FROM THE PRINCIPAL
TERM 4 - WEEK 5
Last Sunday I accompanied the School Captains at the Remembrance Day service at the Tamworth Town Hall. It was a very powerful and moving ceremony and I thank the captains for presenting in such a respectful and mature manner.
Tomorrow the school will be visited by the Director and Assistant Director of Catholic Education in the Diocese (Chris Smyth and Terry McCarthy). They will be accompanied by representatives of Catholic Schools NSW. This body is responsible for the delivery of Catholic Education across the state and replaces the NSW Catholic Education Commission.
Earlier this week I sent home a note on some house-keeping matters for the school. These are to ensure that the school day runs smoothly and that the learning of our students has as few interruptions as possible. A copy of the note can be found further on in this newsletter.
On Monday Emily Lasker took on the role of Principal for a Day. She had a wonderful day, helping with Kindergarten Orientation, analysing data, visiting classrooms, sharing morning tea with the staff and many other activities. You can read her thoughts in General News in this newsletter.
We are currently carrying out our end of year ACER assessments in Mathematics and Comprehension in grades from Year 2 to Year 6. It has been very encouraging looking at this data and seeing the growth of our students in these areas in comparison to the data collected at the beginning of the year. Many of our grades have hit strong targets. Congratulations to the teachers and students on striving for “2 more marks”.
From Monday this week the students who attend Sherpa Kids after school care are to be picked up from the Hill Street exit. Thank you for your support with this directive.
Please continue to make time to pray for the deceased members of our school, families and parish in this Month of the Holy Souls and keep Mr West in your thoughts as he recovers from illness.
Enjoy the rest of the week.
IMPORANT NOTICE TO ALL PARENTS
A few housekeeping rules for all parents to read and be aware of.
SCHOOL HOURS - 8.45am to 2.55pm
Our school hours are strictly 8.45am to 2.55pm Monday to Friday. For the sake of your child’s education, please make the effort to have your child attend a full day. An average of 10 students arrive to school each day late and an average of 15 students are leaving early each day. Do you realise that each time a child arrives late or leaves early from a classroom, the entire class is interrupted and can take 15-20 mins for the teacher to get ‘back on task’ to finish the lesson? You are not only disturbing your own child’s education but those other children in the class.
CHANGES TO PICK-UP ROUTINE
Our office staff are receiving as many as 15-20 messages from parents each day changing or clarifying a child’s afternoon collection. Many of these are received in the last 30 minutes of school, once again disturbing many classes with the teacher having to halt teaching, answer the phone, relay the message to the child and then start the class again.
Children thrive on consistency and routine. Discuss your child’s pick up routine before saying goodbye to them in the morning and stick to it.
CHANGES TO LUNCH ORDERS
Friar’s Tuckshop does not have the ability to make changes to lunch orders once they have been submitted. Friar’s Tuckshop is currently filling close to 100 lunch orders on a daily basis. Mrs Harding is often without volunteer help and must serve over the counter sales as well as prepare the orders. Changes to lunch orders will no longer be accepted after 9.00am.
BIRTHDAY ICYPOLES
Many days, our staffroom freezer cannot cope with the amount of birthday icypoles. Please be aware, that we can not store the icypoles for more than one day. Left over icypoles muct be collected at the end of the day.