St James Learning and Teaching 

NAPLAN

The National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) for Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 students are held in March each year. In 2024, the NAPLAN test window is between Wednesday 13 March and Monday 25 March. 

Below is a schedule of when the students will complete each test.

A public demonstration site is available for schools, teachers, parents/carers and students to familiarise themselves with the online tests https://nap.edu.au/naplan/public-demonstration-site 

All eligible students are expected to participate in the NAPLAN tests. Catch up tests will be available for individual students who are absent on test days up to and including Monday 25 March 2024.

Support can be arranged for students with disabilities, if the student regularly uses similar support for classroom assessment tasks.

Exemptions may be granted to students with significant intellectual disabilities and to students who have been learning English for less than one year. 

If your child is eligible for support due to disability or exemption, you should discuss this with their teacher prior to the tests. Parental consent is required before any support due to disability or exemption is granted.

Students may be withdrawn from NAPLAN by their parent or carer. This is a matter for consideration by parents and carers in consultation with the principal. If, after consultation, you decide to withdraw your child, you must sign a student withdrawal form. These forms are available at the school.

Later in the year you will receive your child’s personal NAPLAN report. The report will describe your child’s particular skills in reading, writing, conventions of language (spelling, grammar and punctuation) and numeracy. 

For more information about the tests, please visit the VCAA website at: www.vcaa.vic.edu.au or the NAP website at: www.nap.edu.au.

SPORT

On Thursday 15th February Ethan K, Ava N, Evie R and Nick S will be representing St James at the Holt District Tennis competition. This will be held on the St James tennis courts from 9.30am. Students from other Holt District Schools will also be competing on this day. We wish the students from St James all the best.

Also next week on Friday 16th February we will be taking a team of 26 students to the Holt District Swimming Competition. I met with the team yesterday and answered some of their questions about the competition. We also practiced our St James chant which is always a lot of fun. Please refer to the Operoo for further information. Emma Herbert and Maree Fatouros will meet the students at St James at 8.40am. I will meet the team at Oakleigh Recreation Centre. 

Holt District Sport Information

As always at this time of the year I think it is worthwhile giving families some information about how sport works at St James. We are part of a district called Holt. This district is made up of 8 schools in our area who have a similar number of students. In this district we compete in tennis, swimming, soccer, netball, football, athletics, cross-country, basketball as well as term 2 weekly sport. The main sports are governed by School Sport Victoria(SSV). If you do well at our district level, i.e., win team events or come first or second in individual events you are asked to then go on to represent the Holt district at the Beachside division level. At this level you will be competing against representatives from other districts. If you are successful at Beachside competitions, winning individual or team events you will go through to Regionals and then if successful States. 

Swimming, Athletics and Cross Country are all run in age groups. 9/10, 11, 12/13. Your age is taken from the 31st December of the year of competition. For the team events we usually only offer places to the year 5 and 6 students. Except for basketball which we offer to year 3,4,5 and 6 students. Occasionally we will trial Year 4 students to supplement teams. 

SSV Nominations 

School Sport Victoria each year holds trials for students who are highly skilled competitors in their chosen sport to trial to be a part of Team Vic. This is a highly prestigious and sort after honour by many athletes. If you feel that your son/daughter may be eligible to trial for a Team Vic sport please talk with your child’s coach. Please use the following link to assist you with further information in regards to eligibility, nomination process and dates of trials. https://www.ssv.vic.edu.au/team-vic

Looking forward to hopefully a full year of sport at St James.

Mrs Georgia McNamara

Deputy Principal-Student Wellbeing/Sport Co-Ordinator/ Senior Physical Education Teacher

WELLBEING

Hello Everyone,

I am hoping that all students have settled well into their new classrooms and are enjoying getting to know their teachers and new students. 

Over the holidays there have been some updates to our Student Wellbeing procedures. The first one you may have already noticed is notifications from Operoo when your child has visited the Sick Bay. When a student visits the Sick Bay a form will be completed by the staff member on duty in regards to the incident and treatment undertaken. If a phone call is required, one of course will be made. Eg a knock to the head. 

Please ensure you take time to read these notifications and file them if necessary. 

Also in Operoo in the Form Library you can find access to the Medical Authority Form. For those of you who have not had to use this form, it is a form that needs to be completed if your child requires medication during the day. This could be regular medication for long term use or medication for short term use. If your child will need to be given medication during the day please find the form in Operoo. Of course if you prefer to fill one out at the office this can be accommodated also. It is important to note that a medical practitioner is required to fill out part of this form ensuring that the medication is warranted. 

The other important information involves Panadol and Nurofen. As the Medication for all students in MAC’s schools policy states:

Medication use in First Aid or Emergencies Medication such as aspirin and paracetamol will not be stored or administered for first aid purposes as these medications may mask symptoms of serious conditions. 

Therefore medications that mask other symptoms can no longer be administered by staff at school. If your child requires such medication whilst at school they will be asked to be collected. 

If you should have any questions or concerns regarding any of the information provided please do not hesitate to contact me. 

Kind Regards,

Mrs Georgia McNamara

Deputy Principal-Student Wellbeing

Year 2

Year 2 are ‘Getting ready to Learn’

In Year 2 , we have been working hard, getting ready to learn.

Over the past week, we have written our class expectations and class prayer.

All the children contributed and we say the prayer each morniing in our Yarning circle.

Year 2 Class Prayer

Dear God,

Thank you for the land that we live on, our family, friends and lovely school.

Thank you for the trees, food we eat, air we breathe and nature.

We pray for the poor, the hungry, the sick, the lonely and the people in war.

Help us to show the school values throughout the day.

Amen.

Well done Year 2 on a great class prayer!

Cathy Busch

Year 2 Teacher