Community Projects

As our project, ‘Our Land, Our Future, Our Calling’ comes to an end, we reflect on the incredible theories and insights that our children have shared over the past few weeks.

Our Prep Hub children have captured their learnings from the project using the ‘language of art’. They represented the different landscapes of Mother Nature and the creatures that inhabit the lands. Using mediums like paint, they represented the different features of these landscapes and captured their understanding of how animals survive and thrive in these environments. These artworks were launched through a gallery in the Prep Hub Space, and will be available for viewing for the next week.

Our children in One Hub have been busy exploring the impact of floods on different systems within our world. Together, they explored how floods impact big systems like urban landscapes and small systems like mini beasts, flora and waterway habitats.

This video captures the children’s theories and insights as they recreated the Maribyrnong River and its surroundings. They simulated a small flood to investigate its impact on these systems.

Some of the theories they explored captured how native flora is uprooted, how rubbish is brought to the surface of the water, how waterways become contaminated and how floating debris causes destruction and damage to homes and livestock.

We are in awe of the insights the children shared and the intricate models they created to represent the river and its surroundings!

Our children in the Two Hub were captivated by their visit to Brimbank Park, they were shocked to see how much rubbish and pollution had been brought to the surface by the floods. They wondered how much more damage is hidden and how it will impact our world in the coming years.

They captured their thinking through a collaborative art installation, which they have displayed in their Hub. Their installation features a healthy and happy tree and a polluted tree, which the children called the ‘Rubbish Tree’.

The children reflected on the impact that pollution has had on the systems they explored, and how the effects of pollution are magnified through disasters like floods and fires. The children talked about how these disasters disrupt the delicate balance of different systems like the waterways and airways.

The children in the three-four Hub have delved deeper into exploring the complexities of eco- systems and the intricate balance needed to keep these ecosystems surviving and thriving. Their exploration was enriched by their visit to the Point Gellibrand rock pools, which gave the children a first hand experience in witnessing how inhabitants of certain systems depend on each other and their surroundings. Some of the systems that they explored were the tundra ecosystem, the rainforest system and the marine system.

Together, the Hub captured their reflections by creating digital dioramas of these systems. Through narration and animation, the children explain how these systems co-exist to create vast and diverse landscapes in our natural world.

Our children in the Five-Six Hub investigated how big industries have impacted systems within our natural world. They explored the impact that human beings have had on the natural world, and how major industries have disrupted the natural order and processes of systems. The children investigated major industries like the cattle and meat industry, fashion industry and energy industry. Together, the children explored how these industries have created problems in the natural world, and how they are working to repair some of these damages, such as by providing more sustainable alternatives, like meat free foods and meat free leather, such as cactus leather. The children launched their vision for the future and ideas they had for improving the problems posed by big industries. Some examples of solutions included planting more lavender farms for bees, seaweed farming and more. They launched their ideas through a series of posters using Canva.

This incredible project was launched by one of our children in the Three- Four Hub. Her intention was to raise the profile of native Australian birds. She was inspired by their colours and beauty, and thought to capture this through the ‘language of artistry’. She designed these beautiful cards using water colour pens (a sample of the cards are shown in the photo).

The educators supported this child to professionally print and sell these cards to the 3/4 community. The money raised was then donated to Bird Life Australia. We are thrilled to hear that Bird Life Australia have requested a pack of cards to display at their Melbourne base!

Although we have sold out for now, we are looking to restock and offer to the wider community next year!

“I am proud of my hard work and the impact the cards have had on others” - the (very) creative and persistent artist.

Literacy

Building a Community of Writers

Next year we will continue our work with Lisa Burman, Literacy Consultant, in continuing to build our “Community of Writers”. This work is in line with the goal in our Annual Action Plan of “Building assessment capable learners - extending and challenging learning goals in order to articulate their progress.”

Educators will work alongside Lisa and our Literacy Leaders in Term 2 and 3, observing Lisa in practice, then meeting with her to discuss their observations and receive guidance and coaching. Educators will then set their own individual goals to build their capacity to support children as writers.

We have seen tremendous growth in our children’s disposition of being persistent, brave, reflective and expressive as they have developed their view of themselves as writers.

Below are two poems published by Authors in Grade 6:

Hope by Athena Tran

Hope is the thing that sees you through

It helps you do what you need to do

It keeps optimism alive

It encourages you

Hope is what gets us by

Hope brings life to dreams

It gives us courage to believe

Hope drives us to our goals

It helps us when we are feeling low

My hope for you, is that your hopes come true

Ode to Cookies by Erin Nguyen

Ah.......the sweetness

The sugar

The light

The golden brown

The crunch

My sugary lunch

A message from Dani

It is with immense sadness and pride that I share my final message in our newsletter. Working at St John’s had a profound and positive impact on me. I have thoroughly enjoyed leading Literacy learning the past few years. It has been such a privilege to witness immense growth in children and educators alike.

To be literate is a fundamental right for all humans. In order to succeed in life and function in our society we need to be able to communicate and express ourselves effectively; be that in the oral or written form. When we engage in the world of literature we learn about ourselves, others, and our world. We are encouraged to consider perspectives and listen to stories beyond the familiar, inviting us to develop empathy, understanding and connect.

I am grateful for the opportunity to work alongside our leaders and educators at St John’s the past few years; I have learnt so much from and with them. I have no doubt that Mairead, Lauren and Amy will continue to lead our learners with rigour and love, ensuring that children are at the heart of what we do, and supporting educators to set the conditions for children to flourish.

May you all have a restful break, with time for connection, joy and rejuvenation!

Daniela De Luca

Literacy Leader

Wellbeing

Throughout 2023, we will be working closely with The Resilience Project to support the wellbeing of our school community.

The Resilience Project delivers emotionally engaging programs and provides evidence-based, practical strategies to build resilience.

Our Partnership Program consists of online presentations and weekly lessons for students, professional development for staff, and a Parent & Carer Hub (inc. digital presentations) for our parent and carer community.

Over the coming weeks, we’ll be sharing the Parent & Carer Hub with you. The videos are 5-10 minutes long and will walk through the key pillars of resilience: Gratitude, Empathy & Mindfulness. You’ll hear stories and be introduced to activities to show how these strategies can support our kids' learning and development, and also support you as parents and carers.

This program is an important part of our school’s effort to look after the mental health of our community.

We look forward to working in partnership with all of our families to deliver a Wellbeing Program that will have a real and enduring positive impact on the mental health and wellbeing of all children at St. John’s and in turn, all of our families. We strive to create hopeful futures for each child which can only be achieved through close partnerships between home and school.

Karen Dodemaide

Co-Deputy Principal and Wellbeing Leader

kdodemaide@sjfootscray.catholic.edu.au

Learning Diversity

I would like to take the opportunity to say a very big ‘THANK YOU’ to the St. John’s Community! It has been such a privilege to work closely with children, families and staff in support of our diverse learners. I thank you for your openness, collaboration and ongoing communication and feedback with St. John’s and myself. You will all be very missed!

Next year we welcome Shelly Stuart into the Learning Diversity Role. Shelly comes as an experienced Learning Diversity Leader, with a passion for and wealth of knowledge in supporting diverse learners. Shelly will no doubt introduce herself to you early Term 1.

We also farewell Kay Fung, Speech Pathologist, who worked with our children over the year. We thank Kay for the connections she made with our children and families and for the knowledge and wisdom she shared with our educators. Thank you and good luck in your new adventures Kay.

Hannah Kelly will join the St. John’s speech team in 2023.

Ashlee Owen

Learning Diversity Leader

aowen@sjfootscray.catholic.educ.au

Faith

On behalf of the St John’s staff, I’d like to wish everyone a happy Advent and Christmas!

Message from Mitch

Well St John’s, it has been my absolute pleasure in the role of RE leader at St John’s. I have thoroughly enjoyed working with children, staff and families, and supporting them with their personal faith development. Preparing liturgies, Masses, prayer gatherings, as well as sacramental evenings and celebrations, sacramental workshops and attending Sacraments throughout the year, has been a rewarding experience I'll always cherish. Jordan will no doubt do a tremendous job stepping into the role next year.

It has been an incredible year of faith formation and celebration in 2022. As part of our Annual Action Plan for 2022, St John’s committed to promoting the Catholic Identity of the school, starting with staff deepening their understanding of our Catholic story, including our place within the advocacy of the Sisters of St Joseph and St Mary MacKillop. In 2023, we will be continuing to broaden our understanding of prayer, with Jordan investigating the many ways we pray and its symbolism, significance and role in Catholic participation and identity.

Would you believe it, we’re already near the end of our Advent celebration here at St John’s. We have our wonderful Prep Hub celebrating the third week of Advent with ‘joy’, while our One Hub will finish the year with ‘peace’ next Thursday. Across the school, our children have been learning about the significance of Advent as a time of preparing, waiting and rejoicing the birth of Jesus.

A big congratulations go to all our hubs who have helped us celebrate Advent throughout the last month!

Ways of the West:

A big thank you to our generous families who have supported us each week with providing donations for our Ways of the West food and essentials drive.

Next week will be our final week before it’s all collected on Thursday. We thank you all for thinking and acting generously during this time.

Mitch Hayes

(Faith/REL Leader)

mitch.hayes@sjfootscray.catholic.edu.au

Sport

Summer Inter-School Sports

All students from the five/six hub have participated in the summer Inter-School sports competition throughout term 4. The students should be very proud of their commitment, teamwork and sportsmanship. It has been fantastic watching each student further develop their skill set and enjoy participating in team sport.

The Boys Basketball team has made it to the finals and will be competing against Corpus Christi Primary School this Friday! This is a great achievement. The St John’s community are so proud of you and wish you all the best in the final. Go St John’s.

Kind regards,

Kelly

Physical Education

kedgar@sjfootscray.catholic.edu.au

Parish News

Holy Family Parish

More Parish Events coming in 2023!