A message from our Principal

Dear St. Brendan's School Community,

We welcome all students and parents to St. Brendan's in 2021.  We have had a lovely smooth start to our year.   Our Foundation students have settled in extremely well and are very excited with their new rooms.  

We have renovated the Foundation/1 rooms over the holidays.  Previously, we had two rooms with two classes in each with two teachers.  We have had the wall taken down, and now have one large room with four classes and five teachers.  We have added a wet area with Lino, new carpet, new furniture and a staff office.  

Teachers have been planning this change since last year and are very excited with the opportunities to engage children with their learning.

Our Foundation students also met their Year 6 Buddies and they enjoyed having lunch with them.  Photo's are in the Newsletter.

School Operations - Regulations

The following information is to inform the School Community of our School regulations.  

• Gates will be open at 8.30am from three entrances; Knight Street, Barker Avenue and Oval.   Gates will reopen at 3.10pm.
• We encourage parents to drop and go.  We ask that parents adhere to safe practice of distancing from other adults (1.5m).
• Parents are allowed in the School grounds, however if longer than 15 minutes, please use the QR Code to register your details.  
• We do ask parents at this stage, not to enter classrooms as we want to maintain safe practices for students and staff.
• If you need your child for an appointment, you will need to ring the office and we will arrange for your child to be at the Reception area.
• We continue to use hand sanitisers, soap/water and cleaning tables and surfaces.
• If your child is unwell, please keep them at home.

Thank you for your understanding.

Programs at our School this year

As the Mental Health and Wellbeing of our students remains an important consideration, we have introduced some new programs:

Leanne Pellegrino (Catholic Identity Leader), will be taking groups of children in Years 3-6 areas for small groups to build their confidence, resilience and wellbeing.

David Maskell (ICT), will take Foundation-Years 6 for Technology/Science and will also work with groups in ICT for two days.

Michelle Black (Wellbeing through Creativity), will work with groups of children using the medium of music, art and drama to build their confidence.

Millie Casey (Foundation/1), will work two days as a Foundation/1 teacher and then work three days to support programs in Foundation/1.

Heather Woodman (Reading Recovery), will be trained in this area and to support teachers to improve literacy throughout the school.

Sally Mills (Deputy Principal - Curriculum), will support teachers in the Curriculum areas and planning.

Arti Shah (Speech Pathologist), will work in our school supporting teachers with oral language strategies and working with small groups.

Annie Seccull (Paediatric Occupational Therapist) works in our school once a fortnight in assisting teachers, students and parents.  Annie has worked with the Junior teachers in developing 'break out' areas and different furniture in their new rooms to assist children with their learning, concentration, fine and gross motor skills.

Josh Wild (Physical Education), will also take Perceptual Motor Program three times a week with Foundation-Year 2, to develop their gross and fine motor skills.

Mark Almond (1/2), will also each Friday, spend time in Foundation-2 rooms with Art activities and providing professional development for teachers.

We also have James from Bluearth, who comes to our School once a fortnight to work with students in core movements, relaxation techniques and games.  Teachers will work with James to enable them to become accredited Bluearth Instructors.

As you can see, we are trying different ideas to engage children and to support them after our very challenging year of 2020.

Thanks

Thanks to Ronnyne Magill for organising our Parents and Friends Coffee morning at the Teller last Friday.  There was a great turn out and it was lovely to meet new and existing families. Thanks to Ingrid from Teller for our coffee morning at their restaurant.

School Advisory Council

I will send out information regarding our new School Advisory Council, which will operate in all schools.  Tomorrow there will be information asking for parents who would like to join our Board.  As some of our members' children are now at Secondary School, we would love to have some new families join us.  Please read the information that will be sent via email and the School App,

Kind regards,

Paula Stevenson (Principal)