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WELCOME TO OLSOTS! 

We welcome Crystal (Year Three) and their family to our school community! 

SENIOR CAMP 

I write this newsletter piece from Albany, where our Year Five/Six students are enjoying a great week at Camp Quaranup! It has been an absolute joy accompanying our students, Mrs Tyrrell, Miss Devitt and Mr McCarthy this week. Our campers have had a fantastic time engaging in a range of activities at camp and around Albany. The range of activities have provided opportunities for leadership and teamwork skills to be developed. Additionally, students have also enjoyed learning about the rich history of Albany. I extend a big thank you to the staff who attended the camp, particularly to Mrs Erin Tyrrell for her organisation of the event.  

FACTION & INTERSCHOOL ATHLETICS CARNIVALS 

Our Pre-Primary – Year Six students recently participated in our annual Faction Athletics Carnival. It was a great day with our CORE Values very much on display! Congratulations to all students and to our winning faction, MacKillop! Please see further information within this newsletter regarding the faction carnival. We are excited to be hosting our Interschool Athletics Carnival to finish the term, on Friday 11 April. I thank Miss Anna Swan for her organisation of both carnivals. 

HARMONY DAY 

Our students had the opportunity to wear traditional dress or orange clothing (the colour that represents Harmony Week) as Harmony Day was celebrated on Friday 28 March. Harmony Week took place in Western Australia 15 – 21 March. This annual occasion celebrates our diversity, while promoting inclusiveness, respect and belonging for all.  

HOLY WEEK LITURGY 

We will gather as a Catholic community on Monday 7 April to be reminded about the true meaning of Easter, as our Year Four students lead our Holy Week Liturgy. I hope to see you in the hall for a 2:15pm start. I thank Miss Hannah Starcevich for preparing this important Liturgy. 

ANZAC DAY SERVICE 

Our Year Two/Three students will lead our school Anzac Day Liturgy on Friday 2 May, beginning at 9:00am. Please consider coming along as we stop to reflect on this important day. Our School Captains, Pippa and Zohan, will accompany Mrs Lorna Russell and myself at the Esperance Anzac Day service during the school holidays.

ADMINISTRATIVE PROFESSIONALS DAY 

On Friday 2 May, Administrative Professionals Day is celebrated across Australia. To our Administration Team – Mrs Pippa Crane, Miss Rosey Ryan and Mrs Tammie Florisson – thank you for all that you do for our students, parents, and staff! 

MOTHER’S DAY BREAKFAST 

Our annual Mother’s Day breakfast will take place on Friday 9 May. Please keep an eye out for a message on Seesaw regarding registering for this event. As always, this event is open to all families, Pre-Kindy to Year Six. I look forward to seeing you there! 

URSTRONG 

We are now in our second year implementing the URSTRONG Friendology 101 curriculum. URSTRONG’s whole-school friendship strategy has improved the social climate in schools around the world, connecting over a million kids, parents, and teachers with a common language of friendship. We are proud to be a URSTRONG school and are committed to empowering all students with friendship skills. 

I take this opportunity to remind parents of their FREE Parent Membership to access hundreds of resources. This will allow you to learn the same language & strategies being taught in the classroom through the Friendology 101 curriculum. We hope that, as a URSTRONG family, you will reinforce the important messages of empowerment, self-compassion, & kindness at home. 

We look forward to our URSTRONG online workshop for parents and children, taking place Thursday 22 May, 6:00 – 7:15pm, please see more information further in this newsletter. We offered this last year and received lots of positive feedback from families who joined from the comfort of their loungeroom! 

HAPPY HOLIDAYS 

With just one week to go before the break, I wish all families a happy and Holy Easter break. I look forward to seeing you when Term Two begins on Tuesday 29 April.  

I remind our parent community of our two staff Professional Development Days taking place next term. These are student free days. 

• Monday 28 April – Berry Street Education Model 

• Tuesday 3 June – Religious Education Curriculum  

HOLY WEEK

Holy Week is the week preceding Easter and the final week of Lent. Holy Week begins with Palm Sunday and ends with Holy Saturday, the day before Easter Sunday. Holy Week includes Holy Thursday and Good Friday, which, together with Holy Saturday, are known as the Triduum.  This year the Year Four class will lead us in our Holy Week Liturgy on Monday 7 April at 2:15pm as Easter falls in the middle of the school holidays. 

I take this opportunity to wish you all God’s blessings for Easter and the coming of Holy Week. 

PROJECT COMPASSION BOX: SUPPORTING CARITAS

Project Compassion: A big thank you to all those who have supported Project Compassion this year. Thank you for returning your boxes to the office. There is still time if you haven’t returned your box, please do so early next term. The money you generously give goes to help others in need.  

Project Compassion 

 “We are Compassion in Action. Working together for justice and dignity. Building a better future for all.” 

ANZAC LITURGY

The school community will gather for our ANZAC Liturgy on Friday 2 May, hosted by Year Two/Three students, at 9 am. Families are welcome to attend. 

Our school will participate in the ANZAC Memorial Service on Friday 25 April 2025. If your child would like to march, they need to meet us at the car park of Super IGA on Dempster Street no later than 10.20am. They must wear school uniform if they would like to participate in the march. Students must be collected by parents immediately after the end of the service. Children will need to have sunscreen and a hat for this event. 

FACTION ATHLETICS CARNIVAL 2025

Thank you everyone for participating in our 2025 Faction Athletics Carnival! It was a fantastic day of running, jumping, throwing and cheering. We are so proud of our students for trying their best, getting out of their comfort zone and most importantly, having fun and supporting each other. Thank you so much to all our families for coming down and cheering and helping out. We couldn’t run the day without our wonderful helpers, EACS students, OLSOTS staff and of course, our brilliant students. Well done to all our champions and record breakers for displaying excellence in their field and all your hard work has paid off.

First MacKillop   577pts

Second Salvator   540.5pts

Third Xavier   357.5pts

Record Breakers

Sam Dixon broke the record held for Year 1 Boys 50m, new record 8.12 seconds and the record for Year 1 Boys 75m, new record 14.43 seconds.

Anja Francis broke the record for Year 2 Girls 100m, new record 17.72 seconds.

Nina Bailey broke the record for Year 1 Girls 75m, new record 13.83 seconds.

This week the Year Five/Six’s have been adventuring at Camp Quaranup in Albany!!! Together they have challenged themselves with new activities such as Canoeing, raft making, geocaching, Archery, shelter building, and the sensation trail, and learnt a wealth of new knowledge at the historic Whaling Station. Tomorrow we have our final full day of activities with Laserscape, the Brig Amity and the ANZAC museum. Phew, what an amazing week!!!!

This term in PreLit we have been enjoying our shared reading. Each lesson we learn new vocabulary, how to predict what might happen and what happened in the beginning, middle and end of the story. Our comprehension questions help us gain and show our understanding. We loved this story about Gerald the giraffe and created our own scene from the story. We started with a step-by-step drawing of Gerald and then created the background. Such clever Kindergarten students.

Auslan this term has been jam packed with fun activities! We have learnt all about the art of storytelling and how it is important to ‘ Show not Tell’. We have enjoyed learning some new signs on camp and using Auslan to chat to each other at night in our dorms (without getting in trouble for talking!)

Hands up who loves chocolate? Luckily for all you fellow sweet-tooths, the Easter Raffle is back! The P & F are requesting Easter eggs, whether large, small, character eggs, allergen friendly or alternative Easter items to contribute to the prize pool. Please send your donations along to school with your children as soon as possible. You should have received your family’s allocation of tickets by now, please return all tickets and funds to the front office by Monday 7 April.

Thank you for your support!

Tash McCarthy

P & F Chair

Dear Parents,

We are proud to be a URSTRONG School and are committed to continuing to empower your children with friendship skills. As a school and in collaboration with CEWA, we believe that empowering our students with these skills will create a culture of kindness at our school and we hope that, together with URSTRONG, we can support your children to have healthy, feel-good friendships.

As with last year, you are invited to take advantage of a FREE Parent Membership to access hundreds of resources – including an 8 session video series. This will allow you to learn the same language & strategies being taught in the classroom through the Friendology 101 curriculum. We hope that, as a URSTRONG Family, you will reinforce the important messages of empowerment, self-compassion, & kindness at home.

SAVE THE DATE – Parent-Student online workshop with URSTRONG

Date: Thursday 22 May 2025

Time: 6:00-7:30pm (over Zoom)

We encourage all parents and carers to take advantage of this FREE workshop, facilitated by URSTRONG over Zoom. This workshop helps parents/carers to speak a common ‘language of friendship’ as their children, and reviews the core concepts taught in our Friendology curriculum with students. More information on how to register will be available via SeeSaw next term.

This months URSTRONG theme is Courage. Whether kids are introducing themselves to someone new, letting a friend know they’re not ready for a sleepover yet or standing up for a friend, one things is for sure….Friendship is COURAGE! This month students will learn about the skill of courage, exploring how courage helps us to create healthy friendships.  

The Uniform Shop is in need of paper bags. If you have an over supply of paper bags could you please donate to us as we aim to reuse, recycle and repurpose. Please drop off to the front office, thank you.

JUNIOR REGISTRATIONS NOW OPEN 

Sign up now for the 2025 hockey season! Follow the link below to our registration page, and follow the simple steps listed. We accept KidSport vouchers for eligible children 

https://www.revolutionise.com.au/esperancehockey/registration

“FREE Health Coaching for your family!