Term 1 Week 3 (12/02/2021)

Grafton Pool Day - Friday 19th March

Stages 1 -3 will have their "catch up pool day" on Friday 19th March.  This was postponed due to the weather on the last day of 2020.

Parish School Forum is sponsoring this event and more details will come as we get closer.

For 2021, all children who complete their Premier's Reading Challenge will be invited to the pool in Grafton on Wednesday 15th December. It is such a fun day we do plan well ahead!

What is On?

Tuesday 16th February - St James' School Liturgy

Friday 26th February - Diocesan Swimming carnival -  Murwillumbah

Monday 15th March - School Photo Day

Friday 26th March - School Cross Country 

Tuesday 30th March - Last day term 1 for all students.

Wednesday 31st March and Thursday 1st April - Staff development days - school closed - all staff attend

May

Wednesday 5th May - Proclaim Lismore - School closed - all staff attend

June

Friday 25th June - Staff Professional Learning - School Improvement Plan - school closed- all staff attend

September 

Friday 17th September - Professional Learning - First Aid - school closed - all staff attend

Dear Parents and Carers,

Busy week 3!

This week you will have noted teachers planning units completing MAI's and Running Records for the Diocesan data upload. At this point every stage is building a community of learners and engaging students in the planning process. 

This means that as the teachers finalise their semester plans every class has had the opportunity to make suggestions about what is studied and how it might be presented. I love these student voice meetings. Often the teachers and curriculum are surprised and challenged by the flexible and creative thinking of your children. The planning is always improved by the student suggestions. I am in the process of editing this last weeks videos and will include them in next weeks newsletter. We find when students have voice and choice, the learning and teaching is richer, deeper and much more enjoyable to teach. 

It was great to see the children at the Zone Swimming Carnival yesterday. Teachers as always reported a lovely day with the children demonstrating great "sports-ship" and huge effort. It is the first time I have seen the children wearing the school swim caps and they are a great addition. It's great to have the Forum sponsoring these.  

Over the email this weekend, you will receive your stage introductory letter. Teachers are negotiating their availability for Getting to Know You Interviews. I am just waiting on the clearance for our plan from CSO. I expect we will need to spread the stages over several weeks. 

Today, depending on the flavour they chose, your child or children will come home with icy pole stained tongues. When all children (thanks in no small part to you) were able to change to the new canteen timetable, I promised them icy poles. This afternoon's last session started slightly late as 150 children and 15 staff slurped away the afternoon heat. Thank you for your help in this area. 

Next Tuesday, we will celebrate our commencement of the 2021 school year with Father Nicolas. A zoom link will be shared on Monday. Can this be shared beyond the school? It certainly can, as Grandparents might like to watch. Thank you for your understanding of the Diocesan protocols which do not allow anyone onsite. 

See you in Kiss and Drop

Ann

Thank you

The Yamba Catholic Ladies have made a donation to the school of $500. This will be used to purchase the library books that children request on our I'D LIKE TO READ panel in the Library. 

We Thank the Yamba Catholic Ladies for thier support.

Zone Swimming Carnival

Yesterday we had 22 students travel to Maclean to represent our school at the Carence Zone Swimming Carnival. The effort from everyone who swam was fantastic and one of our best results for some time. St James managed to finish in 3rd place overall in the point score and 1st place in the small schools pointscore (for schools with less than 100 students in years 3-6)

There were some great results gained by a few swimmers in particular. Heidi Van Leest was a standout and managed to finish in a tie for 1st place as the 11yrs girls age champion on the day. A great effort!

Lola Dougherty, Clarence Dougherty, Kydan Jones and Dexta Jones all qualified in individual races for the Diocesan Carnival, as well as the Junior Boys Relay team of Levi O’Shea, Eamon Mawn, Kydan and Clarence. Well done boys.

See results below.

We wish Heidi, Lola, Clarence, Kydan, Dexta, Eamon and Levi all the best for the Diocesan carnival which is being held in Murwillumbah on Friday 26th February.

Placings:

1st 8yrs 50 Freestyle - Lola Dougherty

1st 8yrs 50 Freestyle - Clarence Dougherty

1st 11yrs 50 Freestyle - Heidi Van Leest

1st 11yrs 50 Butterfly - Heidi Van Leest

2nd 11yrs Breastroke - Heidi Van Leest

2nd 12yrs Freestyle - Dexta Jones

2nd Senior Backstroke - Dexta Jones

2nd Junior Boys Relay

3rd 10yrs 50 Freestyle - Kydan Jones

3rd Junior Backstroke - Kydan Jones

3rd Junior Medley - Kydan Jones

3rd Senior Butterfly - Dexta Jones

3rd Junior Girls Relay

3rd Senior Girls Relay

3rd Senior Boys Relay

School Photos - Monday 15th March

School photo envelopes will be coming home with your child today.

Envelopes need to be returned to the school office by Friday 26th February - NOT ON PHOTO DAY.

Please keep your child's photo envelope safe as it has thier unique student code.

Family envelopes are available from the school office if required.

If you are paying online, family envelopes still need to be filled out and returned to the school office.

RE News

Beginning of School Liturgy

Our Beginning of School Liturgy will be celebrated on Tuesday 16th February at 11:45am under the big top, with Fr Nicolas. Unfortunately, due to Covid-19 regulations, we are unable to have parents and families attend this liturgy on school grounds, however we will be sharing a zoom link for families to access and sharing photos and stories on our Instagram page.

Many thanks to all of the families who have decorated and sent back their scallop shell, to be used in our liturgy next Tuesday. The latest to return these will be Monday 15th Feb. 

Why a scallop shell? 

The scallop shell is a metaphor, in that its lines represent the different routes travelled by pilgrims around the world, which all lead to one point, the tomb of St James in Santiago de Compostela. Here at St James School, Yamba the scallop shell represents all of our families that make up our school community and the journeys they have travelled to arrive at St James School and join our wonderful learning community.

Gabion

We will also be creating a whole school gabion where we are asking each student to contribute something from the beach (eg. small piece of drift wood, stone, shell, etc) Students will need to bring their gabion item to school by Monday 15th February please.

Sacramental Dates- for your calendar

Confirmation- Thursday 22nd July, St Mary’s Church, Maclean. 

First Holy Communion- 28th August, St James Church Yamba

Reconciliation- 25th August, in the school hall 11:45am.

Further Sacramental information to follow later in the year.

Please note the change below:

The order of Sacraments in the Lismore Diocese from 2021 is:

Baptism, Confirmation (Year 3), Reconciliation (Year 4), First Eucharist (Year 4)

If you would like your child to receive these Sacraments, please email yamp@lism.catholic.edu.au to advise which Sacraments you would like your child to receive this year. For your child to receive any of these Sacraments they must first be Baptised. If you have any queries please do not hesitate to contact me at school.

Renee Howland

Leader of School Evangelisation & Catechesis

Leader of Pedagogy

Leader of Pedagogy -Reading at school and home 

Monitoring children’s learning in reading in a consistent way is required for teachers to obtain real-time information about how a child is progressing in : learning how to read and reading comprehension .  The focus for the students who are on levelled readers 1-30 is for learning to read and for the students who are post level 30 the focus becomes reading to learn .  

Reading at home is an opportunity for the student to develop their fluency and confidence. It needs to be an enjoyable experience and is not a time for introducing new skills.  Instructional texts are given in the classroom under the guidance of a teacher. Teachers choose levelled readers for home reading  that are at least two levels below the student’s instructional level to foster the enjoyment and fluency . 

Have fun reading with your children 

Lisa Dougherty

Early Stage 1

This was our first FULL week of school for the Early Stage One Class! We have had our first visit to the library, we have started Reading Groups, we have ordered numbers in our Maths books, we have created art work, and we have been making connections with our friends around the letters in our name. We are trying hard to learn all our friends' names... and we may be a little tired too! It’s so great that many ES1 parents have connected to See-Saw and can now get a glimpse into their child’s classroom.

Stage 1

This week in Stage 1 we have been practicing our storytelling with the story of Jesus and the children, thinking and wondering about belonging. Students took turns at retelling the story using the omni people building on their speaking and listening skills.

Stage 2

Stage 2 has settled in nicely in their new classroom environment. In English we are looking at Narrative Writing and the focus this week has been on the book ‘Suri’s Wall’ written by Lucy Estela and Matt Ottley. Students have been discussing character traits and identifying the traits inside and outside of the character. Students then looked at their own traits and created slinky people to represent themselves and their traits on the inside- it made for a great classroom display!

Students have also enjoyed working collaboratively with each other and getting to their new classmates. Students have been having some great discussions within their groups, and learning from one another which not only assists them learning new knowledge, but builds on their existing knowledge.

Stage 3

Week 3 has been a busy one for Stage 3, we’ve been working to get Literacy groups up and running and we have explored our new literacy tasks that support us in gaining more skills in comprehension and fluency. We have additionally begun our Mathematics unit, which is focusing on whole numbers and length. This Term, Stage 3 will be partaking in new ways to learn Religion. We have received new Catholic Youth Journaling Bibles, which are special bibles with colours and a youth friendly language, where we are able to show our connection to the scripture passages by drawing on the pages to represent our understanding of faith. Thanks Miss Dawson & Mrs Howland!!!  In Science, we are diving into the Digital Technology strand, which will lead us to an exciting event called The Australian Video Game Challenge. In Creative Arts, we are learning about the different generations of dance and how this has moulded contemporary styles of dance. We are excited to welcome our new student Bella McEwen, who will be in Year 5 this year! We welcome her with big arms and wish her a great time! Finally, a lot of our classmates went to Zone swimming this week and we were very proud of their efforts.

Birthdays

Jake Seivers - 13th February, Poppy Erbacher - 14th February, Rhys Johnson - 14th February, Henry Miller - 17th February, Taya Murphy - 17th February, Mr Dougherty - 17th February, Mrs Howland - 17th February, Miss Haines - 17th February, Bradley Haslett -21st February, Kydan Jones - 22nd February,  Ella Carolan - 28th February