5-8 Community News

Dear Parents and Caregivers,

It has been another busy fortnight with so many extracurricular activities occurring for our wonderful community.

On Wednesday last week, we had our students in Years 7 and 8 undertake a presentation called ‘Real Talk’. Students engaged in conversations about gender, identity, and respectful relationships in an engaging learning environment. Hearing from presenters who shared their own personalised stories was something that we think touched a number of students.

In coming weeks, students in Years 5 and 6 will engage in the Lone Pine Ceremony along with unpacking the content from the Reach Foundation. These students will undertake themes that also engage in conversations about gender, identity, and respectful relationships. This supports their current unit of work for Religious Education Life Relationships. A really important aspect of development is understanding how and why our bodies require change and how to navigate some of these changes from a personal level.

Likewise, students in Years 7 and 8 will start to really unpack the dangers and the effects on the Human Body. We are so very lucky to have the organisation https://notevenonce.org.au/ present what is useful information to help support students and their decision making, but to also guide students about being upstanders and that it is okay to say ‘no’.

Again, the themes from The Resilience Project continue to drive our learning spaces. Did you know our 7-8 Student Journals incorporate a number of these themes that can be practised at home? Themes such as ‘Empathy and Compassion’ continue to be re-taught, especially after significant sporting events have occurred where unfortunately, teams will have to lose. What’s important is that our children need to understand that we all take wins and losses to sport differently and we need to respect this boundary. We also need to understand that being a good sport is also about respecting some of the decisions that have been made or have not gone the way that we wanted them to. Look at the Carlton Football Club for example.

You will notice with this week’s SOLE focus that ‘being punctual’ continues to be a focus for our Community. This is to help provide students with the opportunity to be ready for their learning and to also prompt quick movement in each transition time, especially after the recess and lunchtime bell and in between lessons.

With lunchtime activities taking place, I strongly encourage you to have conversations with your children about attending, particularly if they are finding themselves bored and uninterested in the schoolyard. We offer a lunchtime activity each day, catered to a variety of interests.

The poster attached, which can also be found in our learning spaces, shows the activities on offer. There are a number of activities that provide exceptional opportunities, further developing positive relationships/friendships but also creating a very safe space for our children.

The boxing and netball activities have been a real hit on Monday and Tuesday afternoons with a total of 10 teams. Well done to all participants. A bigger shout out to the ‘Defending champs and King Gardy Angels’, who currently sit tied on first place.

With the weather starting to warm up, it also means a higher UV radius. This is what burns our skin and creates sunburn. Students will be expected to wear their hats from Week 8 onwards!

Please consistently check in with your children about their use of technology and personal devices. At the moment, apps such as SnapChat, Instagram, and Discord are posing some challenges at home. If you feel your child is being bullied online, please report it to your child's TA teacher and to the eSafety Commissioner. These two websites provide instructions about how to report online abuse:

https://www.esafety.gov.au/key-issues/esafety-guide

https://www.esafety.gov.au/report

Here are some strategies you might like to use.

Mr. Poppa's top tips for creating safer spaces for young people online:

As trusted adults, let’s moderate, safeguard and support young people online at all times. This looks like setting up a learning space where you can monitor your child's phone, computer or iPad screen.
Ensure that students' emails are used for school purposes only. Conversations, which use explicit language, should not be permitted on any email address.
Ensure that any social media profiles are not accessible for all to see and have appropriate privacy settings in place. All social media platforms allow accounts to be set on private. It is okay to ask your child what they are using their devices for. This creates communication. Did you know that social media licences are only permitted for students over the age of 13? Our students can still access social media websites/platforms on their school devices at home, using the home internet.
Enable young people to control and edit their own privacy settings quickly and easily eg. what's appropriate to share online and what isn't.
Make terms, conditions, and rules of engagement upfront, transparent and easy for them to understand. Setting boundaries with your child is really important. For teenagers using their devices in their room, the door open policy is a good one.
Refer to our school-wide SOLE matrices as a means for supporting your children.
Ensure that children have had enough time to rest from being in front of their screens. Set some times that are appropriate where your children are not on their screens. It's important that the students are getting 8-10 hours of sleep and are heading to bed at a reasonable time and without any technology around. This can be stored away from the child's bed.

TA - Please remind your child about the importance of getting to TA on time. TA commences at 8.50am and concludes at 9.10am. It's ever so important that our students attend TA as it enables them to feel a sense of inclusion amongst their community which will foster opportunities for students to further develop long-lasting relationships with their peers and teachers.

Students should not be attending Woolworths before school starts, unless they have your permission. Once students have been dropped off at the College, they will need to remain at the College.

Let’s encourage students to seek help from adults, where needed. If there is a challenge in the classroom where your child is not sure of a learning task or a concern outside of the learning space, please get into contact with your child's TA, or even better, encourage the children to seek us out.

Corey Carver and Anthony Poppa

5-8 Community Leaders