Tag: News

Our Vision for Learning, Shine through Discovery – Let your light shine (Matthew 5:16) challenges our learners to strive for personal excellence. Each student will encounter difficulty, success, failure and achievement. Adopting a growth mindset supports children to accept challenges as opportunities, failing as learning and to value perseverance and determination. By changing our language to support growth instead of grades, and encouraging children to believe they can improve supports resilient, engaged learners. We are honoured to have Dr Justin Coulson work with Newman families on themes of respectful relationships and resilience. I look forward to seeing many families on Monday 25 March.

BUILDING RESILIENT AND RESPECTFUL RELATIONSHIPS PARENT SESSIONS

9 Ways to a Resilient Child (content is most suited for Early Childhood parents)

Parents will learn the psychological secrets that build their child’s sense of identity, strengths and growth mindset in order to perform better, be happier and build resilience. 9 Ways to a Resilient Child is based on Dr Justin Coulson’s best-selling book and shows parents how to help their children cope powerfully and positively with the challenges that life throws at them.
When: Monday 25 March, 9.00am – 10.30am
Where: Marist Auditorium
RSVP: jo.dunn@newman.wa.edu.au

Respectful Relationships; Love at Home – How to get along with your kids and help them get along with you (and their siblings)

We all say we get along just fine at home… but there are those uncomfortable niggles. There’s the eye-rolling, the disrespect, the lack of motivation to help out, and the sibling warfare. If we’re honest, most adults have been known to shout a bit too, and let’s face it, we don’t always listen that well to our kids. Conflict and friction at home cause more trouble than we need, and interfere with everyone’s wellbeing. Wouldn’t it be great if there were some simple, practical things we could do to help everyone get along better – starting right now? Parents will learn the best ‘relationship rules’ for a happier family so home life really does feel loving… most of the time! The presentation will be followed by a Question and Answer session.
When: Monday 25 March, 7.00pm – 8.30pm
Where: Marist Auditorium
RSVP: jo.dunn@newman.wa.edu.au

Updated ICT Policy

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) includes any electronic device or application used to communicate, create, disseminate, store or manage information such as text, images, audio or video.
Students have the right to learn in a safe environment, including when they have access to ICT to enhance their learning. Newman College is committed to the responsible and educational use of ICT and to the protection of students by providing secure access to these services as part of their learning experience.

The College has completed a period of evaluation on the effectiveness of its ICT policy. While this process involved exploring the current use of ICT at the College, it also involved working with other schools in the Metropolitan area as well as direction from Catholic Education Western Australia. The updated policy is now available for parents, staff and students via the College website. Download ICT Policy

Wellbeing and Counselling Team

The College is pleased to announce our newly formed Wellbeing and Counselling Team. The Wellbeing and Counselling team supports teachers, students and families from Kindy to Year 12. Mr Alan Fitzpatrick Deputy Principal Wellbeing Secondary, and Mitch Bristow Head of Primary lead the team which consists of:

• Amber Newsome, Psychologist
• Jessica Bouquet, Counsellor
• Siobhan Quirke, Counsellor and
• Caryl Gioia, Social Worker

Accessing support from this team is done via Leaders of Wellbeing. Wellbeing programs can be accessed via the College website. Click here

Program details and support materials from guest speakers will be shared by your child’s Leader of Wellbeing. Resources available to families and students will be shared and published to the College community via the notices and newsletter.

Student Code of Conduct

Leaders of Wellbeing, supported by Mr Fitzpatrick and Mr Bristow, in collaboration with student leaders, will be developing a Student Code of Conduct which seeks to uphold the same intent as the College Code of Conduct in a way that is meaningful to students. The conduct statements inform our Respect framework which applies to all students. We are committed to ensuring student voice is heard and used to support all relationships between students and staff.

Code of Conduct

A reminder to all families that the Code of Conduct can be accessed via the College website. The Code is mandated by Catholic Education Western Australia and the application of the code extends to all staff, students, parents, guardians, caregivers and volunteers.

The Code seeks to value the dignity of every person, foster positive relationships, ensuring confidentiality and accountability and supports professional boundaries. Events held during school hours AND outside of school hours that are associated with the College are also supported by the Code of Conduct. Any perceived breaches of the Code can be discussed with any member of the Senior Leadership Team. We thank you in advance for your understanding and support of how we strive to partner positively with one another.

“If a school adopts a culture of innovation, then deeper learning is a possibility, plain and simple” [NMC Horizon Report 2017 K-12 edition]

The challenge to equip our students to live in this chaotic and rapidly changing world is the optimum ambition for any school that prioritises an improvement agenda. Leading and managing this vision needs to be developed in a way that builds staff capacity and confidence; engages student agency; and invites parent, industry and community input. Put simply, it needs be authentic where the foundation of literacy and numeracy underpins the critical thinking, innovations and creativity that we seek of our learning environment. The movement of schools is towards project-based learning, challenge-based learning, and competency-based learning; all of these pedagogical trends are in service of creating richer and more hands-on, real-world experiences for students. As schools prioritize active learning over rote learning, students are being viewed in a new light. At our College we have undertaken a major restructure of our learning framework through the development of our Vision for Learning, Shine through Discovery – Let your light shine (Matthew 5:16). Our pedagogical framework (Challenge, Collaborate, Create and Celebrate) now informs and guides teaching practice across the College.

The following is a summary of what has emerged as a result of the development, actioning and now the sustaining of our Vision for Learning:

• A strategic approach to staff professional learning
• Focus on growing innovative cultures for school change
• Engaging student voice in their learning
• Parent collaboration and engagement
• Systematic delivery of curriculum
• New contemporary learning spaces reflective of pedagogical pillars
• Sustaining commitment and energy of whole school community
• Ongoing leadership and management of #shinethroughdiscovery
• Captivating creativity, innovation and entrepreneurship

To optimise future schooling for our students, our College will continue to seek to be proactively and consistently scanning a wide variety of horizons, searching for enablers and alerts to barriers. In developing a contemporary learning experience for our students, we are committed to providing staff with professional learning that will equip them with the relevant skills required. An example of this is the partnership we have formed with Republic Polytechnic in Singapore to provide a learning immersion experience where participants will be introduced to the concept of scaffolding, inquiry path, closure and an overview of holistic assessment in Problem Based Learning (PBL) that will support students’ learning. Later in the year, selected students will also have the opportunity to go to Singapore for a learning immersion.

Perhaps the greatest challenge for schools, moreover society, is the adoption of technology as the dominate paradigm for engagement. We oscillate between varying arguments, being on-screen time for our students and their exposure to the ills that come with the use of technology. Our reality though is that we must prepare our teachers, students, parents/guardians and our community for the future and, ultimately, the imperative of technology in our civic, social and human domains of engagement.

To this end, NMC Horizon Report 2017 K-12 edition outlines the following challenges facing schools: Download NMC Horizon Report 2017 K-12 Edition

• Improving Digital Literacy. To use technology productively and enable intuitive adaptation to new contexts and co-creation of content with others, students must acquire a deep understanding of the digital environment. Schools are charged with developing students’ digital citizenship, ensuring mastery of responsible and appropriate technology use, including online etiquette and digital rights and responsibilities in blended and online learning settings.
• Rethinking the Roles of Teachers. Teachers are increasingly expected to be adept at a variety of technology-based and other approaches for content delivery, learner support, and assessment. In the technology-enabled classroom, educators are moving beyond dispensing information and assessing students’ knowledge, which are tasks that can be increasingly outsourced to machines.
• Teaching Computational Thinking. Teaching computational thinking, synonymous with complex thinking, is still in its ascendancy as definitions continue to evolve and as curricula are built, and it is requiring the development of new forms of pre-service and inservice teacher training to be adequately taught in schools. To succeed in the 21st century, it is essential for young people to learn how to be computational thinkers, defined by the International Society for Technology in Education as the ability for students to “develop and employ strategies for understanding and solving problems in ways that leverage the power of technological methods to develop and test solutions.”
• The Achievement Gap. The achievement gap refers to an observed disparity in academic performance among student groups, especially as defined by socioeconomic status, race, ethnicity, or gender. This challenge also encompasses geographic inequities in student achievement as well as disparate access to educational opportunities inside and outside school.
• Sustaining Innovation through Leadership Changes. Multiple resources, including funding, time, and personnel, are required to effectively implement the innovative teaching and learning pedagogies highlighted throughout this report. Disruption to any one of these resources leaves organizations scrambling to fill the missing pieces. The process of preparing for the unknown is not always well defined, nor is it currently the norm in K–12 schools.

Our ambition as a College is one that cultivates excellence and recognises achievement. We believe that Shine through Discovery – Let your light shine (Matthew 5:16) has permeated all aspects of our learning environment and given license to our students and staff to be innovative, creative and entrepreneurial. We look forward to what is yet possible and yet to be realised for students and staff. This imperative is best summed up in the words of our Founder, St Marcellin Champagnat – “May their lives be an echo of what you have taught them”.

College Production

We are delighted to be staging Masquerade at Newman College in 2019. Masquerade is a play (with music) written by WA playwright Kate Mulvany. It is a beautiful and whimsical play based on the children’s picture book of the same name, by Kit Williams. In the book Jack Hare embarks on a wild and wonderful journey as he searches for the amulet that symbolises enduring love. Jack’s struggle parallels with the journey of a young boy Joe. Joe who is undergoing cancer treatment, is comforted by the pages of the book, and Jack’s journey. As the celestial and human worlds begin to collide the themes of family love, hope and dreams are explored.

At the heart of this magical musical adventure are the themes of family, courage, morality, dreams and love. The production promises to be a theatrical experience for all members of the family.

Performing Arts at Newman College is a significant learning area and its continued growth is ensured under the leadership of Leader of learning Arts, Mrs Maree Grayden. Our College’s Vision for Learning, Shine through Discovery- Let you light shine (Matthew 5:16) inspires our faith and learning community to Challenge, Collaborate, Create and Celebrate who we are and what we seek to achieve. We are a College that values excellence in the growth and development of our students. This production exemplifies our commitment to the creativity, commitment and hard work of our students and staff.

I applaud the staff for their vision in bringing this incredible story to the stage.

‘Trusting in God is both the most difficult and the easiest thing we are invited to do. It is the most difficult, because we always want to be in control, driven, in part, by the expectations of others, or ourselves. We are created by God. We are made in God’s image’ – Sean Cullen

Lent is a precious time of retreat for Catholics across the world. We know that Lent is a time of renewal in faith, hope and love so that we can enter more fully into the celebration of the Sacred Triduum of Jesus’ last supper, his suffering and death on the cross, and his glorious resurrection. As a PK-12 College community, our recognition of Shrove Tuesday, and the commencement of our Lenten journey on Ash Wednesday with liturgies across our three campuses serve to invite each of us to walk with one another during this time of renewal and refocus.

Year 10 Damascus Day, Wednesday 6 March

The Newman College Ministry Plan seeks to invite all students into an experience of prayer and ongoing Christian discipleship. Across Years 3–10, all students are afforded an opportunity to experience an annual retreat day. The Year 10 Damascus Day is an opportunity provided to all students in Year 10 to stop, withdraw and reflect on the opportunities and abundance they are called into on their own personal journey, and the collective journey of the cohort. We thank the Perth-based Youth Mission Team for again facilitating this day, and for the inspiring witness to a faith filled life they give to all our students to ‘come, follow me’.

PROJECT COMPASSION UPDATE

Shrove Tuesday

Students from the Blue and Gold Remar Caravels sold pancakes on the Marcellin and Lavalla Campuses on Shrove Tuesday (5 March) in support of Project Compassion. Students at the Marian campus also received pancakes, with the Kindy and Pre Primary students making theirs with the help of their teachers. A total of $816.85 was raised across the three campuses. A huge thank you and congratulation to those who participated in this fundraising event for Project Compassion.

Walk for Water @ Marian

On Tuesday, students on the Marian Campus took part in the Walk for Water initiative to help them understand how some children around the world walk for many kilometres just to get water each day. Students watched the story of Thandolwayo who risks her life each day just to bring water back for her family? Click here to hear her story. We ask all families to support Caritas this Lent by donating their spare change to Project Compassion.

Caritas Fast @ Marcellin

Project Compassion brings thousands of Australians together in solidarity with the world’s poor to help end poverty, promote justice and uphold dignity. This year, in support of Project Compassion, students were invited to participate in the Caritas Fast held on Wednesday 13 March. Over 150 students participated in the Fast which saw them forgo their usual meals throughout the school day. The students were given barley sugars at recess and a handful of cold, cooked rice at lunch and a muffin at the end of the day. This small amount of food aimed at helping students appreciate how little some people in our world have to eat. It was a fantastic day which helped raise $3630.95 for Project Compassion. Thank you to all those who participated and a special thank you to the Ministry Team, Guild Coordinators, Guild Captains, Mrs McFadden and Mr Jones for their support in the lead up to and on the day of the event.

Year 6 Reconciliation

On Thursday we welcomed Fr Chinh from the Doubleview Parish of Holy Rosary to Newman College. Fr Chinh provided Reconciliation for our Year 6 students and we are blessed to have his support. We look forward to working with Fr Chinh in the future as he supports the Lavalla Campus.

Reconciliation

The Sacrament of Reconciliation allows us to repair our relationship with God by asking forgiveness for our misgivings. Students in Years 4-6 will take part in Reconciliation over the next few weeks. We welcome Fr Chinh from the Doubleview Parish who will be offering this for our community. Parents are welcome to join their child in this healing process.

Weekly Thursday Morning Community Mass (Champagnat Chapel – 8.10am – 8.35am)

All parents, guardians and families across our PK-12 College are invited to attend the weekly Thursday morning Mass celebrated by Fr Joseph Tran and Fr Mark Baumgarten. Our weekly Newman College Community Mass is an important way that we as a Catholic community seek to nourish and live-out our faith in community with one another.

At Mass on Thursday 21 March, we will commission seven Year 12 students who have recently completed their formation as Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion. We congratulate these students on this milestone in their journey.

Sacrament Reminder

Families are reminded to visit their relevant parish website for all information regarding 2019 Sacrament dates and registration. Alternatively please click here to access parish website addresses via the College website. The enrolment dates vary, so please take the time to clearly understand the process for your parish. Students in Years 3, 4 and 6 will undertake the preparatory work in class so they are able to receive the Sacrament in their local parish.

24:7 Youth Group

• For all youth in Years 6-12
• St Joseph’s Subiaco every Friday 6.30pm – 8.30pm in the Parish Upper room
• Call Aidan Walsh 0487 403 456 or Angela Firth 0455 960 174 for more information

Floreat Youth Group

• St Cecilia’s Parish Centre, 47 Peebles Rd, Floreat
• Every Sunday 6.00pm – 8.00pm
• Call Sebastian on 0403230395 or Emma on 0412310019 for more information