Term 2, Week 6 2023

Dear Families,

Welcome to Week 6! It’s hard to believe we are already halfway through the term. It is certainly moving fast with much to celebrate and to look forward to.

SACPPA CONFERENCE

Last week I was privileged to attend the South Australian Catholic Primary Principals Association Conference on the theme, Building our leadership capacity. This highlighted the importance of strong and shared leadership to ensure continual success and sustained growth for our students and our schools. The three-day program engaged a number of nationally and internationally renowned presenters including Kurt Fearnley AO (Paralympic Gold Medallist & Disability Advocate), Professor Lea Waters AM (Director of Visible Wellbeing & the Centre for Positive Psychology), Dr Simon Breakspear (Researcher, Advisor & Speaker on Education Policy, Practice & Change) and Lee Crockett (Author of Future Focussed Learning, Mindful Assessment & Agents to Agency).  The workshops were centred on quality educational practice and leadership explored through the themes of Leading through Adversity, Playing to your Strengths, Team Health and Future Focussed Learning. As I reflect on the conference, I am reminded that school leaders are called to be brave, courageous, hopeful, open-minded and resilient, and to build shared leadership capacity for positive outcomes. At Dominican, we embrace a shared leadership model that draws on individual strengths for collaborative partnerships for continual improvement, student success and school excellence. Our leadership density spans across our school community with staff, parents, students, and the parish working together to ensure that Dominican continues to be a place of excellence in faith, learning and wellbeing. Collectively we are dedicated to Inspiring hearts and minds to be the best we can be. We are a COMMUNITY OF LEADERS that supports our students to be thriving people, capable learners and leaders for God’s world. This is not the endeavour of ONE but us ALL.

NATIONAL RECONCILIATION WEEK

Last week we celebrated National Reconciliation Week on the theme, Be a Voice for Generations, encouraging us all to be a voice for reconciliation in tangible ways in our daily lives. This was an important time for us to learn about our shared histories, cultures and achievements, and to explore how each of us can contribute to achieving reconciliation. At its heart, reconciliation is about strengthening relationships between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and non-Indigenous peoples, for the benefit of all. As a school community, we gathered for Community Prayer on National Sorry Day; our students engaged in various learning experiences to explore this year’s theme; and our RN and 3/4S classes celebrated a Reconciliation Mass with Fr Roderick, parishioners and families. I draw inspiration from our young people as agents of change to work for justice. Here are a few student reflections that highlight their commitment to Take Action – Sorry starts with ME:  I’m using my voice to… respect everyone no matter what; speak up for those who are not able to; say sorry for the kids that got taken away from their families. Special thanks to Matt Kosta, our Indigenous Education Key Teacher for his leadership in providing a rich bank of resources, ideas and activities for our students and staff to experience. I invite you to visit our Facebook page to see a snapshot of our students… Acting TODAY for a RECONCILED tomorrow.

PARTNERS IN PRACTICE WELLBEING PROJECT

This year we have embarked on our engagement with the Partners in Practice Wellbeing for All Project. This is a CESA initiative involving four Catholic Primary schools in our western region to provide a multi-layered approach to support student wellbeing. This presents us with the opportunity to review and evaluate current practices and to work together to develop and implement a school wide approach to wellbeing grounded in evidence-based positive psychology principles and practices. This coming Friday our staff will join with the staff across our project schools to participate in a Professional Learning Day facilitated by David Bott from The Wellbeing Distillery. This will have a focus on the Science of Wellbeing and practical applications in the school setting. One of the key aims of our PiP Project is ‘to elevate the wellbeing and effectiveness of educators in practice and pedagogy’ and we look forward to sharing in this learning opportunity to support us on our journey.

STUDENT REPORTS

As previously communicated, this year all Catholic Primary Schools in SA will begin to use the SEQTA Learning Management System as the platform for reporting student progress to parents via end of semester reports. Both Nick Ryan and I have been involved in a series of professional learning sessions to lead the reporting process via SEQTA, and in partnership with teachers we have developed a report template to adhere to system requirements and reflect our school context. Special thanks to Nick for facilitating a number of staff meetings to guide and support teachers with navigating and transitioning to the SEQTA Marks book and Reporting modes. Our teachers are also to be commended on their diligence and commitment to learning and adapting to this new reporting system. Please see the insert in this edition of the newsletter for more information.

Peace & Blessings

Alison Tanti-Clark
ACTING PRINCIPAL

VINNIES WINTER APPEAL

One of the ways we put our faith into action is by supporting those in need.  Our Year 6 Justice Leaders have started to promote the VINNIES WINTER APPEAL to provide outreach to those doing it tough this winter.  This week they launched the appeal by visiting classes to raise awareness of the work of St Vincent de Paul and to discuss the items we are collecting to provide to our local Vinnies to help the needy in our community.

All students are invited to donate warm winter clothing/accessories, blankets/sleeping bags, toiletries or non-perishable food items, to support our school for the Winter Appeal.  We will be collecting donations until Thursday 6 July, the last day of term. These will go a long way to warming the hearts of those doing it tough this winter.

CELEBRATING THE SACRAMENTS

As a school community, we congratulate Macy C, Harrison H, Harrison L, Amelia L, Isabella H, Tiger M, Matilda H, Angela H and Angelique J, on becoming full members of the Catholic Church.  These students celebrated the Sacrament of Confirmation on Wednesday May 24 where they confirmed the promises made by their parents and godparents when they were baptised.  They then celebrated the Sacrament of First Holy Communion led by Fr Roderick O’Brien on Saturday May 27 and Sunday May 28, where they received the Eucharist for the first time at Mass with our Catholic parish community.

This coming weekend, Parker and Peyton will be celebrating the Sacrament of Confirmation. We keep these students in our prayers as they continue to journey in faith. Special thanks to Sr Marie Egan for her coordination of the Family Faith Formation Program and to Stacey Webb and the Junior Choir for leading us in the singing at the Confirmation Celebration.

RECONCILIATION WEEK MASS

Last Wednesday, RN and 3/4S led a Reconciliation Mass at Sacred Heart Church. They gathered together as one, to give thanks for the diversity of peoples and cultures with which we live. At Dominican, Reconciliation means that we have the grace to say sorry, to hear sorry and to live with forgiveness. We thank RN and 3/4S for leading us in prayer during Reconciliation Week. 

Martina Kovacev
ACTING RELIGIOUS EDUCATION COORDINATOR

STUDENT REPORTS - NEW ONLINE PLATFORM

Over the past 2 years, Catholic Education South Australia (CESA) schools have been transitioning to a new online platform for teaching and learning purposes called SEQTA. This new platform has allowed teachers to collaborate with each other and with CESA curriculum leaders to develop teaching and learning experiences that allow all students to achieve success and be assessed authentically against the Australian Curriculum. This new platform will also be utilised for reporting purposes across all CESA schools this year. 

The information that will be contained in the report is a summary of your child’s achievements to date. Formal reports will be provided twice a year - at the end of the first semester to reflect achievements from Semester 1, and at the end of the year to reflect achievements across the year. These reports are one of a number of ways in which we communicate your child’s achievements and approaches to learning across different curriculum areas. Reporting provides an opportunity for students, families, and teachers to maintain authentic learning conversations and partnership. 

Students will be graded on an A – E scale for each of the eight Australian Curriculum learning areas, along with Religious Education, on their achievement against the achievement standard for their year level. In some cases, students may be assessed against an alternative achievement standard if they have been identified with diverse learning needs. The A – E grading scale are as follows:

Students in Reception will not receive A – E grading, rather their achievements will be assessed and reported on as Working Towards Achievement Standard, Working At Achievement Standard, or Working Beyond Achievement Standard.

Please see below for an exemplar of what the report will look like.

These reports will be sent out electronically to the email addresses you have provided to the school. Please ensure your contact email is up to date and will allow emails to be received from the school. Paper copy reporting can be provided upon request. After the reporting cycle, parents can ask the school to provide  information that clearly shows your child’s achievement in the subject studied in comparison to that of other children in the same peer group at the school. This information will show the number of students achieving in each of the achievement levels A – E for a specified subject.

If you have any questions about our new reporting format please speak to your child’s classroom teacher or a member of the Leadership Team.

Nick Ryan
LEADER OF LEARNING

CONGRATULATIONS to the following Dominican Pillar Certificate recipients for Week 4:

STUDY
Isaiah B, Jed J, Mykaylah S, Beth R, Andrew S, Zahlia R, Georgia S, Brooklyn O, Jessica J, Larique F, Grace B

COMMUNITY
Conner W, Annabelle S, Zane T

MINISTRY
Ariana B, Eva M

ECO WARRIORS – CARE FOR OUR COMMON HOME

To promote ecological conversion and nude food within our school, each fortnight we announce a class that are our ECO-WARRIORS. The eco-warrior champions are the class that have the most nude food lunchboxes within the school, when we do our spot checks. I am pleased to share that our eco-warrior champions for the last fortnight were RN with an amazing 89% of students with nude food! What wonderful leaders our Receptions (and their families) are in teaching us to take care of God’s beautiful creation.

Here are a few tips from RN on how we can all look after our common home:

Marni: “We need to recycle things. We can reuse containers, bottles, boxes and paper.”

Finn: “In the ocean we need to clean up the trash that is stuck to the sea animals, to protect our species.”

In Physical Education this term we are working towards many exciting things. The Year 3-6 students are focusing on netball skills and game strategies in preparation for a carnival in Week 10. The Reception to Year 2 students are practicing throwing and catching skills, with a focus on accuracy. We are hoping to use all these skills to eventually make a 'trick shot' video show casing all our best throws to send home at the end of the term. All year levels also have soccer clinics running on Thursdays and we are even starting some training for cross-country. Lots going on!

Scott Hillard
PHYSICAL EDUCATION TEACHER

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