21st July 2022
Acting Principals News
It’s great to be back! Thank you to the Holy Spirit Infants community for welcoming me back. I’ve been fortunate enough to spend the last 18 months on maternity leave with my two sons Noah, who is almost four and Izaac, 16 months. I’m sure you will all agree that time goes too fast!
New Students
Welcome back to Parker Parry of 2W. We are all looking forward to hearing about all your adventures while you’ve been travelling around Australia with your family. We also welcome Ty Price of 1W to our school community. I’m sure Mrs Porter-Kay and the 1W students have already made you welcome.
Dance
This term we welcome Miss Montana who will teach our students dance each Wednesday for sport this term from week 3.
100 Days of Kindergarten
We are coming up to 100 days of Kindergarten for our students and we will be celebrating this occassion on Wednesday 10th August. We have lots of fun activities planned for the day. We would like to invite our Kindergarten students to dress up like they are 100 years old. Get creative with some glasses, grey hair and outfits! Enclosed shoes suitable for school will still need to be worn on this day. We look forward to seeing you all dressed up!
Could parents please send in some pre-packaged party food for your child to share with the class for our party we will have on the day. Thank you.
Learning to read using decodable books
Decodable books are stories (or non-fiction texts) written for young or struggling learners to read by ‘decoding’ (sounding out and blending sounds to read words). Each decodable book only uses the sounds and letters that children have been explicitly taught to date. Decodable books also use a small number of taught high-frequency tricky words that are not yet decodable, but are needed to construct sentences in continuous text, such as ‘said’, ‘one’ and ‘the’.
Decodable books…• only use words that can be decoded (or taught sight words)• follow the phonics teaching sequence used in the classroom, so children never have to read a word that they cannot sound out and blend• provide maximum repetition of the new letters and sounds taught that week• have a clear and engaging design that prioritises the text and the engagement of the reader• avoid predictable sentence structures• use age-appropriate vocabulary• are engaging and meaningful continuous texts that also allow readers to build vocabulary and comprehension skills. The decodable books that we use in class support the development of each of the 5 pillars of reading (phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, comprehension). If your child has been taught the sounds and letters listed on the book cover - let them read it out loud and proud! Children must be really fluent and automatic in their reading, so don’t be afraid to read it over and over again (the more times the better!). If your child gets stuck, always go back to sounding out the word - don’t promote guessing.
Please find attached a video which will help you support your child when reading a decodable reader.
Office News
School Fees
Please be reminded that fee payers who opted to pay for their school fees in one lump sum (annual fee), that the deadline (30th June) for payment has now passed. Those families who have not yet paid will be contacted to discuss their payments and a plan moving forward. The preferred payment method is BPAY - please do not use Compass Pay as hefty administration costs are incurred.
Families who have a payment plan in place and are making regular periodic payments have until 30 November to meet their fee agreement for 2022 at our school
Thank you for attending to your fee commitment.
NAIDOC Celebrations at Holy Spirit
NAIDOC Week is held annually across Australia in the first week of July and this year ran from Sunday 3 to Sunday 10 July 2022. NAIDOC Week is an Indigenous-led celebration of the history, cultures, and achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
The national NAIDOC theme for 2022, Get Up! Stand Up! Show Up!, pays respect to a proud history of resistance and activism by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. It recognises First Peoples’ resilience and strength and celebrates those who have driven and led significant change in their communities over generations.
NAIDOC Week is a time to celebrate the many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander heroes who have championed change for equal opportunities and basic human rights. Since this celebration time occurred in our school holidays period, we are celebrating Naidoc this Friday, 22nd July at Holy Spirit with some fun music and craft activities. Hopefully your child will share with you stories about this wonderful day.
Nicolette Fredsall
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Teacher
Library News
Book Club
Issue 5 of book club will close on 4th August. All orders are to be placed online through the Scholastic Loop.
Thanks Library Staff
Disaster news and distressing news events: supporting children 6-11 years
School-age children will hear and see media coverage of disasters and other distressing news
events. Children might not understand all the news they’re exposed to, but they can still feel upset by it. Children cope better with disaster news if you give them accurate, age-appropriate
information, plus opportunities to talk.
The Australian website Raising Children has an informative guide to support parents/ carers to support children in times of disaster and distressing news events. Please click on the link below.
Canteen News
Canteen will resume for term 3 on Friday 29th July. Thank you to all our volunteers who have offered their time to support our school. We will continue with a reduced menu of wrapped foods due to covid during this term.