Week 4 Term 4 2023

  Welcome to Week 4!

How fast did those first three weeks go?! The year fours have started the term strong with impressive growth in their yearly PAT assessments. We are so proud of them all!

Uthando Dolls

Thank you to the parents, grandparents and relatives who have found time to come in and help out to create these dolls. Helpers are encouraged for the continuing next couple of Tuesday and Wednesday afternoons from 2 to 3.  If you have a sewing machine and able to bring it in to reinforce our stitching or just have some helpful needle skills and have an hour to spare you will be welcomed!  

Hat Off to Teachers:

Thank you for the cards, little gifts and fun hats to celebrate World Teacher's Day. I am very lucky this year to have such an awesome bunch of kids to teach and learn from myself each day.  

Uniforms:

Please take some time to check in with our school policy around hair cuts and uniform expectations for the last term - this includes socks or incorrect shoes. Long hair past the shoulders and long fringes need to be tied or clipped back.  'uniform malfunction' days as one-offs just write or email a note to give the heads up to take the worry away for your child.  

Laptops:

We have been increasing our use of laptops in class this term and there has been multiple times where many laptops are coming to school flat which means your child is not able to participate in that learning as there is only my charger available in the class.  Please ensure they are charged each night and put in bags when there is a white light to show they are fully charged.  There are also a large number of applications and extensions that have been downloaded by students which are distracting for their focus when completing learning tasks.  They have been told that these are not be used at school and preferably put in a folder so that they are not tempting to use.  Cursor extensions (including changing size and using animals) are also be changed back to traditional cursors for use each day as they are very distracting, students are not to download any extensions by siblings unless they know how to change them back easily.  There are also a number of students who do not have headphones, if students could bring in a pair from home it will assist their learning and they will continue to be a requirement into next year for Year 5.  

Grandparents Day:

We will celebrate Grandparents Day on Friday, the 3^rd of November (Week 4). We will start at 9.00 am with a 1K assembly. Grandparents can then go into classrooms for activities from 9.30-10.40. At 10:40, they will have an opportunity to share morning tea with their grandchildren.

VIA Character Strength – Judgement  

 

Upcoming events and a few date changes ..... see below.

Important Dates for Term 4 2023

1. Saturday 28/10 6pm Year 6 Confirmation Mass everyone welcome
2. 02/11-  06/11 Artist Incursion -Kate Driscoll  
3. Friday 3rd November - Grandparents Day at OLC
4. Wednesday evening 8th November - OLC AGM 
5. Week 5, Wednesday 8th November - Rememberance Day Service -5C presenting
6. Friday 10th November - Pupil Free Day 
7. Wednesday 29th November - OLC Christmas Concert
8. Friday 8th December - OLC Colour Run and Last day of School 

ARTIST INCURSION

Thanks to our wonderful P&F we have a Visual Arts Specialist visiting OLC next week to facilitate art lessons for the Year 4 – 6 classes.  

Each class will enjoy 2 ½ hours of visual art lessons led by Kate Driscoll.  Kate is a very experienced art teacher.  You can view her work on her Instagram page - Art Teacher Life.  

Session 1.  Jelly Paint printing.  1 hour.  

Session 2.  Collage design. 1. Hour.  

Session 3. Final gluing down of design. ½ hour.  

Homework...

Just a reminder to check in with your child to make sure that homework is coming home. Each week we complete the following and your child is to bring it in with them on Friday this week (Week 3 and 4 completed).

Reading - 10-15 minutes each night (out loud preferably) and answering one question thoughtfully from the given list.

Mental Maths - Working through the columns as suits with Mathletics available if your child is looking for more.  We highly recommend students also practise their times tables with one of the many times tables recall practise games available online. 

Thank you all for a great start to the term, enjoy the week!

Penny and Gemma

Week 1 Term 4 2023

 Dear 4K Parents,

Here we are beginning our final term of Year Four! Spring holidays were an absolute joy for our families and we hope you also enjoyed some time with your children soaking up the divine sunshine. We are very much looking forward to our final term together and continuing to grow in our knowledge of ourselves, each other and the world around us.

This Friday is our Year 4 Feeder day visit to St Mary Mackillop College to have a taste of high school life and some of the different subjects.  Most permission slips are back and ready to go but if not, please send to school ASAP.  

Now for a little snippet from the end of Term 3 as we celebrated Book Week dress up day together. We had some incredible effort go into a number of costumes this year!

On the day, it was a real treat to read our classes own CBCA selected text 'Frank's Red Hat'. 

Welcome to OLC Mrs Hegney

We welcome Mrs Angela Hegney to the school this term. Mrs Hegney has expressed her excitement about joining the OLC school community and the students are very interested to find out more about our new school principal.

Year 4 St Mary MacKillop Visit

As per the letter that went home last term, the Year Four students have been invited to visit St Mary MacKillop this coming Friday 13th October. We require parent permission for this excursion and ask that all permission slips be returned by this Tuesday 10th October.

Homework

Just a reminder that our fortnightly homework begins tomorrow and is due at the end of week 2 (21st October). Our following homework due dates are week 4 (3rd November), week 6 (17th November) and week 8 (1st December). 

Please continue with regular reading on week nights and fill out the log. The students are still asked to complete the four Maths columns across the fortnight and we will be discussing some of the answers and strategies in class every second Friday. Some of the children have already won homework free weeks in the form of BANQER vouchers! 

A Learning Snapshot...

In English we will be focusing on the persuasive exposition text genre, convincing our reader to agree with our opinion using reasons with examples and explanations.  We will be reading a variety of persuasive texts including letters and advertisements and writing persuasive text pieces about our point of view with the intention for convince our readers.  We will also begin our class novel study "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory", focusing on literature elements, vocabulary and character plot development. 

We begin our Mathematics program with a unit on money. We will solve problems related to purchases and explore the topic of giving change. Our work with BANQER is a great way for the students to develop finiancial mathematics and explore money in the real world, involving digital exchanges.

In HASS we focus on the investigation of the significance of the natural environment of Australia. Students learn about what living things need to survive and how they interact and rely on specific natural environments for this survival. This includes thinking about what humans need to survive and how they source these things.

Our Religion studies take us further into learning about the Sacrament of Confirmation. This week we explore how Jesus is moved by his emotions to help and support others. Our Year Six students will be attending their Commitment mass for Confirmation at the Church this Saturday night. 

UTHANDO DOLLS

As a part of the OLC tradition for Year 4 students and our design technology unit, we will be making Uthando dolls to send away for others.  The mission of this project is to make handmade dolls for our partner organisations in KwaZulu Natal, South Africa who work with disadvantaged and vulnerable children to strengthen relationships through play.   We will introduce the project to students tomorrow and we welcome any parents or grandparents with sewing skills to come along and help from next week onwards for the next few Tuesday and Wednesday afternoons from 2.00 to 3.00.  It would be great if you can assist to email your child's teacher to let them know when you may be able to help out.  Please feel free to find out more information on this project https://uthandoproject.org/ 

Character Strength of the Week - Creativity

St Cecilia is known for her musical abilities. She also loved to paint, as well as sing and play music. St Cecilia is why music is such a central part of the liturgy today.

• Do you come up with lots of different and individual ideas? 
• Are you a problem solver? 
• Do you have a magnificent imagination?
• 

Important Dates for Term 4:

• Monday 9th October - Term 4 begins
• Friday 13th October - Year 4's visit SMMK
• Wednesday 18th October - Opening term welcome mass 9.30am at OLSC 
• Thursday 19th October - Interschool Athletics
• Thursday and Friday 26th and 27th October - School Photos 
• Friday 3rd November - Grandparents Day at OLC
• Wednesday 8th November - OLC Annual General Meeting 
• Thursday 9th November - Remembrance Day Service
• Friday 10th November - Pupil Free Day 
• Wednesday 29th November - OLC Christmas Concert
• Friday 8th December - OLC Colour Run and Last day of School

Thank you for your continued support,

Penny and Gemma