Term 3 Newsletter, 25th July 2025
Principal's Message
Celebrating Catholic Education Week
At St Francis, Catholic Education Week is a special time to honour the heart and soul of our learning community: our shared faith, values and commitment to nurturing the whole child.
This year’s Catholic Education Week invites us to reflect on how Catholic education shapes lives through compassion, service and truth. In classrooms, across the playground and beyond the school gates, we see students living out these values each day welcoming others, standing up for justice and striving to be the best versions of themselves.
Catholic Education Week also reminds us that learning is not just about knowledge, but about wisdom rooted in faith. We take pride in the opportunities we provide for students to grow intellectually, spiritually and morally. Through prayer, celebration and meaningful learning experiences, we deepen our understanding of God’s love and what it means to walk in the footsteps of Christ.
As a community, we’re grateful for our staff, families and parish who support our mission and bring our Catholic identity to life.
Let us continue to build a place where faith and learning go hand in hand by creating a future filled with hope, kindness and purpose.
Upcoming Events.
In Week 3 - Friday 1st August is a student free day for Bishops Inservice.
In Week 6 – Tuesday 19 August it is our Book Week celebrations. St Francis is going to be hosting this event with various local schools attending. The theme is. “Book an Adventure” So please start thinking about costumes.
In Week 8 - Father’s Day Breakfast is on the 4 September. The Year 6 students will be serving the food to the dads on this day. Year 6 students will be required at 7.50am to assist with cooking and food preparation duties.
In Week 9 – Friday 12 September, we have the Clifton Ball Games Carnival and Development Day. This will be held at the Clifton Recreation Grounds (Show grounds) at 9.30am where our students will play ball games and try out a variety of other sports. Our school is catering for this – so if you can help out on the day, please let Nelia know.
Mr. Red
Middle Leader News
It is approaching the time in the term where teachers begin testing of student learning. This testing informs subsequent teacher practise. You may be given updates from your child/ren’s teacher/s about their progress.
At the end of the term, Parent-Teacher interviews will occur. Interview times will open during Week 7 through the Parent Portal. If you have any questions before Week 9 and 10 about your child’s learning, please contact your child’s teacher and arrange a meeting before the end of the term.
Mrs. Busiko
Prep/1/2 News
Welcome to Term 3!
We’ve had a wonderful start to the term in Prep to Year 2! This week, we began learning about the stories of Jesus in the New Testament. The children have been reflecting on what life was like during Jesus’ time and sharing their thoughts through drawings and storytelling.
In Mathematics, we are learning to tell the time, and our Year 1 and 2 students have started exploring the 2 times tables—they’re doing a fantastic job!
During Science, we’ve been learning about forces. The students have been experimenting with a car launcher to investigate how pushes and pulls make things move. It’s been lots of fun watching their excitement as they test their ideas!
We’re looking forward to a term full of learning, curiosity, and joy!
Mrs. Skillington
Yr. 3/4 News
This fortnight, students actively engaged in the learning of vocabulary through our explicit teaching of vocabulary routine. Specific words were taken from our two mentor texts by well-known Australian author: Sophie Scott Goes South and Are We There Yet. Students practised saying, reading, writing, defining, drawing and using each of the words in sentences as well as learning synonyms and antonyms for the word. We look forward to the students building their vocabulary and begin using these words in their writing.
In HASS, students began their history unit by completing a mapping task that plots the journey of world explorers, Vasco da Gama and Ferdinand Magellan. Students investigated and viewed the journeys of explorers, Dirk Hartog and Abel Tasman and completed a written task that depicted key events of their journey.
In Religious Education, students learnt how to use the Bible referencing system to locate books, people and places. Eagerly, students then combined movement and the outdoors with their learning to participate in an ‘active’ scavenger hunt. Using their teamwork and communication skills, students looked up bible verses to find missing words which then provided the clue to completing an action. ‘This is learning made fun,’ commented one student.
Mrs. Malbon
Yr. 5/6 News
Year 5/6
In class, our students have been jumping into the book – The Grandest Book Bookshop in the World. It is full of descriptive and interesting vocabulary. We have been learning what these words mean and using them ourselves! We have been learning about independent and dependant phrases, and how we can use these to improve our writing.
During Mathematics, we have been learning about timetables, fractions and decimals and discounts. We now know how to solve operations with decimals in them.
Geography has focused on urbanisation and how this impacts the environment. So far, we have looked at what urbanisation is, and how the landscape changes over time. Good maps has been very interesting as it shows progression of the landscape over time. This week, we have learnt about Fire Stick Farming and how First Nations Peoples used this to their advantage.
Mrs. Busiko