Wellbeing
Hi St Mary’s,
Welcome back for Term 4. Our students at St Mary’s have started the term really well and are looking at a strong finish to the year both in and outside the classroom. I have been spending a lot of time on the oval watching the footy and I have to say the level of skill is pretty impressive and the sportsmanship of the players has markedly improved.
This year has flown by and as such, I have started planning for 2025. I have been working closely with Steph Silvagni, our Speech Pathologist and our leadership team to audit and plan our Wellbeing strategy going forward.
In the past we have used the Berry Street trauma informed practice to underpin our Wellbeing strategies at St Mary’s with other programs working alongside it. This program was fantastic for our school but over time for us, it has had some drawbacks. It took a long time to implement thoroughly school wide, was costly and with the amount of staff movement we have had, it has been difficult to sustain. With MACS guidance we have started the journey of planning for and implementing PBL (Positive Behaviour for Learning). This program focuses on positive reinforcement of our expected behaviours for learning and ensures consistent expectations and learning norms.
Steph Silvagni and I have been researching and training to implement The Zones of Regulation which will run alongside. This is a program to develop our students' ability to be able to self-regulate their emotions. As a community we will be learning more about this as we go but if you would like to learn more check out this link.
https://zonesofregulation.com/how-it-works/
The other program that we will be working with is from the Social Thinking organisation. The associated programs Social Detectives and Superflex series, help students boost social awareness and are mainly run in small groups on an as needed basis by Steph. I will also support Steph with this program. Check out the link if you would like to learn more.
https://www.socialthinking.com/social-thinking-methodology
In other news the garden is looking pretty good and some classes are starting to plan recipes to cook. If you would like to help out in the garden or school grounds please let me know. At this stage, it will be on a Thursday afternoon from about 2pm.
Have a great weekend.
Regards,
Mark O’Sullivan