Principal's Message

Dear OLA Families,

Wakakirri

Birds of a Feather

A lost bird dances alone, out of place with graceful flamingos, squarking parrots and fierce hawks. Noticing sadness, kind birds gift feathers. The bird transforms, filled with joy and acceptance by this gesture of belonging.

This is our story, our creation and what a beautiful one. A huge congratulations to our Grade 5/6 Wakakirri students and of course our staff involved in bringing this wonderful message of belonging to life on the stage over the last two terms and especially at the Frankston Arts Centre on Tuesday evening. We couldn't be prouder.

The Wakakirri judge and ambassador spoke glowingly of OLA:

A thought provoking, heartwarming story of belonging! 

It was such a moving moment of community at the end. 

I loved the use of classical dance to represent the lead bird and her contrast to the community.

Beautiful work on taking on my feedback puppeteers.

Beautiful musical choices. A stunning representation of belonging!

I love the use of the Barbie song - a fun pop culture moment!

I loved the use of set pieces and props - congrats puppeteers!!

Congratulations

Notable Awards 

Creative Production Award for minimalist production design

Ensemble Award for overall performance

Lead Cast Award for performance in dancing and acting

Storytelling Award for great story

Production Award for projection

Wakakirri is a nationwide Festival for Australian schools that provides a platform for students to express their thoughts, ideas, and aspirations through the art of storytelling and dance. Inspired by the belief that great stories can inspire change, Wakakirri is designed to promote student engagement and wellbeing in schools through the creation and performance of captivating Story-Dances.

The key message of our story is celebrating the power of belonging. We know that everybody has experienced loneliness or at times felt as though they don’t belong. This can be very isolating and have extremely negative effects on one’s well being. Our Story-Dance proves that actions of acceptance such as, inviting someone to play or including others, work to create a welcoming community for everyone. In fact, it is our differences and our unique qualities, not our similarities that make our community as strong as can be. We love the idea that our message can be used to teach the importance of acts of kindness and inclusion.

Thank you

Thank you to our amazing Miss Riley and Miss Jones for their story writing and inclusion of student voice. Thank you also for your wonderful song choice and choreography.  Thank you Miss Turner for organising all that needs to done behind the scenes - you are a great Producer!! Thank you Rosie and Ann for your amazing work on costumes, props and backdrops and thank you Rosie for taking a lead in this area. Thank you to Natasha (our lead bird's Mum) for your brilliant work on the finer details of the costumes. Thank you to the team for taking such a lead and volunteering their time to create this wonderful Wakakirri performance. We are also grateful to Mr Pertz and Mrs Reeder for your presence and support for the day and night as well as Mrs Thompson and Mrs McDowall for joining the team to paint and prepare props for this amazing event.

Book Week

Author Visit - Anna Fienberg 

Anna Fienberg captivated and inspired our students P-2 and 3-6. A beautiful human and a wonderful storyteller. There is nothing quite like an author reading their own book to you - we ate up every word! Thank you Anna for unleashing in all of us the power of imagination. Thank you for encouraging us to read, read and read even more. Thank you also for encouraging us to remember our dreams and write them down as well as write down our feelings and memories as much as we can. From these ideas and thoughts come great stories and it is so much easier to create through lines and add wonderful describing words when you do this. We heard in Anna an amazing vocabulary and she put a human face to being an author. Anna brought to life other great books such as The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Flat Stanley and Ann of Green Gables - her descriptions of these made us want to read those special books too! It was wonderful to see the children and teachers loving this opportunity. 

The questions from the children were amazing:

• Do you have a favourite book you have written? Why is it?
• Do you prefer to hand write or type during your writing process?
• What inspired you to create the Tashi series?
• How long does one book take to write?
• How long does one book take to write from planning stage to publishing?
• What do you do in your spare time?
• Who or what inspired you to become an author?
• What were your favourite books to read when you were younger?
• When did your love of writing begin? 

Dear OLA 

It’s very special to have a reminder like this of today's most delightful time spent with those bright, enthusiastic, fabulous children (and teachers!) who are all so obviously kindred spirits in the wonderful world of literature. I went away so uplifted and cheered by being amongst such lovely, imaginative souls. How lucky these children are to be nurtured in this school environment sizzling with story making and reading...

Thank you so much for today!

With very best wishes,

Anna 

Book Week Parade

We would have to say this was the best Book Week Parade ever! Children from right across the school P-6 turned up as their favourite character from a book with a spark and smile to match. Thankyou to our amazing families and staff for helping make this such a fun and memorable day. 

OLA Feast Day/Week!

Happy Feast Day OLA!! We had a wonderful week last week celebrating our namesake Mary and her Feast Day, the Feast of the Assumption. We joined our Parish for Mass and participated in lots of activities celebrating Mary's faithfulness, love, joy, compassion, kindness, gratitude, peace and hope.

What a beautiful email from one of our parishioners this morning:

Thank you for our beautiful Mass celebrating Mary, Our Lady of the Assumption. The music was great, the children were absolutely amazing; it was just perfect!

Please thank all our fantastic staff for all the work they did and of course the students. They bring such life, prayerfulness and the beautiful gift of real celebration. We are so blessed to have such a wonderful school! Wishing you all a wonderful Feast Day!

We also had a wonderful end to our Feast Day/Week with Drew Lane running workshops for each year level and finished with a whole school concert. Thank you to Drew Lane. Thank you kids. Thank you Choir. Thank you staff. Thank you OLA community. Thank you Ned! The concert was brilliant and we all finished last Friday with a skip in our step.

Story Dogs

Story Dogs is a fun and unique reading support program that improves children’s reading and communication skills by children reading to an accredited companion dog and its handler. The Story Dog program is primarily designed for students who have reading challenges. Your child may be selected to participate in the program by their classroom teacher in consultation with the Wellbeing Team. We are excited to begin the program later this month to further support the wellbeing of our students. This initiative has been made possible by the 2024 OLA Parents and Friends Team and it has been a wish from our students, staff and parents. We are extra delighted that our Story Dog Bonnie is from one of our very own families. We thank Rachael and all her family for working with us to make this happen. 

Please note that we follow all Story Dogs guidelines of hosting a dog onsite at a school. Please note that Bonnie arrives after the children are in classes and leaves before the children go outside at playtime. We have taken Bonnie around the classes and explained that when Bonnie has her orange coat on we do not touch or pat her, rather we let Bonnie do her magic with reading. We remind all families that dogs are otherwise not to be onsite in the school grounds especially at drop off and pick up times and that when waiting outside the gates that the adult owner has the leash at all times. 

OLA Fete

Things are getting busy for the fete committee with big day only 92 sleeps away!! 

Your donations make for a great fete!

As the fete draws closer we will be requesting your donations to fill our stalls and make for a great community fete. 

August: Lucky bottles. Got anything lurking in the cabinet or want to chip in with a friend to donate an extra special bottle? The lucky bottle stall is always a great hit. 

September: Each class is asked to contribute to a hamper prize. At the end of August we’ll be sending out a notification of what the donation category is for your class. 

October: Chocolate bars. Stash away a few bars when on special to donate to our Choc O Block and cake decorating stalls. 

November: Cake baking. What’s a fete without a bake stall? We’d love your donations of cakes, slices, cookies, jams, chutneys.

We understand we are asking a lot of parents but each contribution to making our school a better place. Every little bit helps and we hope by providing advance notice families can donate to these initiatives. 

Help to raise awareness 

If you live on a high traffic / visible location and wouldn’t mind have a fete billboard on your front fence or garden, please email fete@olacheltenham.catholic.edu.au. Please check out our OLA Fete tab in this Newsletter and let us know if you can help in any way...

Claire & Mel

Fete Co-Chairs

Uniform

During the week I received feedback from our community that the standards in our uniform had been dropping recently, which is a timely reminder of our high expectations here at OLA. We have many balls in the air so let's be mindful not to drop one of them. Please ensure your child only wears blue or black hair ties and ribbons. At our recent gatherings I have seen fluorescent pink and yellow hair ties (and this was not dress up day!!) among many other colours so please work with us on this. Someone recommended we give out blue or black hair ties to those with random colours in their hair. Please also ensure white socks with sports uniform only and no logos and navy blue socks or stockings with our regular school winter uniform. Please support us as we place a press on this important aspect of school life. Taking pride in our uniform/dress is a lesson and learning for life.

OLA Art Show

Save the Date

OLA's Art Show 2024, 'A World Full of Art' will be opened on Thursday 12 September, 6.30-8.00pm. This Art Show will celebrate amazing artworks from around the world and the art will be created in both Visual Art and Indonesian classes. The children can’t wait to show off their creativity.

Volunteers

If there are any parents who would be keen to help with mounting and labelling the children’s artwork on cover paper in Term 3 please email our Art Teacher Sam Hudson shudson@olacheltenham.catholic.edu.au 

2025 & 2026 Enrolments Welcome

Please note our new School Tour Dates from now until the end of the year. Please note that we have a tour at 9.15am this Monday 26 August. If these dates do not work for you please call the office to arrange a time that suits you and your family. It has been so lovely to meet with each Prep child for 2025 - we thank all families for joining us at OLA and for helping your child make the best transition possible.

Being School Ready

Last night we had the great Carley McGauran join us at OLA for our first 2025 Prep Parent Information Night, 'How your family can thrive and not just survive'. Carley is a highly regarded psychologist who partners with Inform and Empower. We opened this presentation  up to our new and current families starting Prep in 2025 as well as to all the local kinders and child care centres. Lovely to see everyone and such wonderful messages like, 'get curious, not furious', take a breath and wait instead of diving in to help and helping children learn to cope when things don't go their way. Carley invited us to think about what we might start, pause and keep going following our session. Thank you to Mrs Reeder, Miss Jones and Mrs Harrsion for joining us and ensuring we hear the same messages. 

2025 Plans

We politely ask all families to notify the school should your child/children not be returning to OLA in 2025.  We have had a number of enquiries in recent weeks across various levels. Having an accurate indication of our enrolment numbers ensures we are able to plan accordingly for the following school year and access appropriate funding i.e. staffing and resourcing. We thank you for your cooperation.

Calendar

Please open the ‘Key Dates and Events’ tab in this newsletter for important dates or access the OLA Calendar here. Key dates for the coming weeks...

Pupil Free Days for 2024

• Monday 7 October Respectful Relationships 
• Monday 4 November Assessment & Reporting
• Friday 6 December 2025 Planning and Preparation 

Please note on the following dates school finish early at 1pm:

OLA Fete on Friday 22 November

Last day of school Tuesday 17 December

Congratulations

30 Years of Priesthood

On Tuesday 20 August our Parish Priest Fr Alan celebrated 30 years of priesthood. Thank you for being our Parish Priest Fr Alan and for inspiring us in our faith.  Thank you especially for your thoughtful homilies, prayers and singing at Mass. We hope you enjoy all the celebrations that come with such an important milestone.

Confirmation

Yesterday Bishop Tony and Fr Alan joined our Grade 6 students who are making their Confirmation on the 6th September. Bishop Tony asked great questions of our students and we were proud of their knowledge and understanding of the gifts and fruits of the Holy Spirit and of their Saints. It was lovely for our students to hear that the gifts are given to us to help us grow and to be good people. 

Our Grade 6 students also participated in their Confirmation Reflection Day. One of the activities was a treasure hunt around the school to find the gifts and fruits of the Holy Spirit. The children were invited to take up the challenge of living life to the full and being spirit filled people. We keep our Grade 6s in our prayers.

Australian Mathematics Competition

Earlier this month 34 enthusiastic students participated in

the 2024 Australian Mathematics Competition (AMC). This competition provides unique problems designed each year by leading educators and academics to challenge and extend students’ problem-solving skills. We congratulate the following students who were fully engaged and worked solidly for 60 minutes to complete the test.

Nicole Collins

Mathematics Leader

Christ Our Light Parish - Highett/Cheltenham

On the 10 &11 August weekend we saw the amalgamation of St Agnes Highett and OLA Cheltenham. While OLA schools and churches keep their same name we become Christ Our Light Parish - Highett/Cheltenham. August is an exciting month of celebrations for our Parish. Thank you to the hospitality team for helping make it a special weekend of celebrating.

First Eucharist

Congratulations to our Grade 4 children on making their First Holy Communion at masses on Sunday 11 August. Such a lovely community atmosphere and wonderful reason for our families to come together and support this next big step in our students faith journeys. 

STEM 

STEM MAD is an opportunity provided by Melbourne Archdiocese Catholic Schools (MACS) that promotes STEM learning initiatives that address real world problems and demonstrate how students in Catholic schools take action that matters. Student teams were invited to design a product, service or innovation to ‘make a difference’ (MAD) to others or the environment. We are delighted to announce that six students from OLA: Alice, Lachlan, Jack, Emma, Aaliyah and Zarah were successful and have been invited to participate at the STEM MAD showcase on Tuesday 10th September 2024 at the MACS Leadership Centre in East Melbourne. We wish them all the very best at the exhibition and thank you Mrs Danson for helping make this possible.

Grade 3/4 Authors

What a wonderful memory from childhood when we made or very own books and signed off as the author and the illustrator! Thank you 3/4s for sharing your chapter books with us and our visiting author Anna Fienberg. Anna loved them and the children asked her to autograph them during her visit. 

Local homegrown Hawks talent

Last Friday night the fantastic and generous Hawks players joined training at their old footy club, the Beaumaris Sharks. The great Calsher Dear, Jack Scrimshaw and Cam Mackenzie came down, answered questions and supported the Dare Hope Foundation. Ben and Zara both loved it and Ben especially enjoyed kick to kick with these Hawk greats and had a great chat. Go Hawks!!

Thank you Nick Staikos

Our Preps were treated to extra time in the library with local member of parliament Nick Staikos coming in to share his love of reading as well as promote the Premiers Reading Challenge and Book Week. Thank you Nick for your support and interest in OLA. 

An absolute wonderful couple of weeks lined with rainbows and super proud feelings. Next week we look forward to our Book Week celebrations continuing with a live performance celebrating the 2024 short listed books and a book picnic on our oval as a whole school! Enjoy the weekend.

Richard Jacques

Principal