From the Head of Junior School

Welcome to a new year at the Junior School!

A new year brings with it a sense of excitement and anticipation. There are new opportunities to be explored and new challenges to encourage growth. I warmly welcome all families to this new year at the Junior School. 

Schools are strange places without students, they are quiet, empty and somewhat lifeless…which is why it is so great to have the students (and you) back at College. It has been a wonderful start to the year with the students hitting the ground running. 

They have embraced their new learning environments with energy and dedication and the playground is a buzz of positive play at every morning tea and lunch break. The signs are extremely positive for the year ahead. I welcome all our new Kindergarten families and what a big week it has been for our newest members of the St Gregory’s College family. I wish them all the best on the new phase of their learning journey.

It has been wonderful seeing the fresh-faced excited students this week, catching up with friends, and making new ones. It has been wonderful to see our new Kindergarten students start on Tuesday and ease their transition into ‘big school’ with their new friends. The staff have been working busily over the break to prepare for the start of Term and I want to thank each and every one of them for their preparations to date.

To our new families joining us, I welcome you to our special school community. At the Junior School, we highly value the strong commitment and bond that exists between the School and its families in working together to achieve the best outcomes for the students. 

I am very excited about leading a team of enthusiastic and talented staff members as we guide students on their learning journey at St Gregory’s College.

2021 Here We Go!

At the start of the year as a staff we met to discuss our goals for the year ahead, look at our practices and what our main priorities are for the year ahead. I look forward to sharing these with you all at the parent forum on February 22. 

A couple of years ago, a Junior School parent shared with me an 8-minute clip that inspired me as an educator about how we look to set personal and school-wide goals for 2021. Being a huge fan of Denzel Washington can I suggest that if you have a spare 8 minutes and have not seen this clip please watch the clip below titled ‘Put GOD First’ . . . it is a must!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxY_eJLBflk&feature=youtu.be

We look forward to achieving success this year as a College as we reflect, refine and challenge our thinking about how we can continue to grow positively as a learning community.

Junior School Parent Forum – Monday 22 February 7:00pm

Just a reminder that our first Junior School Parent Forum is coming soon. We would love to see parents attend our first forum of the year in the Br Luke Hall (we will adhere to strict socially distancing, however, this will also be live-streamed).

Meet the Teacher – Weeks 3 and 4

The ‘Meet the Teacher’ afternoon’s this year will take place as a 10 min chat with parents and teachers. This will take place in Week 3 and 4 and Mrs Romeo has emailed all parents in regards to booking in. For Parents, hopefully, this provides an important opportunity to have detailed conversations about your son or daughter and what the plan will be for the year ahead, as well as getting to meet your child’s teacher early on.

The Importance of Reading

Reading is learned and practised in thousands of classrooms across the globe every day. It is perhaps, the single most important skill a child learns. Without competent reading skills, a child is going to struggle to build on the basis of knowledge in other subjects. Children who experience success in reading are more likely to become confident learners.

Parents are vital role models when it comes to inspiring children to read. By reading to your child and having them read to you, children see the value and enjoyment of reading as well as building language and thinking skills. Stories can aid children to cope with feelings, build confidence and learn reading skills through modelling. I would hope that reading is being modelled to all students from Kindergarten all the way through to Year 6.

As a parent myself, I do understand the hectic nature of bedtime! But, making an effort to scaffold reading time to become a part of your child’s daily routine will set them up for reading success. Give your child 10 minutes in the morning or evening. The reading time should be a time for sharing, relaxing and fun. Every child will be different when it comes to their interests, favourites and the individual development of reading skills. Don’t worry if they like comics as they get older – it is all reading. Once they are confident they are more likely, with some gentle encouragement, to want to move onto reading different things.

Fill your home with reading materials of all kinds and be enthusiastic about your child’s reading. Please use the diary each day to share in your child’s reading success – what are they reading today? 

Keep regular contact with your child’s teacher and try to know what they are learning and reading. Be open to the possibility that your child may have reading problems but don’t delay in accessing help. Ignoring the problem will not make it go away.

Spanish in the Junior School

2021 is the year that was planned to include a LOTE (Language Other Than English) subject and Spanish was the planned language. This week we have kicked off the academic year with all classes from Kindergarten - Year 6 experiencing the language and culture. I know that Mrs Grados is super excited, and I am sure some of your classes have already started sharing this on platforms like SeeSaw. What a wonderful experience for our Junior School students!

I trust that everyone has had a great start to 2021 and we look forward to working together as a community to continue to build a culture that we are all proud of and part of, and build this together. 

As our St Gregory’s College motto states, ‘You will reap what you sow’.

Mr Joel Weekes

Head of Junior School