Term 3 Week 3 Monday 29th July 2024

Acknowledgement of Country

From the Principal

Important Dates:

Term 3

Wednesday 31st July- SAC Meeting at 6:30pm in Staffroom at school

Monday 5th August- 150th anniversary of the Diocese of Ballarat Message Stick stops at St Colman's

Tuesday 6th August- Kinder Visit

                                          - Parent Teacher Interviews

Thursday 8, 15, 22 and 29th August- Gymnastics in Warrnambool

Monday 12th August- Seniors to visit Aberlea

Thursday 15th August- Bullying No Way Day

Friday 16th August- 5/6 Hooptime in Terang

Monday 26th August- Dental Van (all week)

                                              - Book Week at St Colman's

                                               - MRC Discovery Day

Wednesday 28th August- Father's Day Breakfast

Thursday 29th August- Book Fair and Parade 

Friday 30th August- 3/4 Hooptime in Terang

Mon-Tues Sept 2^nd-3^rd- Year 3/4 to Warrnambool

Thursday  5th September- Major Raffle Drawn

Monday 9th September- Middles to visit Aberlea

Friday 13th September- Grade 5/6 Excursion to Budj Bim

16th - 20th September - Meals on Wheels

Tuesday 17th September - Bell's Shakespeare at Mortlake College

Friday 20th September - Footy Colours Day 

                                                  - Term 3 ends

2024 School Camps (with St Thomas’ Terang)

Sept 2^nd-3^rd: Year 3/4 Warra Gnan Coastal Camp, Warrnambool

Nov 13^th-15^th: Year 5/6 Dunkeld Adventure Camp

Pope Francis proclaimed the World Day for Grandparents and the Elderly to be celebrated on the fourth Sunday in July each year – July 28 in 2024. The Day is marked near the Feast of Sts Joachim and Anne, the grandparents of Jesus. This year’s theme, “Do not cast me off in my old age” (cf. Ps 71: 9), recalls the heartfelt plea to the Lord not to be left alone in old age. St Colman's will celebrating the elderly members of our community in Term 4 when we will hold our Grandparent's Day morning tea. Meanwhile, if you have an opportunity to check in an elderly relative, friend or neighbour this week, please do so!

Our Lady of Mercy Parish News

WEEKEND MASS TIMES
ST THOMAS’ TERANG
Saturday 6.00 pm
Sunday 10.30 am
ST COLMAN’S MORTLAKE
Sunday 9.00 am

St Colman's Footy Tipping

With the AFL Footy season almost over, it is a timely reminder to pay your entry fee. Only paid up members will be eligible for the prizes. $20 for adults and $10 for primary school aged children.

Current table topper is Angela Absalom who, after a very impressive round with 7 correct tips, is on 116 points, on point clear of ESPNFAN...

St Colman's Annual Major Raffle

This week we are officially launching our school raffle and tickets are now available to be purchased from the Try Booking link below.

We have renamed our raffle the "Local Loot Draw" as the prizes are being supplied by a large variety of Mortlake businesses in the form of vouchers and gift cards. The lucky winner of the first prize will receive $3,000 in vouchers to spend at many Mortlake businesses. 

The "Local Loot Draw" will take place at school on Thursday 5th September 2024.

First Prize        $3000 in vouchers supplied by Mortlake businesses

Second Prize   $1000 Neighbourhood Benefit EFTPOS card supplied by Acciona                         

Third Prize       $500 voucher supplied by Bates IGA Supermarket Mortlake

Last year the raffle raised almost $10,000 for our school and we would love to do the same again this year. All money raised will go into upgrading our current playground.

This year all families will be rostered on to sell tickets at community ‘hot spots’.

Clarke’s Café - Fridays 11-2pm

Bate’s Supermarket - Saturdays 10-2pm

WVLX (Mortlake Saleyards)- 1^st and 3^rd Thursdays of most months (1st and 15th August and 5th September) 9am -1pm

If you have a preference of where and when you would like to be rostered on, please contact the office ASAP as we are in the process of creating this roster.

Parent Teacher Interviews

Parent Teacher Interviews are scheduled for next Tuesday, August 6th. Appointment times can be made from tomorrow via the PAM app. Keep an eye out for a notification of when they will be available to book. If you have any difficulty scheduling an appointment, please contact us.

Sporting Schools-Gymnastics Sessions

We have received a grant from Sporting Schools that will allow us to participate in 4 weekly gymnastic sessions at Strive Gymnastics in Warrnambool. Starting on Thursday August 8th, all students will be taken by bus to Warrnambool, leaving school at 11:30am, and will participate in a 45 minute, qualified coach delivered, gymnastic skills session. There will be no cost to families for these 4 sessions. Children will need to wear their sports uniform for these 4 Thursdays in August. Please look out for a permission notification on the PAM app.

Junior Student Representative Council

Our Junior SRC met in the staffroom last Friday. This enthusiastic group of school leaders had a robust discussion and idea sharing session. They have settled on their events for Term 3.

Bullying No Way Day- 15/8

Book Week Parade- 29/8

Footy Colours Day and Pies for lunch- Last day of Term 3-20/9

School Uniform

With Winter well and truly upon us, it is timely to remind us all of the uniform expectations at our school. We have noticed quite a few students regularly wearing clothes that are not a part of our uniform. Sports uniform is only to be worn on SPORTS DAY (Wednesday) and black leggings are not allowed. Your support in enforcing our uniform policy with your children would be greatly appreciated! 

The School Uniform and how we wear it is a reflection on our School. Children should wear their uniform with pride and a sense of belonging to the St Colman’s School community.

Boys’ Winter Uniform:

Navy blue rugby school jumper or navy blue school jacket

Navy blue polo shirt (short or long sleeved)

Grey cotton drill trousers   

Navy blue socks (Crew length)

Girls' Winter Uniform:

Navy blue rugby school jumper or navy blue school jacket

Navy blue polo shirt (short or long sleeved)

Navy skirt or navy cotton drill trousers    

Navy blue socks (Crew length)

Unisex Sports Uniform:

Navy blue polo shirt

School blue shorts or PLAIN navy blue tracksuit pants or leggings

Navy blue socks (Crew length)

Runners

Weekly Award Winners

Congratulations to these amazing students who were acknowledged for their achievements at our end of week assembly last Friday. And to Mrs Moloney too, who received an award for getting her certificates to the School Captains in time for the assembly!!

Playgroup at St Colman's

We look forward to welcoming back our local pre-schoolers every second Friday, with our next session being held this Friday August 2nd.

PLEASE SPREAD THE WORD WITH YOUR FRIENDS WHO HAVE PRE SCHOOL AGED CHILDREN. EVERYONE IS WELCOME!!!

The ongoing commitment to this project will require support from other members of the school community. If you are willing to help out by going on a roster to help organise Little Colman’s, please contact either the school or Lily. 

WE WILL NEED TO PURCHASE SOME GAMES AND EQUIPMENT FOR OUR PLAYGROUP. HOWEVER, WE WONDERED IF YOU HAD ANY OLD TOYS AND GAMES THAT YOUR CHILDREN HAVE GROWN OUT OF AND THAT YOU NO LONGER NEED. IF SO, WE WOULD GREATLY APPRECIATE THE DONATION OF ANY PRE-SCHOOL TOYS AND GAMES, INDOOR OR OUTDOOR, THAT ARE IN EXCELLENT USED CONDITION.

School Wide Positive Behaviour Support

School Wide Positive Behaviour Support is: A multi-tiered framework for establishing the social culture and behavioural supports needed for a school to achieve behavioural and academic outcomes for all students. For the next two weeks at St Colman’s we are working with our students on developing effective learning habits that will set them up for success throughout the year ahead. During that time, all staff will be reinforcing the behaviour expectations as set out in our Behavior Matrix (below).

SchoolTV Wellbeing Platform

Raising Boys

This week's link is to a selection of articles that aim to help support parents to nurture and raise confident, happy young men.

Neuroscience and brain mapping has over the years helped researchers gain a clearer understanding into the distinct development of the male brain. When comparing male and female brains, it is necessary to take into consideration the psychology of differences. There are many reasons for these including hormonal, physical, environmental, and of course, brain differences. However these should not translate into limitations or affect how a parent acts towards their child, nor should it influence how you treat them. It's no secret that most boys are active, loud, rambunctious and prone to rough play, but you need to be careful not to pigeon-hole your child into sex specific behaviours as there is a big cross-over. Boys should not be considered all the same as they do have individual differences.

St. Colman's School is a Child Safe Community

Child Safety Officers

Janet Cain and Rosie O'Connor are our Child Safety Officers.

Contact them on:

Phone: 55992285 or 0490539167

Email: jcain@scmortlake.catholic.edu.au or roconnor@scmortlake.catholic.edu.au

The Child Safe Standards

The eSafety Commissioner is once again running online parent and carer webinars, designed to support parents assist their children navigate the online world.  

The topics this term are:

• An introduction to online safety and emerging technologies.
• Consent and online boundaries: How to support your
  primary-aged child.
  
• Understanding how to support your child with online gaming.

The flyer below outlines the topics and the times that these webinars are available.  There is also a link to register.

Our Student Representative Council will be co ordinating our partnership with Cooinda Terang to become a collection point for Victoria’s Container Deposit Scheme (CDS Vic).

We will be collecting all eligible empty drink containers and then returning them to the CDS collection point at Cooinda. The 10c raised from each return will go back to the SRC. They will nominate various charities to support as well as using 50% of the funds to upgrade school resources.

So please start collecting and sending in your empties. 

Most aluminium, glass, plastic and liquid paperboard (carton) drink containers between 150mL and 3 litres are eligible. You can keep the lids on, we recycle them too. The easiest way to know if your drink container can be returned is to look for the 10c mark on the label, often located near the barcode.

You can help in two ways:

1. The first is by far the simplest. Just return your empty eligible containers to the tubs in the corridors at school.
2. If you have a large amount of containers to deposit, you may wish to take them to a Container Deposit Depot and return them yourself. Please download the CDS Vic West App (instructions below). When you return your containers, nominate St Colman's School Mortlake as the charity you want to donate the money to.

Please note, that as we are in partnership with Cooinda Terang, our preferred deposit depot is their Reverse Vending Machine located at 49 Dow St Terang.

Toastie Tuesday

Lunch Orders

LUNCH ORDERS are only available twice a week on Monday and Friday.

Menu and price list below

Out of School Care

A reminder that we continue to have access to Out of School Care in 2024, supplied by TheirCare, at Mortlake College. Registration is made via the TheirCare website. https://theircare.com.au/

Search for Mortlake College P-12

AngliCare Energy Assistance

As part of Anglicare Victoria’s FREE Energy Assistance Program, they provide assistance with energy bills to support Victorians to:

• Talk to their energy retailer and get help with debt
• Access extra financial support
• Check they are receiving eligible concessions on their bill
• Find and move to an affordable energy plan
• Understand bills and fix any possible errors
• Support your child's education with free internet at home

They can provide immediate assistance for clients who are struggling to pay for their gas or electricity bills to prevent disconnection to their property!

The follower two flyers provide further details.

NCCD

Please read the attached information sheet for parents regarding NCCD.