Thank you everyone for the positive feedback and support we have received regarding our Transition Plan for Return to School. Once again I have been overwhelmed with the amount of emails from parents thanking us for what we are doing. It seems that our staff and the parent community are aligned with taking a measured and well-thought out transition plan. This is to ensure a calm, safe and supportive ease back into school life is achieved. One that centres on each individual child and one that places us in the best possible position to ensure success, not just for the short term, but for the rest of the year and beyond. 

I appreciate the fact, that while there are other schools going straight from our current situation to full attendance, this option isn't the right path for us. This pandamic hasn't occurred before for us, children have never had this long away from school, children have not had to have their parents doing school work with them everyday, we have never been placed under restrictions like this, they have never not been able to play with friends, visit family, play team sports. There has been so many changes for these children over a short period of time and we don't know how students will transition.

Being a parent of two Primary age students, I can attest that there will be, for some children, some separation issues, increased anxiety, increased fear or worries, increased behaviours, concerns around friendships, concerns about school work, not sure of changes in routine and safety measures. For other children, everything will be fine.

It is easy for some outside of education to say schools need to go back straight away and everything will be fine, when they are not seriously considering some of the issues mentioned and the overall wellbeing of each child. There is no rush to this. By rushing, we have so much more to lose. Ensuring we build little stepping stones along the way to ensure success is achieved, is our priority. By proceeding in a calm, measured and considered transition, we have so much more to gain.

I really appreciate that for St Michael's Primary School, school and home are on the same page with regard to this. It is just another example of the trusting culture we have created here and we are forever thankful for your continued support and understanding. 

Before & After School Care - YMCA 

Just a reminder that Before and After School Care will be operating as normal during this transition period. Please contact YMCA directly to register or book in for care arrangements. 

School Uniforms

Macdonalds Childrens' Wear in Jamison are the main supplier of our uniforms, unfortunatley they don't have size 8 and 10 sports pants available for the next couple of weeks.  If you are desperate for pants you can purchase a plain navy pair from Lowes in Gungahlin.

I have been informed, that for the time being, Macdonalds is only open on Monday-Tuesday and Friday from 11am till 4pm and on Saturdays from 10am till 2pm.

Enjoy the week ahead. 

Looking forward to seeing everyone starting to come over the next fortnight. 

Take care. 

Pat Ellis

Starting on Monday, we will have revised drop off and pick up arrangements for all students until further notice.

Morning Drop Off

Parents please drive through staff carpark to drop off. Students are not to get out of the car until they reach the front of school, where a teacher will assist. Staff Carpark is not an area for parents to park.

We understand that some children may be quite anxious for the first few days. In this case, please park on the blacktop and walk your child to the teacher at the front of the school (which will most likely be Mr Ellis or Mr Webb) and they will take your child and assist them to enter into school. For Kindergarten students, Miss Lewis will be in her classroom for the first week to assist with an easier morning transition. We will transition them from the parent to the Kindergarten classroom. 

We are asking for parents to remain outside the school building. 

Afternoon Pick Ups

All Kindergarten students and their siblings, will be walked, by a teacher to the oval pick up area on Tyrrell Circuit. Please wait at your cars and not walk to the school. 

Singles (only child from a family at school), will be picked up via the staff carpark. Parents are asked to drive through (similar to morning drop offs) and pick up these children. A teacher will assist students getting picked up here. This space will need to be quick. Parents please remain in your car. 

All other family groups will be walked by a teacher to the blacktop area. We will use our little side road to wait. Parents park as normal in Blacktop and students will walk to your car. It is important that parents are very conscious of road safety when driving in and out of the blacktop area. 

Walkers and riders will go with the group of students (and teacher) based on their normal route home, whether they go the oval way, front of school or back gate. Any parents who meet children to walk home/ride home together, are asked to wait at the appropriate spot based on which way you travel (eg wait at end of oval area if you walk that way to your home etc). 

It will be a bit messy to start with, but with only half the school at any one time over the next fortnight, we can use this time to perfect these arrangements before everyone is back together in Week 6. 

It is important if parents can remain in their pick up areas and not walk to the front of the school. With a change in arrangements, our priority is moving students safely to their pick up area and having parents at the front of the school will hamper these efforts. Please be patient and please wait in your pick up area and a teacher will walk your child/ren to that area. 

Any questions, please email Pat directly patrick.ellis@cg.catholic.edu.au 

Religious Education Curriculum

Godly Play

"Godly play" is a term coined by Jerome Berryman to describe an approach to children's spiritual formation that is based on creating a sacred space in which to present the stories of our faith, wonder about them together, and then allow the children open-ended opportunities, to engage with the story on their own terms.

The stories are told very simply, with simple props, and without interpretation or moral instruction. After a story is presented, the children and the storyteller wonder together about aspects of the story that draw their interest. For instance, with the parable of the Good Shepherd, they might wonder together how the sheep felt as they followed the shepherd, or whether the sheep have names, or how it might feel to be inside the sheepfold.

After a time of exploring the story with wondering, the story is put away, the children choose the art supplies they would like to work with, and they spend some time creating whatever they choose, in response to what they feel is most important in the story, or most interesting.

This is play. It is Godly. It is meeting God along with children, rather than teaching them what we think they ought to know. Our faith stories are very powerful and offer plenty to think about. Godly play is often deeply satisfying for the adults who engage the stories along with the children. https://ceob.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/EncounteringtheWordthroughGodlyPlay.pdf

Currently in Kindergarten and Years 3 & 4 students are exploring the parable of the Good Samaritan. Here is a version of this story for children to engage with: https://ceob.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/TheGoodSamaritan.pdf  Students in Years 1 & 2 are learning about Noah and the Great Flood. Here is a version of this for them: https://ceob.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/NoahandtheFlood.pdf

Year 5/6

Students in Years 5 & 6 are learning about the Holy Spirit this term. Whilst you may have previously considered the Holy Spirit a topic for Year 6 students as they prepared for Confirmation, in current Religious Education it is a concept explored over and again at each year level, deepening students’ understanding as they grow and mature. At the moment the students in 5/6 are learning about the Gifts of the Holy Spirit. Here is a great presentation on the Gifts and Fruits of the Holy Spirit: https://watch.formed.org/ydisciple-confirmation-2/videos/the-gifts-fruits-of-the-holy-spirit-with-gina-bauer I encourage you to watch this one with your children and have a talk about it.

Religious Life of St Michael’s School Community

Lectio Divina – praying with Scripture

The St Michael’s School community is familiar with a variety of forms of prayer, including Lectio Divina. Lectio divina is an ancient method of praying with sacred texts (particularly Scripture but other sacred writings can be used). This form of prayer allows you to spend time listening deeply and intently to what God might have to say to you through the text. I invite you to spend time together in prayer with daily Scripture using this ancient prayer form. Here is an article outlining the process:

https://teachingcatholickids.com/lectio-divina-for-kids/

Mass

Don’t forget there is always daily mass online available at https://www.catholicvoice.org.au/mass-online/. Our own Father Loi is celebrating Mass each Saturday evening and that is being streamed live on the Our Lady of Perpetual Help –North Belconnen Facebook site.

 

Virtual Cross Country - Are you in?

The SSACT Virtual Cross Country kicked off this week! If you haven't decided to take part it's not too late. For information on how to participate, set distances, suggested courses and the recording log, see the sport folder on our remote learning site. Any questions feel free to get in touch erin.hardwicke@cg.catholic.edu.au 

Looking forward to seeing everyone's results next Thursday!

Nutrition and Fitness Resource 

The Raising Children website has lots of great advice and suggestions about a wide range of topics related to parenting and raising children. The link below has some great information and resources for nutrition and fitness. 

https://raisingchildren.net.au/school-age/nutrition-fitness

Chief Minister's Reading Challenge 

It is wonderful that so many of our students are taking part in this year's challenge. Remember that listening to an audio book counts as one book towards your total. Writing a book review also counts as an additional book/entry. Keep up the great work!

SORA 

We have created our own St Michael's account within SORA so we can purchase additional titles that our students are currently enjoying reading. These tiles are available only to our students. When logging in to SORA students will not need to do anything different. The titles appear in the catalogue seamlessly so there is no need to do anything differently when searching or borrowing.

All Harry Potter titles are on unlimited loan, so no wait times, until the end of this month. 

Coronavirus: A book for Children 

Axel Scheffler (illustrator of the Gruffalo) has illustrated a digital book for primary school age children about the coronavirus and the measures taken to control it. It is free for anyone to read as an ebook or print out.

https://nosycrow.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Coronavirus-A-Book-for-Children.pdf

The book answers key questions in simple language appropriate for 5 to 9 year olds:

• What is the coronavirus?
  • How do you catch the coronavirus?
  • What happens if you catch the coronavirus?
  • Why are people worried about catching the coronavirus?
  • Is there a cure for the coronavirus?
  • Why are some places we normally go to closed?
  • What can I do to help?
  • What’s going to happen next?

Published by Nosy Crow, and written by staff within the company, the book has had expert input: Professor Graham Medley of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine acted as a consultant, and the company also had advice from two head teachers and a child psychologist.

I wanted to take the time to talk to you about meditation for kids and adults. 

Meditation is great:

• to building concentration
• strengthen your focus
• reduce the amount of distractions
• escape the world and its worries
• healing effect on your body

There are also Mandala colouring sheets in your home pack which can be used to slow the mind for meditation.

How is a Mandala meditation? Loosely translation to mean “circle”, a Mandala is a simple shape, a geometric pattern. It’s usually in a shape of a circle representing wholeness. The circles we call earth, sun and moon are conceptual circles for friends, family and community.

 Mrs Shahenie Burns

Student Welfare Officer

Congratulations to the following children who achieved a Harmony Award in Week 2 and will have their award posted out to them.  Well done!!   

KL	Valentina C
1/2B	Misha I
1/2W	Elliarna G
3/4A	Coco T
3/4F	Isabella F
3/4FR	Andrew C
5/6F	Matthew S
5/6K	Aarush B

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

Kobe 3/4A, Stella 3/4FR, Valentina KL, Hannah 5/6F and Katie 3/4F

We hope you have a great day!!

On behalf of Their Excellencies General the Honourable David Hurley AC DSC (Retd) and Mrs Linda Hurley, I am writing to invite you and your students to participate in a live reading of Whitney and Britney Chicken Divas as part of this year's National Simultaneous Storytime. 

Written and Illustrated by Lucinda Gifford, Whitney and Britney Chicken Divas takes the reader on a fun-filled discovery about why Whitney and Britney - two seemingly ordinary backyard chickens - sleep all day long. Could it have something to do with them sneaking out at night to a local jazz club?

The reading will take place on 11 am (AEST) on Wednesday 27 May 2020 at  https://facebook.com/events/s/national-simultaneous-storytim/578428786111083/?ti=as

As in previous years, National Simultaneous Storytime aims to promote the value of reading and literacy using an Australian children’s book that explores age-appropriate themes and addresses key learning areas of the National Curriculum for Foundation to Year 6. A large range of supporting teaching resources (including digital copies of the book, video and audio recordings, colouring-in pages and crosswords) can be downloaded free of charge from the National Simultaneous Storytime website.

The school counsellor Jess is available during school hours on Wednesdays for counselling support to St Michael’s students and families. Jess is able to provide confidential counselling over email, over the phone, or via teleconferencing software Zoom during this time of Remote Learning.

Parents and carers are welcome to email Jess directly jess.dawson@catholiccare.cg.or.au if they have any questions and/or concerns about their child’s emotional wellbeing.

Remember to take it day by day and be kind to yourself!

The digital book is now available for $69.99 and is regularly updated with new offers.

Please click on the link below to order your 2020 Entertainment Book.

https://www.entertainment.com.au/orderbooks/232g38