23rd February, 2016 Reflection May your Spirit inspire the Church God in heaven and in my life, guide me and protect me. I so often believe I can save myself and I always end in failure. Lead me with your love away from harm and guide me on the right path. May your Spirit inspire the Church and make us an instrument of your love and guidance. Thank you for your care for me.
Dear Parents and students, Our first three weeks of school have been quite busy but productive with whole School Mass, Information Nights, Swimming Sports and Camps, just to name the main events. From our point of view, the information from school to home should be getting to you via:
Information Nights SIMON Parent portal (PAM) CRC Melton app Text messages
NB: If you are having problems accessing any of these communications from school to home, please contact IT on itsupport@crcmelton.com.au Please note in your home Calendar: Parent/Student/Teacher interviews - Tuesday March 22 and Wednesday March 23 Professional Learning Day - Next Monday February 29, staff are involved in a Professional Learning Day and Brendan Spillane, a highly acclaimed speaker, will be our guest presenter. I realise this date is early in the year, but we only had two days with the teaching staff in January (normally it would be three) before students in Years 7, 9, 11 and 12 started on January 29. Brendan will be presenting on ‘Leading for High Performance'. Other seminars on the day include: Pathways planning, Reading skills, Elearning, Numeracy Strategy, and Understanding Data. Parents and Friends Meeting - Our first meeting is tomorrow, Wednesday February 24th. The meeting starts at 7.30pm. Tour of new Gadal building - a tour of the new Gadal building will take place at 7pm on Wednesday night, just before the Parents and Friends meeting. Mark Sheehan Principal
Parents & Friends Our first meeting for 2016 is on Wednesday February 24th starting at 7.30pm. All welcome, especially parents new to the school.
From the Deputy Principal (Staff) We are into another busy week with Year 8 Camps along with many excursions. It is important that parents / guardians ensure that CareMonkey details and other medical information is up to date, so that we can ensure student safety and be able to contact parents / guardians as needed. Mr Sheehan has already noted that next Monday, February 29 is a Staff Professional Learning day, so no students will be at the College this day. VCE students will be given work to complete for any missed classes. VCAL students will be undertaking the first of their 3 day Port of Melbourne excursions as this was booked last year before our key speaker for the day was confirmed. Information Evenings A copy of presentations from our Year 7, 8 and 12 Information Evenings are now available on the College Website for any parents / guardians who were unable to attend or wish to review. Camps As stated last week, our Year 7 and Year 8 students will attend Year Level camps. I am sure all the students will have a great experience as staff have put a lot of time and energy into the planning of these events. Please note that if students do not have parent/guardian permission or updated Medical information they will not be able to attend camp. Parent / Guardians will / have been advised of specific requirements. Year 8 Camps – This week. 8C & D Homerooms Tuesday 23rd to Wednesday 24th 8M & O Homerooms Wednesday 24th to Thursday 25th 8C Homeroom Thursday 25th to Friday 26th. Year 7 Camps – March 7 - 11. 7D, M, O & R Homerooms Monday 7th to Wednesday 9th. 7A, B, C Homerooms Wednesday 9th to Friday 11th John Christie Deputy Principal (Staff) Camps, Sports & Excursion Fund (CSEF) If you hold a valid means-tested concession card or are a temporary foster parent, you may be eligible for CSEF. The allowance will be paid to the school to use towards expenses relating to camps, excursions, or sporting activities for the benefit of your child. CSEF will be provided by the Victorian Government to assist eligible families to cover the costs of school trips, camps and sporting activities. The annual CSEF amount is $225 for secondary school students. Parents who are eligible need to lodge forms with the school by 26th February 2016. CSEF application forms can be downloaded from www.education.vic.gov.au/csef or are available at the office. A copy of the concession card needs to be attached. 2017 Pilgrimage Tour On Tuesday 23 February, at 7.00pm, a meeting for parents and students will be held in the Performing Arts Centre to answer any questions regarding the trip, staffing, safety precautions, how Trekset deal with issues that may arise before we depart etc. If despite paying an initial deposit you no longer intend you son/daughter to take part in the trip please inform me as soon as possible, in this way I can quickly organise a refund AND contact a family on the waiting list to offer the spot. If you have questions you wish addressed at this meeting please email me beforehand so I can present the information you wish to have clarified. scoates@crcmelton.com.au The next payment of a further $700, which is non-refundable, is required by 26 February, 2016. Shaun Coates
From the Deputy Principal - Students PAM - Parent Access Module This week all new parents to the College will receive in the mail login details for access to their son/daughter’s student profile. These details provide you with an access username and password. Please keep this in a secure and safe place. All other parents can access PAM using their existing username and password. PAM provides you with access to your child’s timetable, attendance, homework and assessment tasks and reports. Now that we are into the fourth week of the school term, many students would have submitted and completed the first set of assessment tasks. Teachers will have marked these and will load the results for each student onto their PAM profile. These results will now start appearing on your child’s assessment profile. Students arriving late The School requires regular and punctual attendance at school and to all classes. Students must be at school throughout the hours of a normal school day, this includes Homeroom at the start of the school day. Attendance enables proper continuity of programs, development of understanding, completion of work in class and dissemination of information. Students with a pattern of lateness will receive discipline points and a possible after school detention. We are asking for your support to ensure your son/daughter is arriving to school on time and ready for Homeroom at 8.48am. If a student arrives after the start of first period they must report to the Main Office to have their name marked on the roll. If they fail to do so you will receive an SMS message asking for an explanation of why your child is not at school. Rob Blackley Deputy Principal – Student Welfare Teaching & Learning News The use of technology, more specifically the iPad, in learning gives students opportunity to engage with content in a variety of different ways that is not possible without the iPad. Although students are expected to master traditional skills such as writing essays, successfully completing tests and examinations and drawing graphs, they now also engage in more creative presentations of content such as creating professional keynote presentations, making movies and designing websites. The iPad allows students to research content in more detail, to seek clarification where needed and to explore students varying interests where content allows. The College Library also has a selection of ebooks including fiction and non fiction for students to access via their iPad. For information on the use of the elibrary, students should see the library staff. At CRC Melton, the iPad is a learning tool for all students and should be treated as such. Social media, games, movies and the like should not tempt students during classes. It is the responsibility of the student to ensure that their iPad is charged and ready for learning each day. Some websites that may further learning include: The Khan Academy- https://www.khanacademy.org Khan Academy is a non-profit educational organisation created in 2006 by educator Salman Khan with the aim of providing a free, world-class education for anyone, anywhere. The organisation produces short lectures in the form of YouTube videos. Learn for free about math, art, computer programming, economics, physics, chemistry, biology, medicine, finance, history, and more. The Education Corner - www.educationcorner.com/study-skills.html This free site contains a wealth of information including tips and techniques for studying smarter, not harder. The site includes guides to discovering your learning style, improving note taking skills and strategies for reading text books to name a few. Narelle Layton Director of Learning
Parents & Friends Dear Parents, The Parents & Friends committee would like to welcome you all to CRC for another great year. We would in particular like to extend a warm welcome to new families and hope that you enjoy being a valued member of our school community. Thank you to the families that have been and continue to be supportive and involved with our school community. The Parents & Friends help in many ways ie: school uniform shop, canteen, working bee, sports carnivals, special BBQ days and more. We have been able to use funds from the Parents & Friends levy for such things as shade cloths, seating, music equipment and also the beautiful artwork for the Performing Arts Centre. The Parents & Friends normally meet on the last Wednesday of each month at 7.30pm in the conference room. Our principal, Mr Mark Sheehan is in attendance and is always happy to report on the progress of the school. He is always willing to discuss general business and happy to answer and follow up on any questions from parents & friends. Our first meeting for 2016 is Wednesday 24th February at 7.30pm. Looking forward to seeing existing families and meeting new ones. Regards, Jenny Machado Languages News on Education Perfect Students in Year 7 to 10 who study Indonesian or Italian use this engaging and interactive app called Education Perfect. Students work on this app from time to time in class and they are also assigned homework using Education Perfect. Students should only spend 10 minutes each night on this app as part of their Languages Homework. Any questions concerning how the app operates please feel free to contact me. Claudia Russo Head of Languages
Ever wondered how Video Games are affecting your child?
Does your child play a lot of video games? Are you worried about video games having an impact on your child’s mental health? Would you like to learn some easy tips on how to manage gaming in the home?
Come to a free workshop for parents on the impact of video games on young people. Facilitated by Steven Duponk, author of the Parent’s Guide to Gaming. Wednesday 20th April, 2016, 6pm—8pm Melton Library, Seminar room, Ground floor, 31 McKenzie Street, Melton. Refreshments provided This workshop is strictly limited to 80 people. Please reserve your spot now to participate in this innovative workshop. For more information: call (03) 8746 0500 or Kate.McKernin@ccam.org.au Sirlsha.Guntur@ccam.org.au
Uniform
Calendar 2016
2016
Term 1
Term 1
February
February
23rd 24th
25th 26th 29th
2017 Pilgrimage Information Night 7.00pm Year 7 Swimming Program Year 8 D & M Camps Year 8 M &O Camps 2015 Year 12 BBQ P & F Meeting Year 8 M & O Camps Year 8 C Camps Year 8 C Camps Staff Professional Learning day - No classes
7th 8th 9th 10th 11th 14th 15th 16th 17th 18th
March Wednesday 2nd 6.30pm - 7.30pm Snjezana De Courcy Grace Merceica Wednesday 9th L. Vella
1.00pm - 2.00pm C. Arthur
Wednesday 16th 6.30pm - 7.30pm E. Flanigan Leanne Holt
March 2nd 3rd 4th
Wednesday 24th 1.00pm - 2.00pm Karen Vella Maria Muse
VCE Unit 1 & 3 Outdoor Education camp VCE Unit 1 & 3 Outdoor Education camp VCE Unit 1 & 3 Outdoor Education camp Senior Cricket Soup Van visit Year 7D, 7M, 7O & 7R camp Year 7D, 7M, 7O & 7R camp Senior Cricket Semi Final Year 7A, 7B & 7C camp Senior Sports day Year 7A, 7B & 7C camp Year 7A, 7B & 7C camp Catholic Education week Labour day - No classes Catholic Education week Federation Mass day - No classes Catholic Education week 2016 Indonesian trip Information evening Catholic Education week VCE Studio Arts Excursion VINCIT Work Readiness Induction days Catholic Education week VINCIT Work Readiness Induction days Year 8 Kryal Castle excursion VINCIT Pathways Training
Homework Club Homework Club will run every Wednesday from 3.30pm to 4.30pm in the Library until 16th March.
Wednesday 23rd Winter Uniform Pickup 1.00pm - 2.00pm Judy Johnson Christine Sicily 6.30pm - 7.30pm F. Conway A. Salmon
Mass Times
Parish of Melton Parish Priest : Fr Michael Moody Weekend Mass times: St Catherine of Siena Church Bulmans Rd, Melton West Saturday: 6.00pm Sunday: 9.00am & 11.00am St Dominic’s Church Sunday: 5.00pm St Bernard’s Parish Parish Priest: Fr. Brian Glasheen Weekend Mass times: Saturday: 6.30pm Sunday: 8.30am & 10.00am
St Anthony’s Parish Parish Priest: Fr. Fabian Smith Weekend Mass times: Saturday: 5.30pm Sunday: 8.30am & 10.30am