St Lawrence & Mary Immaculate Parish Balcatta:

Parish Priest: Fr Emil Ciecierega SDS Assistant Priest: Fr Leonard Macionczyk SDS

Dear Parents

As our new semester begins, perhaps it is time to think about tending the winter garden in

preparation for spring. The following reflection may be helpful.

THE GARDEN OF OUR DAILY LIVING:

PLANT THREE ROWS OF PEAS:

1. Peace of mind

2. Peace of heart

3. Peace of soul

PLANT FOUR ROWS OF SQUASH:

1. Squash gossip

2. Squash indifference

3. Squash grumbling

4. Squash selfishness

PLANT FOUR ROWS OF LETTUCE:

1. Lettuce be faithful

2. Lettuce be kind

3. Lettuce be patient

4. Lettuce really love one another

NO GARDEN IS WITHOUT TURNIPS:

1. Turnip for meetings

2. Turnip for service

3. Turnip to help one another

St Lawrence Primary School 386 Albert Street Balcatta WA

Telephone: 9344 4944 Fax: 9344 5099 Email: admin@stlawbal.wa.edu.au

Home Page: www.stlawbal.wa.edu.au

Newsletter No. 21 18 July 2018

School Vision Statement The vision of St Lawrence Catholic Primary School, Balcatta

is to share the message of God’s love and friendship in a community of learners, developing the full potential of each child.

TO CONCLUDE OUR GARDEN WE MUST HAVE THYME:

1. Thyme for each other

2. Thyme for family

3. Thyme for friends

WATER FREELY WITH PATIENCE AND CULTIVATE WITH LOVE.

THERE IS MUCH FRUIT IN YOUR GARDEN

BECAUSE YOU REAP

WHAT YOU SOW.

Learning

Learning is what we do - we are committed to learning at every level.

As we return to school, I take this opportunity to remind all of the importance of sleep.

Sleep

Sleep is the secret weapon of cognitive success. Across a range of activities, involving not just language

but mathematics, logic problems and spatial reasoning, sleep has been shown to enhance our brainpower.

That is why we are told to ‘sleep on it’ when we have a problem. The solution is often obvious in the

morning.

Young people need much more sleep than adults for the health of their bodies and their minds.

Prioritise your sleep and your happy brain will help you get a lot more done, and done well. Ensure your

children have an abundance of sleep to organise their minds and you are all but guaranteed a great term

ahead.

Acknowledgement: The Organized Mind: Thinking Straight in the Age of Information Overload, a book

by neuroscientist Daniel Levitin reported on by Laura Vanderkam.

I strongly encourage all parents to ensure your children have the adequate hours of sleep to support their

learning at school. Tired children simply do not learn as well as rested children. Set sleep times, patterns

and processes are required. E.g. go to bed at the same time every night, start by brushing teeth, preparing

school bag and uniform for the next day. Try to read to your children every night, it really does improve a

child’s reading if parents read to them at home regularly. Once children are in a pattern, it is much easier

to follow the routines and attain the correct amount of sleep.

Engagement

Engagement is essential-we are committed to Catholic Education’s mission through

relationships with all.

You read a lot about the different parenting styles these days and how they impact strongly upon our

children; the helicopter parent, the lawn mower parenting style and laissez-faire style, to name but a few.

I am not sure if there is a totally right way to parent but I am certain there are a significant number of

things we can do as parents to support and encourage our children, to set them up for success and not

failure, to build resilience and independence. Equally, there exists much data to articulate the many down

falls and hidden learning agenda’s associated with certain styles of parenting. I take this quote from an

article I read recently:

“We have to be willing to let our children struggle and fail and make mistakes without always rushing

in to protect them or fix the problem. We also have to be careful not to give the contradictory message

that mistakes are OK, except when they count.”

“Why Wrong Is Not Always Bad” by Alina Tugend in Education Week, May 18, 2011

Way too often I see parents overcompensating for a child’s mistakes, making excuses, or trying to right

every wrong a child makes. These efforts are often done with good and caring intentions, however they

can be very unproductive for the child. We must allow our children to make mistakes, to seek to self-

correct, to know that making a mistake is not the end of the known world. That we learn from our

mistakes and can use them as springboards to greater learning. Children need to be given the

opportunities to correct their own problems from time to time, to learn how to self-correct and to learn

that it is ok to make mistakes. Give our children a safe environment, a place where mistakes are accepted

as part of progress and learning. The same applies to problem solving, children must develop and learn

appropriate problem solving skills. Not allowing our children the opportunity to attempt to solve their

own problems before we step in and solve them for them is very damaging to the appropriate

development of successful problem solving strategies that are essential in adult life.

Accountability

Accountability is not optional - we have a personal and collective responsibility for our

system’s success

During the school holidays, a number of maintenance works were carried out including the following.

1. Completion of internal midyear cleaning.

2. Some gutting was replaced.

3. Review of external night lighting completed.

4. Polishing of floors.

5. Cleaning of grouting and tiles.

6. Steam cleaning carpets.

The maintenance and upkeep of the school comes under the functions of the School Board by always

ensuring ample funding is allocated for this work to occur. I thank the Board for their excellent financial

management of our school and ensuring we have appropriately maintained grounds and facilities.

A HUGE THANK YOU and SHOUT OUT to all the wonderful helpers at the Bunning Sausage Sizzle

on Saturday 30 June. It was a super day! Another great example of our wonderful P&F coming together

to work for our school and children. The P&F always strive so hard to provide a strong sense of

community and to raise added funds, which are always spent on our children. Please if you have time

consider becoming an active member of the P&F. I would relish the opportunity to speak with any

interested community member about joining the P&F. Positions on the committee for 2019 are pending

and we would love to hear from you.

Discipleship

Discipleship is our calling - we are committed to deepening our relationship with Jesus.

Preparations within the Parish and School are well underway for our St Lawrence School Feast Day on

Friday 10 August. Most Catholic Schools are named after Saints, just as many of our hospitals, aged care

facilities and charitable organisations are. Older schools like our own often have long and significant

connections to the Saint’s named for the school. In the early days the Saints for schools and parishes were

and still are selected with great thought and consideration. Even our very own school colours and uniform

give testament to the Sisters’ consideration of the relevance to the life of the Saint. Red and yellow have a

very significant connection to Saint Lawrence and the Sisters wanted to make sure this was evident.

St Lawrence Parish Feast Day celebrations will be held on Friday 3 August and Mass and Procession on

Sunday 5 August. St Lawrence School will celebrate the Feast Day on Friday 10 August. Further details

will be included in next week’s newsletter.

I leave you this week with one of my favourite little quotes!

Millions saw the apple fall, but Newton was the one who asked why. Bernard Baruch

God bless each and every one of you.

Sheldon Carey. M Ed, B Ed, Grad Dip

Principal

PASTORAL CARE

We pray for all families of our school that the new school semester will bring much joy, happiness and learning as we all

strive to maximise our full potential.

I also pray for our new families starting this term:

Valentina Di Trento (Pre Primary), Isabella Di Trento

(Year 4) and Ethan Maina (Pre Kindy).

May your time in our school family be filled with much

joy, happiness and learning.

Learning at Home Tips:

MONEY Encouraging children to think about money, saving money and considering how they

spend money are important skills for all children to develop.

Encourage your child to work out how much change you will get after buying

something.

Investigate costs for family trips together. For example, a visit to a water park may

include transport costs, entry ticket costs and food costs.

Discuss saving money for presents or something your child may want to buy. Work

out how long it will take to save this much if they get a small amount of money each

week.

Negotiate increases in pocket money as percentages. For example, a 5% increase

would be how much money per week? You may also want to link this to how many

chores they do to earn this 5% increase.

Encourage your child to save a percentage of their pocket money or birthday money,

and work out how much this would be. For example, how much money would you

have if you saved 40% each week?

Calculate together how much a mobile phone costs per month. How much is spent

on messages and how much on phone calls?

PARISH CHILDREN’S LITURGY

On behalf of the parish, congratulations to the students who received their first holy communion.

A big thank you to all who read and sang at the children’s mass at the end of last term.

I was unable to be there but I hear the children were great! We look forward to having them all

participate again this term. The first Children’s mass of the term will be this Sunday July 22. Further

information will be given in regards to readings etc.

Mrs Toni Mattiaccio toni.mattiaccio@cewa.edu.au

FROM THE ASSISTANT PRINCIPALS

HOLIDAYS

We hope you all had a refreshing and relaxing holiday. Term 3 promises to be a very busy term especially

for our Year 6 students who will be going on camp and receiving the Sacrament of Confirmation. All the

events taking place this term are included on the Term 3 school planner.

BISHOPS RELIGIOUS LITERACY ASSESSMENT

Year 3 and Year 5 students will complete the Bishops Religious Literacy Online Assessment this term.

Each class will have a practice assessment first. The Year 5 students will complete the assessment in

week 4 and the Year 3 students.in Week 5. The assessments focus on a student’s ability to recall content

about the Catholic religion and their knowledge and understanding of Religious Education, the

assessments do not measure a student’s faith. The purpose of the assessment is to provide schools with a

snapshot of performance in Religious Education.

SACRAMENT OF CONFIRMATION

Our Year 6 students will be preparing to receive the Sacrament of Confirmation

this term, which is a very significant occasion in their lives. The Sacrament of

Confirmation is a sacrament of initiation. The sacrament is

called Confirmation because the faith given in Baptism is now confirmed and

made strong. During Baptism, parents and Godparents make promises to

renounce Satan and believe in God and the Church on the child’s behalf. At

Confirmation, the confirmation candidate personally renews those same

promises.

IMPORTANT DATES FOR YEAR SIX PARENTS AND STUDENTS

Parent information meeting

Wednesday 29th August

7.15pm in the School Hall

Confirmation Parent and

Student Workshop

Wednesday 5th September

5.30pm or 7pm in the

School Hall

Confirmation Retreat Day

for students

Wednesday 12th September

School Hall

Confirmation Masses

Saturday 15th September

and Sunday 16th September

Saturday (6pm)

Sunday (8.30am)

Mrs Gabrielle Brennan and Mrs Jacki Tucker

CLASS NEWS

PRE KINDY

We are back! Term 3 promises to be exciting with our first four weeks looking at Sensational Shapes. I

hope that everyone had a terrific two-week break and is ready to come back to some wonderful happy

times at Pre Kindy. Welcome to our new class member – Ethan Maina. We look forward to sharing time

with our helpers in the afternoons. Our meeting about our Take Home Story Books is next Thursday 26th

July and will be in the Library at 2pm just prior to pick-up. Mrs Kaylene Bozich, Pre Kindy Teacher

KINDERGARTEN

Welcome back to Term Three! The children were all so excited to share all of the wonderful things they

got up to in the holidays. I hope everyone enjoyed the break and feel ready for fun filled term of learning

in Kindy! We will begin our focus ‘We are Different; we are the Same’ Teaching young children about

diversity in our world. We will expand on this by focusing on four different countries that the children in

our classrooms or extended family are from originally. I would love to have different parents come in

during the morning or afternoon sessions to talk to the children about the country they were born if

different to Australia. Please email me if you are interested. It does not have to be anything too formal;

you could even read a story about your country and explain some of the things that are different to life in

Australia. The sounds this week are 'Ss’ and 'Aa'. Next week is 'Tt' and ' Pp'. Hope everyone has a great

week!

Mrs Rachel Wake, Kindergarten Teacher

PRE PRIMARY

I would like to welcome all the families and students of St Lawrence back for the start of Term Three.

I truly hope all the students and families had time to relax and spend lots of quality time together over the

school holidays.

This term in Pre-Primary we are going to be learning about all the wonderful things we find in the world

around us under the theme ‘nature’. We will be learning about different fruits and vegetables, plants we

can grow in our classroom and what different things look, fell, feel and taste like.

The children will take home their Early Year Pictures books again this term each Tuesday. Please

remember to return them each Monday.

Book club will still be happening each Wednesday and Thursday morning. There is a roster at the front

door if you are able to help. I am looking forward to a fun term ahead.

The Pre-Primary kids enjoyed spreading the new sand in the sandpit. Thanks to Mr Tonge for organising

the new sand and the sandpit cover.

Mrs Laura Talbott, Pre Primary Teacher

YEAR ONE Welcome back to Term 3! The children have settled back in to the routines of Year One and are working

hard to become better learners. It was wonderful to see that so many of the children did lots of reading

over the holidays. Thank you for your support with this. A big thank you to all the parents who have

already been in to help with Morning Reading. Your help is very much appreciated. We have a busy

term ahead with St Lawrence Feast Day, Book Week, the St Lawrence Sport Carnival and the Year One

Assembly which we are looking forward to presenting next week. Have a great week.

Mrs Roselyn Pizzino, Year One Teacher

YEAR TWO

A big welcome back to all of our families. It sounds like our class members all enjoyed their break and

they have returned with eagerness and enthusiasm.

This term, we will be investigating the question ‘Who Are Australians?’. This unit will involve learning

about Australia’s first people, our landscape and our native flora and fauna. We will be reading some

great books by Australian authors and will be exploring both fiction and informational texts.

During our Maths lessons this week we have been learning about Australian currency and how we can

make set amounts using different coins. We used Rally Coach to work with a partner to identify different

ways we can make $1.00, which was a lot of fun. It was wonderful to see our class members supporting

each other and encouraging each other to come up with a variety of ideas.

This semester, Mrs Tana will be teaching Dance and Drama to our class on Mondays. I would also like to

extend our thanks to Mrs Tana for the additional time she has put into preparing our class for the Catholic

Performing Arts Festival, I cannot wait to see our Year Two stars lighting up the stage!

We have a great term of learning ahead.

Mrs Jacki Tucker, Year Two Teacher

YEAR THREE

What a pleasure it is to begin Term 3 with the Year 3’s. I hope that everyone had a restful break over the

holidays and I wish Mrs Heavey a joyous and restful break for the next three weeks. It is fantastic to have

the opportunity to see how the children have grown and developed since Pre-primary and I am enjoying

this time with them.

To begin this term we are focusing on money in Mathematics; adding and subtracting money and we will

be working on solving word problems.

In English we are working on recount and descriptive writing and in reading our focus comprehension

skill is cause and effect. This can be a tricky concept to learn and we are looking for examples it in our

reading. We will be starting our spelling sorts in Week 2.

In Geography we are learning about the states and territories of Australia, the capitals of each as well as

researching some of the natural features of our country.

In Digital technologies, we will be working in groups to code and solve problems with our new robots.

We will be creating maps and obstacles to program and navigate our robot. This should link nicely to

creating simple grid maps in Mathematics, which we will be exploring in Week 3.

Looking forward to seeing you all over the next few weeks,

Mrs Edel Waldron, Year Three Teacher

YEAR FOUR

Year Four have a busy term ahead! We are lucky to have a new class member and would like to welcome

Isabella Di Trento to our Year Four class. This week we have been busy working on our 9 x tables and

learning to multiply two digit numbers. In Science we have continued our Forces unit with a focus on

Gravity and later in the term we will also look at the force of Magnetism. In reading, we have started

learning about the importance of Sustainability and how to reduce, reuse and recycle. We will continue to

look at Sustainability through our Science and Technology lessons.

Miss Emma Reid, Year Four Teacher

YEAR FIVE

With cross country, our sports carnival and then Zoo Camp on the last two days of this term, there will be

plenty of extra activities to stimulate your children. Please check the School Planner to keep abreast of

dates. We are beginning to turn our focus to civics, the United States and our extraordinary solar system.

Most students have the Solar Walk Lite App on their iPad already. You may like to do a little star gazing

with your child this term; Mars and Jupiter can be easily viewed at the moment, the International Space

Station is frequently crossing our skies, and we will be following the phases of the moon’s visibility.

Mr Phil Haydon, Year Five Teacher

YEAR SIX

The Year 6 students got straight to work yesterday, completing a number of assessments. They are to be

commended on their excellent effort and behaviour. I would also like to say a big congratulations to the

students for their fantastic dance presentations and general behaviour at the disco last term, it was a

terrific night! We have a very busy Term Three with camp and confirmation and the sports carnival. In

English, we will be focusing on poetry and narrative texts. In Mathematics we will be focused on

fractions, decimals and percentages, as well as algebraic patterns. Reading and Mathletics homework

started this week, spelling homework will begin next week.

Miss Anna Brenkley, Year Six Teacher

CLASS REP NEWS

PRE KINDY

‘Catch up with the kids’ on Friday 27 July (after drop off) 9.30am at Mighty Jungle Morley.

RSVP Antonella 0418 163 170. Hope to see you all there!

YEAR ONE

Ladies please join us for a ‘decadent high tea’ at the Atrium, Crown Perth, Sunday August 12 at

2.30pm. Great value at only $39, including a glass of sparkling wine. Check your email or see the flyer

classroom for further details. Looking forward to seeing everyone there. Michelle & Anna.

LIBRARY NEWS

Welcome back to Term 3. We are busily preparing for Book Week, which

will be held in Week 6 of this term (20 to 24 August).

The theme for Book Week this year is “Find Your Treasure”

We will be holding a book character parade on Tuesday 21 August, at the

beginning of the school day. More details to follow in the coming weeks.

Book Club

Issue 5 of Scholastic Book Club will be sent home this afternoon. If you are interested in ordering any

resources, you may use the LOOP system online, or send cash/ cheques into school with your child’s

order. Orders are due back at school by next Tuesday 24 July.

Mrs Jane Stanton, Teacher Librarian

UNIFORM SHOP NEWS WINTER UNIFORM

Welcome back to Term 3 in full Winter Uniform. Order forms and price lists are available in the school

office. If you wish to place an order for uniforms, payment must be paid in full and order can then be

handed to your child.

Uniform Shop Opening Hours

Wednesday 8.30am to 9.30am

Thursday 2.30pm to 3.30pm

Mrs Angie Miola, Uniform Shop Manager

P&F NEWS

Welcome back, we hope everyone had a relaxing holiday and is ready for a busy term ahead.

We sincerely thank:

Christina Russo, Fiona Femia, Tara O'Leary, Sheldon Carey, Sarah Sabatino, Laura Siciliano, Danica Bajaroaki,

Annette Terranova, Palmira Trimboli, Briyit Silva, Cayley King, Lyan and Keith, Michelle Millard, Leah

Ferolla, Michelle Cirillo, Emma Fazari and Linda Russo for your valuable help on the day.

Also a very big thank you to the Donatelli family for the onion donation, they were very much appreciated.

Penny Godfrey P&F Vice President

pandf@stlawbal.wa.edu.au

CANTEEN NEWS

Welcome back everyone; hope you had a lovely break!

Thank You

A belated thanks to Jacqui Tana for her help on the last day of last term, much appreciated!

Canteen Specials

This term we will be doing a few different specials so keep your eye out for updates in the newsletter!

This Friday - beef curry and rice for $1.50 and also bacon and egg burgers half for $2 at recess.

FRIDAY 10 AUGUST 2018

Thanks to the P&F, all students will receive a hamburger and a juice box.

Parents and siblings are also welcome to join us for lunch.

A flyer will be sent home for you to complete for catering purposes.

Please return the slip by Friday 3 August 2018.

Christina Russo, Canteen Manager

Frances Caccamo and Antonella Crupi, Assistants