WISHING YOU ALL A SAFE, HAPPY AND HOLY CHRISTMAS

Thanks to everyone in our school community who have worked so hard this year to make St Ita’s a truly wonderful learning environment.

Each year we grow bigger in terms of student population, and with this growth the dynamics of our school change immensely.

I thank all those in our learning community who are able to embrace this changing dynamic and work so hard to make St Ita’s a place where all students are nurtured academically, emotionally, spiritually, physically and socially.

Thank you to all our students for the effort that they have put into their studies and for the way that they have endeavoured to live the Gospel values in their day to day schooling. Your efforts are to be commended.

To all our parent’s, thanks for your support in the partnership of learning. The research shows that the best learning comes when the student, the parent and teacher are all in sync supporting one another.

A big shout out to our wonderful teaching staff for their enthusiasm, dedication and ongoing commitment. We are blessed to have such a professional staff who constantly give above and beyond to make sure your children are respected, protected and cared for whilst on their learning journey.

Finally, I would like to thank Father Confidence for his spiritual leadership, his wisdom and his ongoing support to all in our school community.

I wish everyone in the St Ita’s learning community a safe, happy and Holy Christmas and look forward to seeing you all in the new year.

On Tuesday your child had the opportunity to experience their class for next year during our annual transition day and all went very smoothly.

The sorting of children into class groupings is a complex and time-consuming process where teachers are expected to exercise and make professional judgments. It’s all about identifying the particular social, emotional and academic needs of all our children and making sure there is a balance across each grade level.

Groupings of children are based on a number of factors such as:

• Current educational philosophies held by the school
• Social, emotional, physical and academic needs of the children within the cohort
• Gender balance
• Student behaviour
• Children who work well together / children who don’t work well together
• Family siblings or family relations
• Court Orders or Legal Interventions

Occasionally we receive parental feedback that their child is unhappy or emotional when they find they are not in the same class as their best friend/s. Whilst we will always do our best to make sure children have good social connections within classrooms, it is often the case that best friends, doesn’t make for best learning. The strong message across all our grades at St Ita’s is that class time is for learning and recess and lunch times are for socializing.

If your child comes home disappointed that they are not in the same grade as their best friend, use this as a teachable moment to give your child the skills and capacity to be resilient and work through the situation. It’s great preparation for students going into secondary school and moving into the working world with people you have never met before. It is also a great opportunity for children to develop an inclusive, resilient mindset and develop new friendships.

Our classes and teachers are now locked in for the 2023 school year and unless it is an error from our end, we will not be making changes to any classrooms as doing so creates a domino effect across levels.

Our experience shows us that children are naturally nervous or anxious when moving to their new classroom but we find that once they have their orientation experience and they come back from the end of year break they settle very quickly into their new environment.

SCHOOL CAPTAINS / VICE CAPTAINS 2023

It is with great please that we announce our school captains for the 2023 school year as Ollie Robinson and Chloe Gargan. These two students will be supported by our two vice school captains, Ruby Jose and Nate Spargo.

Ollie, Chloe, Ruby and Nate were selected from a strong pool of exceptional young leaders at St Ita’s who applied for the leadership positions. A big shout out to the 5-6 team for their preparation and organisation getting this big task pulled together.

ST ITA’S CAPTAINS FOR 2023