pay School Fees by Instalment will continue year to year until a further notice is received from the family.
- If instalments are not paid as agreed and there is serious default, the school may withdraw the offer of payment by instalment at any time and all fees will be due and payable until such time as a further arrangement is agreed upon with the school. Please note, families will be informed of the withdrawal of instalments in writing by email.
FAMILIES WITH EXISTING SCHOOL FEE AGREEMENTS
If you have an existing School Fee Agreement and are meeting your periodical payments as set out in the agreement, you will automatically be allocated to the instalment process in 2020 with your payment frequency. Therefore, it will not be necessary for you to submit a Request to Pay School Fees by Instalment.
FAMILIES WITHOUT AN ACTIVE SCHOOL FEE AGREEMENT
If you do not have an active School Fee Agreement in place and would like to pay by instalments, please obtain a Request to Pay School Fees by Instalment from the school office. By submitting this request you may elect to pay your school fees next year by weekly, fortnightly, monthly or quarterly instalments. When fees are invoiced and issued in early 2020, you will be provided with a Schedule of Payments and due dates with your school fee statement to enable you to commence payments. Please note, if you do not elect to pay by instalments, your school fee account will be payable in full 30 days after annual invoicing.
FAMILIES WHO MAY BE EXPERIENCING HARDSHIP
For those families who are experiencing financial hardship, please do not hesitate to contact the school office to access an Application for Fee Concession, either when your 2020 school fee statement is received, or in the case of an existing Fee Concession arrangement, on the date of your annual review.
SYSTEM REMINDERS
With the introduction of the new system, we now have the ability to generate system reminders for late payments. Should you default in your payments, reminders will be issued for each payment missed and they will continue to be issued until your account is brought up to date.
You will also have the opportunity to contact the school, if necessary in these circumstances, to provide explanation and make a further arrangement for payment.
Copies of the Request to Pay School Fees by Installment in 2020 are available from the school office now.
Carols under the COLA – The Giving Tree
Next week, on Thursday 12 December, we are hosting Andrew Chinn for our annual Carols under the COLA.
As we have done for a few years, we are having a Giving Tree in the corner near our big steps. This Christmas Tree will be up for people to place their presents under to assist families in our local community.
St Vincent de Paul have asked us to buy a gift for a child.
They have asked us to mention a few simple instructions:
- Could all donated gifts please be put into bags and NOT WRAPPED.
- Could parents buy a gift for their child’s age group. For example, if you have a child in Year 2, you would buy a gift that is suitable for a Year 2 child.
- St Vincent de Paul have also told us that gifts for children who are aged 11 or 12 are usually in short supply and they run out of them when organising the gifts.
- If you are able to buy an additional gift, St Vincent de Paul has kindly asked that you buy a gift for an 11 or 12 year old child.
All these beautiful gifts will be collected by St Vincent de Paul on the night of our Carols under the COLA with Andrew Chinn.
Thank you for your kind donations.
Sacramental Program – Reconciliation
Congratulations to all those children who made their Sacrament of Reconciliation last Wednesday evening. Also congratulations to all their families who journeyed with them as well.
Mrs Kathryn Hampton
Religious Education Coordinator
ICAS RESULTS- Writing
Congratulations to the students in grades 3-6 who participated in the ICAS Writing Competition this year. The students in years 3 and 4 completed the assessment using pencil and paper and the students in Years 5 and 6 completed the assessment online.
| Name | Result | Name | Result |
| Elliarna Anthony | Credit | Arya Bhattarai | Credit |
| Annie Jacob | Credit | Jonathan John | Merit |
| Hannah Butler | Participation | Fiona Fernandes | Participation |
| Natalie Fik | Participation | Ye Jun Ko | Participation |
| Alyssa Rodrigues | Participation | Brandan Slavin | Participation |
| Name | Result | Name | Result |
| Matthew Smyth | Distinction | Karylle Cooke | Credit |
| Hayley Espinoza | Credit | Francine Manalastas | Credit |
| Luca Sen | Credit | Tessa Simon | Credit |
| Ryder Wilson | Credit | Noritha Al Haider | Participation |
| Frances Dagami | Participation | Joieslin Emmanuel | Participation |
| Shaynika Lal | Participation | Jiya Manandhar | Participation |
| Karen Patana | Participation | Aarosh Shrestwa | Participation |
| Name | Result | Name | Result |
| Caprice Fleijsman | Credit | Jared Tan | Credit |
| Ella Carstens | Participation | Phoebe Eagleton | Participation |
| Hammy Kushan | Participation | Henry Kushan | Participation |
| Emma Russell | Participation | Esaf Tadres | Participation |
| Nicholas Turner | Participation |
| Name | Result | Name | Result |
| Eve Dooley | Distinction | Maryanne Star | Distinction |
| Eva Grados | Participation | Cordelia Jeffrey | Participation |
| Ankita Patole | Participation | Katelin Pereira | Participation |
Encouraging Positive Behavior
We all want our children to behave well, yet sometimes it is easy to forget that children don’t have the life experience we have. We often assume they know how to behave in all situations when in fact they are still trying to navigate how to do this. Our child's behavior is often a reflection of what they are experiencing and feeling. Once we understand where the behavior is coming from we can then know how to respond. For some children a change in routine, lack of sleep, feeling un-well or new situations can see them act out in ways we may feel are not positive. As parents our role is to help guide them in life. For this to happen we need to understand what is triggering the behavior we are seeing. This then helps us know how best to respond and support them to make positive behaviour choices. Tips to encourage positive behaviours include:
- Actively listen to your child – hear what they are saying and how they feel without judgement – listen to hear not to respond, take time to understand their perspective
- Make your expectations clear about how your children need to behave
- Encourage self reflection – ask what they could do differently next time
- Set clear limits and make any consequence fair, don’t over react
- Model the behavior you want to see in your child, remember they learn from you
- Give warning of transitions in activities, moving from playtime to dinner, bed time etc this allows your child to prepare for change
- Pick your battles – Is it really important, does it really matter and is it worth the fight? Teaching children how to let go of little things is just as important in learning to manage behaviors
- Praise your child when you see them demonstrating good behavior, this helps them feel great and reinforce positive behavior
- Encourage responsibility - by allowing your child some age appropriate responsibility you are teaching them independence a skill for life
- Mistakes are ok – let your child know that they will make mistakes and it helps us to learn how we can make better choices moving forward
Mostly importantly have fun with your children, they want your attention, spend time playing with them, talking to them and enjoying them.
Please read the attached article featured on the CEDoW Facebook page regarding the official opening of our new Yarning Circle.
On December 1, James Pal-pal Latoc went to Notre Dame University in Sydney to compete in the Visual Art Christmas Story Competition. 1,100 students entered, and James was one of the talented 88 students chosen to display his artwork at the University. It is a huge achievement to be selected to show his work and we send him a huge congratulations. James spent hours completing his artwork and reflection statement which you can see below.
My artwork was inspired by Luc-Oliver Merson’s ‘Rest In the Flight to Egypt’ which I tried to turn into an origami sculpture. I chose to do origami because it is an interest and hobby of mine that would allow my artwork to be unique and three dimensional. Origami originates from Japan allowing the artwork to link to my Japanese background. The blue colour of Mary’s clothes symbolises peace and the red of Joseph’s robes symbolises his love for Mary. I tried to capture the magnificence of the Great Pyramids of Egypt, that is the reason for the size of the paper pyramids. The water represents the rough journey they had to go through. The sea is treacherous and could bring a boat down at any moment but Mary, Joseph, Jesus and the donkey managed to pull through it.
Year 4 has been learning about Street Art this term. We looked at how it is temporary, large scale and how audiences interact with the art. Street Art can be found on walls, footpaths, staircases or buildings. All the classes worked together to create an underwater scene on the playground. Be sure to check out their talented chalk drawings before it washes away. A few pictures are shown below.
Wacky Wednesdays
See attached note from year 6.
Sherpa School Holiday Program attached.
The Clothing Pool will be open for the last time this term on Friday 13 December
Morning 8.30-9.30am
Afternoon 2.30-3.30pm
