St Francis Catholic School - Hughenden eNewsletter

From the Principal

Last week, we proudly inducted our new student leaders, Rhianna and Miranda. We look forward to a fantastic year with these two leading the way. They have some exciting ideas they can’t wait to share with our school community in 2025, and I am confident they will lead with pride, faith, and love.

Our Year 6 girls have had a busy week, also heading off to Julia Creek for the Midwest Netball Trials. A big thank you to Emily Page for driving them and to Miss Danielle and Miss Rowe for assisting with the trials. Our netball superstars did very well, with Rhianna being selected into the Midwest team and Miranda being selected as a shadow! A massive congratulations to them both. On the topic of sport we also wish Hayley well as she heads to the North West Swimming Trials in Barcaline tomorrow!

This week, I sent home information regarding NAPLAN, which will take place from March 12-17. I will be conducting the tests with our Year 3 and Year 5 students. Please check COMPASS for more details about the testing schedule and preparation.

Recently, our Teaching and Learning team from Townsville Catholic Education introduced DIBELS in all diocesan schools. DIBELS (Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills) is a set of short, one-minute reading assessments designed to track students' progress in key literacy skills from Prep to Year 8. These assessments help teachers identify students who may need extra support and ensure every child is developing strong foundational reading skills. On Tuesday, Miss Allison and I participated in professional development to learn how to administer these assessments effectively and use the results to support student learning.

Last week, our Prep and Year 1 students also took part in Early Years screening. This process is a valuable way to assess students’ oral language, literacy, and numeracy skills. Teachers, parents, and students work together to gain a clear understanding of each child’s learning needs. The insights from this screening help teachers tailor their instruction to better support student growth. We also provide parents with feedback, ensuring a collaborative approach to learning.

At St. Francis, we are always striving to enhance our teaching and learning practices to give our students the best opportunities to succeed. Thank you for your ongoing support, and I hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

Sharn Greenaway

Principal

School TV Topic of the Week- School Transitions

Happiness & Gratitude

Happiness is a term that captures a huge variety of positive emotions such as humour, serenity, optimism, joy, pride, inspiration, love and hope. Happiness means different things, to different people and is essential to your understanding of emotional literacy. Throughout history, philosophers, religious writers and poets have pondered on the meaning of happiness and how it might be achieved. In the last few decades, scientists and psychologists have researched this further by studying a field of science called positive psychology.

The result of this research suggests there is a strong correlation between gratitude and greater happiness. Practising gratitude helps you shift your focus to positive memories or experiences, noticing the good in your life. Over time, this will re-wire your brain to create new neural pathways, increase your state of happiness and overall wellbeing.

In this edition of SchoolTV, parents and care-givers will learn how to achieve happiness and the benefits of practising gratitude.

Here is the link to your Edition https://sfsh.catholic.schooltv.me/newsletter/happiness-gratitude

Student Of The Week

Week 3

P/1: Maggie Middleton

2/3: Bella Fryer

4/5/6: Bella Harriman

Week 4

P/1: Bo-Deen Robson

2/3: Danica Howie

4/5/6: Arley Peddle

Maggie- 10th February

Declan- 13th February

Sophie- 13th February

Prep/1 Happenings

Prep/1’s Science Adventure: How Do Toys Move?

This week, our Prep/1 scientists put on their thinking caps and embarked on an exciting scientific investigation! Their mission? To explore how different toys move, sort them into categories, make predictions, conduct experiments, and record their discoveries.

Each student selected a toy from around the classroom and carefully observed its movement. Would it spin, slide, roll, bounce, or swing? After testing their toys, they worked together to sort them into the correct movement category. But the investigation didn’t stop there! The budding scientists then collected and analysed data by creating a graph to determine which type of movement was the most common. The big reveal? Slide was the winner!

It was a fantastic hands-on learning experience that sparked curiosity, collaboration, and critical thinking. Well done, Prep/1!

Miss Brown,

P/1 Teacher

Year 2/3 Happenings

Another busy 2 weeks in Years 2&3!

In Science, we have been exploring the fascinating patterns in the sky, focusing on moon phases. To enrich our understanding, we enjoyed listening to First Nations stories, including the beautiful tale of "Brother Moon." These stories have provided valuable insights into cultural perspectives and the significance of the moon in different traditions.

In Maths, our focus has been on mastering place values. Students have engaged in various activities to practice identifying and working with 4 and 5 digit numbers. In the pictures below, you'll see our learners actively participating in maths rotations, using relevant games, MABs, and charts to enhance their understanding of place value concepts.

Miss Allison,

Year 2/3 Teacher

Year 4/5/6 Happenings

Over the past two weeks, our class has been diving into our class novel The Wild Robot by Peter Brown. We’ve been exploring key themes throughout the text, discussing survival, nature, and technology. Alongside this, we’ve been sharpening our narrative writing skills by experimenting with different sentence types including simple, compound and complex, to make our writing more engaging and effective.

In Science, we’ve been investigating living things and their features. To bring our learning to life, we planted our own sunflowers! This hands-on experiment is helping us understand what plants need to survive and how their environment plays a role in their growth. We can’t wait to see how they develop over the coming weeks!

Miss Rowe,

Year 4/5/6 Teacher

Captains

On the 14th of February, we were privileged to receive our school captain badges. There was a whole ceremony to celebrate our new School leaders, Rhianna Angus and Miranda Page. We both received a School Captain badge, a notebook with our names on it and a pen to go with it.

On Wednesday, the 19th of February, we were lucky enough to travel to Julia Creek to trial for midwest netball. Rhianna was lucky enough to be chosen for the midwest team and Miranda was picked to be a shadow which is a backup for the midwest team.

We have had a great few weeks!

Rhianna and Miranda,

School Captains

Library

Library Lunch Times

The past few weeks at the library during lunch have been filled with fun and creativity. The children have thoroughly enjoyed engaging in play-based construction activities, building with Lego, and exploring imaginative worlds together. It’s been a wonderful environment for them to connect with friends and have fun.

Library Lessons

In our recent library lessons, the older students have been diving into the exciting world of online resources, learning how to navigate apps like Destiny, Sora, and Britannica. They’re mastering the tools that make finding books and research fun and easy! Meanwhile, our younger students have been on an adventure of their own, discovering the importance of book care. To top it off, they crafted their very own personalized library bags—making their reading journeys even more special!

Miss Margy,

Librarian