MATTHEW GIBNEY CATHOLIC PRIMARY SCHOOL

30 Munday Road, High Wycombe WA 6057 Phone: 6216 8400 Email: admin@gibney.wa.edu.au Website: www.gibney.wa.edu.au

NEWSLETTER No. 7 15th March 2018

Dear Parents, Friends and Students

Thank you to the many parents who came along to the

Parent Information session that outlined the content of the

new Keeping Safe: Child Protection Curriculum. I would

particularly like to thank Bron Pescud who presented at

this session. This new programme is significantly different

to previous programmes that have attempted to address

child protection and, as a school, it was extremely

important that parents were given an opportunity to see

what it was going to look like in classrooms. During the

session, the school’s ‘Code of Conduct’ was referred to.

This can be found on our website under the ‘Our School’

tab. All parents need to be familiar with this document.

On Tuesday, information was sent home to parents

regarding the topics that will be covered in year levels and

last night, this was made even more specific. This

information will also be available on our website. Any

questions regarding the Child Protection Curriculum can

be directed to your child’s class teacher or to me.

Our school website is an important communication portal

between school and home. It has all the information that

families require in order to be well informed of happenings

at our school. We are currently planning a refurb of our

website and we will launch this in the coming weeks.

Thank you to Mrs Keddie and the Public Relations Sub-

Committee of the School Board who has taken on this

huge task.

Our next assembly will take place on Friday 16th March.

It will take place in the undercover area and begin at

9:00am. The Year 3 class will be hosting this assembly.

All parents and members of our community are invited to

join with us. The Year 2 class will be hosting their

He guides the humble in what is right and teaches them his way. (Psalm 25:9)

assembly on Friday 23rd March.

A reminder to all our families that our parent/teacher

meetings will take place on Tuesday 20th March. They

will begin at 12:30pm. School will close for the day at

12:00pm. Please ensure that all families are prepared for

this as there will be no supervision for students at school

after this time as all staff will be involved in meetings.

Please ensure that you have made a time to meet with

your child’s/children’s teacher. These meetings are

extremely important as teachers will be able to give

parents an accurate picture of how well the students are

achieving to date.

Our school will be participating in Harmony Day on

Wednesday 21st March. Harmony Day is a celebration of

our cultural diversity – a day of cultural respect for

everyone who calls Australia home. It is held every year

on the 21st March. The Day coincides with the United

Nations International Day for the Elimination of Racial

Discrimination. Mrs Keddie sent home some details

regarding this day.

Our next P&F meeting will take place on Wednesday 21st

March. All are invited to attend.

Have a great week.

Mark Powell PRINCIPAL

Makaydee Arend Amber

GOOD NEWS GOOD NEWS GOOD NEWS GOOD NEWS GOOD NEWS GOOD NEWS GOOD NEWS

The Year Ones have been working very hard!

Jett Cooper

BATTERY RECYCLING We are very pleased to “do our bit” for

the environment by offering recycling

collection for household batteries. You

can drop your batteries off in the metal

collection bin in the hallway opposite the

Year 3 class room.

DATES FOR YOUR DIARY

Fri 16th Mar…. Year 3 Assembly

Fri 16th Mar… Year 6 Cricket Carnival

Tues 20thMar… STUDENTS EARLY FINISH @ 12PM

Tues 20th Mar… Parent/Teacher Meeting 12.30 - 6pm

Wed 21st Mar… Harmony Day Activities

Wed 21st Mar… Board Meeting 6pm

Wed 21st Mar… P & F Meeting 7.30pm

Fri 23rd Mar… Year 2 Assembly

Fri 23rd Mar… Cool Pool Afternoon

Sun 25th Mar.. Palm Sunday

Thurs 29th Mar. HOLY THURSDAY Easter Assembly

Fri 30th Mar… GOOD FRIDAY

Sat 31st Mar... EASTER SATURDAY

Sun 1st Apr… EASTER SUNDAY

Mon 2nd Apr.. EASTER MONDAY

Tues 3rd Apr.. EASTER TUESDAY (School Holiday)

Tues 10th Apr - Fri 13th Apr …Year 6 Camp

Fri 13th Apr… LAST DAY OF TERM 1 FOR

STUDENTS

Mon 30th Apr… STUDENTS RETURN TERM 2 2018

REMINDER

EARLY CLOSING

Tuesday 20th March at

12 Noon for Parent/Teacher Meetings.

KINDY ENROLMENTS 2019 (eligible date of birth 1 July 2014

to 30 June 2015).

Our Kindy enrolment interviews will take place in

Term Two. If you have a family member or

friend who would like their child to come to

Matthew Gibney Catholic Primary School,

applications are available from the office or you

can download one from our website.

www.gibney.wa.edu.au

COOL POOL AFTERNOON REMINDER

Permission slips due back tomorrow Friday 16th March.

UNIFORM CENTRE NEWS

Please note the Uniform Centre

will be CLOSED until Friday

23rd March. For any urgent

uniform matters please come to the Admin

Office. Apologies for any inconvenience

this may cause.

Assistant Principal’s

Religious Education New

SACRAMENTAL COMMITMENT MASSES

Thanks to all the students and families in Years 3-6 who

attended the Sacramental Commitment Masses last

weekend.

Karen Keddie

Assistant Principal RE

PROJECT COMPASSION

Fourth Week of Lent

Evangeline is strengthening Aboriginal culture while

making a living and creating

opportunities for her community.

Featured in Project Compassion during

2016, Evangeline went from seeking

employment to being a Senior

Artsworker and an inspirational leader

for youth. Her work at the non-profit

Djilpin Arts Aboriginal Corporation has

supported the organisation’s growth and it is now a major

employer for young people in the remote Northern

Territory community.

Making Jesus Real Every Day!

CANTEEN ROSTER

Fri 16th Mar Natasha A

CAN YOU HELP?

Tues 20th Mar Vashti

NO LUNCH

Fri 23rd Mar Charlene M & Stephanie A

COOL POOL AFTERNOON

YEAR 5 NEWS

This week we have been working hard in literacy learning

more about how to use speech to develop characters in

our narratives and writing a good opening “hook” to catch

our readers. We are writing space narratives to

accompany our space artwork. We have also been using

the new “Literacy Planet” app on the ipads. All the Year 5

students have been working through a series of activities,

spelling, grammar and reading on the app. We are nearly

finished our class novel “Billionaire Boy” much to our

great sadness, we just want it to go on forever! Just one

more chapter PLEASE???

Karen Keddie & Jess Savory

Parents & Friends Association

Agenda item request for meeting - Wednesday

21st March@ 7.30pm.

Please submit your Agenda item request either

through the Skoolbag app - eForms - P&F

Meeting Agenda Items or through the

Matthew Gibney website

http://web.gibney.wa.edu.au/pandf.html

You must attend the meeting if you wish to

submit an agenda item.

P & F Meetings Term 1 2018

Wednesday 21st March @ 7.30pm

PARENT/TEACHER INTERVIEWS

Parent/Teacher Interview Booking Form

was sent home 2 weeks ago with the

eldest child. The event code for parents

was sent via SMS and Email. PLEASE

DO NOT SHARE THIS EVENT CODE AND

INFORMATION ON SOCIAL MEDIA. Bookings must

be finalised by tomorrow Friday 16th March 2018 at

5.00p.m.

HARMONY DAY 2018

On Wednesday 21st March, MGCPS will celebrate

Harmony Day. This is the day when we celebrate

Australia’s cultural diversity and share what we have in

common. The central message for Harmony Day is that

‘everyone belongs’.

All MGCPS students are encouraged to wear the

colours of their family’s heritage. This is to show

that we all come from many different places.

We will make orange Harmony Day badges in class,

to show that even though we come from many

different cultures, we are still an inclusive Australia.

Why orange? Traditionally, orange signifies social

communication and meaningful conversations. It

also relates to the freedom of ideas and

encouragement of mutual respect.

There are some fascinating statistics about Australia’s diversity

nearly half (49 per cent) of Australians were born overseas or have at least one parent who was

we identify with over 300 ancestries

since 1945, more than 7.5 million people have migrated to Australia

85 per cent of Australians agree multiculturalism has been good for Australia

apart from English, the most common languages spoken in Australia are Mandarin, Arabic, Cantonese, Vietnamese, Italian, Greek, Tagalog/Filipino, Hindi, Spanish and Punjabi

more than 70 Indigenous languages are spoken in Australia.

These facts are taken from ABS 2016 Census Data. Check out the Australian Bureau of Statistics website.

EASTER EGG

RAFFLE DONATIONS! Thank you to all the families that have already

donated Easter Raffle items.

We are still in need of any donations of Easter

Eggs.

Donations can be placed in the tub in the office.

Could all donations please be in by

Monday 26th March.

Raffle drawn on Thursday 29th March at our

Easter Assembly.

Good luck to all!

Friday Giving

Don’t forget our Friday Giving Appeal to

help the needy.

Please bring your donations of canned

foods or non-perishables, etc. to school

for collection each Friday.

Thank you for your generosity!

KINDY NEWS

Thank you so much to all families who supported the Mini

Vinnie cake stall, it was much appreciated . The children

enjoyed spending their ‘own’ money and making the very

important decision on what to buy.

At the moment we are busy learning to not only count but

also being able to recognise our numbers. We are

practicing our cutting skills and we are learning how

Easter is not only about the bunny and eggs but also

about a very special person called Jesus.

If you have any empty boxes at home, we would love for

you to bring them into Kindy for construction at our

‘Creation Station’.

Just a reminder that parent teacher interviews are next

Tuesday afternoon. I look forward to meeting with all of

you and discussing your child’s progress so far.

Saroya Powell, Lucy Marchetti & Sylvie Spadaccini

IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT

Parents/Guardians please sign in and out on the visitors

form in the office when on school

grounds for any reason, e.g. class

room helpers, book exchange,

banking and canteen volunteers.

This is a requirement in case of any

emergency procedures. We thank you for your

understanding in this matter.

SENT HOME MONDAY 12th MARCH

★ P&F Welcome invite to P&F Meeting

SENT HOME TODAY

★ Book Club

★ Kalamunda Show Colouring Competition

★ Harmony Day Flyer

YEAR 3 NEWS

Year 3 have been working hard on their assembly this

week and are very excited to show the school all the work

they have done so far this year.

Students have started their STEM investigation where

they will become partner engineers to design a safe water

slide for our class Lego Man. As a class we came up with

6 rules and they include the slide must be waterproof, it

must have an open-top, must be on an angle or include a

bend, be at least 30cm tall, have a tower with a ladder to

reach the top and lastly have a pool at the bottom to

catch the water and the Lego man. This week we will be

finishing our labelled plans and start designing our slide

that will follow ALL six rules.

Please remember to bring in library books every Tuesday

and ensure written entries are done in reading logs for

every night of reading.

Christina Zurzolo

CANTEEN NEWS

In celebration of Easter the Canteen will be

holding an “Easter Egg Hunt” placing a

surprise egg token randomly into lunch bags

when you place your order. This will run

each week until Easter.

To redeem your egg token, just bring it to

the Canteen at morning recess or lunch.

Happy Hunting!

PLEASE NOTE

As from this year the school will no longer be

accepting cash or cheque payments for Bookclub.

All orders will now need to be done online.

Please see below instructions for online ordering.

Apologies for any inconvenience this may cause.

Book club orders are due

by 9.00am Wednesday 21st March

No late orders can be accepted.

We are now in the Loop!

Using your credit card you can now order and pay for

your books directly online using Loop.

Go to scholastic.com.au/loop where you can register to

order online.

No need to fill in any order forms or return anything to the

school. There is often bonus offers and promotions.

IT’S EASY!

If you have any queries on placing orders please contact

Donna on 0417 921 274

Thank you.

Donna Masters

Shop at Coles, between 7th February - 11th May 2018 and collect the vouchers from

the checkouts and drop them into the collection box either outside the Administration

Office or the box in the main corridor near the Year 5 class room.

Thank you for supporting our school.