Dear Parents/Carers

Last Friday was a busy day for Sacred Heart. It was our Sacred Heart Feast Day, and many of our 3-6 students attended Church. Fr Chatty made all of us feel welcome, along with many of our parishioners, to celebrate this special event. Thank you to the students who participated in the Mass and for the respect shown by all during and after the Mass. Thank you to Woolworths in Ulverstone for donating sausages and bread for all of us to enjoy on the day.

Thirty-three of our 3-6 students attended the Northwest Cross Country and returned to school still full of energy and smiles on their faces. Students from prep to year two also had their final day of Water Awareness. A big thank you to the instructors, Mrs Murdoch, Mrs Donnelly, and Miss Clemonds, for their patience and support. Our students completed their Feast Day with a prayer in their classrooms and participated in a buddy activity during the week. It was a busy but Heart-Full day for all.

As we progress through the year, it is important for us to seek feedback regarding how we share learning with families. Sharing learning can be done in various ways, and many schools do things a little differently. While observing the energy and engagement in the classrooms during teaching and learning, it is important to reflect on where and how we spend our time and energy.

Please take some time to complete this short survey so that we can better assist families in accessing and understanding their child’s learning progression.

Students need to know how they are doing, and feedback is essential if teachers are to make an impact on student improvement. The research and evidence from educational experts are clear…. feedback needs to be specific… ‘what did they do well’ and timely… ‘in the moment.’

Teachers consistently check for understanding during explicit teaching lessons and provide immediate feedback to students in the classroom. Students know what they are learning and understand what success looks like; this information is shared and unpacked at the beginning of lessons.

Current online ‘Seesaw’ sharing learning with families provides a tool/platform for a window into the classroom…the weekly ‘Feed Up’ provides an opportunity for parents/carers to have a snapshot into the teaching and learning on a weekly basis. This information can support parents/carers in beginning a conversation with children about their learning or further investigating a topic of interest. Whilst we offer two academic reports every year and an opportunity for parent conversations, we must communicate effectively, and all parents feel they understand how their children are progressing in all areas. We look forward to receiving feedback from families regarding the ‘sharing learning’ to provide feedforward.

Please let our administrative staff know if you are not receiving effective and timely information about our school events so we can improve our effectiveness in this area. We consider feedback an important part of our improvement process.

Thank you for your continued support.

Charlene Best

Principal

Essential Assessment

Yesterday SHU welcomed Jacinta Browning from Essential Assessment to work with our teachers and students.

Essential Assessment is an online assessment platform that allows teachers to pre-assess students within each strand or sub-strand of the Australian Curriculum Mathematics. Student results are automatically compiled, advising the teacher of each student’s current achievement level and analysis of the achievement standards that have been understood and misunderstood for each student, group and class.

The curriculum is differentiated within each sub-strand based on each assessment result and a tailored paper-based and online curriculum (My Numeracy) is created for each student, group or class. My Numeracy is a differentiated and personalised formative assessment model with an interactive teaching and learning function that enables students to progress through each content description and the four proficiency strands of the curriculum.

Post-assessment identifies each student’s new Australian Curriculum achievement level demonstrating the growth achieved by each student. Continued analysis of class and cohort data within each strand and sub-strand is provided along with guidance on the developed and potential Numeracy progressions within each sub-element. Each assessment, curriculum activity and curriculum resource has been carefully aligned to the Australian Curriculum with emphasis on student growth through achievement.

Jacinta met with Leadership teams from neighbouring Catholic schools in the morning to facilitate collaboration and sharing of best practices. Jacinta then modelled lessons in our classrooms to enable our teachers to observe the platform and teacher practice.

Keeping our community well:

With the cooler months upon us, please be mindful of not sending your children to school when they are unwell. We are currently experiencing staff and student absences due to sickness. 

It is also important to remember that staff and students are required to isolate at home for 48 hours when they have any gastrointestinal symptoms (vomiting and/or Diarrhoea).

If your child is not attending school, please remember to mark them as absent/unwell on Compass. 

Keeping our community safe: