Dear Families,
Last Thursday we held our School Concert at the Christian Family Centre at Seaton. This was a fantastic event and a culmination of a great deal of work from the students and the staff. I would like to thank Naomi Ali, our Music Teacher, who planned the concert and organised a wide variety of items for the classes to perform. Thank you to our staff who supported Naomi with extra practices, making costumes and props, and encouraging our children to do their best. You should be very proud of your children, they were simply amazing on the night. Thank you to all of you who were able to attend, enjoy the atmosphere and support our young stars!
On Tuesday night of this week our School Choir performed at the Entertainment Centre as a part of the Catholic Schools Music Festival. Our seven young people joined students from a whole range of other Catholic schools to form a 400 strong choir. They did a tremendous job and sounded simply amazing. When your child gets to Year 5 or Year 6 please encourage them consider joining the choir. It is such a great experience for them to be on the big stage in a big choir that always sounds fantastic. Congratulations and well done to Angelina, Anjleen, Anna, Marissa, Mikaela, Natasha and Xavier. Thank you to Naomi Ali for supporting and preparing our students for the choir they were simply awesome.
In May this year our Year 3 and Year 5 students sat the NAPLAN tests and this week they have received their results. The Year Three Writing test was completed on paper while all other tests (Reading, Spelling, Punctuation and Grammar, Numeracy) were all completed online. As always I ask parents to consider these tests as one part of the overall learning that your children do in their time at school. It provides useful information for us to complement all the other information that the teacher gathers about learning throughout the year.
Also arriving this week were our School Photos and new Hats. Thank you for your patience in waiting for their arrival.
The Womens and Childrens Hospital has a new virtual assessment and referral service "Child and Adolescent Virtual Urgent Care Service". This new service allows children aged 1 to 18 years with non-life threatening conditions to receive advice and coordinated care over a video platform. Run by a highly skilled team of emergency consultants, nurses and administration staff, the service will allow children who are well enough to avoid hospital receive expert advice virtually, no matter where they are. Information about the service is available at www.wch.sa.gov.au/virtualurgentcare, including materials you can print and a series of frequently asked questions.
Over recent times we have had a real decline in the number of students using School Banking and we have had difficulty in obtaining volunteers to administer the service at TWCS on a regular basis. Thank you to Michelle and Allison who have stepped in and maintained it for us in recent times. There may be a number of reasons for the decline. Maybe it is the reduced reliance on cash in society today. Maybe it is the economic reality of very low interest rates. Maybe it is the bad press that these services have received recently, especially in some of the eastern states, where the Minister has banned school banking in the government schools. We discussed School Banking at the School Board last night and given the decline and current climate we felt that now was the time to discontinue offering this service through TWCS. While we do still consider financial literacy and the idea of saving to be valuable, it has just become impractical in our school setting. Families with student accounts are still able to continue banking at any Commonwealth Bank Branch or consider other options. Thank you for your understanding.
Congratulations and all the best to Isabella's mum and dad (Donna and Craig) for their wedding this Sunday. May it be a really special celebration for you and your family.
I encourage you to support the upcoming Parents and Friends events – the Picnic on our school oval on Thursday 7 October and the Quiz Night on Saturday 6 November.
In the past couple of weeks I have made some new staff appointments. Firstly we welcomed a new Education Support Officer (ESO), Karlee Cave, who comes to us from Our Lady of Grace School at Glengowrie. Karlee will provide support in a variety of classes on Wednesday and Thursday of each week. You would all be aware that Heather Docherty is having a baby and will take leave from Week 4 of Term 4. I have appointed Kate Mainprize to teach Year 4/5Purple for the last 6 weeks of the school year. Kate has been working at Christ the King School at Warradale. The other appointments are permanent appointments to commence next year. The first is our very own Gina Margush, who goes from part time to full time. The second is Brooke Flatman who joins us from McAuley Community School at Hove. I would like to congratulate Nicole Puopolo who has been appointed to a permanent position in 2022 at St John Bosco. We will get to farewell Nicole and the end of the year. I am sure you will join me in welcoming Karlee, Kate, Gina and Brooke. I also wish Heather every blessing for the lead up to the birth of her new baby.
This week our teachers have held Parent Teacher Learning Conversations by telephone. Thank you to all those parents who took up the offer of having a conversation. I hope you found it useful for finding out more about your child and how you can support them with their ongoing learning. A special thank you to our teachers who took the time to prepare and provide these conversations after an already full day at work.
Again another school term has simply flown by and we now begin the school holidays. I would like to take this opportunity to say thank you for welcoming me into your wonderful community over the past 18 months. I feel truly blessed to have met such a delightful group of students, dedicated staff and supportive parents. It has been an absolute pleasure to greet children and families each morning at the gate. While I leave a term earlier than expected, I take with me fond memories and the knowledge that the school is in the very good hands of Mr Ben Catalano who takes up the position of Principal in Term 4. I wish Ben well in his new role and know that you will provide him the same support and welcome that you offered me. I would like to thank the Staff and School Board for their support in my time at Tenison Woods. A special thank you to those with whom I have worked closely with: Rita Campbell, the Leadership Team and the Office Staff. As I move to St Thomas School and Pre-School at Goodwood, I pray for God's blessing upon each of you and every one of our Tenison Wood's families.
Australia's only saint, Mary MacKillop, left us with many quotes and I would like to leave you with one:
"Be a gift of love and compassion for one another".
Kind regards
Peter Mercer
Principal
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