Term 3 Week 2

What's on at St Joey's

We look forward to seeing you at our Stay & Play days. Please note these days are in addition to our Transition Days for Kinder 2026. Parents must stay & supervise their children at our Stay & Play playgroup mornings.

Principal's Messages

                                                                              Celebrating Growth and Looking Ahead

As we begin the second half of the school year, I want to take a moment to reflect on the growth we’ve already seen across our school community and share some exciting updates and plans for the term ahead. Semester 2 provides a wonderful opportunity for a fresh start. Over the past week, I’ve been lucky enough to spend time in classrooms and in the playground chatting with students about their goals for the term. Whether it’s aiming to improve in a subject, working on friendships, or remembering to pack their hat every day, students are thinking intentionally about their own learning and behaviour. These small conversations are powerful reminders of the responsibility and pride our students take in being part of St Joseph’s.

We are continuing to support students in setting meaningful learning goals and engaging them in reflective conversations about their day — “What did you learn today?”, “What was something you were proud of?”, “What was a challenge you overcame?” These daily check-ins, both at school and at home, help build student confidence and promote a culture of gratitude, growth and connection.

I also want to thank families for your ongoing support of our Building Levy. This term, we have completed several important upgrades using these funds. We have installed a new automatic pedestrian gate, improving safety and access to the school grounds. We’ve also upgraded the pathways, down to our bottom oval making them safer and more accessible for all. To complement this, we’ve refreshed the surrounding gardens, adding colour and life to the heart of our school. These improvements not only enhance the functionality of our site but also create a more welcoming and attractive space for our students and families.

Thank you for your partnership as we work together to ensure the very best for our students. I look forward to what this term brings — both in the classroom and in the many ways we grow as a community.

Warm regards,
Kathryn Hill

Assistant Principal

Curriculum News – Grow Your Mind

This year, St Joseph’s have invested in the ‘Grow Your Mind’ program as a whole school approach to wellbeing. It is an engaging and innovative mental health program that introduces students to the fundamentals of social-emotional resilience and self-care. It is linked to the NSW PDH/PE curriculum and our school’s wellbeing SIP goal that ‘All students feel safe and supported at school through consistent implementation of whole-school wellbeing strategies and processes.’ Last term, classes trialed the introductory program and we are now exploring different topics such as how the brain works, friendships and belonging, consent or growth mindset in Physical Development/Health lessons. We are also using 5 minutes of daily mindful routines throughout the day.

Introduction to the animals

In Grow Your Mind, key parts of the brain and their core functions are taught through different animals. The animals are a playful and engaging way to teach children about their brain and links it to social and emotional wellbeing habits.  Here is a helpful video of all the animals.

This fortnight we are learning about the guard dog (the amygdala). Your guard dog keeps you safe at all costs. It senses danger and lets you fight, freeze or flee without even thinking about it. It is also linked with your emotions.  When we are feeling happy, joyful, safe, relaxed our guard dog (amygdala) is quiet & small. If you are worried, confused, fearful, upset, your guard dog (amygdala) is very big / barking loudly and cannot make wise decisions or make a plan about what to do next.

The eSafety Commissioner (eSafety)

The eSafety Commissioner is Australia’s independent regulator for online safety. It educates Australians about online safety risks and helps to remove harmful content such as cyberbullying of children and young people, image-based abuse and illegal and restricted content.

Parents and carers can access free webinars and resources to help keep children safe online. This relevant information covers issues including cyberbullying, parental controls, child grooming, sexting, doxing, trolling and privacy. Follow the links below:

https://www.esafety.gov.au/parents/webinars

https://www.esafety.gov.au/parents/resources

Council of Catholic School Parents

Did you know that there is group of parent volunteers across NSW and Canberra who provide leadership, advocacy and support to all parents and carers of students in Catholic schools? They offer support and resources to families and schools, as well as engaging with fellow parents. Check out their website.

Two free webinars this month include:

• Strengthening young people against anxiety with psychologist Karen Young – Tuesday 5^th August 7-8.30pm

https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_1F2ru7CCQy-Ey1hGpbn-vw    

• Sleep impacts learning, mental health and behaviour - Wednesday 13 August 7pm – 8pm (see flyer or website to register)

https://ccsp.schoolzineplus.com/parent-talk-enews?nid=45

Kind regards,

Frances Courtney

Assistant Principal

News from the Religious Coordinator

Grandparents Day

Come and celebrate with us on Wednesday. Bring a rug or a picnic chair for the BYO picnic. Please leave plenty of time for parking. Those with mobility issues may be dropped at kiss and ride. See below for more information.

St. Mary Mackillop’s Feast Day

On Friday, 8th August is the Feast of St Mary of the Cross Mackillop. She is Australia’s first saint and is known for founding the St Josephite sisters and starting schools with the intent of educating disadvantaged children who would otherwise miss out on schooling. These Josephite schools have spread across our Diocese including our school St Joseph’s which follows the traditions of the Josephite sisters who founded our school.

Please join us on the 8th August at 9am on tar as year 4 lead us in an important liturgy to remember this great saint.

Invitation to the Celebration to mark the closing of the Sisters of St Joseph's Convent

An important milestone in the life of our school and Parish is occurring. The Sisters of St Joseph, who founded our school, and many other schools in our Diocese, are closing their convent at Charlestown. This is a special and historic event and it will be held on Saturday the 9th August.

We are inviting members of our school community, particularly our senior students, to show leadership by attending this occasion. It is important that we continue the legacy of the Sisters of St Joseph's, established by St Mary of the Cross Mackillop.

The schedule for the day is:

10:30am: Closure of the convent, 11 Milson St, Charlestown

11:00am: Mass

12:15pm: Lunch

1:45pm: Formal farewell to the sisters

Please RSVP to Mrs Kathryn Hill by Wednesday, 6th August - Kathryn.Hill@mn.catholic.edu.au

Religious Literacy test

On Tuesday 2nd September year 6 students will be assessed about their religious literacy knowledge gained through the years at school, but particularly years 5 and 6. The assessment will occur on computers so students will need to bring a fully charged computer and earphones. Please ensure that your child is here on time and has the equipment needed.

Catholic Care Fundraiser

Catholic Care is an agency who support the homeless and disadvantaged through soup kitchens, aged care and health and housing services. On Friday the 15th August, we will follow in the tradition of St Mary Mackillop and never seeing a need without doing something about it. To make a difference we will have an infants and primary morning/ afternoon of fun sporting activities led by our year 5 students too support Catholic Care.

To participate it will be $3 per student or $5 per family.

Thank you for your support

Heads Up Father’s Day Celebrations, 5th September

We will hold a Dad’s and Donut’s Day celebration for Father’s Day for all fathers, granddads and father figures to occur on Friday, 5th September. The celebration will start on tar at 1:30pm with a prayer and a song. We will then have a myriad of indoor and outdoor activities to enjoy and donuts (including gluten free ) to eat. We hope you can join us.

School Fees

Dear St Joseph’s Family,

Welcome back to Term 3. I hope all the children have settled in comfortably and that everyone has enjoyed a positive start to the new term.

This is a friendly reminder to kindly continue making your school fee payments as allocated through Compass. We sincerely appreciate all the families who are regularly keeping up with their payments and those who have already finalised their fees.

If your family is experiencing any hardship or would like to discuss your fees, please don’t hesitate to contact the admin office. We are here to support you.

Thank you for your ongoing support and cooperation.

Amale Yi

Office of Safeguarding

School Improvement Plan

2025 School Improvement: At St Joseph’s, we are committed to continuous improvement and growth in all areas of school life. In 2025, we will be focusing on our three School Improvement Goals, which will guide our efforts to enhance student learning, well-being, and engagement, ensuring the best possible outcomes for all.

Primary Coordinator

Garden Group

Class News: Year 6

HUB News

Book Week

Book Week is happening next week! We are so excited that our favourite celebration has arrived. We have many activities and fun events planned. Please see below for further details:

Author Visit

On Monday July 28, author Nat Amoore is visiting our school. All students will have the opportunity to meet Nat and listen to her deliver fun, inspiring and informative talks. Nat will be signing books in the library at lunchtime, so students are welcome to bring copies of Nat's books to have signed on the day. Nat's books can be purchased directly from her website - https://www.natamoore.com/books/ or from bookshops.

Book Fair

Our library will be turned into a magical bookshop throughout Book Week! The fair will be open for sales to our school community on Wednesday and Thursday only. Cash and card payments are welcome. We will not be accepting online sales this year, due to only opening for sales on selected days. Students will have the opportunity to fill out their wish lists before Wednesday, which is where they list all of the items they wish to buy from the fair. Please do not make online purchases from the wish lists, thank you for your understanding.

The book fair will be open for sales on Wednesday 8.30am-12:00pm. Please pop in anytime throughout open classrooms and BYO picnic lunch on Grandparents Day. We will be open on Thursday for sales before school (8.30am-9:00am) and at lunchtime for last minute purchases.

Book Parade

On Thursday July 31, we will be meeting on tar at 9am as a whole school to show off our wonderful bookish costumes! All classes will be parading and we can’t wait for the joy that dressing up brings our students (and staff!). All parents, grandparents and members of our community are welcome to join us for this fabulous celebration.

Book Week Competitions

Students are invited to enter as many Book Week competitions as they wish for a chance to win either a book prize (written by Nat Amoore) or a $10 voucher for the book fair. The winners will be announced on Wednesday next week, so entries need to be in by 9:00am Wednesday morning at the latest. Entry forms and colouring competitions can be collected from the library or printed from Compass.

Competitions:

• Guess the maps - correctly guess which books the maps are from, for a chance to win a prize.
• Colouring-in competition
• Guess the page – guess the page that the bookmark is resting against in the Nat Amoore book to win the book (on display in the library).
• Guess the shortlisted book - de-code the Emojis to identify the correct shortlisted book. Use the Children’s Book Council of Australia website to assist with this activity, where the list of 2025 shortlisted books can be found.
• Book adventure photo - take a photo of you reading in an adventurous place/position for a chance to win a prize! Please print your photo and hand to Mrs Gibson or Mrs Hoffmann.

Happy reading!

Mrs Gibson – Teacher Librarian

Mrs Hoffmann – Library Assistant

Story Dog News

St Joseph's very own Story Dog ‘Ted’ was a special guest at the Riverina Readers Festival in Wagga during the school holidays! Here is a photo of Leonie and Ted enjoying their time at the festival.

Aboriginal Education

Happy Birthday to the following students

We wish the following students a very happy birthday!

FACE - Family and Community Engagement

Our next Family and Community Engagement (FACE) meeting will be held on Friday 19th September, at 1:00pm in the HUB, just before our Whole School Writing Fair. All are warmly welcome to attend. We’ll be sharing our Learning Goals and Vision, and we’re keen to hear your input on these, as well as upcoming fundraising initiatives. We look forward to seeing you there and working together to support our school community.

Canteen News

Kelly our Canteen Officer would love to see you if you have a spare couple of hours to assist in the canteen. Volunteers need to be registered with our CSO, by following this link: https://www.mn.catholic.org.au/people/volunteer/

Once cleared please sign up for a shift. The children love to see you here!

https://signup.zone/ZYkfNzsbws83p9yHM

Hall of Fame

We love celebrating the achievements of our students both in and out of the classroom! If your child has recently accomplished something special in sports or any extracurricular activity, we encourage you to share their success with us. Whether it's a competition, performance, or personal milestone, we'd be thrilled to feature their accomplishments in our school newsletter. Please let us know so we can celebrate their hard work and dedication!

Congratulations to Billie E who competed at the NSW Country Championships before the holidays. She won 7 medals. 🥇She will compete at NSW State Championships in September.

Little Billie is hard at work honing her skills in many areas from sports to performance to academics. During the July school break, she debuted her new jazz solo and came away with a Highly Commended in her first competition and then a 2nd place finish in her second competition. It will be exciting to watch her grow and evolve as the competition season draws on. We are so proud of you Billie!

Good For Kids - Good For Life

Uniform Shop

Normal Shop Hours - Every Tuesday and Thursday 8am-10am 

See Elaine and Ian from Wearitto for all your uniform needs.

Our uniform shop is run by Wearitto: 

OOSH

The before and after school care at St Joseph’s is provided by St Nicholas OOSH, Diocese of Maitland Newcastle.  Open form 7am-8:30am and 3:00pm-6:00pm. 

Please contact Taylor for further information.  

Taylor Richardson  
NOMINATED SUPERVISOR | ST NICHOLAS OOSH    
P 0429 435 571     M  0429 435 571   
Email taylor.richardson@stnicholasoosh.org.au Visit us online www.stnicholasoosh.org.au