From the Principal 

Dear Parents and Carers,

Term 2 is well underway, with the school being a hive of activity. Congratulations to each of our students for the settled manner in which they have adapted to and embraced their new learning spaces. It was great seeing many families taking up the opportunity to visit on Tuesday and yesterday, for our Open Classroom morning. The feedback was positive all around. 

I would like to thank the staff for giving up precious family and holiday time, to ensure their new spaces were ready to go for day one. Time was spent in collaborative planning and classroom preparation to ensure that the students' learning would be seamless, they succeeded above and beyond. In particular, I felt as though I was transported to Italy last week as Ms Caroline Egan and Ms Carmel Vozzo collaborated to teach Art in Italian, through learning about Venice. I walked into Year 4 to see the children sketching images of bridges in Venice, whilst practising their Italian phrasing! 

Greta (1B)  had an exciting holiday welcoming her new little sister Beatrix. We congratulate Bella and Richard on the arrival of their precious little bundle of joy. We know that Greta is being a wonderful big sister.

Anzac Day, celebrated on Sunday 25th April this year,  is always a day of pride and sadness as we remember those men and women who gave their lives for our country in various wars across a range of services. Ms Bryan’s Year 3s presented a beautiful and moving assembly last Friday focusing on Anzac Day. Each child shared their learning with us and their creative illustrations of poppies and varying other images.  All year levels explored Anzac Day within their Faith Based Inquiry last week, including our Foundation students. Please enjoy some of their reflective artist responses. 

We congratulate Isabel in 6R for her achievements in the State Swimming Championships at MSAC on Monday 26th April. Izzy came first in her 12/13G 50m Freestyle and 50m Backstroke events, we are very proud of her. 

We also congratulate our Year 5 and 6 Boy and Girl soccer teams for both reaching the Semi Finals, last Friday at the Holt Soccer Lightning Premiership.  Ms Curtis and Mrs Mason were very proud of their sportsperson ship and skill level, as they represented our school. It was great seeing so many of our students and some parents training for Cross Country this morning. Thank you to the many people involved. 

Please keep Friday 7th May 7:30-8:30am in your diary free. The P & F are in the process of organising a breakfast for our wonderful Mums and Special Friends. More information will be communicated via your class reps. Thank you to our hard working team, for this event. It is greatly appreciated. 

Thank you for supporting our upcoming School Closure Day on Monday 3rd May. On this day, as a staff we begin preparing for our school review which will happen early Term 3. The Melbourne Archdiocese Catholic Schools (MACS) Southern Region (SR) team of 5 are facilitating in small groups, as we begin to evaluate our 5 year School Improvement Framework, Annual Action Plan and Strategic Intents. The feedback from this review then drives our School Improvement Framework (SIF) for the next four years. It acknowledges the strengths of our school and areas needing refinement, to best meet the needs of our community across the spheres of: Religious Dimension, Learning & Teaching, Leadership & Management, Student Wellbeing and School Community. 

At St Mary's we are doing the paper NAPLAN Test in Years 3 and 5 in the next few weeks.   NAPLAN is an assessment used in conjunction with our formative and summative assessment schedule throughout the year.  Whilst it gives a snap shot of each student's learning it allows us to receive  valuable whole school data, to inform planning and future Learning and Teaching. 

Tuesday 11th May: Language Conventions and Writing 

Wednesday 12th May: Reading 

Thursday: Numeracy

Finally we congratulate our Year 4 students who made their Sacrament of Reconciliation last night. They were well prepared by our Year 4 team of Ms Aoife McGuines, Mrs Anna Heta, Ms Stephanie Schultz and Ms Mary Craven. Thank you to Mrs Maureen Mc Donald for your work behind the scenes and to Father Jerome for all that he brings to our St Mary's community. 

Wishing you all a wonderful fortnight ahead and Happy Mother’s Day/Special Friend’s Day to the amazing women within our St Mary’s community.

Peace and Blessings,

Mrs Cathy Ferrari