Matthew O'Brien, Principal

Dear Parents, Guardians, Staff, Students and the wider St. Joseph’s Primary School Community,

God our friend, you help and guide us in good and bad times. 

Help us always to find our way to you.

We are all learners in our school community.

 

Help us to open our hearts to others even when it is challenging, 

and celebrate that we are all different in so many ways.

On this land of the Gunditjmara people, 

Guide us to look after each other and our environment - both beautiful and fragile.

 (except from St Joseph’s School Prayer)

Matthew O'Brien, Principal

Happy Birthday to children celebrating their birthday this week.

Dia Jagad, Levi Wood, Mila Vladic, Sophie Dubyna, Hudson Gale, Noah Daffy, Neve Edwards, Lola Petrie and Tessa Eagleson.

Parent Teachers Conversations (Interviews) and Reports

At 4pm on Friday 21st June, Semester 1 reports will be released via the Parent Access Module (PAM) accessible from the SZApp and our website. These reports provide families with information about children’s progress socially, academically and behaviorally. The written report will be accompanied by each child’s “Work Sample Folder”. This folder will contain examples of the children’s work across the semester. It may include a range of subjects, assessment pieces, unedited work and published pieces. 

Following the reports we will be conducting the mid-year Parent Teacher Conversations.  These conversations are designed for two way communication between parents and teachers to further discuss children’s progress. These are held from 3:30pm - 6:00pm on Monday 24th June and Tuesday 25th June.

Parent Teacher Conversations can be booked via PAM are are now open.

Parents are welcome to book a phone call or come into school for a face to face meeting. 

Please note that some parents have participated in a PSG in the second half of the term this meeting will take the place of the Parent Teacher Conversation. 

Excursion to St Joseph’s Church on Wednesday 29th May 2024

The Year 2 unit of work in Religious Education is all about ‘Participation’ this term so we hopped on the bus and went down to our church. We really enjoy traveling on the bus and chatting with our friends from other classes. We attended the weekday mass with parishioners and participated through songs and responses and listened well to Fr John. Everdeen and Alice had a special job of taking the bread and wine up in the Offertory Procession. 

After Mass we went on a discovery tour to learn all about our church building and grounds. We were able to explore inside the church, around the grounds and heard about the Soup Kitchen. In the Church Fr John showed us around the Sanctuary and we were able to examine the Altar and the Reredos. Fr. John opened the reredos and we recognised the pictures from stories we know about Jesus. 

We had a closer look at the baptismal font, paschal candle and the holy oils that we have been learning are used for the sacraments. We were interested to look at the stained glass windows and to see the Stations of the Cross. Fr John showed us in the sacristy and it was interesting to see the different coloured vestments. We have been learning about the seasons in the Church year and knew the vestments matched our prayer cloths in the classroom. 

Mrs Hyland took us up the steep and windy stairs to the choir loft where we were amazed to see the size of the pipe organ. We loved having a go of the organ. We couldn’t believe that it was 132 years old and had 2012 pipes! 

In the gathering space we heard from Mary Lancaster about outreach in our parish supporting people in the community. This area is a nice place for people to gather and chat. We found out about the soup kitchen and how there is a need in Warrnambool to provide a hot meal and company. It was fun walking around the grounds with Pat. We saw the workshops where they fix things. 

We know where Fr John’s house is now and we even went into the offices and saw things like the safe and archives room where they showed us some old photos. 

We learnt a lot on our excursion.

Mrs Gabe Ewing, Year 2 Learning Leader

The Victorian Premiers’ Reading Challenge is now open and we are excited to be participating again in 2024. The PRC application offers a range of exciting features including:

• access to a library catalogue (including book images and blurbs)
• a modern user-friendly interface
• rewarding students with badges as challenge milestones are achieved
• the option for students to mark books as a favourite, give them a star rating or complete a book review.

The Challenge is open to all Victorian children from birth to Year 10 in recognition of the importance of reading for literacy development. It is not a competition; but a personal challenge for children to read a set number of books by 6 September 2024.

• Children from Foundation to Year 2 are encouraged to read or ‘experience’ 30 books with their parents and teachers.
• Children from Year 3 to Year 6 are challenged to read 15 books.

All children who meet the Challenge will receive a certificate of achievement signed by the Victorian Premier and former Premiers. To read the Premier’s letter to parents, view the booklist and for more information about the Victorian Premiers’ Reading Challenge, visit:

Please fill in the attached link to an online form to register your child’s interest in joining the Reading Challenge this year.

Registrations close: Friday 21st June

Any other queries please feel free to email me at elloyd@sjwarrnambool.catholic.edu.au  

Mrs Emily Lloyd, LRC Coordinator

Online Enrolment

Online enrolments are now available and can be completed and submitted electronically. 

For this process go to our school website and select the Enrolment tab. Complete the Enrolment Enquiry to add your details for reminders and updates.  

Under the Enrolment Tab you will also notice an Online Enrolment Form - select this and away you go. A tip with this one is do not use a phone or ipad to complete the form, any laptop or desktop computer will work fine. 

You will also need to make sure you have your child's documentation (birth, immunisation, baptism certificates and any specialist reports) loaded onto your device, either by taking a photo or scanning and uploading as you will be able to upload all of that as well.  

The Arts Team is in need of help to sew up new covers for our cube chairs in our Drama room. There are quite a few of them that will need to be sewn up and many hands make light work.

We will get the material so if there are any crafty parents or grandparents that could help could you please contact Kath McMeel via email kmcmeel@sjwarrnambool.catholic.edu.au

Pizza Day: Tuesday 18th June, 2024

Orders Close: 3pm Thursday 13th June, 2024

Once per term the PSA run a Pizza Day as a "special occasion" lunch option and to raise money for the PSA.

This term the Pizza Day is set to coincide with the school's St Joseph's Feast Day Celebrations.

Children can choose from either Garlic or Hawaiian pizza (Gluten Free options available) which are provided by Pepper's Pizza (formerly Pinkies Pizza) who are one of our school sponsors.

Orders are now open via CDFPay (Canteen ordering system)

There are no canteen orders on Pizza Days and children not wanting to order pizza should bring their lunch from home.

Sorry, no late orders can be accepted.

8:30am - 9:00am on Thursday 13th June and Friday 14th June

Items for second hand sale can be dropped into the school office at any time of the year.  

Uniform items MUST be:

• current "Lowes" brand uniform items only
• very good to excellent quality
• washed and free of stains
• have any naming labels crossed out
• labelled with either the printable Pricing Label template or similar.

Items that are NOT suitable are:

• school bags more than 2 years old
• library/book bags
• stained or torn clothing
• non-current school uniform
• sports shorts without the school logo
• shoes
• secondary school uniform items.

Unsuitable items will be returned to the seller/donator.

Pricing of Uniform Items

Price uniform items accordingly and receive 70% of the amount (when the item is sold) with 30% of your sale going to the school’s PSA.

Items are kept in the second hand uniform shop until they are sold. We will notify via text of any monies to be collected, this may be after a family has left the school.

Alternatively you can donate items to be sold. We will label and price donated items. 100% of these sales go to the school's PSA.

Refer to suggested pricing guide linked below.

Purchasing of Uniform Items

Parents are able to complete an online form indicating the uniform item and size required and it will then be sent home with your child or made available for collection.

Payment to be made in cash the following day. Items can be returned if they aren't the correct size or quality.

School Canteen Support 

A letter from the Australian Smile Group is being sent home with all children this week containing information regarding onsite dental services being provided at our school by their qualified Dental Health Team.

The dental van will be onsite at the school starting on Monday 5th August. 

If you wish your child to participate in this program please complete and return the form to the school office by Tuesday 16th July.

Note: This is a service provided by the Australian Smile Group and is NOT compulsory.