School Vision

St Matthew’s School empowers children to embrace life-long learning, and grow and develop as God intends.

This prayer is chosen to recognise St Matthew:

God of mercy,

you chose a tax collector, Saint Matthew,

to share the dignity of the apostles.

By his example and prayers

help us to follow Christ

and remain faithful in your service.

Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,

who lives and reigns with you

in the unity of the Holy Spirit,

one God, for ever and ever.

Amen.

Dear Parents & Carers,

Welcome to Week 10! Every year, we celebrate St Matthew’s Feast Day during the last week of Term 3.This year, we are concluding our celebrations with an Open Day and Cultural Afternoon Tea. 

St Matthew’s Feast Day/Open Day 21 September

This Thursday, St Matthew’s would like to put out an open invitation to visit our beautiful school and join us to celebrate unity and cultural diversity. Visitors are welcome to join us from 2:30pm to 4:30pm to view classrooms, join in cultural activities, take part in a school tour, view our STEM and Enrichment projects and share in cultural dishes supplied by our generous families. 

Family Challenge – Have You Started Your Book?

I hope many families are finalising their picture books based on their family history and culture; however, if you need more time, we will happily share and celebrate your masterpieces whenever they are finished.  Please see previous newsletters for more information.

Cultural Afternoon Tea

If you are able to supply a culturally inspired dish, please use the link below to help us with planning.

ST MATTHEW’S DAY CULTURAL AFTERNOON TEA

Parents would need to supply a list of ingredients with each dish to ensure we protect our students and staff with food allergies. Families would only need to supply a small plate of cultural delights to share. 

Date: 21 September

Time: 2:30 – 4:30pm

The Night of the Notables

The Night of the Notables is a major inquiry learning project that our Enrichment students have been completing this term. It is based on the assumption that we all need our heroes. While students research a notable person, they are encouraged to work autonomously, learn research skills, practise role modelling skills and search for deeper studies.

The Night of the Notables culminates in an evening of kaleidoscopic delight at which our parents and families are introduced by the students to the highlights and fascinating detail of many notable people throughout history .

‘Our Story’ Fence Pickets

Thank you to all of our families who have completed fence pickets to add to our family fence. They are so beautiful. If your family would like to contribute, please let us know and we will send home a fence picket for you to complete at home with your family.

Important Dates

St Matthew’s Feast Day/ Open Day 21 Sept

End of Term 3 22 Sept

First Day Term 4 10 Oct

Principal Focus – Collaborative & Proactive Solutions

St Matthew’s has always prided itself on staying up-to-date with the latest innovations in education. This includes staying informed of techniques that best equip our students to be able to function positively in difficult or overwhelming situations.

This week I am very fortunate to be able to attend a course facilitated by Dr Ross Greene, “Collaborative & Proactive Solutions”. I would sincerely like to thank Kylie Turton for sharing information about this course. Dr. Greene is a clinical psychologist, and he’s been working with children and families for over 30 years. His influential work is widely known throughout the world.

Dr Greene’s philosophy, Collaborative & Proactive Solutions (CPS):

is the evidence-based, trauma-informed, neurodiversity affirming model of care that helps caregivers focus on identifying the problems that are causing concerning behaviors in kids and solving those problems collaboratively and proactively. The model is a departure from approaches emphasizing the use of consequences to modify concerning behaviors.

We recognise that all of our students deserve an educational experience that helps them feel safe and confident, whilst ensuring they are provided with the best learning opportunities and environment. This means recognising those students who face challenges at school and working collaboratively and proactively with these students, their teachers, and their families to specifically identify these problems. We recognise that being proactive, will always be better than being reactive.

If you would like to learn more about Dr Greene’s work for your own family, or to better understand some of the practices that we utilise at school, please visit Dr Greene’s website Livesinthebalance.org

Wishing all of our beautiful families a safe, happy and relaxing holiday,

Mrs Susan Milton

Principal