Wellbeing

Bullying No Way Week is Australia’s leading initiative for bullying prevention in schools. It’s an opportunity for schools to foster a shared understanding of bullying behaviours and highlight strategies for their prevention.

This year’s theme is: Small Acts, Big Impact

It takes a community to address bullying behaviours, within and beyond the school gate.

Students can make a big impact through small acts of kindness and support for others being bullied. Trusted adults are there to guide children and young people as they learn how small, thoughtful actions can create a positive difference and encourage reporting of bullying.

This Bullying No Way Week, we’re encouraging you to embrace the theme Small Acts, Big Impact. Show kindness, support others and take meaningful steps to stand up against bullying. For more information about Bullying No Way Week and bullying prevention, visit the Bullying No Way website.

During the week, we will engage students in meaningful discussions and activities that highlight how small actions can create a big impact. We encourage families to use this time to have open and supportive conversations with their children about recognising bullying, its effects, and ways they can make a positive difference.

You can visit the Bullying No Way website for tips around how to have this discussion.

On Tuesday, 18th August SJW students are invited to wear purple as it represents peace, strength and empowerment to take a stand against bullying behaviour.

On this day, students will join our largest every anti-bullying lesson. With tailored sessions for different age groups, each lesson is created by Kids Helpline counsellors, curriculum-aligned, and designed to give students practical strategies to respond to bullying.

Throughout this year, our PBL Team and staff have been working together to prepare for the launch of Positive Behaviour for Learning (PBL) across our school in 2027.

At its heart, PBL is about something quite simple: we don’t just expect children to know how to behave, we teach them.

Just as we explicitly teach reading, writing and mathematics, we will explicitly teach what it means to be Respectful, Responsible and Safe at SJW. Students will learn what these behaviours look like, sound like and feel like in different parts of the school.

This year, staff have been working together to:

Develop a whole-school expectations matrix, so students hear consistent language and expectations wherever they are at school.
Create explicit teaching lessons and social stories to help students understand and practise our expectations.
Develop consistent ways to acknowledge, correct and reteach behaviour.
Design our whole-school acknowledgement system, including our new PBL ticket system coming in 2027!

An important part of PBL is recognising that behaviour is something we teach, not simply something we manage. When students make mistakes, we calmly help them understand what went wrong, teach them what to do instead and give them opportunities to practise.

We know many students have been eagerly waiting to find out who the winner is! At our first Assembly in Week 2 of Term 4, we will finally announce the winning entry and present the winner with a small prize.

This work is grounded in research and best practice and has been supported through our professional learning with Melbourne Archdiocese Catholic Schools (MACS).

We are looking forward to bringing PBL to life across SJW in 2027 and creating a consistent approach where every child knows what is expected, is taught how to meet those expectations, and is acknowledged and supported along the way.

We look forward to sharing more with our families as we get closer to our 2027 launch!

Kind regards,

Jane Manton

Engagement Leader

Mental Health and Wellbeing Leader | PBL Coach