Principal’s Blog

After many many years in the planning, Holy Family opened Early Learning for Long Day Care on January 9, 2023. Our PreSchool subsequently opened on January 30th 2023 together with the Reception and Year 1 who had the run of the school for the first day of school in 2023. Year 2-6 Classes commenced the school year on Tuesday 31 January. Congratulations Team on getting the job done.

Filling the Billabongs 2 Having billabongs is like having a box of chocolates; you never know what you are going to get. What are your reflections on what you see in this video?

On the 28th March, ABC TV “Landline” will be covering the release of some of the purple spotted gudgeon we have bred into waterways near Murray Bridge. A group of 12 students will accompany some teachers from the school in a bus travelling to and from the “Release Event’. Teachers and students, if you would like to be part of this group, please write to me explaining:

• How have you personally been active as conservationist?
• Why the Purple Spotted Gudgeon Project is important?
• What can we learn from this project which could applied in other similar ways?
• Why do you wish to be part of the fish release?
• How will you contribute to the Fish Farm/ MUDLA /Billabong Project in the future?

Please feel free to use a combinations of words/pictures/drawings Applications close 15th March at 4pm

Holy Family is proud of our orchards of red and black olives, oranges, avocados, nectarines together with our gardens of salads, mints and vegetables. Not forgetting the Principal’s Rose Garden. These crops provide content for our studies of food production, supplying the School Canteen “Food for Life”, casual eating by students and families and various other community celebrations. We are commencing a project on a “Food Trail” in which we curate the various food production areas with signage to inform learners as they traverse the trail. We need the learners at Holy Family to understand the source and purpose of food production.

At Holy Family we are conscious of the Outer world of the Universe and Inner worlds of the biosphere. We are undertaking very important work in ecology by our work in farming some endangered species of native fish. These include the Southern Purple Spotted Gudgeon. We are breeding this species for the purpose of releasing them into the wild. The next release is on the 28th March near Murray Bridge. You may see a program about us on ABC Landline! During the holidays, we started constructing a series of four Billabongs in which we shall store and develop populations of these species. We need to look to the inner worlds of the biospheres to help us to understand the ‘big picture’ which we need to guide our learning. What do you think?     

The recently constructed Design Lab within the new complex “Curiosity” is an ideal venue for students to build robots and to code them to undertake tasks. I have been speaking to the children about their future and what it may hold for them. I am fascinated by the NASA program exploring Mars and the ambitions of Elon Musk in transporting equipment and people to Mars for future colonization.    

Holy Family Learning Continuity Plan Well, what a wonderful eventful few weeks as we transition from holidays through Remote Learning to full enrolment (minus some students at home isolating) Our Learning Continuity Plan is in full swing flowing through from our experience last year. In fact we are always improving our professional practice as we learn which techniques elicit a positive response from our students. We are all life-long learners here at Holy Family. Kerry White Principal

Leadership Team Working Online with Teachers

Hi Everyone, During the Pandemic our staff have been deployed in four groups:

• The Administration Team is keeping the organisational side of the school in operation: ICT services, Enquiries, WHS, enrolments, maintenance, support services, Canteen, OHSC and Alive ELC
• All class teachers are working from home using Microsoft Teams and Blogs to provide lessons for the children in their class
• Teachers who work in roles other than class teachers are facilitating learning for the children who are at school each day. Yesterday they were in “Curiosity” and today they are in the Hall and OHSC
• The Leadership Team (shown in the picture) are monitoring each class blog and each Teams Channel to keep the flow of information flowing both ways between teachers and their students. The leaders are sharing ideas among the staff and highlighting the best practices.

At 2.30 pm each day the whole staff meet together online to discuss the highlights of each day and to share online professional practice Our teachers are coming up with a fantastic array of activities online to keep the children engaged in their learning. The children are waiting keenly in their Class Channel on Teams for the learning contact from their teacher as well as monitoring their own Class Blog. In this way the children are taking responsibility  for their own learning and taking it to a higher level. Please take some time to look through all the Blogs and ask your child to show you their Class Channel. Kerry White Principal    

The next phase of the Fish Farm and Curiosity Precinct is the development of the new billabongs into which we will release the Purple Spotted Gudgeon and various other creatures in the coming months. The new Curiosity building will capture up to 91,000 litres of water which will water the oval and provide water for the Fish Farm, MUDLA and billabongs.