St Francis of Assisi | eNewsletter

From the Principal

Dear Families,

Teaching (and learning)

As the year draws nearer to a close, we begin our yearly assessment cycle, where the students complete a various number of assessments as to ascertain their growth across the course of the year.

At present we are measuring students’ competencies in reading comprehension, Mathematics and Spelling. Later in the term they will complete some further assessments referred to as Dibels that further ascertain students decoding, fluency and comprehension ability.

Excitingly, we are beginning to see the fruits of the teaching and learning consistency we have delivered across the site this year, as the early signs is that across our site we have above average learning growth.

With a re-focus and training on PLD across the site, as well as the use of Maths Reviews (daily revision of key concepts previously learnt) we are seeing the signs of strong growth in our learning data. This has been an enormous amount of work by our teachers and leadership to create this consistency.

While we aim for one year of growth each year, we know that this is not a straight linear pathway, much in the same way our children don’t grow in height identically each year. There are spurts and changes. Some years we may see 2 years growth in Reading, with spelling to follow the next year. Other years we may see a plateau as children consolidate concepts.

We went through a similar journey when I led the community at Yorketown. By the 4^th year of my principalship there we demonstrated as a school the 5^th strongest growth of all Catholic Schools in South Australia, and 18^th overall across the course of the state across that four-year period. I believe we are on a similar trajectory here at Newton but further along.

What is most important is that we are creating consistency across the site, measuring the impact of that consistency, and ensuring that our children are receiving the best educational experience possible.

Welcome!

We’d like to introduce a new member of the St Francis family Miss Bianca Silvestri. Bianca will join us in 2025 teaching in the Middle Primary at our school.
A Mary Mackillop College old scholar, Bianca has been part of a high performing environment at Salisbury Primary School, a school that has hosted study tours each year to observe the teaching practice on site. We’re super excited about what Bianca will bring to St Francis and can’t wait to have her on board next year.

Sports Day

Sports Day is finally here! I’ve watched the forecast go from 22, to 24, to 29, to 33……all the way back to what appears to be a steady 25 degrees for tomorrow.

Looking forward to a great day. There’s an infographic later in this newsletter which will provide you with final details.

Kind Regards,

Scott March