Principal's Panorama

Dear Families of SMOTA, 

What a wet day to end the week! Let us pray for some clear skies for our Water Familiarisation program next week.

I was lucky enough to spend the day with Early Stage One combined with Stage One today.  We learnt about;

•  ES1 wrote about the Life Cycle of Frogs using words to show the order of the life cycle from "first" to "finally". These sequence words or time order words are used in writing and speaking to logically organise events, instructions, or a story's sequence of steps. We learnt about eggs hatching, tadpoles growing legs to become froglets, thos froglets losing their tails and becoming frogs!
• S1wrote about: Would you rather be a bear or an eagle?  Would you rather be blind or deaf? Nash wanted to be blind so he could still listen to Alex Warren's music! Lochie H wanted to be deaf so he could still see colours and the smile on mum and dad's face.
• We joined to work on volume in Maths, learning that we can use uniform objects of the same size to work out the volume of different boxes and ordered them from smallest to largest.  
  • Our tea box held the most with 114 unifix cubes and a card box was the smallest and held 15 (well done Clark for showing us three lots of five make fifteen)!
• For Religion our ES1 young people, shared their knowledge of Noah and the ark (appropriate topic in RE today) with S1.

• Finally for Geography and Creative Arts, we investigated the important features of places that we see, that we live in and that we belong to.

  We looked at some of the places in Guyra and asked questions about the features of these places.. why does the hospital have big doors? Why does the hotel have rooms to sleep in?  We then moved our attention to Sydney! We made great connections about why we have more fire stations and hospitals in Sydney and why they are sooooo much bigger! Together we used recycled boxes to make our own cityscape.  Stage One and Early Stage One are a dream! 

2026 Student Leadership

We are excited to announce that in 2026 our school will be introducing a Student Leadership Structure that is slightly different for our senior students. Formulated directly from our parent feedback nights with the support of the School Advisory Council, this is the first time our school has offered formal student leadership positions, and we are thrilled to provide our students with the opportunity to grow as leaders and role models within our school community.

Leadership positions will include:

• School Captains (2 students - Year 6) not gender specific
• House Captains (3 students - Stage 3)
• Student Spiritual Leader (1 student - Year 6)

These roles will give students the chance to develop confidence, responsibility, teamwork, and communication skills while serving and representing our school. Each leadership position has its own Roles and Responsibilities and Code of Conduct, which outline the expectations and values of student leaders at our school.

We are looking to build our young people so that they can:

• Model Catholic values: A core purpose is to develop leaders who embody Christian principles like compassion, integrity, and service, as guided by the school's mission statement and the example of Jesus.
• To amplify student voice: To serve as a bridge between the student body and SHAs, ensuring student opinions and concerns are heard on a range of school matters, which can lead to positive changes. Combined with an SRC.
• To prepare future leaders: To give students practical experience and skills necessary for leadership roles in their future personal and professional lives.
• To build a stronger community: To foster a sense of belonging, support, and collaboration among students across different year levels through initiatives like buddy systems and joint projects.

Whilst all of our Year 6 and Year 5 students are considered leaders within our school community and should work together to problem solve and represent our school in a positive and productive way. The formal roles of a student leadership team will have significant responsibilities and a code of conduct that they will commit to.  Our Year 4 and Year 5 parents will receive the outline via COMPASS today and I hope that they will discuss the opportunity with their child.  When I spoke with Year 4 and 5 students yesterday there were some very excited faces who are keen to nominate!

All incoming Year 6 students (current Year 5), will present a leadership speech (prepared in the classroom) to the school community on Tuesday 2nd December 2025 (Week 8) at 9am.  We warmly welcome all members of our community to join us to hear these speeches. Stage 3 students who would like to nominate to be a House Captain will present their speech to their House during a House eeting.

We look forward to seeing our students rise to the challenge and take pride in helping to make our school the best it can be. This initiative is an exciting step forward in recognising and celebrating the positive qualities of our senior students. We can’t wait to see their leadership shine!

Real Talk Staff, Parent & Caregiver Sessions

Real Talk is an agency providing values-based education on human dignity, personal identity, and relationships to students, parents and caregivers.  Armidale Catholic Schools provided different sessions for Skilled Helpful Adults, Primary Parents and Secondary parents last Tuesday at Armidale Catholic Schools Office. 

The session for Skilled Helpful Adults focussed heavily on what Real Talk can offer for educators of all age groups for topics that we cover as a part of our PDHPE curriculum and  also touched on the social media ban that will come into effect on the 10th December.  

Social Media Ban - eSafety Commissioner Advice

The eSafety Commissioner has published a helpful Social Media Age Restrictions Hub. This includes advice for Young People, Families & Educators. As the social media age restrictions take effect on 10 December, we encourage you to explore this valuable online resource.

School Advisory Council

As previously advertised, we are inviting parents to join our School Advisory Council! The advisory council plays an important role in supporting the leadership of our school by providing advice, sharing ideas, and helping strengthen the partnership between home, school, and parish. It’s a great way to have a voice in our school community and contribute to the continued growth and success of our students. If you’re interested in joining or would like to know more, please contact the school office.  

Until next time,

Zoe

Principal