Primary News

As we began Term 2 last week, there were a number of events to get the boys straight back into the swing of things. Many thanks to John Lambourne for the organisation of the Primary Cross Country Carnival last Wednesday, we were blessed with beautiful weather and it was fantastic to see so many boys participating. I was delighted to hear a good news story from the day - one of our Year 6 students stopped during his run to assist another boy who had fallen and injured himself. This exemplifies what mateship at Ashgrove is all about and set a great example for all the students in the Primary School.

ANZAC Day

ANZAC Day gave us an opportunity to reflect upon and remember those brave men and women who have and will serve our wonderful country. Thank you to all of our students and families who marched with the school on Sunday or who participated in their own local ceremonies in uniform.

Student Devices

We are fortunate that every student in the Primary has access to a device to assist them with their learning. At the beginning of this term, students and parents completed the ICT Device Agreement which outlines the expectations of the students when using their device. Last week I spoke with all Year 5 students about the additional responsibilities they have since being given the privilege of taking their devices home. They were reminded that the device is owned by the school and, as such, must be used only for school work. As Year 5 students get into the routine of taking their devices to and from school, I encourage you to have conversations with them about the learning they are doing on their device. Furthermore, it is also important that you establish clear guidelines around the use of the device in your home. This may include: Where will the device be used? What times will it be used between? What routines are in place for packing, unpacking and charging the device? And conversations around digital citizenship. Should you have any questions about your son’s use of his device, please do not hesitate to get in contact with me.

Primary Mass

Tomorrow Wednesday 28 April, the Primary students will lead our College Community Mass. The Mass commences at 8:00am in The Chapel. All students need to be at school by 7:45am to walk over to The Chapel. Due to this, football and rugby training scheduled for Wednesday morning will not go ahead. This gathering will also provide an opportunity for us to present our Men of Courage and Love of Work Awards for each of our Primary classes. Unfortunately, due to COVID restrictions and The Chapel’s capacity, we are not able to invite parents to this event.

Year 6 Emu Gully

Best wishes to our Year 6 students who will be participating in a full-day excursion to Emu Gully on Friday 30 April. This will be a great experience for them as they continue to build their capacity as leaders of the Primary. 

Year 5 Camp

The Year 5 Camp will take place from Wednesday 26 to Friday 28 May at Tallebudgera Outdoor Education Centre. More information regarding the camp will be provided to Year 5 families tomorrow and families will need to access Parent Lounge to confirm their son’s attendance. As part of the camp, we also require a small number of parent volunteers to assist across the week, if you are interested in this please follow the instructions on tomorrow’s communication.

From the Primary Learning Leader – Ms Jen Little

Last week, Year 5 students spent their time in the Library familiarising themselves with the NAPLAN online Public Demonstration Site. Over the coming weeks, students are encouraged to spend some time continuing to familiarise themselves with the NAPLAN Online Platform in order to build confidence in this medium. The link can be found here.

Students have also taken part in the School Readiness Test that consisted of a Writing and Omnibus Test. Overall, we were impressed with the student’s commitment to the practice testing. Some points to note are as follows:

• Students will require their charged Chromebook for NAPLAN online. Please double-check that your child is getting into the habit of charging these devices nightly and bringing them to school each day.
• ALL students will require headphones – not Bluetooth.

For the next couple of weeks, students will continue to prepare for the testing. Our focus has been in the area of writing. Specifically, students have taken part in daily STOP, DROP, WRITE and in Term 1, they participated in-class lessons and additional workshops that concentrated on writing techniques for narrative. Within these workshops, they were exposed to the NAPLAN writing criteria for Narratives.

This term, their writing focus will shift to Persuasive Texts that they will be learning about in their English lessons. We will take a similar approach to the first term and ensure that all boys have been exposed to the writing criteria for Persuasive Texts. In addition, we will move our daily STOP, DROP, WRITE sessions to keyboarding sessions so that students can continue to build their keyboarding skills in practice for the online platform. For this writing, all spell and grammar checks will be disabled.

Students have also been encouraged to continue to develop in other areas of the testing. Meaghan Round, our Teacher Librarian, has exposed students to skills in the area of reading, which has been well supported by the student’s classwork. Further to this, the students have spent time in their Maths lessons working on NAPLAN questions from previous tests. This week, they also completed a previous NAPLAN Maths assessment under test conditions.

Importantly, their preparation is not just aimed at targeting improved NAPLAN results. These tests are a reflection of their capacity in the areas of Literacy and Numeracy which, undoubtedly, are important skills for life.

At this time of year, I am often asked by parents what they can do to support their students learning and their readiness for NAPLAN online. I would advise the following:

• Continued writing practice at home with attention to the following:
  • Awareness of audience – make sure they are using techniques that make their writing interesting to the reader
  • Varied sentence types and beginnings
  • Accurate and varied punctuation
  • Separation of paragraphs
  • Use of specific, technical and challenging words to improve vocabulary
• Engage in the Literacy homework with your child over the next two weeks – this has been designed to build upon areas that have been flagged as areas for general improvement by the cohort
• Continue to encourage keyboarding skills at home
• Additional practice tests have been uploaded to the English Year Level Page on the School’s Learning Portal in the areas of Reading and Concepts of Language

I am aware that this is an incredibly busy time of year for all: students, teachers and parents. I would like to take this opportunity to thank you all for your support of the academic program at Marist College Ashgrove. Specifically, I would like to acknowledge the efforts of our Year 5 teachers who have been making every effort to ensure that the literacy and numeracy skills of our boys are a priority.

Sport Update – Mr John Lambourne

Primary Cross Country Carnival

Congratulations to all the MCA Primary boys who gave 100% effort while out on the course and also cheered all their teammates and classmates home. It was a fantastic morning and it was great to see the way that the boys approached the event. The Green team were the champion house on the day, special congratulations must also go to each of our Age Champions.

Term 2 Sport

Term 2 Training Schedules

AIC Cross Country

Term 2 Training Schedule

Cross country training: boys meet at the pool, 6:30am for a 6:45am start.

Boys are encouraged to attend at least two sessions per week, 1 A session and 1 B session. 

Sports Photographs

We are always on the lookout for photos and action shots to be used for the Blue & Gold, other College publications, season or end-of-year wrap-ups etc. Please follow this link and add your photos - Marist College Ashgrove Primary Sports Photos.

College App

Please ensure that you download the College App to your smartphone. This app will be used weekly to inform you of sporting fixtures, cancellations and bus arrival information.

Primary Sport Photos