We have had a calm and engaging start to Term 2. We hope everyone had a restful and peaceful Easter break. 

Next week we celebrate Catholic Schools Week. The theme for Catholic Schools Week 2019, ‘Engaging Faith, Minds and Community’, which best describes the Catholic school experience. It illustrates the holistic approach to educating children at St Michael's to become adults who personify Catholic values and serve their communities.

The theme highlights the faith based nature of St Michael's, while emphasising our inclusiveness – that all are welcome. Catholic Schools are places where we strive for all to be engaged in faith, inspire the mind and build strong communities.

The theme explores what makes us unique, in particular the richness of our Catholic school communities.

Faith – placing Christ at the centre.

Minds – inspiring achievement and the fulfilment of each child’s potential.

Community – to become valuable, caring members of the school and extended community.

At St Michael's we strive to embody these values every day, so it is fitting that they form the theme for celebrating Catholic education in 2019.

Pope Francis at the World Youth Day 2019 final Mass, reflected on the importance of young people for society. He said their gifts are not reserved only for tomorrow. Young people, he said, “are the today for tomorrow. They are not ‘in the meantime’, but are the ‘today’, the ‘now’, of the Church and the world.” To inspire young people of today Catholic Schools are places that embrace their joyful presence and provide a community where young people can personally encounter God through the nurturing words and actions of others.

As part of a Catholic community our schools are called to celebrate the gifts and diversity of all its members, inspire the minds and spirit of all those in our midst and help shape the young people to care for and serve those most in need.

We will celebrate Catholic Schools Week by hosting Open Classrooms on Monday morning (9-10am) where we invite parents and families to come into the classrooms and join in the learning experiences. On Tuesday, we host our Community Breakfast, Wednesday is our official Enrolment Open Day and Thursday we will celebrate our Mothers and the special women in our lives with Mass at 9.30am and an Afternoon Tea (3-4pm). A fun and exciting week full of celebrating the special place that St Michael's is. 

Please keep the Lualua family in your prayers during this difficult time. 

Enjoy the week ahead. 

Regards,

Pat Ellis

Principal

As you know, we are moving into enrolment period for 2020. Thank you to all those families who assisted with letterbox drops over the break, much appreciated.  

Our new online enrolment option has gone live! If you have a younger child ready to enrol in Kindergarten for 2020, please follow the enrolment link on our website (see below) and enrol. Alternatively, we have paper enrolment forms in the Front Office. 

https://www.stmichaelsps.act.edu.au/enrolment

If you know of any other potential enrolments, please mention our school as an excellent option. To ensure class structures/sizes remain as they are, we do require more enrolments moving forward. Our enrolment zoned areas are Kaleen, Giralang, Lawson and Crace, however under varying circumstances, we can accept from outside our area. Please encourage all to ring the Front Office to arrange a tour and chat. 

Our official Open Day is Wednesday 8 May, where families can come to school at anytime between 9.30 and 6pm for a tour. We can however arrange a tour at anytime if that does not suit. 

Thank you in advance for promoting our school to the wider community.

Whole School Prayer Times

Thank you to 3/4YM for their beautiful Holy Week WSPT last term and Mr Webb and 5/6 students for the moving ANZAC WSPT on Monday. This week we celebrate the joy of Jesus’ resurrection at Easter in our Whole School Prayer Time this Friday afternoon. Miss Frogley and 1/2F have been very busy preparing to lead this celebration and would love to see families and friends there. Our Easter WSPT will begin at 2:20 in the St Michael’s church.

First Communion

Parents of students in Year Four (who are preparing to receive their First Communion this year) need to attend the parent information session this Thursday, 2May in St Michael’s Church. This information session is for all members of our parish, Our Lady of Perpetual Help.  The First Communion Information evening will begin at 6:00pm and should be concluded within the hour. Children preparing to receive their First Holy Communion will need to be at a commitment Mass with an adult family member, on either Saturday 4May or Sunday 5May. Their commitment may be made at any of the four parish masses over that weekend.

Easter Egg Raffle

Congratulations to Grace (3/4YM) who won the Easter Raffle last term. Thank you to everyone who helped to raise $162 for the Jariah Education Centre, our partner school in Kenya.

Mothers’ Day Mass & Afternoon Tea 

1/2W are busy preparing to lead us in a Mass to celebrate Mary and all mothers next Thursday 9 May. Mass will begin at 9:30am in St Michael’s Church. All families, especially mothers, grandmothers and aunties are warmly invited to join us in this Eucharistic celebration.

We will also host a Mother's Day Afternoon Tea (3-4pm) on Thursday 9 May in the school library, along with some activities in each block. All most welcome to attend. 

Belconnen Region Cross Country - 30 May, 2019

Notes for the Belconnen Region Carnival will come home tomorrow. The competition will be held at Stromlo Forest on 30 May. The top 5 boys and girls aged 8-12 years from our carnival are eligible to compete. If you don't  wish for your child to participate, we ask that you return the note indicating that this is the case. It assists us greatly with the administration side of things here at school. 

St Michael’s Athletics Carnival  - Tuesday 4 June

Please save the date and if you are able to help out on the day we would love to hear from you. Notes will come home in Week 2 with details of the carnival.  

ACT Sports Trials
There are a number of ACT trials coming up very shortly. Football (soccer), golf, touch football, rugby league, tennis, softball and hockey are just a few sports up on the School Sport ACT website. Please see the School Sports ACT section of the newsletter for further information about how to register for these trials.  

Library

Our theme for this term in the library is 'Don't Judge a Book By It's Cover' We will unpack what this means in a variety of contexts over the coming weeks. If your child brings home an unusual book choice, they many have been tempted to try something new. In library today, the older students were surprised to discover how old some of the 'classics' are. The Wizard of Oz was first published in 1900! 

Please feel free to stop and make use of our parent reading space and the new comfy couch! As the weather becomes colder over the coming months, the library is a warm space to spend a few minutes reading while waiting to collect your children at the end of the day. You are most welcome to take a book from the shelf and when you have finished reading it place it in the returns. 

New Books

We have recently put over 100 new titles on the shelves for our students to borrow. There are 287 (thanks to Max for counting them) that are waiting to be accessioned and then covered ready to made available for our students to read and borrow during library lessons.

Change and loss are issues that affect all of us at some stage in our lives. At St Michael’s we recognise that when changes occur in families through death, separation,

divorce or related circumstances, young people may benefit from learning how to manage these changes effectively. We are therefore offering an education program called Seasons for Growth. This program is facilitated in small groups and is based on research that highlights the importance of social support and the need to practise new skills to cope effectively with change and loss. The program focuses on issues such as self- esteem, managing feelings, problem-solving, decision-making, effective communication and support networks.

Seasons for Growth runs for eight weeks and each weekly session is 40-50 minutes. The program concludes with a “Celebration” session.

If there is an interest for Seasons for Growth we hope to commence this term, facilitated by Jo Krippner who has received special training in the use of this program. If you think your child would benefit from Seasons for Growth we would encourage you to talk to them about this. Should they decide to participate please email Jo at jo.krippner@cg.catholic.edu.au

St Michael’s is pleased to be able to offer this important program and we are confident it will be a valuable learning experience for those who request to be involved.

The app of the week is Topia. A fun world building tool, this app is colourful and easy to use for the whole family. Add animals, mountains, gullies and lakes to your personal utopia. Once complete, consider using this as a stimulus and ask children to write about how they created their world.

Printing

Printmaking is an exciting art form. 

Over the term we will experiment with a variety of printmaking techniques.

History -The First Printing

In the 2nd century, the Chinese started using wooden blocks to print images of flowers on silk. The Chinese began printing on paper in the 7th century, and the first ever complete printed book, Diamond Sutra, was created in 868 AD.

In the woodblock printing process, images and text were carved into wood, rolled into dyes or ink, and then stamped on cloth or paper. Block printing technique required a new wooden block to be carved for every page in a book.

This week we will learn about the history of printmaking, the tools used and create a simple mono-print. ​

The Woolies Earn and Learn program is back running from 1 May till 25 June.  For every $10 spent at a Woolworths store you will be given a sticker, the stickers can then be placed on a sticker sheet (available from the Front Office) or on the posters displayed near sickbay.  The stickers will then be redeemed for resources from Modern Teaching Aids.  Start collecting today to enable us to receive some great resources.

Congratulations to the following children who have achieved a Harmony Award in Week 1 and will receive their award this Friday at morning gathering (weather permitting).

Special wishes to those children who celebrated their birthday in the holidays:

Liana 5/6FW, Alexander 1/2W, Connor 3/4AK, Kai 1/2F, Stella 3/4YM, Avi 1/2F & Maggie KL

We hope you had a great day!!

Special wishes to those children who celebrate their birthday this week:

Cooper 5/6B, Brodie 5/6FW, Sebastian 1/2M, Trisha 1/2M, Isabella 1/2F, Phoenix 1/2W & Samara 5/6F

We hope you have a great day!!

CHESS!!

Learn to be a chess champion! Coaching for students at St Michael's Primary School (Kaleen, ACT) is held on Tuesdays from 11:00am to 11:40am, starting on
30 April 2019.

Learning and playing chess helps children develop their logical thinking and problem solving skills, improves their concentration and focus, while also being a great source of enjoyment. Activities include group lessons on a demonstration chess board or interactive whiteboard, puzzle solving and fun practice games.

Students earn merit awards by making checkmates, or by displaying skills and positive qualities, which all good chess players strive to develop.
If your child is interested in taking part, you can collect an enrolment form from the school office, or email enrol@sydneyacademyofchess.com.au for a copy. For all enquiries, please contact Sydney Academy of Chess on (02) 9745 1170.

Playgroup will be starting back next week, Wednesday 8th May at 9.00 am.

I am looking forward to seeing how much the returning children have grown over the holidays as well as meeting any new families that may be joining us. All most welcome to attend. - Kylie Arena

Lunch Orders are to be placed by MIDNIGHT on Wednesday nights. 

The canteen still require assistance on Friday's from approximately 12.30-1.45 to help pack lunch orders, if you can assist in anyway, please contact Lisa in the Front Office.  Any help is greatly appreciated.  Helpers are urgently required for Term 2.

The 2019/20 Entertainment Book is now available to purchase.  Books can be purchased at the Front Office for $60 or digital copies can be ordered through the following link.  Please see Lisa in the Front Office for more information.