Message from Learning & Teaching

Our school closure day provided St. John’s educators the opportunity to consider, think about, struggle with, and better understand each of the capabilities of the Victorian curriculum. (The capabilities consist of four different areas - Personal and Social, Critical and Creative, Intercultural and Ethical). Educators worked collaboratively in teams to develop progressions of learning for each of the areas. They used prior knowledge and experience, supporting resources and thinking tools. We’d like to share some of the conversation stems that were heard on the day that might offer you a snapshot into the work...

“This is what 21st century learning is all about”

“I’m loving this!”

“These progressions are so important”

“How do we think about this differently?”

“What’s the thinking tool to unpack this?”

“Can we combine our thinking?”

“What dispositional thinking is needed?”

“That’s a new word for me”

“Wow, there’s a lot here!”

“We want kids to use this language”

“What is an example of this?”

“I hear what you’re saying, thanks for clarifying!”

Our hard working and innovative team at St. John’s is looking forward to implementing our new knowledge and understanding to continually assess and improve the way we approach the capabilities curriculum in order to create learning experiences that are rich and authentic for our children.

Seesaw

We love to see family engagement through Seesaw whether this be by commenting on your child's learning, asking questions, or even hitting the like button (love heart) on posts. This engagement means your child has a greater audience beyond the classroom and that the school can collect valuable engagement analytics that help us to continuously improve. Next time you see a post for your child, leave a comment or hit the like button!

Kind regards,

Lauren Davis, Jarryd Bradford, Gemma Goodyear

ldavis@sjfootscray.catholic.edu.au jbradford@sjfootscray.catholic.edu.au

Literacy

At St John's, we value the importance of getting to know your child, who they are as a person; their interests, passions etc. As such, we strategically delay formal testing until 3-4 weeks into the new school year, to allow the opportunity for children to establish and re-establish relationships with Educators and their peers.

Children across the school have taken part in formal Literacy testing including; Prep-2: 'Running Records', Record of Oral Language and for 3-6: 'ARCOTS' testing (children read texts and answer comprehension-related questions).

Educators and Pedagogical Coaches are currently analysing and in dialogue about this data, to determine children's strengths, areas of need and plan Target Teaching, and, where necessary, Interventions to support them to access learning.

You might like to have a conversation with your child about this assessment, and the dispositions they used throughout i.e. problem solving a word, or perseverance when experiencing challenges.

At St John's, we try to ensure that most of the texts children explore are contextual. Over the weekend, we celebrated 'International Women's Day'. In their Target teaching groups, children may be exploring texts that are connected to this event; celebrating key women in history that have paved the way for women's rights, or texts / stories about the importance of gender equity.

At St John's, we have purchased a subscription to 'Story Box' which you are invited to access as a family. Story Box is a website through which you can access a range of picture books, read by Authors or other well known people in Australia. This week they have included a list of books connected to 'IWD' as well as the upcoming event, 'Harmony Week'.

The website details are:

www.storyboxlibrary.com.au

Username: stjohnsfootscray

Password: sjf3011

As always, if you have any Literacy-related questions, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Daniela De Luca

ddeluca@sjfootscray.catholic.edu.au

Message from Wellbeing

On Friday the 19th of March, St John’s will acknowledge Harmony Day and the National Day of Action Against Bullying and Violence (Bullying - No Way! Day). St John’s is strongly committed to creating a world of kindness, acceptance, inclusivity, diversity and peace.

Harmony Week is all about inclusiveness, respect and belonging for all Australians, regardless of cultural or linguistic background. Bullying - No Way! Day is a day to mark Australian school communities standing together against bullying and violence.

We will acknowledge and celebrate these days by:

Wearing orange casual clothes on Friday 19th March. Orange is the traditional colour of social communication and meaningful conversation and also relates to freedom and mutual respect.
Focusing on the themes of both days during our Ready To Learn time next week. These themes will be explored through literature, discussion and short video clips.
Labelling actions that will help make our school and world a more kind and inclusive place.
Participating in a Bollywood dance workshop on Friday 19th March. The very important WHY behind this incursion is - the more we know and understand about the culture or experience of another - the stronger the connection grows.
Having a Bollywood dance party as part of our Assembly on the Friday afternoon.

Some great books for exploring cultural diversity are:

I’m Australian Too - Mem Fox

Mirror - Jeanie Baker

My Two Blankets - Irena Kobald & Freya Blackwood

Warm regards,

Ashlee Owen

aowen@sjfootscray.catholic.edu.au

Message from Faith

Prayer Gatherings

Our 3/4 Hub is busy supporting some of our children in preparation for the Sacrament of Reconciliation. The children led us in reflection on the concept of forgiveness at a recent Prayer Gathering. Year 2 Hub have been exploring the concept of service inspired by the story of the Washing of the Feet, they will lead our gathering tomorrow and will also acknowledge the Hindu Festival of Holi which some of our families will soon be preparing to celebrate.

Project Compassion 2021

A reminder that throughout Lent we are supporting Project Compassion, an annual charity collection in aid of Caritas Australia who make a life-changing difference to those in need, both here in Australia and overseas. This year the theme is: 'Be more', Caritas asks us to consider the small actions we can take to be more for others. Collection boxes are in each Hub and at the main office if you would like to donate some money. Project Compassion will run throughout all of Lent. If you would like to know more about Caritas and the work they do please visit: https://lent.caritas.org.au/

Sacraments 2021 - Yr 3/4 Family Faith Evening

A reminder that we will be holding a Yr 3/4 Family Faith Night online next Tuesday 16th March. A note will be sent home to each family to remind you of the log-in details next week.

Please note:

Sacrament of Reconciliation will be celebrated on March 29th, 6 pm

Sacrament of Eucharist will be celebrated on September 12th, 10am

Sacrament of Confirmation will be celebrated on June 10th, 6pm

Please do not hesitate to get in touch if you have any questions about our Sacramental celebrations.

Kind regards,

Aoife Mc Carthy

amccarthy@sjfootscray.catholic.edu.au

Sustainability

Hi, our names are Leni and Chloe and we are the sustainability leaders for St. John’s in 2021. We are passionate about helping the planet in any way we can and making our Farm and school more sustainable.

Hi I'm Chloe I love animals and reading. I love our common home. It's really sad how people treat it, so our jobs are to help our common home with doing small things like collecting bottle caps, bread tags and recycling.

I’m Leni, and I really love caring for the chickens and the Farm. We do different things to help the farm but there’s a lot of things we can do from here, but luckily, there’s lots of time.

At the farm we water the plants and trees, care for the chickens and keep their area clean.

If other families could help on the weekend they are more than welcome to take some of the ripe plants and veggies and if possible, take compost to the chickens.

We noticed that while the hub recycling bins have been very successful, no hub has been using the compost bins yet. We are hoping that by speaking with your children about the food scraps we can compost, we can lessen our environmental footprint. We will be encouraging children to collect fruits, vegetables, dairy products and bread scraps and we will take the scraps over to our Farm - composting and providing the chickens with a good snack each afternoon.

At home, we invite all our families to undertake our first challenge to collect and send in bread tags. These plastic bits end up in landfill but there are plenty of initiatives that recycle them! Please think about how you will store these while you are collecting. We ask that you place them into paper envelopes or a reusable container with your name so that we can return it to you instead of using plastic snaplock bags.

If you are a passionate sustainable member of our community or have any suggestions to help improve our ecological footprint at St. John’s, please contact us through Lauren ldavis@sjfootscray.catholic.edu.au

Kind regards,

Leni and Chloe

Community Noticeboard

'Little Seeds' Food Playgroup for Term 1 & 2