What a fun day we have had at St Michael's with Singer, Songwriter, Dancer and TV Star, Timomatic coming along to teach our Year 3/4s a dance routine. The dance program we follow at St Michael's is called 'Every Chance to Dance'. This is a great online program created by Franco (who also visited us today). Channel 9 were here filming, so be sure to watch Win News tonight at 6pm to see if we make the cut.

Vinnie's Winter Woolies and StayOut

What a great night it was on Friday night. I am hoping that students really got a feel for the importance of raising awareness and a deepening understanding regarding homelessness in our society. Everyone deserves a safe place to call home. That’s why Vinnies raises money to provide people experiencing homelessness with vital access to food and accommodation. They also provide education, counselling, employment and health services to help people overcome poverty in the long term.

Thank you to the school community for your generous donations of winter woolies and for alowing your child/ren to experience the 'StayOut'. 

Sacrament Of First Eucharist

This weekend we will celebrate the Sacrament of First Eucharist with 19 of our St Michael's school students. This Sacrament will be celebrated across the 4 Parish Masses. This is an exciting and special next step of these student's faith journey and I congratulate them and their families. 

Term 2 Award Assembly

On Friday we will present this term's Rainbow Award recipients.

The Rainbow Award will be presented to 2 students from each class, each term, selected by their class teacher. These students will be recognised for displaying our school values.

This is not just to focus on academic achievement, but to focus and recognise students who support others, show compassion and empathy, challenge themselves, listen to feedback from teachers, display a positive attitude and are an overall good role model for others.

In Term 4, all students who have received a 'Rainbow Award' will have a special 'uniform free day' and lunch with Mr Webb and myself.

Letters have been sent home to families of students who will be receiving these awards this term. 

Support Staff Day

On Friday we celebrated Education Support Staff Day which is celebrated on 13 June. 

The day celebrates and acknowledges the tireless work of support and operational staff. The annual celebration is an initiative of the Independent Education Union Australia (IEUA) and the New Zealand Educational Institute (NZEI), reflecting a resolution passed at the seventh Education International (EI) World Congress in 2015 to create a global celebration held every June known as World Support Staff Day.

We thank Lisa, Maria, Kylie, Sonja, Sharon, Unnati and Kim for all that they do to support us all at St Michael's. 

Refugee Week

On Sunday, Damien Webb, Laura Frogley and I started the Ration Challenge to raise awareness of the refugee crisis during Refugee Week. The three of us are living on the same rations as a Syrian Refugee for 7 days. Please continue to be gentle with us as we hit half way without coffee, alcohol, vegetables, red meat and sugar. We really appreciate all the sponsorship that we have already received from the school community. We originally aimed to raise $1500 collectively and have now surpassed this to have a total of over $4100. You can still sponsor us, every little bit counts to help us to help those in need. You can sponsor us at https://my.rationchallenge.org.au/t/stmichaelsstaff

Staffing Update

We welcomed Yvette Whalan back last week after a fortnight away. Yvette will continue working in a part-time capacity sharing with Natasha Kapantais on 1/2W until the end of the term.

Yvette Whalan and Shannon Blakey are both accessing long service leave for the whole of Term 3. Natasha Kapantais will continue as classroom teacher on 1/2W (Mon, Tues, Thurs and Friday) with myself taking the class every Wednesday. I am in the process of locking someone in to take 5/6B and will annouce that once it is confirmed. 

My Wellbeing Lessons on Wednesday will be planned and programmed by me, but covered by a casual teacher for Term 3 whilst I am on 1/2W. 

Sarah Anderson will be accessing Long Service Leave in Week 1 next term, Jane McKeough and Ann Webb will cover the week. Jane McKeough will be accessing long service leave in Weeks 2-4. Regular casual teachers will cover her days across various class/es and roles. Bridgette McCann will be accessing long service leave at the end of Term 3 for a week and a regular casual will replace her during Week 10. 

Thank you in advance for your support regarding staffing. At all times, Damien Webb, Meaghan Younger, Jo Krippner and myself are connecting with classes to ensure consistent and effective learning is occurring. 

Enjoy the week ahead.

Regards,

Pat Ellis

Principal

First Communion

Last Thursday Year Four had a fabulous retreat day exploring the importance of Eucharist in sustaining us as a people of faith and as God’s children.

We pray for these children as they make their First Holy Communion this coming weekend on the Feast of Corpus Christi:

Mini Vinnies

Thank you to all who took part in our Winter Woolies Day and Stay Out last week. We were overwhelmed by the generosity of our community with the donations of warm winter clothing, thank you again.

The students who took part in the Stay Out had a fun and educational evening learning more about the realities of homelessness. They also provided practical support through the donations of money and packed hygiene kits for the Night Patrol Van. We raised $745 for the Night Patrol. Thank you so much to our very generous parents for your donations.

Special thanks to the parents who assisted with making the delicious soup for our evening meal and all staff who gave so willingly of their own time to make the evening a success.

Our Lady of Perpetual Help Feast Day

Thursday 27June is the Feast of Our Lady of Perpetual Help, our Parish’s Patron. We will celebrate as a school community here at St Michael’s with Mass on the day. Mass will begin at 9:30 in the St Michael’s church. Families are warmly invited to join us for this special Feast Day Mass.

As a parish we will join with students from St Monica’s on Friday 28^th June. Students from both schools in Years K-2 will have a liturgy and special activities here at St Michael’s School from 9:30 – 1:30pm. The students in Years 3-6 will have a liturgy and special activities at St Monica’s School from 10:00 – 1:30. Permission notes for the students in years 3-6 have gone home this week and are due back by Monday 24June.

Last night’s Community Council meeting was another great opportunity to dedicate an hour of our time to discuss the inner-workings of our wonderful school. Recently we made it a regular fixture that we would set aside a moment at each meeting to reflect on our commitments as a Council based on the Council Constitution. This ensures that in addition to our operational goals, such as fundraising, we also focus on the more strategic elements of our leadership role. We have broken our role into several areas, those being - Catholic Identity & Character, Academic Programs, Physical Resources, Leadership, Financial, Enrolment & Growth and Event Planning. At this week's meeting we spent time going through each area and identifying what we are currently doing in these areas to support the school and started to name areas we can focus on for improvement.

Events: The school disco was considered a big success by all with particular praise for the fantastic DJ who really created a fun atmosphere for the kids. Overall we raised a profit of around $1000 which is noticeably more than the same event last year. In future we will incorporate cleaning up the hall as part of a fun game so there is less rubbish left for staff and parent helpers to manage. 

Plans for the TV themed trivia night are going great with lots of exciting decorations being discussed. Tables are starting to fill up so get in quick and reserve your team’s spot. Should be a fabulous night. If any families own businesses that might like to donate a prize in exchange for some publicity, please contact the school this week.

Financials: The Council is currently working on a two-year financial plan which will ensure that spending is managed well across the two-year cycle of our big fundraisers: fete and raffle.

Parish Report: Qkr! is soon to be introduced as part of the Parish Planned Giving program which will make donating easier given everyone seems to be moving away from cash payments elsewhere. Parish Feast Day for Our Lady of Perpetual Help will be held on Saturday 29 June at St Monica’s in Evatt.

Sustainability: A meeting was held by the Sustainability Action Group emphasising their shared vision to keep Miss Jordan’s Garden a vibrant part of our school landscape. It was noted how proud and dedicated our senior Sustainability Leaders have been when showing the greenhouse to school visitors and this mirrors a healthy level of interest from all year groups. We hope to include more content from their work on this project in the newsletter soon. 

Reconciliation Action Plan: First meeting will occur soon and the goal is to draft a statement of intent outlining ways to build reconciliation into our activities at school. Parent volunteers are needed and should chat to Miss Lewis if they have any questions.

Enrolments: We are hearing positive things about St Michael’s in the community and are happy to report that enrolment numbers are looking good for the rest of this year and 2020.

If you would like to be involved with any of the activities of the Council or have some suggestions, please email us at: council.stmichaelsps@cg.catholic.edu.au

Emma Bickley on behalf of the Community Council team.

The app of the week is Let’s Read. Children love being read

aloud to! This app allows parents to record yourself reading classic stories to share with your kids. Choose a book from the bookshelf and start recording.

Relief Reduction Printing using a Styrofoam Block

The reduction technique is essentially a method used by

printmakers to incorporate multiple layers of colour onto a relief print.

As suggested by its name, this technique involves ‘reducing’ a block to create a multiple coloured print.

A single piece of styrofoam will be engraved to produce the first colour, then the block will be ‘reduced’( i.e. engraved further) and this will be used to print over the top of the first colour.

The plate will be further reduced and printed again using the third colour.

Over the next three weeks our prints will have 3 layers of colour!

Belconnen Region Athletics Carnival

The team for the Belconnen Region Athletics Carnival has been announced.  Congratulations to the 33 students who will represent our school on Monday 19th August at the AIS.  Permission notes will come home at the beginning of next term.

Chief Minister's Reading Challenge

Well done to all those students who have already completed the challenge and have read 30 books. A big effort! As students complete the challenge, forms can be put in the black tray on the library desk. If there are students who would like to take up the challenge, there is still plenty of time to do so. All the information is on display in the library for those interested. 

Overdue Library Books

There are a number of students with overdue library books, if you could please assist us by returning these books at your earliest convenience.

Congratulations to the following children who have achieved a Harmony Award in Week 8 and will receive their award this Friday at morning gathering (weather permitting).

Yesterday the students in K-2 were visited by Kenny Koala, he taught them how to #StayOK.

Lunch Orders are to be placed by MIDNIGHT on Wednesday nights. 

The canteen still require assistance on Fridays from approximately 12.30-1.45 to help pack lunch orders, if you can assist in anyway, please contact Lisa in the Front Office.  Any help is greatly appreciated.  

Please feel free to contact Empire Catering on 0408 200 481 for queries with lunch orders or any constructive feedback you have regarding menu items.  

Playgroup is held on Wednesdays in Weeks 2 to 9 from 9am til 10.30am in the School Hall. It is for children ages 0-5 and their parents/carers.  Please contact Kylie Arena or Lisa Monro on 62414022 for any enquires. 

Special wishes to those children who celebrate their birthday this week:

Aaron 3/4AK

We hope you have a great day!!

The 2019/20 Entertainment Book is now available to purchase.  Books can be purchased at the Front Office for $60 or digital copies can be ordered through the following link.  Please see Lisa in the Front Office for more information.

Thank you to those families that have been bringing in the Earn and Learn stickers, so far we have well over 7000 stickers and still counting.  Lets keep collecting!!!

The Woolies Earn and Learn program is back running from 1 May till 25 June.  For every $10 spent at a Woolworths store you will be given a sticker, the stickers can then be placed on a sticker sheet (available from the Front Office), or placed in the boxes on display in the Front Office or at the Woolworths store in Belconnen Mall.  The stickers will then be redeemed for resources from Modern Teaching Aids.  Start collecting today to enable us to receive some great resources.