Week 4 - Term 2

FROM OUR PRINCIPAL

Dear families,
Winter is well and truly upon us, with a period of wet and cold weather settling in. Please ensure your children come to school appropriately dressed for these conditions! Term 2 continues to hum along and we have been fortunate to have not had too much of a significant covid impact thus far. Having said that, we are still experiencing the ongoing effects of staff and students being unwell. Please remain vigilant in following all advice and protocols put in place by the government, SA Health and CESA to ensure we keep our school community as safe as we can.

Earlier this week, our year 4 classes were able to go away on camp. This was a significant move forward in covid management, as camps had not been permitted up to this point. A very successful camp was enjoyed by all, and my particular thanks go to all of the staff who attended – James Daley, Angela DeNadai, Christie-Lee Hansberry, James Goldy, Chantal Driver and Nives Kresevic. For each of these staff members, camp was time away from their own families and their commitment is greatly appreciated.

Sacramental preparation is beginning to take shape. As the Catholic School of the parish of Christ the King at Lockleys, preparation of young people for full and active participation in the life of the Catholic Church is central to our mission. I am looking forward to witnessing the process and the celebrations that come with these important milestones on our young people’s lives. My sincere thanks to Angela DeNadai, the year 4 teachers, Joan Walsh our Pastoral associate and Fr Michael Trainor for their work together in bringing the Sacramental program to life.

In recent times, we have been able to more fully roll out our ICT infrastructure improvements through the allocation of iPads for our year 3 students and Apple MacBooks for our year 6 students. These have been exciting developments as not only do our students have some brand new hardware to learn with and from, we have also been able to create the enabling conditions for a 1:1 device allocation for students in years 3-6 and a 1:2 device allocation for students in years R-2. These devices will further enhance the learning capability of all of our students. My thanks to the teachers and particularly to David Giannotti for this important development.

During this week, I have spent some time in Canberra as part of my dual roles as National Vice-President of the Australian Catholic Primary Principals Association (ACPPA) and as member of the National advisory Council of the Australian Primary Principals Association (APPA.) Both of these important national bodies engage with important issues in education, and this work directly impacts locally. One of the key pieces of the conversation was around the continued implementation of the Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership (AITSL) standards for teachers and the development of Highly Accomplished and Lead Teachers across Australia. As you can appreciate, the development of more HALTs has a direct positive impact on student learning outcomes. I would like to commend all of our teachers-each of whom strives daily to develop and improve their practice, in the interests of better learning and well-being outcomes for your children. We also discussed aspects of the National School Reform Agreement, which impacts directly on appropriate funding for all school students as well as a number of other key components of our work in education.

Have a great week everyone.
Phil Schultz
Principal.

Read More Read Less

LITERACY @ ST FRANCIS

The topic for my article this week is Home Reading. Teachers are working hard during their Literacy Block to explicitly teach strategies to enable each student to read accurately, fluently and to be able to comprehend (make meaning) from texts. At St Francis School, we also firmly believe that parents play a vital role in developing their child’s fluency, vocabulary and love of reading within their Home Reading time.

Obviously the amount of support your child will need when reading at home will differ between students, ages and year levels. It is important to note though, that all students benefit from reading aloud – even older more experienced readers! It is also important to note that Home Reading time does not always need to be about reading a text sent home from school. Reading a picture book, a magazine, the newspaper or instructions for making something together promotes reading in many different ways including expanding their vocabulary and having positive impacts on their language and literacy abilities.

Your child may bring home a decodable text to read for the week. In this case, it is very important that the book be read at least 3 times during the week (more if possible). Your child will still be developing their decoding skills and may need some support with sounding out, blending and fluency. Use the strategies on this bookmark to help them with their reading and stay positive! Here are some suggestions for what to do when listening to a decodable text:

• Encourage your child to point to each word (if they are an emergent reader). This allows them to keep on track with the blending of the letter sounds. Once they develop confidence with reading, encourage them to keep track with their eyes only.

• If an error is made, ask your child to say the sounds in the word – to decode it. Start on the left (Lefty Larry), sound out each grapheme (Grapheme Grasshopper), blend the sounds together (Blendy Wendy), chop the word into syllables if it is a longer word (Syllable Sam) and if it is a longer word with a base, break the word up into the base and affixes (Chase the Base). Go back and re-read the whole sentence to ensure fluency and understanding after using these strategies.

• If your child forgets the sound when decoding, tell them the sound (ensuring to use correct pronunciation) and then ask them to re-read the whole sentence (as above).

• At the end of the book, ask your child about the story. Check for understanding.

• As you will have the same decodable book for the week, give praise when your child reads the book with greater fluency and expression. Celebrate the effort.

All students will be at different levels and have different abilities in term of reading. Some students may have ‘cracked the code’ and be choosing their own books to read. These students will choose from a variety of books in the library or classroom that align with their ability level. These texts will likely be novels (fiction) or nonfiction books. Often the students who have ‘cracked the code’ are independent and would prefer to read in their head, but if your child is at this stage, it is important to listen to them read aloud at least once per week (up to 3 times per week is preferable for younger readers). Remember the goal is to improve fluency which is harder to do when reading in your head.

It is also very important to question your child about their home reading texts. In this graphic you can see many appropriate questions to ask: checking for comprehension and understanding. If your child struggles to answer your questions, this may indicate that the text was too difficult or that perhaps they were not reading accurately in their head. In this case, it may be appropriate to listen to them read aloud more often and to let your child’s class teacher know.

The most important thing to remember about Home Reading is that it is meant to be enjoyable. Reading is fun! Is there anything better on a cold, rainy day than sitting in front of a fire and reading?

Please talk to your child’s class teacher, or send me an email if you have any questions about Home Reading. Each year level has different expectations in terms of amounts of time and recording of reading. If you would like any further information about Home Reading, here is a link to an online parent reading workshop which has some excellent information and ideas for home reading.

Until next time, keep on reading!

Christie-Lee Hansberry