Dear Parent/Carers and Families,

What a positive couple of weeks we have had at St Marys District School.  Classrooms across the school are settled with students really focussed on their learning.  Our grades 7-10 students have commenced travel to Launceston each week to participate in Netball, Soccer and Football and our primary students continue to meet regularly online through their Teams assemblies. Below I have included some updates and reminders for your information.

Attendance

Attending school every day helps your child make steady progress with their learning and establish and maintain firm friendships.  Our approach to attendance marking is now back to normal, with all students expected to attend school every day unless they are unwell.  Parents/Carers are reminded to contact the school office if your child is absent so we can record the reason for absence.  An SMS will be sent to you if your child’s absence is unexplained.

St Marys District School Uniform and Mobile Phones

A huge thank you to Parents/Carers and Families for your ongoing support of our uniform dress code.  Our students have really appreciated the addition of the school hoodie and they are reporting being much warmer now they have this as an added layer during the colder winter days.

Students have shown great respect for the new Mobile Phone Policy with student mobiles no longer being seen in our classrooms or playgrounds.  The impact of this change is clear, with far more interaction between students evident, and our common room and playground areas full of chatting, laughing groups of students!

Can we do Parent Help?

Over the past few weeks we have had a number of questions in regard to when Parent Help and other activities involving parents being onsite will recommence.  All decisions in regard to our new ‘normal’ way of working following the COVID 19 restrictions and learning from home period are informed by current Department of Health and Department of Education guidelines.  When making these important decisions we also take into account the wellbeing of our students and staff and in particular whether we are seeing heightened levels of stress or anxiety for our students.  Currently, the following strategies are in place at both campuses of St Marys District School.

Parent/Carer Stop, Drop and Go & Collect and Go in the Classroom – Parents/Carers are now allowed onsite to drop off or pick up their child/ren at the classroom.  Parents should limit their time and their interactions on school grounds as Drop and Go and Collect and Go is still a requirement.  If parents wish to drop their children at the classroom, please park in the pool car park or driveway, sign in at the office and sign out when leaving.

Parent/Carer Meetings - Parent/Carers are able to meet with teachers to discuss their child/ren’s learning.  Please contact the school office on 63 723 900 to set up a suitable time.  On arrival for this meeting you will need to complete a Visitor Health Screen and sign in.

Parent/Carer Help – At this stage Parent Help is not recommencing as it was prior to COVID 19.  Parents are able to express their interest in helping by contacting the school office.  Any Parent Help programs will need to be carefully planned by teachers and senior staff to support identified opportunities.  Once identified Parent Help opportunities are identified Parents/Carers will be contacted.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact us.

Camps and Overnight Excursions

Given the current Department of Health and Department of Education advice we have made the decision that there will be no overnight excursions and school camps during 2020.  Although this is disappointing for all involved, making this decision now allows teachers and teams to plan for the rest of the year with this in mind.  Teachers across both our primary and secondary teams are being encouraged to plan day excursions to ensure all students have the opportunity to participate in off campus experiences to support their current learning programs.  Further information about these excursions will be shared with you as soon as possible.

Best wishes,

Carolyn Watson

Many parents will have seen their children using the Department's Learning Management System - Canvas  to access their learning during lockdown.  We are excited to advise that St  Marys District School as been selected as a Pilot School for the roll out of Canvas Parent.   Please see the letter below for more information.  We would appreciate you updating your email address with us as soon as possible. 

Dear Parent/carer

In the coming weeks St Marys District School will be introducing parent access to Canvas – our Department’s Learning Management System.

To take advantage of the platform’s capacity to also share information between home and school, St Marys District School will be using Canvas Parent to enhance the way our school communicates with families about the learning progress of their children. Canvas Parent will enable parents/carers to review upcoming or past assignments, receive alerts for student activity and most importantly, see ongoing teacher feedback for their child in order to progress their learning,

To provide you with access to Canvas Parent we require up to date email information for all parents/carers. We will work with families over the next few weeks to review and update parent/carer email information where required.  Please contact the school Administration office on 0363723900 or Email st.marys.district.school@education.tas.gov.au to provide us with  your current email address.

Further information regarding the use of Canvas Parent will be shared as soon as the platform is available.

We look forward to embarking on this journey and strengthening our connection with our parent community.

Regards

Carolyn Watson

Principal

St Marys District School

Last week you would have received your child’s Mid Year Report.  During this reporting phase students and teachers were triumphant at St Marys District School in driving and maintaining the momentum for learning throughout the Learning from Home period followed by the returning to onsite learning, during unique times. 

You would have noticed that the reports included three distinct sections: An indicator against the Achievement Standard for their year level, Next Steps and a Wellbeing comment.  Please take the time to celebrate the learning accomplished with your child.  Additionally, identifying and discussing ways to achieve the next steps will help support your child as they continue in their learning journey.

Thank you to our dedicated teaching team who carefully co-construct student reports so that the feedback is meaningful and to our Administration team who then collate and ensure the delivery of the reports to you.

We trust you have found your child’s report encouraging and informative.  

Lynette Yodgee

Warm as toast…thanks to the coordination between our school Chaplain - Hannah and the Salvation Army.  Beanies, vests, woollens and thermal.  Perfect for those frosty St Marys mornings.

High School  and Year 11/12 students using the various mediums available in Art , creating their own ideas and art work.

Secondary students enjoying fun in the Art room using the clay medium.  Students learnt how to do wheel pottery, mould pots and small sculptures out of clay.

Mentor Program

At the beginning of the year, the Student Leadership Board had a look at our school’s goals and priorities and from that created a priority to guide our actions. Our priority is: to create positive relationships and a sense of belonging for all students in the school. Two of our main targets to achieve this are: every student can name an adult or older student they can go to for help and students have positive relationships with all students and staff.

The way we hope to achieve these targets is to start a mentoring program. We think that this will be a great way for our younger kids to get to know some of the older kids and to create a welcoming and supportive environment at school. We plan on having two whole school sessions a term with all the secondary classes going into one of the primary classes to have a little fun and make connections. There will also be people who will continue to mentor throughout the term with students who would benefit from support from an older student and have made a good connection with one.

On Tuesday the 11^th of August, our first session of mentoring began. The Grade 10s underwent mentor training with our social worker, Sarah, and then went to the Prep-1 and 1-2 classes. We spent some time doing activities such as colouring in, reading, building, footy, soccer and just playing around on the playground equipment. Both the Grade 10's and younger students had a great time getting to know each other and making connections.

Over the next few weeks, the Student Leader Board will lead mentor training in Grades 9, 8 and 7 before those classes head off to their buddy primary class. The success of our trial session with the Prep, 1, 2's makes us confident that this program will achieve our goals and create some great connections and relationships across the school.

Tasharna 

SLB

Communications Liaison

Results from round 2 - WEDNESDAY 12TH AUGUST 2020  

Netball    Div 2-  St Marys - 23      Kings Meadows - 7

              Div 3-  St Marys - 4        Kings Meadows - 14

Soccer -  St Marys - 3                  Kings Meadows -  3

Football    St Marys  5-2-32           Kings Meadows    19-12-126

What’s on the menu? 

Beef Enchiladas.

Our Year 7-8 Year Option chefs exploring a Mexican focus.

Simply del-ish!

Congratulations to all Primary students for the positive manner in which Term 3 has commenced.

 On Thursday 13^th August we had our first online assembly for Term 3, lead by 5/6 A and Mrs Burbury. 

Some wonderful art work and writing was shared, along with the following students recognised by receiving certificates:

Prep/1

Respect – Willow Davenport

Courage – Tommy Adams

Respect – Reed McDonald

Respect – Amelia Williams

Grade 1/2

Respect – Marley Paul

Courage – Beatrix Cornelius

Aspiration – Lily Harrop

Courage – Jett Worrall

Grade 3/4

Aspiration – Taz Bryant

Growth – Jacob Worrall

Growth – Wesley Kremmer

Fingal Campus

Respect – Bianca Freeman

Aspiration – Layla Woods

Respect – Aiden Woods

Growth – Elijah Dumas

Grade 4/5

Courage – Jack George

Aspiration – Zaylie De La Pair

Growth – Mia Hibberd

Grade 5/6 A

Aspiration – Cortney Smith

Respect – Dakoda Davenport

Growth – Haydon Haberle

Grade 5/6 B

Growth – Wally Freiboth

Growth – Jayden Garth

Courage – Alexandra Syka

Courage – Dominic Locket

Aspiration – Ruby Hoskinson

Aspiration – Helayna McGiveron

We are very proud of all the efforts of these students.

Before we moved to Learning from Home we had conducted several art workshops which were facilitated by Natasha Lowe.  The aim was for these workshops to support students entering pieces of work into the Break O’Day regional Arts Youth Art Prize.  Unfortunately all of our classes were unable to complete these sessions, but several classes were still able to submit their work.

The following students will be receiving a certificate for the work that they submitted:

Kinder-Grade 2 Highly commended:

Bella McCullagh

Kinder-Grade2 Finalists:

Huntta Blair

Georgi Phegan

Hamish Davenport

Levi Woods

Groovy Lined Chicken Art.

Students drew lines to decorate their chicken templates.  Each student made a unique piece of work by using lines and shapes.   In art, a line can be described in several ways. The words used to describe line in artwork are not fancy terms that require formal education in art.  They are ordinary terms often used in everyday conversation.  

• flowing
• delicate
• simple
• bold
• thick
• thin
• fine
• vertical 
• horizontal
• flowing

Students used white paper and black pen to highlight their line design.

With the sleet driving us indoors last Wednesday, it was PE inside with Mrs Fyle.  We worked on the floor, exploring supports and poses. Everyone tried all the individual stretching poses and balances before attempting the partner poses, some of which were quite tricky.

Inspired by the covers of two quality texts, “Flight” by Nadia Wheatley & Arminian Greder and “Small Things” by Mel Tregonning, 5/6B focused on pencil technique, tone and negative space whilst sketching spheres.

Introducing Freddo, Toby and Nelson our SMDS newest members down on the farm. Please make them welcome as Jordan, Haydon and Catherine have.

Healthy habits

In grade 1-2 class our focus for this week has been “Healthy habits”.  During the whole class discussion students shared some of their healthy habits.  Afterwards, each student created a poster about their healthy habits by either choosing an existing template or coming up with their own design.  Next step would be to create a “Healthy Habits Chart” to help children keep track of their healthy habits at school and at home.

In the Grade 4/5 class we have been enjoying the "Once" series written by Morris Gleitzman.

These are portraits of our favourite characters, Zlea and Felix.

We have also one of the pig, Trotski.

Putt -putt golf

In the first few lessons of term three, grade 9 students have been learning skills and knowledge about Golf.  Students were asked to design a putt-putt golf hole with a partner.  We then went around and played each hole to hone and practice our putting skills.  Here are some photos of some of the awesome designs.

Grade 10 students were asked to design their own Ninja Warrior course using some of our large gymnastics gear during PE lesson time. They then participated in the course and some students did a timed run.

Here are some photos that show how much fun they had designing and participating in this activity.

We were very busy during our 6 week course making an Infinity Cube, paper flowers, paper bead bracelets, a quilling flower and a decoupage pot. The students were not sure what they had really signed up for, but after many sighs of frustration and with lots of patience that they said they didn't have, the pride on everyone's face when they had finished a project was awesome! The photos show some of their paper creating journey. 

These notices have been sent home to parents in the last fortnight.  If you did not receive one and would like to receive a copy of the notice, please contact the school office on 63 723 900.

PRIMARY

SECONDARY

Work Placement Notice - Grade 10 students only

Orientation Day Notice for Grade10-12 students

Book Walk and Talk - Selected 7-10 students

Book Fair Notice - Monday 24th - Friday 28th August

WHOLE SCHOOL

Scholastic Book Fair Notice - Monday 24th 2020- Friday 28th August 2020

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