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St Clare’s Feast Day Celebrations 2023
Friday 11 August 2023 Kaboom Incursions
On this day we have Kaboom Incursions visiting us and our students will participate in rotational novelty games for 90 minutes. Students may wear free dress and/or house colours and sneakers/shoes suitable for running and jumping (not fashion shoes).
Students will be provided with a free donut during the day.
Saturday 12 August St Clare’s Feast Day Mass at St Patrick’s Parish 6pm followed by pizza (for those families who have pre-paid and wish to stay after Mass) in the Parish hall. Students are asked to wear their St Clare’s red jacket over free dress clothing at the Mass. We hope to see a “sea of red” on this evening.
Tickets for the Pizza following Mass can be purchased via CDFpay or $20 can be sent to school in an envelope with Family name and flyer sent home ysterday.
School Disco
St Clare's School Disco will be held on Friday 11 August. Tickets are to be purchased via CDFpay by 5pm Friday 4 August. Please contact the office beforehand if you are having trouble accessing CDFpay.
The Confirmation Commitment Mass is this Saturday 5 August at 6pm at St Patrick’s Parish. Confirmation candidates are expected to attend this Mass.
The Parent Evening (for parents only) is on Thursday 10 August at 7pm at St Patrick’s Parish hall.
If you have any further questions, please contact Gab Verstraete via email.
Protective Behaviours
Each term we focus on our School Wide expectations, particularly Respect and Safety.
This term, across the school, we are focussing on:
- Who are our safe people (Safety Network)
- Safe/unsafe feelings and actions
- Early warning signs – responses (feelings and physical) when we feel unsafe
- We have a right to body autonomy (body bubble/space)
- We can identify public and private body parts and name these
- When touch might be necessary (safe people hugging us or giving us a kiss, doctors, nurses, Allied Health professionals)
- The difference between secrets and surprises
If you wish to discuss this further or would like any clarification please contact Gab Verstraete (Child Safety Officer) gverstraete@stclaresofficer.catholic.edu.au
Cybersafety - Free webinar
As part of our involvement with Esmart (Alannah and Madeline Foundation) parents and carers are invited to register for a free webinar called Parenting in the Digital World on Friday 8 August at 7.30pm. If you wish to register please use the TryBooking link below:
https://www.trybooking.com/CJFXJ
In this edition of SchoolTV - SUICIDE & SELF-HARM
Young people today face a multitude of stresses in many areas of their life. Some of these stresses are the result of negative experiences. Unfortunately, as a coping mechanism, some young people resort to self-harm. The reason for this behaviour will vary for each individual, but generally, those that self-harm do not necessarily wish to commit suicide.
Tragically, suicide is the biggest killer of Australian youth and the statistics are alarming. Studies have shown that nearly 1 in 5, Year 12 students, have considered suicide or self-harm, because of exam and homework pressures. Self-harm in girls has increased by 200% over the last decade, and suicide calls to Kids Helpline have increased by 22%.
In this edition of SchoolTV, parents will learn to understand and recognise the warning signs in order to prevent the unthinkable from happening. The focus for parents should always be on identifying the underlying difficulty the child may be facing and be proactive in finding the best preventative measure.
We hope you take time to reflect on the information offered in this edition of SchoolTV and we always welcome your feedback. If you have any concerns about your child, please contact the school counsellor for further information or seek medical or professional help.
Here is the link to the Suicide & Self-harm edition of SchoolTV
https://stclaresofficer.catholic.schooltv.me/newsletter/suicide-self-harm
Here is the link for the St Clare's Parent Access Module (PAM)
St Clare's PAM
You username is the email address that you have registered with the school. The first time you log in we ask that you use the forgotten password feature to set your own password.
ALL parents must access PAM to receive up to date information and grant necessary permissions. Students will miss out on events if permission is not granted.
School Fees
Term 3 fees are now due and payable.
If you are experiencing financial difficulties please contact the school via finance@stclaresofficer.catholic.edu.au for a confidential discussion.
If you financial situation has now changed and you have a Pension or Health Care Card please let us know that this will impact your school fees payable.
Lost Property
Our Book Fair will be held in the Welcome Room from Friday 11 August to Wednesday 16 August. Further details regarding times will be provided soon.
CDFpay is a secure, safe and efficient method for ordering and paying for items through school.
Below you will find instructions for setting up your CDFpay account both if you are an existing parent "already have a CDF pay account" or a new parent.
Here is the link to head to our school CDFpay shop St Clare's CDFpay Shop
How to Help Kids Stay Safe Online
Adapted from: https://www.esafety.gov.au/about-us/blog Office of the eSafety Commissioner
- Start the chat
It’s not possible to be at your child’s side every second of the day, so it’s important to talk with them about online safety issues to help develop their critical thinking and ability to make good choices. It’s also good to let them know they can come to you for help if they have any concerns. You may feel they know more about the latest technology than you do, but you have more life experience to guide them.
- With primary school aged children use online devices in the open living spaces at home to make parent supervision part of the expectation for your child.
- Take the opportunity to set some boundaries around when and where they can use devices like tablets, smart TVs and gaming consoles, to help limit potential tech tantrums — you could even fill in an Early Years Family Tech Agreement
- Screen free time before bed is important for good sleep. Consider charging devices in a central location at a regular time each night to allow an hour screen free before bed.
- While you are all at home more, it’s a great time to co-view and co-play with your kids, so you can understand what they are doing and experiencing online.
- Learn about the games, apps, social media and platforms they are using at The eSafety Guide, including how to protect their information and report inappropriate content or conduct.
- Use parental controls and safe search options
Parental controls can help block your child from accessing specific websites, apps or functions. They can also monitor your child’s use of connected devices and set time limits. But beware! You cannot always rely on them — they should be used in combination with other online safety strategies.
- Parental controls are available on most tablets, smartphones, computers, TVs and gaming consoles.
- You can also download family safety controls or buy robust filters out of the box.
- You can set up child-friendly search engines, or select safe search settings on digital devices, to help prevent your child from stumbling across inappropriate sites and content.
- Check smart toy settings
It’s surprising how many toys or devices can connect online these days, from drones and smart teddies to tablets and wearables. While they can be both entertaining and educational, they can reveal your child’s personal details and location — and allow other people to contact them without you knowing. You can help keep them stay safe by:
- setting strong passwords
- turning off location settings
- limiting the amount of personal information shared.
The eSafety Gift Guide has advice on what to check for and how to stay safe.
- Look out for unwanted contact and grooming
Unwanted contact is any communication that makes your child feel uncomfortable or unsafe, even if they initially welcomed the contact. It can come from a stranger, an online ‘friend’ or even someone they actually know. At worst, it can involve ‘grooming’ — building a relationship with the child in order to sexually abuse them.
You can help by:
- making sure their accounts are private — including chat functions on games
- encouraging them to delete requests from strangers and any contacts they don’t know in person
- checking in with your child as they use online devices in the open living spaces at home
- reporting and blocking anyone suspicious on a website or service
- remembering that if suspicious online contacts become aggressive or threatening you should contact your local police.
- Know the signs of cyberbullying
Kids who are bored by long periods at home can pick at each other, and that happens online too. So it’s important to keep an eye out for cyberbullying. It can include mean posts, comments and messages, as well as being left out of online group activities like gaming.
- Remember, when they are away from school, kids have less access to their usual support systems, including friends, teachers and counsellors.
- eSafety research shows that girls are more likely to be affected than boys and the person doing the bullying is generally someone they know from school.
- Watch out for signs such as your child appearing upset after using their mobile, tablet or computer, being unusually secretive about their online activities or becoming withdrawn.
- Cyberbullying can make social isolation worse and the longer it continues, the more stressed kids can become, impacting on their emotional and physical wellbeing.
What to do if your child is being cyberbullied
As parents, our first instinct may be to ban our children from social media, disable the wi-fi or turn off the data access. But this can actually compound the problem, making your child feel as if they’re being punished and heightening their sense of social exclusion.
There are four simple steps that can help minimise the harm:
- report the cyberbullying to the social media service where it is occurring
- collect evidence of the cyberbullying material
- if the material is still public 48 hours later, make a report to eSafety — we work with social media platforms to have the harmful content removed.
block the offending user.