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Date	Activity	Venue	Details
Fri 14 Oct	Chapel & Assembly	St John’s Church	8.45am – All Welcome. Come and join us for Coffee & Connect from 8am
Fri 14 Oct	Prep 2023 Transition Morning		Students in Prep 2023; see emailed information
Mon 17 Oct	Swimming Lessons		Prep – Year 6; see emailed information
Thu 24 Nov	Twilight Concert	TBC	Save the Date! More information to come

 

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Welcome to Term 4. Our final term of the year. Where has it gone? Over the coming term we have some Health and Wellbeing events to draw your attention to.

eSafety Parent and Carer guide to Digital Safety and Mental Health

Do you know how how games, apps and social media can influence young people’s mental wellbeing? The eSafetyComissioner has scheduled the following webinar to assist in our understanding as parents, carers and educators, the impact digital technology has on the health of young people.

This webinar is designed for parents and carers of young people aged 10 to 18.

It will cover:

• current research on young people, time online and mental health
• what to do about accidental exposure to content about suicide, self-harm or eating disorders
• using games, apps and social media to support mental wellbeing
• the pros and cons of digital mental health platforms
• strategies for young people to support friends online.

We are encouraging our parent and school community to register for one of the following webinars for valuable and much needed information; giving our parents and carers tge knowledge, skills and tools to support their children to have safe online experiences.

REGISTER NOW

 

Life Education – ‘Talk About It’ – Year 4-6

Life Education Queensland will be providing a sensitive and age-appropriate program designed to help support students to understand and manage physical and emotional changes and engage in respectful relationships – ‘Talk about it.’

The program offers opportunity for students to learn more about physical growth and development, identity and self-esteem, diversity and inclusion, managing and maintaining healthy relationships, peer pressure and protective behaviours, and hygiene and pubescent changes. As educators and parents, we are aware that children are learning about such topics from many different sources including television, social media and their peers. In engaging a Life Education Specialist Health Educator, we are able to provide content delivery at an appropriate level, aligned with the Australian Curriculum and supportive of our ethos as a school.

Student sessions will occur at school during the regular school day on Thursday 20 October and parents are encouraged to join us for a ‘Talk about it’ Parent Zoom session, scheduled on Wednesday 19 October from 5:45 p.m. for approximately one hour. Please register your interest in the ‘Talk about it’ Parent Zoom session below.

Life Education – ‘Talk about it’ Parent Zoom Session

Shoeboxes for Operation Christmas Child

St John’s Congregation has participated in Operation Christmas Child for many years now. Shoeboxes are filled with Christmas gifts and sent to children in many Pacific countries. These are children who otherwise would not receive Christmas presents. After receiving the gifts, the children are invited to participate in a program to learn more about Christ. These shoeboxes are now available for you to fill with gifts of love and are to be RETURNED BY 15 OCTOBER to the Church or to the Parish Office.

Those who cannot pack a box can bring a donation and place it in the donation bottle at the entrance to St John’s. Shoeboxes are available from Church or the Parish Office. Please include a $10 donation per shoebox for postage etc. Your gift will be a great blessing to the one who receives it. Please contact the Church Office on 41525900 for further information.

Family Fun Night

This coming Friday evening, 14 October at 6:30 pm we will be holding our first Term 4 Family Fun Night. Join us for a night of games and a shared meal! More details can be found in the flyer below.

There will be further Family Fun and Faith Gatherings this term. The dates are as follows:

Family Faith October 27

Family Fun November 11

Qld Mental Health Week

You may be aware that 8-16 October marks Queensland Mental Health Week. The new theme for this year’s Queensland Mental Health Week is ‘Awareness, Belonging, Connection’, reflecting the important factors that help people maintain positive mental health and wellbeing.

• Awareness is about understanding the things we need to maintain and boost our mental wellbeing, and knowing when we need to reach out for help and where to get it.
• Belonging is about looking out for each other, ensuring we feel safe and supported, and understanding that however we feel, we’re not alone, and that there are others going through the same thing.
• Connection is about our relationships with our friends, families, and those that we care about, as well as the groups, clubs, and networks around us that we rely on to help keep us happy and healthy, wherever we live, work, or play.

We can learn about the activities that boost our mental health. There are six different areas (or building blocks) of mental wellbeing. Each building block helps us respond to the range of mental tasks we face every day, in a unique and powerful way. To keep our minds in top condition, we can use each building block regularly.

The building blocks | Your Mental Wellbeing (initiatives.qld.gov.au)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Grace and Peace

Tamara Carroll

Director of Pastoral Care & Wellbeing

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ICAS CERTIFICATES

Thank you to those parents and grandparents who were able to attend our weekly assembly last Friday and be witness to students receiving ICAS – English certificates.

Well done to all who participated!

 

THANK YOU FOR SUPPORTING OUR YEAR 6 MARKET MORNING

As a result of our school community support our Year 6 students have been able use the profit from their market stalls to make a substantial donation to our local Angels Community Group. Our Year 6 School Leaders have presented Angels with $1378.00 to assist with their program helping those doing it tough.

 

HOMEWORK

Homework begins this week. Homework at St John’s is set to allow students to revise concepts learnt in class and to practise and consolidate fundamental skills such as: sight words, reading and mathematical concepts.

As teachers and school staff we certainly understand that homework can at times add to the business of many families. At our school this is why we have chosen that homework is handed in on Monday mornings – this allows families some flexibility as to when they complete their 4 nights of expected homework. Families may choose 4 weeknights or 2 weeknights and 2 days over the weekend.

Please encourage your child to complete their weekly homework and hand it in each Monday.

Happy Term 4 and I look forward to connecting with you and working with you this term.

Jocelyn Bakker

Director of Learning and Teaching

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Earthing Greetings, Earthlings! Oh, sorry, earth-ing.

Earthing: The action of walking on (grass/sand) bare feet: soaking up the earth’s energy through your soles. (urbandictionary. com)

How interesting. I don’t know about ‘the earth’s energy’ but certainly there is a lot of sensory information we get through the soles of our feet that we miss when we have shoes on.

Early last term I attended a Spiritual Retreat with other principals from Queensland Lutheran Schools. We met on the Sunshine Coast and spent some time reflecting on a few Bible passages and in prayer, having a meal together and just kind of getting away from it all for a day in each other’s company. There is a famous quote from one of our principal colleagues that we often throw around when we get together. ‘The only place you don’t feel like a principal is when you’re with other principals.’ That supportive collegiality is special, taking time to consider our work and our spirituality, to focus, or re-focus is important. Part of that retreat included some time wandering on the beach at Mooloolaba Beach. We were invited to go and find a quiet place, to sit, to soak up the environment, to avoid emails and questions and people….. just to be.

It was lovely. We took off our shoes, walked on the sand, sat in the shade, watched people go by, listened to toddlers chatting with young mums, avoided those seagulls that are wandering around. The sun was out, that smell of a new spring was in the air. The moment was rejuvenating and important. But it was deeper than hippie stuff and avoiding workI The theme for the retreat was incarnation. A simple translation for this word could be, becoming flesh. More usually it is referred to in relation to God becoming human in the form of Jesus. He was incarnate. Our amazing, infinite, powerful, eternal, glorious, lightning-bolts-coming-out-of-his-eyeballs God humbled himself and took on human form. And a frail one at that, a tiny baby to start with, completely at the mercy of the world. Immanuel, God with us. God was not just ‘with us’ as a bloke who walked around Palestine 2000 years ago. He is actually present every day. Our infinite God of Love is present physically in the world. The Bible tells us, ‘… since the creation of the world, God’s invisible qualities, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made…’ (Romans 1:20).

In other words, you can experience God through nature. Yes, that beautiful sunset, that clear blue sky, that rolling sea or gentle breeze, that scary storm or the smell of blossoms in spring, the taste of food, the majesty of forests, grass under your feet, the list goes on. God didn’t make it all a gazillion years ago, disappear for millennia, send his Son down to sort it out 2000 years ago and then take off again. He is here, He calls to us in every moment, He always has. He is as close as our breath. Indeed, His name YHWH is breath itself, the word in Hebrew is designed to be breathed not spoken. It’s always God’s work. He is not an old-fashioned idea but an ever-present help. He is active in the world, healing through the work of doctors, loving through the hugs of mums and dads, feeding us through the work of farmers and shops, and raising and growing our kids through the work of staff in schools.

As you go about this day, week, month, term, I encourage you all to take time to be with God and bask in His glorious creation.

(Some Contents Cited)

Be like a Bumblebee

According to scientists, the bumblebee’s body is too heavy and its wing-span too small.

Aerodynamically, the bumblebee cannot fly. But the bumblebee doesn’t know that, and it keeps flying. When you don’t know your limitations, you go out and surprise yourself. In hindsight, you wonder if you had any limitations. The only limitations a person has are those that are self-imposed.

Don’t let yourself or others put limitations on you.

This is an exciting time of the year as we celebrate student achievement across the school. There will be a few events as the year draws to a close where the student body will be able to come together as a community and share in the successes of 2022.

This final term for the year has started well with all classes underway with their units of work. In addition, many other activities are planned or already in progress. It promises to be both a busy but rewarding term ahead and I would like to encourage all students to continue to strive for excellence in all areas of their school life – academic, social, physical, spiritual.

We welcome some new students and families into our school community across year levels. Please join me in making our new families welcome.

Our Term 4 Goal: Start Strong, Finish Strong, Together.

 Thank you for working in partnership with us.

Grace and Peace

Chris Mallett

PRINCIPAL

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