Administration / Finance

Compass – Attendance

Attendance - Parents/carers are required to explain a whole day absence within 7days via the Compass App or written notice to admin@mayfieldsd.catholic.edu.au. 

Please add an attendance note if your child is absent from school for a whole day only. If arriving to school late or leaving early, this will be entered by the office. Please see instruction on how to add an attendance note via your smart phone. 

If you require any assistance, please contact the office on 4968 1295.

Volunteers -

St Dominic's Centre values the significant contribution volunteers make to our schools. Volunteers bring a rich and diverse mixture of culture, life experience and expertise from their communities.

Thank you to those who have expressed an interest in volunteering at St Dominic's. If you have not completed the registration process to be cleared as a volunteer at St Dominic's before, we require you to complete the form through the below link which will then be submitted to the Diocese for approval.

If you have any further questions please do not hesitate to contact the office on 4968 1295.

Finance

Thank you to all those who have paid the 2023 school fees in full, and to those who continue their regular payments. Finalisation of school fees are expected by the 30^th November 2023.

If you have not yet made any contributions, please contact our office as a matter of urgency on 4968 1295 as we have commenced and are following CSO procedures for the recovery of overdue or unpaid fees.  

Secondary

Class Teachers          

Book Week

By Annie Boyle

On 24^th August St Dominic’s students participated in Book Week 2023. The theme this year was Read, Grow and Inspire.

Students from across the school dressed up as their favourite book character and had a wonderful time by being part of the book parade and also being cheered on by their friends.

Healthy Harold

By Nicolas Hatch

On Friday the 1st of September St Dominic’s had a visit from the Healthy Harold Team. Stage 5 and 6 met Harold the Giraffe and learnt about making good decisions.

Stage 6 Workplace Learning

By Xavier Scanlon

Over the last two terms Stage 6 has been attending workplace learning at Martha’s Café at the Cathedral Functions Centre. We have been learning skills and meeting different people.

As well, we have been given special jobs around the school such as, helping to organise the school sailing excursion and bus roster. 

Lime Class

Term 2 and 3 has seen the Lime Class learning through real-world experiences and outings. Outings are a great way to bring relevance to learning and strengthen engagement through hands-on activities. The students in Lime Class experienced learning across a variety of Key Learning Areas, including English, Maths, Science, PDHPE, and CAPA.

Lime Class has been collaborating with other classes for art activities, such as an art incursion in Term 2 Week 6, and a weekly art incursion in Term 3. Students have participated in workshops where they learnt about the basic shapes of a face and created face collages to express their feelings and creativity, and created mosaic art mirrors. The students did an amazing job of listening to instructions and working with peers from other classes. They showed maturity in being role models for other students and produced some wonderful pieces. We hope you love the art pieces as much as we do!

In Term 2, Lime Class walked to McDonald’s as part of our Mathematics content this term. Week 3 focussed on the distance to and from McDonald’s, and Week 9 focussed on measuring the weight of McDonald’s items through hefting. Students found this activity fun, measuring what drinks they thought were heavier and lighter and trying hard not to drop any! Great work Lime.

We were fortunate enough to be invited to watch the students from the Diocese perform a Music performance, Dio Sounds Week 7 Term 2, and Aspire ‘The Pirates Code’ In Term 3. Our stage 5 and 6 students performed in the music performance, and it was great to see the Lime students recognise the familiar faces on stage. Students enjoyed both experiences, with the students saying these two excursions were their favourite - we even had some interest in participating once they reach high school.

In Week 8 Term 2 we travelled to Newcastle Museum where the Lime Class explored the Supernova exhibition. This term students have been learning about different forms of energy and how they can be transferred and transformed, and developing their understanding to consider how essential electricity is to their daily life, and the lives of people in another country. The students showed excellent behaviour and it was great to see the students interacting with each other and talking about the different experiments.

The Lime Class does an amazing job of demonstrating the four Dominican pillars of Prayer, Study, Community, and Service when on outings. The students represent our school with pride and have shown this term that they can take on mature responsibility in a range of activities. The Lime Class have worked hard across Term 2 and 3 and should be very proud of themselves!

Ready for an awesome Term 4!

Lilli Kingdom

Green Class

Green Class have had a wonderful term.

For English lessons we have been learning about rhyming words, reading lots of quality literature including all of the Macca the Alpaca books and enjoyed reading and dressing up as a pirate, Poh, Sonic, Harry Potter and Mario for book week.

In our Religion lessons we have learnt about the different parts of a eulogy and some of the different Catholic Celebrations such as a Baptism and First Holy Communion.

Green Class have enjoyed learning about odd and even numbers, addition and subtraction strategies, as well as informal and formal units of measurement as we measure distances around the school. A real highlight and the boys favourite lessons this term has been collecting data and making a graph of all of the different coloured teacher’s cars.

Green Class have loved our cooking lessons. So far we have made pancakes, cookies, French toast, pasta and garlic bread. 

Tennis on a Monday has been a real highlight this term, as has learning about the healthy food pyramid, five food groups and ways we can nourish our bodies. We have also enjoyed dance lessons on a Friday morning, especially using the scarves, tambourines, maracas and coin belts which move as we dance.

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Aqua Class

The students have been engaged in lots of experiences this term including PLD tasks and handwriting. We have been listening to stories such as ‘Are We There Yet?’, ‘Walking with the Seasons’, ‘On Our Way to the Beach’, ‘Great Barrier Reef’ and ‘Somewhere in Australia’, to name a few.

Students have had the opportunity to participate in Maths, learning about counting 1-100, counting by 2’s to 100, 10’s to 100, addition, subtraction, fractions using a pizza, time, followed by  volume and capacity.

During Science we have been learning about the life cycle of a frog, bee, caterpillar and butterfly. The students have enjoyed the stories and art/craft activities associated with the topic.

In PDHPE we have been learning about healthy eating and preparing food. Our cooking experiences have included making cheese scrolls, pizza, honey joys, carrot cake, cupcakes, popcorn and green apple jelly. During fitness, the students have been engaged in T ball and tenpin bowling.

Religion - learning the school prayer, class prayer, the Lord’s Prayer. We have been discussing what we are thankful for – family, love, care, friends, food and the students have created their own poster.

Geography - we have been exploring the world map and learning about the continents of Australia and Africa.

Yellow Class

Angela Morris
Primary Coordinator

Term 3 in Yellow Class has been full of excitement! We have been participating in gymnastics at school as well as dance classes through external providers. We loved hanging from the bar in gymnastics, and our favourite dance lesson was moving our hips with Turkish coin skirts on.  Unfortunately, we had to say goodbye to Mrs N, and we thank her for her effort and contribution to Yellow Class’s learning throughout the year.

We have been completing PLD activities each day and working through a new book each week exploring persuasive texts. Students loved “Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus” and made alternate endings to the story. During Maths we engage in daily skip counting and then explore a different topic each week, such as data, chance, forming groups, shapes, time and location. We enjoyed cutting and pasting objects onto a map for location and made a farm scene using prepositions. Our recent theme for Religion has been exploring baptism. We have been looking at the symbols and objects associated with baptism as well as sequencing the celebration of being welcomed into God’s family.

We hope you all have a happy break filled with rest and fun activities with your families.

Coordinators Report

All classes have completed the second round of Personalised Planning meetings for the year, which has been a great way to share our students successes and progress with families. Please check your child’s bag to sign a copy and return to school before end of this term.

Secondary have thoroughly enjoyed taking part in weekly tennis coaching sessions at Empire Park which we have seen great skill development and enjoyment for both staff and students. This has encouraged more of our classes to come along during Term 4. Excursion information will be out soon.

Everyone is enjoying being back in the kitchen each week with our whole school cooking timetable, with plenty of scrumptious treats being whipped up. The cooking practice links across several KLA’s and helps build essential life skills for all our students.

Book week was a huge success, and we hope you all had a chance to join us through the live stream. The costumes were fantastic which made for a wonderful parade. Well done to all classes and to all you families for getting involved in a day which we know students (and staff) look forward to every year.

Assistant Principal Report

Thank you to all the families and therapists who were part of our Semester 2 Personalised Planning Review meetings a couple of weeks ago. These meetings are a valuable opportunity to review students’ progress, achievements and goals as we move into the end of the year.  Thank you to parents for ensuring this paperwork has been returned by the end of Term 3.

At St Dominic’s our curriculum is modified and adjusted to meet the individual needs of students and links closely to students Personalised Planning Goals. During Term 3, Primary classes have continued to have a strong focus on phonic development through the morning PLD program. It has also been exciting to see many classes focus on developing and writing persuasive texts which have been related to a focus story each week or an event that may be happening within the school.

Secondary classes follow a Life Skills Curriculum for all KLAs, they explore many opportunities to embed practical skills in the delivery of the curriculum which form part of their community access including Café Club and weekly shopping trips to supply items for St Dom’s Bites.  Secondary classes have also developed a variety of pervasive pieces writing about English films, school events and even having a three-day weekend – which many staff and students were very supportive off!!!!

 Well Done to all our students and staff for another fabulous term. 

Principal’s Report

Dear Families, and Friends,

Often the role of principal sees me buried under the obligatory desk duties and meetings. This term was particularly hectic and enjoyed the opportunities afforded to sneak away and witness the focus of our work – the children. This term Mel from ‘Galaxy Dance Company’, has been taken our ‘students out of this world’ with her engaging props and inviting music. Please see the photos of our infants students and their belly dancing bells and scarves enjoying their tutelage – they speak for themselves! The students are loving the experience and we will be sure to continue our relationship with Galaxy Dance Company.

We welcome Mrs Laura Collins and Mr Blake Sellers to St Dominic’s. Mrs Collins started with us thi term and is very familiar with the Catholic system being a local and attending Catholic and Primary high schools. Mrs Collins has a number of years experience in diverse learning teaching and will be teaching a very lucky Aqua class. Mr Sellers is a familiar face amongst our community. Mr Sellers has relocated from interstate and is rejoining us from week 10 on Green Class. Our wonderfully talented and flexible Mrs Shailey Biddle will move across to Yellow Class. We thank your patience as we continue to seek the best staffing for our classes.

Two major events at the end of this term included Perpetual Day of Remembrance and National Child Protection Week. Please see the letter of recognition from Bishop Michael Kennedy here: 

St Dominic’s has recently undergone a facilities audit including our buildings and playground spaces. This has resulted in nominated building works which we are hoping will commence over the September/October holiday period. Prior to this audit, we were required to cease on site activities, however we have been advised we can move forward with smaller events in Term 4. We miss our families being able to be engaged in our community and looking forward to celebrating again with you in Term 4.

Wishing our families and friends a warm and relaxing holiday period. Looking forward to seeing you all in Term 4.

Blessings,
Rachel

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2023 Term 3 Planner

Safeguarding Information

Pastoral Care

Welcome back to school families! Get ready for an exciting term ahead, filled with lots of great activities and fundraisers.

Macca's Fun Night raised $238, which bought the Painting on the Pathway project to life. The pathway painting project exemplify the power of community support, creative initiatives, and collaborative efforts in enhancing the school environment and creating meaningful experiences for students. The alphabet rainbow serpent, number crocodile, and other elements on the pathway will continue to brighten the school's atmosphere and inspire young minds for years to come. Allowing students to participate by using chalk to add on to the artwork encourages their creativity and artistic expression. Such involvement empowers students, making them active contributors to their school's visual appeal. We also would like to thank Broadmeadow McDonald's for hosting us and look forward to joining forces another night.

We have been lucky enough to be granted a grant from NCIG for $1048. The project is Garden to Plate this amazing initiative that will not only benefit the school community but also promote sustainable and healthy practices. With the grant covering various essential items like soil, matting, garden shed, tools, shelving, wheelbarrows, hose, garden gloves, and plants, you're already well-equipped to start the project. And the donation of garden beds from Viking Builders is a fantastic addition to your resources, showcasing the support from the local community. A working bee is on the drawing board and excellent way to kickstart the project and get everyone involved.

Lucky again, SchoolSports grant has been approved for $2420, Lime, Green, and Teal classes are already participating in Tennis on Mondays. The continuation of this activity until the last week of the term will undoubtedly be a fun and engaging experience for the students. Who knows, with their skills honed through regular practice, you might have future tennis stars in the making, and the Australian Open might not be too far off! With more ideas on the drawing board, the school community can look forward to additional exciting activities in the pipeline. Once these activities are confirmed, information and details will be sent home.

Thompson Pie's fundraiser raised $424.57. Thank you for putting on the stretchy pants and ordering up big. With these funds we have been able to purchase a new basketball stand. Playdough, games, chalk and craft kits have also been purchased for our Lunch Club.

UPDATE: Our Bunnings BBQ fundraiser will happen later this year. We will need volunteers to help us cook and serve the sausages, as well as donations of soft drinks, onions, and sausages. Information will be put up on FB and Compass once a new date has been confirmed.

Our current fundraiser is the Father’s Day socks and chocs… for $10 you will receive a pair of socks and some homemade Rocky Road. The combination of a jolly pair of socks and homemade Rocky Road is sure to put a smile on any Dad's face. Order forms have been sent home and orders are coming in. Orders can be paid via cash or by card. If you need more order forms please contact your classroom teacher or phone the school to make an over the phone order. Numbers are limited. Orders are to be in by 18^th August.

As we continue to work together, remember that each contribution, no matter how big or small, plays a significant role in achieving our goals.

Stage 5 and 6

Class Teachers

School Community

Secondary students have continued to lead the school community in their example of how to build relationships. They have displayed empathy, honesty and responsibility in their approach towards their peers and teachers. This has been reflected in their commitment and engagement to learning.

Student Learning

Term 3 has provided students with many learning opportunities in a variety of contexts and styles to demonstrate their understanding and knowledge of the skills learnt and gained within the context of a subject area. Students have especially enjoyed participating in practical lessons.

Community Access

During Term 3 students have been eager to attend new community access events across Newcastle. The aim of community access within the school context is to provide students with access to recreation tasks and social opportunities that enables them to develop skills and competencies.

Students have shown their sporting skills and prowess learning to play tennis at Merewether Tennis Courts under the instruction of Michael Mills Tennis Academy.  They have also enjoyed outings to local Mayfield businesses such as KFC and antique shops, where students have used their financial Mathematics and English communication skills to purchase goods and services.

Workplace Learning Visits

Stage 6 students have spent the past several weeks undertaking Travel Training and Workplace Learning Visits to Martha’s Cafe located at the Cathedral Functions Centre as part of their Stage 6 Work and Community Practical Learning Experience. The aim of these workplace visits is for students to explore first hand the world of work, gain job ready skills and knowledge and practice general and industry specific skills.

Teal

Welcome to Term 3 Teal Families!

We have had a fantastic start to the term with lots of exciting events. Teal were lucky enough to head to the museum to learn all about the history of Newcastle. This linked well with our studies last term in HSIE. The class especially enjoyed the BHP steelworks show with all the lights and smoke.

We have begun tennis for sport and have been walking down to our local courts to learn new skills from a professional.

On the 3^rd of August Teal was selected to represent St Dominic’s at the St Dominic’s Day liturgy at San Clemente High School. Well done for showing off our school so nicely Teal.

In English we have learnt all about environment and sustainability. We have been reading lots of interesting books and have been using our imagination to create weather reports after reading ‘Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs’. We now have a special Teal Class weather report book that we have been able to show off to visitors.

I look forward to another term full of learning fun with these amazing Teal students.        

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Blue

What a welcome to Term 3! All students returned to school ready to learn and have fun. We have been enjoying a lot of challenging and enjoyable activities including dance, mosaic plate making, and this week will see us begin a series of 3 gymnastic sessions onsite with Primarily Active group- shout out to Mrs Allen for sourcing these external services for us.

In Literacy we are continuing to meet our goals in reading, spelling and dictation. Our fluency and comprehension skills are at an impressive level and students enjoy sharing rich texts and then exploring the content in creative ways.

Our little mathematicians have been hard at work, and we have been using several platforms to explore our world with a mathematical lense.  Our focus this term is number patterns and skip counting. Everyone is enjoying the songs and choral counting activities.

Our other KLA’s have us exploring the natural resources our earth has to offer, our place in the world and how to care for our world and others.  

Book Week promises to be lots of fun and hopefully we can make another trip to Mayfield Library.

Our overarching religion focus this term has been on our Patron Saint, Dominic and exploring our Dominican history. Every day we aim to live our lives reflecting our faith pillars.  We care for ourselves, our community and our world. Blue Class tries every day to speak respectfully to each other, show empathy and walk together peacefully.

Here’s to a great Term 😊         

Red

We are busy engaging in lots of different learning experiences in Red Class. With Mrs John we are exploring weather during our Science lessons and in Geography, we are investigating how we can look after the places we live in. In PDHPE with Miss Ange, we are learning about how to establish and manage happy, healthy and active lifestyles, as well as developing our ball skills, including passing the ball to each other, dribbling and shooting for a hoop. The persistence that we are demonstrating is fantastic. Miss Ange is encouraging us to move safely and expressively in dance during our Creative Arts unit. This is complimented with our weekly dance sessions on a Friday with Miss Mel from Galaxy Dance Academy – one favourite lesson has been learning about rhythm with buckets and drumsticks. Noisy but fun!

Everyday we participate in English, Maths and Religion activities. Each week we focus on another sound through our Promoting Literacy Development (PLD) program when we are ready to move forward. So far, we have looked at the sounds s, a, t, p, i, n, m, r, h. We are beginning to blend them together to make words like tap, sat, map. Nursery rhymes are also our focus during the morning session for English this term. We had fun acting out Goldilocks and the Three Bears with props. During the middle session of the day, we engage in Maths activities. We have explored addition, subtraction, grouping, and then we will move on to data, time, position, mass and 2D shapes throughout the remainder of the term. Our topic for Religion is Knowing God the Holy Spirit. We have made some beautiful artworks to decorate our classroom and are practising making the sign of the cross during our daily prayer.

Everyday we work towards receiving helping hands on our class reward chart. We read our class social story that reminds us to make good choices when we are angry and to always use safe hands and feet at school. This will be a major focus in Weeks 5 and 6 as we work together as a class to look after one another. Please keep an eye out for photos on Seesaw – we love showing you all the amazing things we are achieving in kinder.

Coordinators Report

During Week 1 we celebrated NAIDOC by participating in dot painting on bark to make a collaborative art piece, learnt how to weave with Samara and Sierra, tasted crocodile kebabs and had a disco dancing to some awesome Indigenous artists. It was a great afternoon experiencing and reflecting on our First Nations rich culture.

NAPLAN results were distributed early in Term 3 for Years 3, 5, 7, and 9. We are proud of all the students who participated in the activities, they tried their best and persisted through the activities. If you have any questions about the results please don’t hesitate to contact us.

Our Aboriginal secondary and primary students were lucky enough to participate in a cultural event at San Clemente during Week 3. Hilary McEntyre, from Dreamtime Dance Company, taught us dances including the eagle, goanna, kangaroo, emu and some deadly modern Aboriginal dance moves. We also listened to Bryan Rowe play the yidaki (commonly known as the didgeridoo) and we could paint our face or hands with ochre. Check out the special Worimi design on the girls faces.

Assistant Principal Report

Thank you to all families who have booked appointments and liaised with external therapists and support networks to collaborate around the educational, emotional, social, sensory, physical and wellbeing needs of their child.

We look forward to holding the PP review meetings in Week 6 to share and celebrate the successes of our students and to plan for successful end to 2023.

Thank you to Ethan James (Occupational Therapist) and Kate Mahony (Speech Therapists), representatives from our therapist team who presented at our Term 2 Parent Engagement Meeting. They spoke about how the therapy team is working in consultation with school staff. The therapist, have and will continue to observe, trial and facilitate strategies for teachers and support staff to support student engagement and participation in the school. Some examples of the work that they are doing include:

1. Observe current routines
2. Observe current strategies/tools implemented
3. Facilitate social interactions during class
4. Facilitate social participation during breaks (lunch club and playgrounds)
5. Set up movement and sensory spaces appropriately
6. Provide education to teachers and support staff
7. Implement visual strategies during class (i.e., visual schedule, facilitate use of visuals as a communicative tool)
8. Interpret reports and provide information back to class teachers

This is another great partnership that is happening at St Dominic’s and we look forward to it continuing to unfold.

Principal’s Report

Dear Families,

As I reflect on the last 5 weeks, I cannot help but be excited by the incredible range of activities that have kept the school buzzing with joy, creativity, and healthy competition. It continues to prove to me that excitement and thinking outside of the box is one of our special talents of students and staff across St Dominic’s. The students have been fully immersed and engaged in the different activities, even asking me to be a part of their fun, which is far more enticing than sitting at my desk doing paperwork. When I have a chance to participate, the joy on our students’ faces is data enough for me! The enthusiasm and enjoyment are expressed through squeals of laughter and delight. The activities have promoted self-confidence and pride they have in learning new skills exudes with their retell of their adventures. Students have returned as the future Lleyton Hewitt and Ash Barty’s after playing tennis, whilst our budding artists are producing artworks destined for the NSW Art Gallery.

August 8th had us come together with our hosts San Clemente, and St Columban’s representatives, to observe St Dominic’s day, where we celebrated the feast day of Guzman. Our school representatives, Dakota and Harry, participated in the mass by bringing forward the St Dominic’s school candle, before joining their classmates for the liturgy.

Many memorable moments and meaningful activities. Thank you to the students (and staff) for allowing me to be part of your learning days. Thank you to our families who continue to support us.

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Administration / Finance

Compass – Attendance

Please add an attendance note if your child is absent from school for a whole day only. If arriving to school late or leaving early, this will be entered by the office. Please see instruction on how to add an attendance note via your smart phone.

If you require any assistance, please contact the office on 4968 1295.

Finance

Thank you to all those who have commenced regular payments towards school fees and/or have already paid in full. If you have not yet made any contribution, please contact our office to discuss payment plan options.

• If paying fees by instalments, your payments should have already commenced and fees are expected to be paid in full by 30 November 2023.
• If your intention is to pay your schools fees in full, this payment is expected by 30 June 2023. 
• Our preferred method of payment is either BPay, CentrePay, EFTPOS over the phone or Direct Debit.
• A new Direct Debit can be established or an amendment to existing Direct Debit is an option, please contact our office for a form.
• For those families experiencing financial hardship, or wishing to discuss other payment arrangements, please contact the school office on 4968 1295 to arrange an appointment with the Principal.  
• St Dominic's will now commence the school fee management process if no initial payment has been received or if there has been no contact with our office.