Clare's message........
Good afternoon Families,
I hope you have enjoyed a couple of good weeks.
On Wednesday, we farewelled Marie Kennedy with morning tea and speeches. She has been a much loved and respected member of our St Luke's family for over 20 years and has taught generations of children, watched new families come into our community and watched them leave a little taller, a little wiser but a whole lot richer for being part of our collective story. Marie has contributed to that and l want to thank her for her years of service to Catholic education, to her commitment to our faith-filled community and for her skill, expertise and compassion she has afforded all in her care. We will miss Marie greatly. I wish her continued blessings as she embarks on the next stage of being a grandmother, of taking time for herself and maybe a little travel in there too.
Today, our staff have engaged in some professional learning in Maths led by Emily Chlebica- our Numeracy Leader. We took a further dive into the Vision for Instruction, reviewing the Science of Learning, cognitive load theory and full participation strategies that help children to retain their learning and to actively engage in it. We also looked at recent staff surveys and discussed what we are feeling confident about and what we need to learn more about to build our confidence as educators. These pupil free days provide staff with a wonderful opportunity for staff learning. Thank you to you, our families, for supporting us to embrace these opportunities.
I would like to call on all parents to stop for a few minutes, read the following and consider what YOU can do to further support our children navigate the digital world. We have all heard about the challenges social platforms, digital technologies and screen time are presenting to children and families. We can see, feel, hear, sense and experience an ever changing society that has far too many poor influencers and influences that place huge stress and strain on young minds. I congratulate all parents who have promoted responsible and safe on-line, digital use but our primary aged children remain vulnerable. Whilst as a parent you may think your child is mature and ready to use devices for a range of child friendly activities, l encourage you to maintain close and open monitoring of their time in front of a screen. As we all know, when one opportunity shuts down, another one opens up. I believe WhatsApp has changed and is offering more features that align with some social media platforms that are banned for under 16 year olds.
There is a fantastic range of resources and a lot of information for parents to be found at:
A reminder that is mentioned on the eSafety website is that Age-restricted social media platforms are:
- Facebook,
- Instagram,
- Snapchat,
- Threads,
- TikTok,
- Twitch,
- X,
- YouTube,
- Kick and
- Reddit are age-restricted platforms, among others. This list may change in the future.
From time to time, we hear from parents that their child is accessing these platforms or chat groups where things have become disturbing, offensive and/or distressing for their child. This is happening outside of school hours (as we have filters and blocks on these platforms at school). We can monitor what is happening, for the most part, here at school but we cannot monitor what is happening at home and in chat groups where offensive language, racist comments, pornography, discriminatory comments and verbal abuse may be present. Again, l ask that each of you are vigilant, open to how quickly a child may find themself in a situation that they feel uncomfortable or unsafe in and be pro-active in creating an environment where your child feels safe on-line. We are here to work with you but l cannot condone children who are primary age but whose parents have allowed them to access banned platforms.
This week at assembly, l spoke to the children about being kind and respectful to each other, especially through the words they use with each other. I spoke about how being respectful to someone is equal to being kind and vice versa. There can be such unkindness in the world and we hear it daily coming out of the mouths of people in leadership. I do thank my blessings that we have a community full of beautiful families who can model just what kindness looks, sounds and feels like.
We are very excited to be welcoming a short term, overseas student from China next term. Leki will be joining 1-2 Emerald for approximately four weeks and we look on this as a real gift. I'm sure our Junior children will help him settle in beautifully.
I am hoping my week ahead will begin with a win by the Hawks this round. Make sure you head to the COMMUNITY PAGE for the special offer to the 26th June game against GWS. I hope your team wins!
Have a great weekend.
Clare Ryan