Principal News 

TERM 2 - WEEK 5

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CAMPS 2024

*Updated Key Dates T2-T4 2024 - Including new dates for lightning premiership

When We Know Better, We Do Better

Dear Families and Friends,

As we close out another remarkable fortnight, I again extend my thanks to our dedicated students, staff, and families for their contributions to making Sacred Heart the place to be in the bayside area. Our recent Mother's Day morning tea, assembly, and classroom visits beautifully highlighted another stunning celebration. The turnout surpassed our expectations, with many noting it as the largest gathering for this special event at Sacred Heart. We are confident it provided such a wonderful opportunity for mothers, extended family members, and special guests to take a moment from their busy Friday morning schedules to connect, enjoy some treats, and most importantly, cherish valuable moments with the children in their soon-to-be-refurbished learning spaces. Thanks again families for your involvement and feedback throughout the day, this is always appreciated. 

We are also immensely proud as we had more reason to celebrate last week as our school, students, and staff were acknowledged in the Herald Sun (inc. article & video below) for their exceptional efforts and approaches to teaching and learning. Over the past two years, we've embarked on a transformative journey, reflecting, reviewing, and implementing significant changes across various aspects of Sacred Heart, particularly in our teaching and learning sphere.

Guided by the principle "When We Know Better, We Do Better," our leadership team, with full 'buy-in' from our staff, has heavily influenced this remarkable shift. These changes include adopting only research and evidence-based methodologies such as explicit and direct instruction, embedding a structured literacy approach and mathematics program and focusing on specific curriculum topics & content knowledge, moving away from inquiry-based methods. 

Additionally, this transformation has aligned with our targeted and rigorous professional development initiatives led by our curriculum leaders. We've also implemented a tight daily learning schedule, including refined timetables to enhance accountability measures, provide predictability and consistent delivery of core curriculum areas of literacy and numeracy. Importantly, emphasis has also been placed on establishing and maintaining routines, reducing cognitive loading (teaching the stuff and not the fluff and removing distractions) and fostering positive learning habits, such as building stamina, improved focus and perseverance among our students - creating a calm and orderly classroom environment.

Celebrating Best Practice

Collectively this recognition of these efforts, recently highlighted through various channels affirms the amazing work of our team. Last week, these efforts were published in a Herald Sun article, and as previously mentioned, showcased in a leadership presentation at the MACS forum, which drew over 200 attendees. 

Moreover, our practices have drawn the interest of educators, leading to numerous visits from those eager to observe our staff in action. In recent days, we have had visits from the MACS Teaching & Learning Team, as well as several schools and their leadership teams from the South Central Network scheduled next month.

Feedback from visting MACS representatives:

#1 Dear Team

Many thanks for your warm welcome today and your generosity in giving us your time to show us the learning taking place in your classrooms. It was great to see and to talk with you about how you got to this level of consistency in your practices. A testament to your dedication and thoughtful collective leadership. Congratulations to you as a team but also please pass on our thanks to the teachers who let us spend times in their rooms today. We really appreciate it. 

#2 Sandy Team,

We are so grateful to your school community for sharing your educational practices with us. Embedded, sustainable practice leads to enriched learning spaces and flourishing learners. This was so evident in your school. Congrats to your leadership team, their enthusiasm and commitment is infectious.

Well done

While we warmly welcome these achievements, we recognize that our journey is ongoing and necessitates continued refinement and embedding in the months and years ahead. Our primary aim is to sustain this momentum and continually raise the bar at Sacred Heart, with a strong focus on improvement. Ultimately, this is to enhance the overall wellbeing and academic progress of all our students.

Though it's just a glimpse of 'some' of our incredible team, I'm immensely grateful and proud to work alongside these dedicated educators. They exemplify lifelong learning and continuously strive to enhance their skills for the benefit of the students they support, while fostering positive and trustworthy connections i.e. relationships.

#gratitude 

Apologies for not capturing all staff in this instance. 

Confirmation 2024

Congratulations to our impressive Year 6 students who received their final sacrament while on their Sacred Heart faith journey. This was such a lovely celebration and gathering for our community. 

Earlier in the week, they spent some quality time with Bishop Ireland, who quizzed the students and reinforced the importance and significance of this sacrament. Prior to this exchange, the students spent many hours preparing with the support of their teachers, Miss McKay, Mr. T, and Mr. Blake. This year, we have welcomed and valued the active involvement from Fr. Martin, who joined the students for the entire retreat day leading up to Thursday evening. A special thank you to Mr Blake for his leadership and organisation, Mrs McGrath for her photography, Heather McGrath for setting up the church and Mr. Brown, who supported the students during Mr. T's leave. We are truly blessed to have such a supportive team!

Mr Blake has also written a comprehensive report in the Education in Faith News section.

Mother's Day Assembly

We want to extend our sincere thanks to Karen, Brigid, and dads who assisted with last Friday's special morning tea. It was such a delightful start to the day, with our mums and guests welcoming this revised format. This gathering provided a wonderful opportunity for everyone to enjoy before the gorgeous junior performance and precious classroom time. Our rooms were overflowing at times. 

Sacred Heart 'Certainly' Has Got Talent

Congratulations to Mr Coutts, Mrs Pennington, and our Art Captains (Elsie, Ella, Sophia & Kit) for organising yet another highly successful three-day Sacred Heart Got Talent festival. This event provided a perfect platform for our students to showcase their talents, sometimes surprising even themselves. For some, their talents may not always shine as brightly on the sports field, but thanks to events like this, they have the chance to shine on stage. From captivating dance routines to stage musical classics, comedic performances, and even tributes to Taylor Swift, our Sacred Heart students were able to showcase their talent, creativity, courage, and inner performer. Congratulations to all our confident students—your talent truly shone brightly! We certainly didn't envy the judges with so much talent on show. 

Class Award & Value for the Week - Pride

As mentioned earlier, our weekly Class Award focuses on a specific value we aim to emphasise in our classrooms and playground. This week, I had the privilege of visiting Year 6 to witness Miss McKay and Mr. T discussing (Circle Time) the important value of pride. The students' responses were exemplary, a fact further reeinforced during their visit from Bishop Ireland. Both Miss McKay and Mr. T reiterated the significance of pride, expressing how proud they were of their students and the exceptional manner in which they conducted themselves during this special visit.

Building Program Update Q&A #1

At the last School Advisory Council meeting, it was requested that a Q&A document be organised for the community once the refurbishment program gets underway. This is to ensure families are well informed and have the opportunity to ask questions about the status or features of the program. Although formal commencement has not yet begun, please find attached our first Building Q&A for 2024. We hope that you will appreciate these fortnightly updates. 

Administrative Duties Taking a Backseat

On Thursday, I was greeted at my door by our beautiful Prep Ms as they wanted to share their incredible sentence work. This week, they wrote a full descriptive sentence about a koala sitting in a tree. Just by chance, there were two bags of Caramello Koalas in the office, ready for a special treat. It is also worth noting I was working with the MACS Business Manager at this time, so needless to say this was a worthwhile distraction from finances. 

Staffing News

Please be advised of upcoming staffing changes next week, particularly on Tuesday and Wednesday, due to professional learning commitments with MACS and the ongoing implementation of the T.I.M.S. (Teaching Impact in Mathematics Series) initiative. This initiative emphasises explicit teaching practices and provides resources for our teachers. We've already seen success in the P-2 area, where staff engage with online resources, participate in peer feedback sessions and coaching, and are tasked with recording their teaching sessions. We extend our thanks to Mr. Blake for leading this valuable professional development opportunity for our staff. Please note,  Miss Donnelly will assume this leadership role within our community starting from Semester 2 in light of Mr Blake's return to Ireland. 

Congratulations to Stacie Stewart, one of our fabulous LSOs who is also studying for a teaching degree. Her efforts have not gone unnoticed, as she has recently been invited to serve as a mentor for Deakin University students, a testament to her outstanding dedication to her studies.

Little Hearts of Sandy Playgroup

Family and friends are most welcome to attend our Little Hearts Playgroup. Please note, there is no age limit on toddlers or pre-schoolers. We typically have about20 pre-schoolers and toddlers and it has been fabulous to see lots of new faces at these sessions. We'd love to see you there! 

• 31st May
• 21st June
• 26th July
• 30th August
• 18th October
• 22nd November
• 6th December

P&F NEWS

Many thanks to Nat McCabe and Ash Dooley, and team of mums and dads for helping with the Mother's Day Stall and morning tea. We are so grateful for this level of support and generousity, particularly for our very busy families. 

Well done P&F on the phenomenal response to the Ladies Day Out - 88! We dearly hope you have a spectacular and well-deserved day networking and celebrating. What happens on the 'day out' stays on the day out. 

SAVE THE DATE

LITTLE GEMS

One of the most rewarding aspects of my role is when students drop by my office to share their work and achievements, namely celebrating their efforts. Often, their pride is palpable without them needing to say a word—their smiles and body language say it all.

We have just loved having Fr.Martin join our community. He can often be seen engaging with staff in the staffroom, visiting the classrooms, or roaming the playground during his precious spare time with his trusty companion, Monty. On Thursday, I glanced across the yard and noticed he had indeed taken this interaction to a whole new 'level', literally. 

Thanks Mr Brown for sourcing these new soccer goals for our students and his team of helpers for putting these together. Straight out of the box and into action within minutes. Needless to say these have been a hit/kick!

Old School Yard Games, Apparently Never Get Old

Such a calming lesson with Yr.6, our students were completely emersed in their art with Mrs Hyslop, so much so they were oblivious to the photographer. 

I love the photos Mr. Brown shared on Friday during the interschool football. It's remarkable how he manages to keep me updated weekly with scores and photos, even while umpiring. This week he even provided running 'Brownlow' votes for best on ground. 

And finally....

Just a gentle reminder that next Friday, the school will be closed in response to MACS' 'time in lieu' requirements. This closure will also allow our newly contracted building company to have uninterrupted access to the school facilities, enabling them to survey the classrooms and grounds without any students present.

We sincerely thank you for your understanding and apologise for any inconvenience this may cause. Despite our efforts to secure aftercare for our students, our provider was unable to staff this full day closure.

Here's to another fantastic fortnight ahead,

Simon Collis

Principal

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