What defines excellence?
“We are what we repeatedly do . . . excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” Aristotle.
Are we living it out? Are we working at becoming excellent? Do our students really understand what this means in practice in their own lives and habits?
Homework, sports, music ability etc. – it is the concerted, diligent and regular practice that makes natural talent and ability become excellent.
In Middle School we have the following things on our horizon:
NAPLAN this week coming for Year 7 and Year 9. Please ensure your child is:
- well rested
- has had a good breakfast,
- comes to school with wholesome snacks and lunch
- has in the bag – several HB lead pencils, an eraser and a sharpener
- AND MOST OF ALL – that they know that this does not define who they are.
Open Day on Saturday 18 May from 10.00am – 2.00pm
This is a lovely opportunity to walk around the school, have a look at various subject displays and see our school. Bring your children and they could take you on their own personal tour. Bring friends who are interested in our school so they can have an official tour.
Year 9 Bike Ride to the Glasshouse Mountains. There is a safety and servicing session this Thursday and the bike ride is next Thursday after the NAPLAN tests. While the ride is to have some first hand experience and exposure to our local mountains and consider the indigenous stories, it is also an opportunity to encourage students in this outdoor pursuit.
Student Led Parent Teacher Conferences in Term 3. At the end of this term, you will receive a semester report on your child’s progress. However, in Term 3 our parent teacher conferences will take a different format. Your child will be conducting one main interview with you as their parent and their Pastoral Care teacher. They will inform you and their teacher with how they are going in all aspects of their schooling in general. Parent-teacher conferences can still be booked with specific subject teachers by appointment and the student may or may not be present for this. What this will mean is that:
- All parents of Middle School students will need to book an appointment.
- Subject interviews will be conducted as an option
- These interviews will be conducted in the Pastoral Care Classrooms.
Reminders and Updated Information
- iPad game and messaging concerns – please be reminded that this is primarily a school resource – similar to a textbook and you can put restrictions on the iPad with a passcode. Refer to last term’s newsletters or contact us if you need help with this.
- Moodle – this online system is being used by most subjects and has class and assessment tasks as well as (for some subjects) your child’s marked work. If you wish to access it – use your child’s moodle login.
- Term Planners – of dates for assignments, tests and other assessment tasks are on the website under ‘Learning’
- ebooks on iPads – we are noticing that some students do not have enough space to load these on. This can be remedied by removing games which can take up a lot of the iPad space. Ebooks are an electronic version of texts and having them on the iPad is essential to the way we now operate.
- Uniform – for our male students, Term 2 and 3 are our winter months and ties, belts and tucked in shirts are the uniform code.
Jacqualina Vreeling, Head of Middle School