Dear Parents,

Congratulations to all the students who competed in the District Swimming sports last Thursday. Thank you to Emily Reed for her excellent organisation and to staff who supported our students on the day. What a team of champions!

All students who competed on the day did so with such great positivity and resilience. What a great community we have with so many parents attending, cheering the students on and making sure our students know they are part of a wonderful village.

It was a brilliant day full of stories of celebration and the outstanding attitude and positive relationships of our students in action. A special mention to the students who have made it to the next level of the swimming program and will swim at the Zone event.

Thanks to the year 3/4 students and their brilliant teachers for a beautiful school Mass The students were so well prepared and led with style with a beautiful message of spreading peace and love in the world

Congratulations to our Cafe team last Friday for a wonderful Cafe. It was such a special afternoon and we are so proud of our year 6 students and staff.

Saturday was a wonderful day at Balnarring Emu Plains reserve at the Wominjeka festival. What a brilliant day of celebration our first nation people underpinned by our amazing local community showcasing, supporting and respecting the sacred story of this magnificant land!

A huge congratulations to Karen and Anne from Balnarring Pre- school for their inspiring leadership in this area.

A huge shout out to Leah Hogg and Mason de Wit who lead our stall at the festival and are inspirational in embedding, celebrating and highlighted the importance of ensuring our students and families respect and honour our first nations people.

Thanks to all staff who attended the day and to Jarna Brown (parent of Jacob and Charlie) who has been involved with the festival for the many years and has done a brilliant job. Also to any parents who were able to attend. It was such a special day for everyone.

We continue with a high focus on ensuring every student reaches their full potential and achieves excellence and equity in their learning. The new vision for instruction strategy as part of MACS 2030 focusses on these two important areas and we are very proud of all we are doing in our school as we are very much in line with the new strategy.

We explicitly teach through an instructional approach in regards to our Literacy and Numeracy with a high focus on each individual's learning style and cognitive load capacity. We then provide our students with wonderful opportunities to transfer this knowledge to real life situations where they can retrieve the information stored in their long term memory and flourish and make a difference in the world.

Our themes below allow our students the opportunity to do this in high quality learning experiences.

I wish our year 3 and 5 students all the best as they prepare for the upcoming NAPLAN testing period and we look forward to seeing them shine in their learning.

I will be leaving the school in the capable hands of my Vice Principal Sue Jackson who will be acting Principal for the next three weeks capably supported by our leaders Trish Brennan and Kate Huon. I am taking two weeks long service leave to celebrate the wedding of my daughter Tahlia and partner Jeremy and will then be attending the Victorian Catholic Principal conference. I look forward to seeing you all in the last week of term.

Yours in Partnership,

Gab

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