Term 4 Week 2 2022

Principal's Message

Dear families and friends,

‘We do whatever it takes to lead the way in Love, Learning, Faith, School Spirit, Sport & Community’

World Educators Day next Friday 28 October
We have a crew here at SMP that deeply loves and cares for your kids. We work tirelessly to be our best for the kids and the community. Through the recent events of Covid and Floods, we did whatever we could to have your kids in at school as quickly as possible. We went above what was expected by creating personalised learning for those who couldn’t attend. We don’t look for the easy option but have the wellbeing and education of your kids always at the forefront of what we do. Being a teacher in today's climate is not easy. So please consider showing appreciation if you feel warranted for any of our educators here next Friday, possibly even educators that made a profound difference for you in your life too. I thank my crew for the blessing that they are to the kids and community of Casino. We also remember Legends like the Mercy Sisters, Charlie Cox & Mary Mackillop who have paved the way and inspired us.  

Plans Ahead

• Our Christmas Concert will be a simple event showcasing our kids in their grade as they perform carols for our community (most likely at the back of the new College building).
• The teachers for next year will be decided upon and shared with the community around Week 6 in the Newsletter.
• Classes will be known by the last Monday (12/12) of the schooling year at the latest, possibly before.
• Any new school building plans are on hold at the moment as we seek further advice and support from the Lismore Catholic Schools Office.       
• Our damaged Kinder and Year One classrooms will be ready sometime early in the new year. I have purchased all the furniture for these new spaces. It will be a great space & learning environment for our kids.
• We are looking at Home Learning in preparation for 2023 as to what is best for our SMP kids and families.             
• A new syllabus in English and Mathematics is coming in 2023 for Years K-2 and 2024 Years 3-6.  We are preparing well for this.

Landscaping out the front  
Thank you to all the offers of assistance with this, I was able to source some great logs and stumps from the Richards and create a space around these. I enjoy creating these spaces for our school, for our kids, staff and families to enjoy. I am planning more play space area for our kids to come.

Important Dates
Student Free Day Term 4 - Friday 25th November
SMP Cup - Tuesday 1st November (Melbourne Cup)
Proposed Christmas Carol Concert - Thursday 24th November
2023 Kinder Parent Information Evening - Monday 21st November at 6pm
Swimming Carnival (Only for competitive  swimmers wanting to go onto the next level as Casino pool is yet to be complete) Thursday 1st December
Casino Dance Concert - Friday 2nd December
Year 6 Graduation - Wednesday 14th December
Last Day of the Year for all - Friday 16th December
Proposed starting dates 2023 -  Years 1-6 Wednesday 1st February, Kinder Friday 3rd February 

Compass and School Fees
In line with the introduction of the new student information and financial accounting software,  one of the Parish Schools Office staff members will join the Catholic Schools Office in the position of Finance Assistant.  The Finance Assistant (Leanne Brentall) will continue to support families with school fees, sibling discounts and fee assistance.  The new software has been introduced in readiness for Term 4. School tuition fees and sibling discounts will remain unchanged.  Detailed communication will continue to be provided to support this change.

      Take care
John O’Brien
Principal

Assistant Principal's News K-9

Vinnies News

I had a great holiday and spent most of it with a man named Guy LeRoy.  He is my trainer and is doing a great job with me.  I am learning so much to ensure I can be best support for my friends here at SMP.

Woof Woof,
Vinnie - Assistant Principal K-9

Assistant Principal's News - Mission

Year 5 Exuro Retreat Day
On Tuesday we had 14 students from Year 5 attend the Exuro Retreat Day at Tullera Hall.  Exuro is a retreat day for selected Year 5 students from parish primary schools based in regions of the Diocese to celebrate their faith at a diocesan level. Exuro is Latin for ‘on fire’.

The idea of the day was to bring students together with like-minded peers, to share and build relationships that strengthen the practice of their Christian faith and to be leaders in building strong Catholic school communities. The SMP students who attended this day will now lead a retreat day for the rest of the Year 5 cohort later on in the term.

Three Sixteen Youth Group
The registrations for the Three Sixteen Youth Group in Term 4 has gone through the roof! We have 109 students registered from Years 2-6 to attend the after school events held 3 times this term. Students will be taken to the Youth Group by SMP teachers after school on the Fridays and parents are to collect their children at 5.00pm at the church.

• Week 2 - Friday 21/10 
• Week 4 - Friday 4/11
• Week 5 - Friday 11/11
  

Sam Irvine
Assistant Principal - Mission

Assistant Principal's News Teaching & Learning

ICAS Assessments 2022
Congratulations to all the students who took part in the ICAS Assessments this year. The International Competitions and Assessments for Schools (ICAS) recognise and reward student achievement in a number of academic areas and we were pleased to have six of our students take part this year. 

Our students have been awarded a number of Merits and Credits for their efforts in English, Maths, Science, Spelling, and Writing and these will be awarded at our next Student of the Month Assembly.

The Importance of Reading to your Children
Most parents understand the importance of reading to young children and the positive impacts it has on their development.  We know that a child's language development is formed through regular oral interaction with adults and vocabulary is built through exposure to texts.  Numerous studies have shown that students who are exposed to reading before starting school have a much better understanding of phonemic awareness (being able to hear sounds in words), phonics (connecting the letters with sounds), vocabulary, reading comprehension, and fluency (being able to read quickly and accurately).

 It is a common misconception however, that once a child learns to read themselves, they do not "need" their parents to read to them anymore. The importance of reading aloud to your child continues throughout their primary school years. This is a wonderful opportunity to develop a special bond with your child and it also cements a love of reading and learning whilst improving imagination and creativity. Students who are read to regularly show a greater competence in developing ideas when writing and demonstrate a deeper comprehension of the books they are reading themselves.

I highly recommend asking your child to borrow a book from the school library that interests them, and that they would like you to read to them, so you can both experience the wonderful benefits that come with this.

Felicity Wilde
AP Teaching & Learning

K-2 Instructional Leader

Year 2 Learning
Year 2 have started Term 4 with a bang! This term for English, students are focusing on how purpose, audience and subject matter vary in different texts. Students will learn to plan, compose and present a range of different texts using different language, punctuation and grammatical features. Their learning journey has started by identifying similarities and differences in texts and displaying these as their Third Teacher to help the students consolidate their understanding of texts. 

Laura Hughes
K-2 Instructional Leader

Year 2 Learning

Sport News

Swimming Carnival
The school swimming carnival will once again be held at Evan Head pool. It will be a competitive swimming carnival only with students needing to nominate. The carnival will be held on December 1st, Thursday, Week 8. Nominations have been taken over the past number of weeks at school, if you have any questions contact myself at brendan.mitchell@lism.catholic.edu.au  Also, if there are any parents that would like to help out on the day please contact me, it would be greatly appreciated.

Summer Sports Trials
The Summer Sports Trials are on Wednesday 26th October (Basketball) and Thursday 27th October (Tennis, Cricket and Touch) in Lismore. Students have nominated to participate and a note has been sent out on Compass. The permission needs to be done by Friday 21st October.

5x5 Soccer
A Stage 2 and Stage 3 team will be selected to represent SMP at a gala day in Lismore. The day is on Wednesday 16th November (Week 6). The event will be held at Thistles Soccer Club and a note will go out to the teams selected.

Brendan Mitchell
Sports Co-ordinator

Leader of Love and Community

Welcome to Term 4 everyone!!

Can you believe we are here already! There are many exciting events coming up over the next 10 weeks coming into the festive season. 

Casino Fun Run

This is being held this Sunday 23rd of October. We look forward to seeing as many SMP students as we can on the day. Registrations close THIS Friday 21st October 2022 at 05:00 PM. Please see our school Compass App for how to register  - there is still time! 

Wakakirri

A HUGE congratulations to the 60 students who participated in our school Wakakirri performance last term. We have received our feedback from the team at Wakakirri and have some exciting news!! We have been awarded a NATIONAL STORY AWARD - for excellence in performing arts and raising awareness about Cultural Diversity for their performance 'This Is Us - Casino'! Click on the link to take you to the Wakakirri website. We are SO proud of all the students involved and look forward to receiving our award in the mail asap! Bring on Wakakirri 2023!!! 

Kristie Irvine
Leader of Love & Community

Birthdays

Happy birthday to Ava Armstrong Charlotte Hogg Sophie Robinson Genevieve Hines Alice Shields Kallan Hancock Connor Clark Libby Johnston and Talyi Troy who celebrated their birthday in September.

 Happy birthday to Zoe Northfield Sophia Turner Drew Ludlow Maddox Ring Nash Stephens Takoda MacMahon Chaz Creighton Chelsea Rose Reagan Fraser Ted Richards Athena Brown Charlie Campbell Payton Fuller McKenzie Morgan Charlotte Evans Slater Gould Kobee Hammond Adeline Jones Angus McMillan Tyler Brown-Williams Jacob Convine Kade Baker Nevaeh Dennis and Ariah Whitney-Thompson who have celebrated their birthday in October.