Term 1, Week 11 (9 April 2024)

PRINCIPAL'S ADDRESS

Alleluia! He is Risen! Alleluia!

It does seem a little unfamiliar to be back at school immediately following the Easter weekend, but what a wonderful teachable moment this is for us to celebrate with the students. On Holy Thursday we gathered to reenact the Stations of the Cross, commencing with a reflective piece on Jesus washing the feet of the disciples and then sharing the Last Supper, which was beautifully presented by our Year 11 and 12 students. This was very moving and captured the spirit of Holy Thursday as we commenced our own journey towards the Cross with Jesus on Good Friday. Following the Easter weekend break, we joined together for an Easter liturgy to declare and celebrate the resurrection of Jesus on Easter Sunday. 

The Church celebrates the Easter season, known as “Eastertide”, for 50 days, culminating with the feast of Pentecost, where Scripture (Acts 2:1–31) tells us that the Holy Spirit descended on the Apostles. As we now journey through Eastertide, we are reminded of the beauty of renewal and the promise of new beginnings. This season is not only a time of reflection but also a celebration of hope, growth, and transformation. In our school and in our lives, Eastertide serves as a reminder of the values that we hold dear – compassion, kindness, and unity. It is a time for us to extend a hand of friendship to those in need, to forgive those who have wronged us, and to embrace the diversity that enriches our community.

The Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord is usually on March 25, but when that date falls during Holy Week, the feast is transferred to the first day after the Second Sunday of Easter. The Annunciation is the announcement by the angel Gabriel to the Virgin Mary that she would conceive a son by the power of the Holy Spirit to be called Jesus (Luke 1:26–38). As “Mater Dei”, the Mother of Christ, we acknowledge this major Marian feast and Mary’s important role in God’s plan.  

Today we had a ‘Jersey Day’ at Mater Dei with a gold coin donation to contribute to the funds for Caritas Australia and Project Compassion. While I was very pleased to see some “Roosters” supporters amongst the staff and students, it really was a celebration of our different interests coming together with a little bit of ‘friendly rivalry’, but mostly fun!

You would have recently received a letter from me outlining the great work that our P&F do and a request for additional help from our parent/carer/family community. Thank you for the forms that have been returned and for the generous offers of support and interest in being involved in the P&F and/or availability to assist with different events. Our next P&F meeting will be held in Term 2 on Monday 6 May at 7pm in the school hall. Please come along if you are able to. The election of P&F Committee members has been held over from the AGM with the hope of finalising these positions at our next meeting.

I will be sending out reminders for the payment of school fees and urging any parents/carers who are experiencing financial difficulties in paying these fees, to please contact me via the school office as I am committed to working with you to explore payment plans or other arrangements that can accommodate your situation. Mater Dei will continue to offer financial support to families, however, for auditing purposes, we need to have a documented process of where and how these funds are allocated. Please do not see this as a barrier to accessing this assistance.

As we come to the end of a very full Term One, I certainly look back in gratitude. It is important that we acknowledge the achievements and celebrate the successes, rather than devoting energy to focusing on what could have been done differently or perhaps what didn’t go well. At Mater Dei we pride ourselves on our diversity and inclusivity. I pray for a time to rest and re energise over the holiday period, while also acknowledging that our staff will spend time during this period to prepare for the Term ahead. We will commence with a full calendar of events including the Athletics Carnival, Lipstick Luncheon, Mothers Day liturgy and Celebration of Learning K - 12, where I look forward to catching up with parents/carers and visitors to Mater Dei. 

As we continue to navigate the challenges of the world around us, let us draw strength from the message of Easter – that even in the face of adversity, there is always hope. May this season fill our hearts with renewed faith, our minds with greater understanding, and our actions with love and compassion towards one another.

JENNIFER FOLDES
PRINCIPAL

FROM THE DEPUTY PRINCIPAL'S DESK

The first term of the year is coming to a close and as I reflect upon all that I have experienced in my first term at Mater Dei, I cannot help but be drawn to the way in which our school is living the Benedictine value of Hospitality. 

In his Rule, St Benedict defines hospitality as offering warmth, acceptance and joy when welcoming another.  The celebrations and events of Term One, including the Opening School Mass and Commissioning of our Principal, primary and secondary assemblies, Peace Cafe, Stations of the Cross, Easter Liturgy, not to mention the learning that takes place daily, are all forms of active hospitality and prayer within our community.

Benedict says, Let all be received as Christ [RB 53].  This understanding of hospitality is based on relating to another as a guest, on cultivating an openness to others. Whilst our students are coming to understand Hospitality in a literal sense through their school experiences, they are also working towards understanding hospitality as St Benedict teaches - not as a social event but rather a holy event.  Hospitality is costly, not in terms of money, but in the demands it makes on our hearts, our time, and our personal resources.

This leads me to reflect on the work that our Year 12 students are doing throughout this year. Overall, they are contributing so much back into our community by way of hosting assemblies, welcoming visitors into our school, leading the celebration of liturgies, working within the community and leading the student community with great responsibility.

Through all of this they are not asking What will I get out of this? But rather, What more can I give? 

We are, indeed blessed, to have such great Year 12 student leaders who are having such a positive influence on our student community. Our Mater Dei parents should be very proud!

Balancing Time Online and Offline during the Holiday Break:

The holiday break is a time to be vigilant about the amount of online and offline time your child is having. It is easy for the children to use the holiday break as screen time for gaming, watching Youtube clips and not engaging in face to face activities. 

The eSafety Commissioner has informative information about managing your child’s screen time. You can follow this link to read more.  Also, below is an eSafety parent information sheet that may support you to reestablish the expectations of screens at home.

ANZAC Day March: 

Mater Dei students are invited to attend the Camden RSL Sub-Branch Committee’s ANZAC Day March to commemorate the Anniversary of the Landing at Gallipoli on Tuesday, 25 April 2024.

TIME: From 9.30am - march will commence at 10:30am sharp.

MARCH MARSHALLING AREA: Elizabeth Street, Camden

Mater Dei’s meeting location will be identified by signage in alphabetical order.

STAFF: Mrs Sillis will meet students at the marshalling area

FURTHER MARCH INFORMATION:
The Camden RSL Sub-branch ANZAC Day March will make its way down Argyle Street and conclude on Cawdor Road to the Camden Bicentennial Equestrian Park.
At the conclusion of the March, parents/carers of participating children are advised a pickup zone will be at Onslow Park. 

No parents/carers will be able to collect their children from Cawdor Road.

Please see the Compass event to register your child’s participation.

UPDATED 2024 Parent Handbook: 

The Parent Handbook has been updated for 2024. This handbook is a reference point for parents about the processes, procedures and expectations required to support the efficient running of the school. Please note that this handbook may be updated from time to time throughout the year in order to consistently remain current. Parents will always be advised as to what, and when, changes may be made within the handbook. In addition, our school newsletter will have a Reminders from the Parent Handbook item going forward.

TONI SILLIS
DEPUTY PRINCIPAL

SCHOOL NEWS

MISSION & VISION

Easter has now come and gone - we have had our celebrations, caught up with our friends and families, enjoyed the long weekend with the children and now life goes back to normal. Children are back at school, parents are back at work and Easter is over, it’s finished for another year. Or is it?

Easter is only over if we allow it to be. How often do we take that period of Lent - that period of preparation for the Resurrection of Jesus - beyond the season of Lent and into the season of Easter? How often do we reflect on the events of Holy Thursday, Good Friday and the Resurrection of Easter Sunday after the event? In all likelihood many of us don’t think too much about it until the next year - until the next Easter.

Just before Jesus dies on the cross he utters the words, ‘It is finished!’ However, Jesus didn’t mean that it’s over for yet another year; his intent was something more like, ‘I’ve done it! I’ve succeeded! I’ve held out!’ Jesus wasn’t defeated as he hung on the cross - he had in fact succeeded beyond our wildest imagination - triumphant in his death.

This triumph left him precisely in blood, tears, and helplessness. He’s won, but it’s cost him his life, tested his faith to the limit, lost him his popularity, scattered his friends, shrouded his life in misunderstanding, left him looking compromised, and isolated him in an unspeakable loneliness.

Each of us experience our own ‘Good Fridays’ throughout the year. These may be periods of loneliness, grief, despair, anger or misunderstanding. We have to experience the Good Friday so that we are able to rejoice in the Easter Sunday - the beauty of life, love and above all faith. The important part is remembering that we can’t stay within our Good Fridays; we have to move to those times of resurrection. But how do we do that? 

Everything inside of Jesus believed that, in the end, always, it is better to give yourself over to love than to hatred, to affirmation than to jealousy, to gentleness of heart than to bitterness, to honesty than to lying, to fidelity than to compromise, to forgiveness than to revenge. 

As we conclude this term at Mater Dei, it is important that we remember to acknowledge that not only will we as adults experience Good Fridays, but our children will too. What we need to assist them with is recognising when their moment of resurrection is because they were able to forgive, they were able to affirm someone else, they became gentle in their friendships, they were honest in their actions and they acted unselfishly in their work and their play.

Together, we have worked towards another successful term for our students, your children - one where we finish knowing that we have listened to the Easter call that Jesus has spoken to each and every one of us.

PEDAGOGY

WELLBEING

In Week 1 next term students in Years K to 8 will undertake the Life Education Program.  The Life Education program provides valuable lessons exploring healthy eating, personal safety, physical activity, positive relationships, cybersafety and the impact of alcohol and other drugs. All modules are age and stage appropriate and aligned to the NSW PDHPE syllabus.

Please refer to your child’s compass for further details about the lesson your child will participate in.

CURRICULUM

Mrs Twine visited a number of classrooms in the last few weeks and noticed a lot of very engaging and well planned lessons and learning. K Samaritan were listening to Mrs Keepence during whole class reading instruction. Mrs Keepence introduced key vocabulary before reading aloud to model reading strategies such as volume, pace and expression. In 1/2B, Mrs Mansfield and Donna were supporting students to write a written recount to a text by forming sentences about the beginning, middle and end. Not only did their writing focus on sentence structure including punctuation but also handwriting skills including letter shape, spacing and size. Also in 1/2B with Miss O’Riordan, the students were observing an explicit instruction lesson about two-digit numbers and how they can represent these numbers using bundles of ones to make the place value of ten. The students were able to practice counting by tens up to one hundred. Mrs Twine was kept very busy in 3/4P while they were working with letters and letter sounds to make words. By blending three letters/sounds together students practiced reading, making and writing three letter words.

In Year 11 and 12,  Mrs Steadman is teaching the Textiles and Design unit for semester one. The students are currently getting hands-on with fibers. Students are learning that textiles come from different fibers and investigating what makes each textile unique.

The class recently had some fun making a collage artwork using various fibers. They also got crafty with an Easter basket project, using wool and PVC glue to tweak its properties. Stage 6  had experienced some exciting excursions. The students visited the Campbelltown Art Gallery where students will be able to view sculptures and artworks made from a variety of textiles. Students also experienced some more real world applications of textiles at the Camden Show and connected the information they had learnt in class.

SPORTS & EVENTS

Representative Swimming

On Thursday 4th April, Maya, Justin and Aidan represented the Wollongong Diocese at the Combined Catholic College Swimming Championships in Homebush. All three students swam extremely well, narrowly missing out on selection to the next level. Congratulations Justin, Maya and Aidan.

WORKPLACE LEARNING

What a great first term of workplace learning, with students familiarising themselves with their workplace environments, adapting to new routines, expectations and processes, getting to know staff, and learning new skills and tasks.

Students will continue in their same work placements for Term 2. This allows students to build on their skills and also gain confidence as they learn and explore new and familiar tasks throughout the weeks.

The 3 year 10 students attending meals on wheels this term have been fantastic. We have received such positive feedback that the students always come in with huge smiles and big hello’s and the  clients love seeing the students every Wednesday. A new group of year 10 students will commence MOW next term.

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IMPORTANT REMINDERS

2024 SCHOOL DROP OFF / PICK UP PROCEDURES

EVENTS

Student Voice

School staff have engaged in professional learning and discussion around ‘student voice’. Student voice is about the students themselves being encouraged and supported to have a say and reflect on their learning , strengths, stretches and supports. Earlier this year our students engaged in a student voice survey with their teacher to provide opportunity for all students to communicate their thoughts. During professional learning the teachers have reflected on this process and started to refine it so that it is accessible for every student. Student voice can also provide additional evidence for personalised planning for students with disability and self determination advocacy. 

At Mater Dei School we are continually involved in staff professional learning across a variety of topics. Recently both teachers and teaching assistants engaged in learning more about Tourette Syndrome. The Tourette Syndrome Association of Australia https://www.tourette.org.au/ has many resources and information available on their web site. Our staff welcomed a guest speaker, Alysha, who shared information and answered questions.

Kindergarten to Year 6 teachers have continued to learn more about the Science of Reading. The new English Syllabus aligns with the Science of Reading. Through watching a webinar recording about the Science of Reading the primary teachers engaged in conversation and planning around their own class programming and teaching. 

Secondary classes have had the opportunity to enhance their understanding of the obligation to make adjustments as per the Disability Standards for Education 2005. Teachers have

developed a better understanding of the collaborative curriculum planning process and the types of adjustments that might be suitable for curriculum and teaching and learning activities. They have reflected on how assessment can be more inclusive and adjusted for students with a disability.

World Maths Day - Update

Mater Dei School celebrated World Maths Day on Friday 22nd March 2024.

The theme for this year was games, so Mrs Twine decided to focus on games using playing cards. The students soon realised that there are a lot of numbers in a deck of fifty-two playing cards as well as the picture cards.

Each session started with some trivia such as, the number four is the only number that has the same number of letters to spell the number as its value. Four has four letters. Then the students were amazed with Mrs Twine’s magic card tricks.

During the rest of the session students rotated through a variety of mathematical games using cards such as UNO, Make 10, Memory with Matching Pairs, sequencing numbers, sorting suits, finding the number before and the number after a given card, adding cards together, making the largest and smallest three digit numbers from three cards, Race to 100 and Blackjack.

The staff and students were busy and actively engaged in the activities which promoted plenty of talking about numbers and strategy. Of course the Big Idea was simply, Maths is fun!

2024 Athletics Carnival

P&F Easter Raffle Wrap

Lipstick Luncheon Tickets

Final reminder to Parents/Carers for tickets to this years Ladies Lipstick Luncheon.

The RSVP date has been extended to Friday 12 April.

Please return your order form to Alison McManus at AlisonMc@materdei.org.au to guarantee your seat.

Harmony Week

On the 21 March students in years 9 and 10, celebrated Harmony Week by completing activities to celebrate inclusiveness, respect and a sense of belonging for all Australians, from the traditional custodians of the land to those who have come from many countries around the world.

On the day we were lucky enough to have students from St Partick’s College come and perform cultural dances for our school.

Students came dressed in orange as traditionally, orange signifies social communication and meaningful conversations. It also relates to the freedom of ideas and the encouragement of mutual respect.

Australians choose to wear something orange during Harmony Week to show their support for cultural diversity and an inclusive Australia.

Connection and Country at Mount Annan

On the 8 April students in Years 9 and 10, had the opportunity to learn about the culture of the local Aboriginal people, the Dharawal people.

Aboriginal Education Officers guided the students through a learning journey of the culture and history of the Dharawal Nation and its people.

Students discovered the amazing ways that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples shared their stories, knowledge and culture through dance, music, art and more.

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MAISY'S CORNER

As we approach the end of the term, I want to take a moment to reflect on the positive impact of our Wellbeing Dog program on our school community. Our furry friend Maisy brings joy, comfort, and support to all.

Maisy has forged meaningful connections with the students. "Silent" conversations inspire students to engage in a range of experiences, fostering a sense of wonder and joy. Though their conversations may not be heard out loud, the bond between Maisy and the students speaks volumes about the power of companionship and shared experiences.

As we look ahead to the next term, let us continue to cherish Maisy's presence and recognise her invaluable role in promoting mental health and wellbeing for all.

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2024 IMPORTANT DATES FOR PARENTS

**Please Note - School photos are now being held on Friday 31 May**

HELPFUL REMINDERS

PARENT FORMS AND SCHOOL DOCUMENTATION

School documentation and common forms are stored in Compass for parents to access at any time.  Parent Forms can be found by following these steps on your Compass App:

 (Steps 1-3 are for App users only)

1. Click on the student
2. Click on the 3 lines in top left corner
3. Click Open in Browser
4. Click on Community Icon (2 heads)
5. Click on School Documentation
6. Click Parent Forms

ATTENDANCE EXEMPTION FORMS 
Any families who wish to apply for attendance exemptions to attend therapy services in 2024, please download the Application for Leave Exemption form on Compass, complete and return to schooladmin@materdei.org.au 

COMMUNITY NEWS

FESTIVAL OF DEMOCRACY 

NEXTPATH CONTINUOUS LEARNING HOLIDAY PROGRAM

TEAM DANCE & PERFORMING ARTS

HEROES WITH ABILITY

FREE School Holidays Sports Program for all students.

Please use the link to register. - https://forms.gle/LpmD8QbiQ7SbKK8u8 or by email or contact Marco on 0413317247.

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