It’s All Happening

Our Apple Distinguished School story is now an iBook

We made our story into a multi-touch book and it is now available through the Bookstore and viewable on iPad or Mac devices. Download it here.

Nine Shine at Orana

Nine of our Year 6 students have been recognised for music, sport and academic excellence and head off to high school on scholarships and specialist placements for 2017.  Congratulations to Shauwen, Bryan, Ryan, Sam, Alyssa, Jessie, William, Kiah and Abigail.

Performing Arts Festival

The school is so well-represented in the Catholic schools performing arts festivities each year.  It is no different this year with strong performances by our junior and senior choirs as well as those in the instrumental ensembles.  The school band is practising hard and ready for their performance at Chisholm College on Friday evening, 19 August. Our senior choir was honoured to lead the congregation at this year’s Opening Mass for the Performing Arts.  We are so grateful for the skilful teaching of Mrs Draper, Mrs Marshall and out instrumental teachers.

Our New Principal

We welcome our new Principal, Ms Christine Walsh, and we look forward to working together as staff, students and community.

Year 4 History

Today, author and historian Mike Lefroy visited the Year 4 classroom to help the students with their understandings of Captain Cook’s first journey of discovery. They are tuning into this major event in Australia’s history and thanks to Mike, his book, his knowledge and his humour they are being thoroughly immersed in the topic. Soon, they will be creating their versions of all things Captain Cook.

Jubilee Year of Mercy Mass

On May 18, we celebrated the Jubilee Year of Mercy by gathering on the front lawns, walking to Mass through our school jubilee gates and singing ‘Jesus Remember Me’ as we processed to the Hall. Father Thai spoke to the children about forgiveness. We acclaim our extraordinarily talented musicians for their contributions at Mass.

Sporting Action

With winter comes the winter sports and we show our competitive spirit in many forms. Orana teams participate in Southern Districts Netball and can be seen hard at practice after school out on our courts. We are grateful for our parent and teacher volunteers who undertake coaching of our teams. The boys and girls basketball teams recently represented Orana in the CPSSA Carnival in Cockburn. They both performed brilliantly throughout the day, supporting team mates and each other’s team. The boys scored 4 wins and 2 very close losses, while the girls won 5 and drew 1 game. This was enough for them to take out the girls shield as the top team – a fantastic effort. Congratulations to all the players and a special thanks to their coaches, Shane and Brad.

Out and About

Lots of camps and excursions occurring in Term 2. The Year 6 students attended a 3 day camp at the Ern Halliday Recreation Camp in Hillarys whilst the Year 5 students stayed overnight at New Norcia, the only monastic town in Australia. Year 1’s went on excursion to Woodbridge House in Guildford. Our students learned about the majestic Harper Family home from the nineteenth century and toured the inside rooms where they got an idea of the way some people lived in those days.

From the Library

The library has been abuzz with activity including digital storytelling by young iPad users, coding for CodeClubAus on a Monday after school and busy lunchtime sessions including knitting, UNO, chess, relaxation colouring and much more. A highlight has been a visit by Year 3 students from Parkwood Primary School in a ‘meet2learn’ session with our Year 6 students. 107 students with 107 laptops and the joys of iMovie. Can’t wait for our next session when we take ‘coding on the road’ and go to visit them. Fantastic effort in the technology department and on a friendship level as well.

Principal Appointment

Congratulations to Ms Christine Walsh on her appointment as Principal at Orana Catholic Primary School. Christine will be taking up this position on 1 July 2016. She is coming to our school community from her position as Principal at Iona Presentation Primary School, Mosman Park, a position she has held for seven years. Previously, she was Principal at St Paul’s Primary School in Karratha for 3 years. We are looking forward to working with Christine in our school and community.

Apple Distinguished School for 2016-2017

We are excited to inform our community that Orana Catholic Primary School has again been selected as an Apple Distinguished School for 2016-2017, a two-year designation. Apple recognises outstanding schools and programs worldwide for innovation, leadership, and educational excellence.

Congratulations to our leaders, teachers and students for having our school recognised as an exemplary learning environment where we commit to blending current technology practices into the daily teaching and learning that occurs in our classrooms

Autism Awareness Month

On the last day of term, we listened to the inspiring words of our young guest speaker Alyssa who has autism. Her key message was listen, respect and accept that everyone is different. One child in a hundred is autistic. Alyssa told us she is proudly autistic and invited us into her world and said quite emphatically that “our two worlds can be awesome together”. An amazing young lady from whom we have so much to learn. Her mum Rona also spoke very eloquently and joyfully about understanding her daughter’s ambition to teach others about how important friendship is to everyone and how together they are inspired to tell others about their great project: Alyssa’s Autism Acceptance Project.

Sleeping Bag Drive

The Orana community collected sleeping bags for the homeless this week. Donations of sleeping bags can make a great difference especially as winter approaches. We had a trailer in the Quad where donations were made. It has been the source of great pride and a tangible sign to our students that their bountiful and blessed lives can contribute to the wellbeing of others in such simple ways. Generosity is about making space in our lives to think of others and to give happily.

Stations of the Cross

A whole school integrated art and religion project has been now been completed. Each class has used mosaic pieces to create the Stations of the Cross ready for Easter celebrations. The stations are now embedded around the school and just with the Harmony Garden are a now permanent fixtures to remind us about what is important to our school. This project showed the best of what happens when everyone works together – parents, students and teachers.

Toe-by-Toe Program

Toe By Toe is a systematic phonic approach to improving reading through the drilling and practice of: letter sounds, blending, segmenting, syllabication, tracking and sight word recognition. Our program has started again. We are all working hard on improving our reading skills. Thanks to our parents and grandparents who volunteer to help in the mornings before school. Good work to our students who are earnest in their endeavours and arrive with a smile each morning. The sky is our limit.

School Band and Choirs Underway

Rehearsals have begun as those participating in band and choir look forward to another brilliant year of performances and practising, practising and practising. Rehearsals take place each Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday mornings before school. No-one seems to mind the early starts and there is always a full house.

Swimming Carnival

Green faction (Ward) won their first carnival for the first time in 16 years much to the enjoyment of current members who gave a mighty effort at the pool.

New Traffic Signals

New solar-powered signs were placed in Querrin Ave recently to help slow the traffic during the times our students arrive and depart the school grounds. Flashing lights help to remind drivers they are in a school zone.

Digital Portfolios for all Students

This year we have implemented the use of FreshGrade App as our classroom communication channel for parents. Teachers will regularly send digital portfolio work samples to parents via the app. Teachers have been working really hard sorting out how it works on their iPads and laptops.

World Read Aloud Day

We celebrated this day in several ways. Year 4 students visited their younger buddy classes and read from books and iPads. We were also part of the launch of the Quality Time app created by one of our Dads. The idea of the app is so that children can read a bedtime story to a family member who is away from home. To show us how it works Chris and daughter Amelie read to each other from a storybook inside the App. Chris was at the Alexander Library in the City where his app was being officially launched. Amelie was in our school library with her classmates. Really cool!