ST FIDELIS NEWSLETTER

What's happening in our learning spaces? 

Students of the Week

 

 

 

Foundation

Term 2 has certainly gone by very quickly, and so much learning has been achieved by all the students in FLW!

 

This Friday, Foundation LW farewells Sarah Hogan who has been on placement for the past five weeks from ACU. Sarah will now be graduating and be a fully qualified teacher, so we hope to see her back at St Fidelis very soon as she plans to complete some CRT work during Semester Two at a variety of different schools. We would like to thank Sarah for everything she has done for us in FLW. We have really enjoyed working with her and have learnt so much, and I have enjoyed assisting Sarah to develop her skills.

 

As inquirers, we planned, designed and labelled a habitat for a chosen animal. On Thursday 9th June and Wednesday 15th June we had time and the opportunity to use a variety of different materials to create the habitat we had designed. Everyone did an amazing job creating their habitat.

Also as part of our inquiry into living things, we were very fortunate to experience an incursion last Thursday which was run by Bunnings Coburg. We decorated our own pots, used soil to fill the pot and then planted pansies. It was a great experience to find out first hand how to plant and care for living things and also to use our knowledge of what plants need to survive and grow.

It was wonderful to see so many of the FLW parents and other family members at the whole school Celebration of Learning last Thursday. I look forward to seeing everyone at the Parent/Student/Teacher conversations this Thursday 23rd June between 1:30-7:30 pm.

 

Wishing everyone a restful two week holiday and I look forward to seeing everyone on the first day of Term 3, Monday 11th July.

 

Leanne Wenckowski, Foundation Teacher

Year 1/2

It has been an exciting and eventful past few weeks to end Term 2. We have had the opportunity to invite our families and friends into the learning spaces to showcase our finished inquiry pieces and engage in fantastic learning experiences. 

 

On Thursday, we held our first Celebration of Learning for this year. As self-managers, we welcomed our friends and families into the space to present our completed inquiry learning. Throughout Term 2, we have been discovering different types of living things, how they change and how they grow. As researchers, we have learnt how to use different resources such as books and technology to find out about these living things. Some of us used this information to create posters, non-fiction texts and presentations, while some of us constructed different habitats that included the basic needs of our chosen living thing. As inquirers, we find ways to extend our learning and go further with our findings. To do this, some of us who created non-fiction books will be placing these texts in our own library to educate others about living things. 

 

It was great to show our families and friends our completed inquiry pieces and independently explain to our loved ones about the inquiry process and the information we collected and represented in the way we chose. Have a look at us being self-managers by taking the lead in our learning and showing our loved ones our amazing learning. 

On Wednesday we engaged with the Bunnings Workshop where we learnt about plants and sustainability. As responsible citizens, we found out about the importance of caring for our environment. The helpers from Bunnings taught us the responsibility that minibeasts in our gardens have in growing different plants. We decorated our own pots and planted our very own flowers! We can’t wait to watch these grow in our gardens.  

As part of our Resilience Project curriculum, we are learning to understand the importance of gratitude, empathy, mindfulness and emotional literacy. For the last couple of weeks, we have been focusing on the element of mindfulness. We have been practising mindfulness through different strategies such as belly breathing and yoga. These strategies help us in identifying that being mindful can affect our feelings and help us become mindful in daily situations. We can use belly breathing or yoga when: 

  • We are feeling sad- Eva K
  • We need to calm down - Orlando
  • We are angry- Harrison 
  • We are stressed - Ella 
  • I feel sad because I fell over - Hannah 
  • I am nervous - Felix 

Term 2 has been a wonderful and exciting time for all of us. We hope you all have a fantastic break and enjoy your holidays. We look forward to seeing you all this Thursday, 23rd June, for Parent Teacher Student Conversations, and can’t wait to see you all back in Term 3 on Monday, 11th July. 

 

Alycia Marsico, Stefanie Carriera and Alexandra Phillips 

Year One/Two Team.

Year  3/4

We cannot believe Term 2 is drawing to an end! 

 

On Friday, the Year 3/4 students ventured off to CERES Environmental Park to consolidate our learning on healthy habitats and why they are important. 

We focused on addressing these questions:

  • What do ecosystems need to be healthy?
  • How do humans impact habitat health?
  • What is the role of the community in keeping local ecosystems healthy?

In small groups, we engaged in a variety of activities hosted by Eirene and Isabel. From our excursion, we learnt…

  • An ecosystem is when living and nonliving things work together.
  • Biodiversity is the wide range of different living things in an ecosystem. 
  • CERES used to be a landfill, but the local community transformed it into an environmental park.
  • How to create a micro-habitat to attract a diverse range of insects. 

Have a read of Selena’s reflection from our day…

On Friday the 17th of June, the Year 3/4’s went on an excursion to CERES. At CERES we learnt lots of interesting facts and did fun activities about healthy habitats. We also learnt about what CERES was before and how it is now. CERES is an environmental park with lots of species there. At CERES they like to recycle and have no pollution. CERES is a place where we learn about different things and where we, animals and plants work together to support life. At CERES there was also a park where we played together and had fun. CERES was very fun and informative. 

 

We would like to wish everyone a safe and restful holiday break and look forward to welcoming you all back in Term 3! 

 

Year 3/4 Teachers

Belinda Panazrino, Katarina Davidson & Graham Troy

Year 5/6

Celebration of Learning

As a school community, we took the time and opportunity to facilitate an afternoon where our learners engaged in a “Celebration of Learning”. Our learners were given the opportunity to showcase the amazing learning that they have engaged in throughout the term. This celebration enables our children to spend time with their families reflecting, discussing and sharing all the learning opportunities that they have experienced. It was great to see so many of our 5/6 families participate in this opportunity.

Resilience project

Our Year 5/6 learners take great pride in engaging in our Resilience program. This program focuses on three key pillars that have been proven to cultivate positive emotions within our children. These include Gratitude, Empathy, Mindfulness and Emotional Literacy which gives our children the fundamental skill to practice these strategies.  This program educates our learners to become resilient throughout their lives. Each week our 5/6 learners engage in this program with the focus for last week being Empathy which looked at supporting others.  Our learners engaged in this learning by documenting their thinking about the following questions. 

  • Who do you support?  We support our family, friends, classmates, teachers, St Fidelis soccer team and our school leaders. 
  • Why do we support others? We support others because by doing so they feel safe and loved. Makes people feel better and also cheers them up. 
  • Who supports you? We are supported by our friends, family, teachers, sporting teams that we are part of and leaders. 

Empathy: Is putting yourself in someone else’s shoes.  People can show empathy by doing the smallest things for someone like checking up on them when they are sick or just asking them are they ok.  

 

This week our learners will focus on “Lights, Camera, and Action.” What does empathy look like? Feel like and sound like?

 

Inquiry Learning

How do living things adapt to changing environments? 

During our Inquiry, our learners were given the time and opportunity to unpack the above question by investigating and researching various zoo animals.  After collecting and sorting out the information gathered as collaborators and communicators our learners presented their mini inquiry research project. Our learners took the time and opportunity to present their learning by creating brochures, newspaper articles, reports, videos, collages, dioramas, and podcasts. 

Confirmation workshop and celebration.

As our Year 6 children begin to prepare for the Sacrament of Confirmation, we ask that you place these dates in your calendar. A Confirmation online workshop has been organised for parents and students to attend.  This online workshop will be facilitated by Maria Forde on Monday the 11th of July at 7.00 pm.  The celebration of Confirmation will take place on Friday the 5th of August at St Fidelis Church. 

 

As the term comes to an end we would like to wish our families and learners all a very restful break. Thank you for your partnership and support with the education of our children. 

 

Take care from the 5/6 teaching team,

Annette Gasbarro, Michelle Casamento, Viviana Clarke & Olivia Sargent.