Compass No 470 - August 2017

From the Principal

Celebrating and Thanking Our Dads

Men play an important role in the development of children and in the development of our community. Studies have shown that the way fathers and significant men interact with children through the different phases of their lives has impact on children’s social and emotional development and their educational outcomes. The rough and tumble of a dad’s play in the early years can help children learn how to regulate their feelings and a dad’s influence extends into adolescence and young adulthood. Various studies have shown that children who have active and nurturing fathers are seen to have better verbal skills, intellectual functioning and academic functioning into adolescence. They are also “more likely to be emotionally secure, be confident to explore their surroundings and, as they grow older, have better social connections” (2011, Oliker).

Within our community men have played a significant role in growing and supporting the various activities of the College, including being significant males for each other’s children. Like mums, dads play a significant role in the development of children and community. This week we take the time to thank the men of this community for all they are and for what they have given. We pray that God would give them joy and equip them well for their important role of growing and nurturing young people across all dimensions of their lives, including the spiritual, within their families and the broader community.

(Oliker, D 2011, The Importance of Fathers, https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-long-reach-childhood/201106/the..., accessed 31 August 2017)

Principals Log

Over the weekend, Ms Sue Arahill, Mrs Rae Hall, Miss Michelle McMillan and Ms Alisha Janssen presented at the national Cultures of Thinking Conference held at Bialik College in Melbourne. The conference, held in conjunction with Harvard’s Project Zero team, provided the opportunity for educators from across Australia to come together and reflect on ways to enhance young people’s engagement, quality of thinking, understanding and dispositions to learning. The nurturing of healthy and effective habits of thinking has impact across all dimensions of life and is critical for thriving in a rapidly changing world. Each of the interactive workshops conducted by the Pacific team, which focused on sharing our journey in Growing Teachers As Researchers and Coaches, were oversubscribed and received with great enthusiasm. We congratulate and thank the team very capably led by Director of Teaching and Learning Ms Sue Arahill. The invitation to present at such a high profile conference is a testament to the great learning teachers across the College have been involved with over many years to shape a rich culture of thinking for our staff and students. 

Our students were also engaged in energetic thinking as they participated in the Opti-MINDS competition over the weekend. After six weeks of preparation, the students represented themselves and the College well as they enjoyed and grew from the experience. We congratulate the students involved and thank Mrs Lu Pollard and Mrs Kirsty Ridley for their leadership and reinvigoration of the College’s participation in this event.

It was a delight to attend the opening of the Creative Generation Excellence Awards in Visual Art 2017 exhibition at the University of the Sunshine Coast art gallery last Thursday night. We congratulate Jamie Beasley and Georgia Woods on having their work selected to be part of the exhibition. Exhibiting students were praised for showcasing their thinking on important life issues. Each of the artworks, including those produced by Jamie and Georgia, enabled the voice, thoughts and viewpoints of young people to be expressed powerfully. We congratulate both students and thank Mrs Denise McMahon and Dr Kym Rodgers for their inspiration of artistic talent within the College.

It was very pleasing to see the way our Year 12 students engaged with the QCS Test this week. We thank Ms Sue Arahill for her leadership of the QCS days and training and Miss Kim Stone, Mrs Rae Hall and Miss Rebecca Ross for their preparation of the students over the course of this year. Students who didn't undertake the QCS Test had the opportunity to participate in an Alternate Day on Wednesday, which focused on the transition from school and navigating the world of work. Students enjoyed a presentation from East Coast Apprenticeships as well as a number of sessions facilitated by Mrs Natasha Purcell. We thank Mrs Natasha Purcell for her leadership of this new initiative.

We wish all the Dads of our community a happy Father’s Day, where their importance is celebrated.

Dr Bronwyn Dolling, Principal

From the College Pastor

Caring Adults and Neighbours

One of the well-known stories from Jesus’ life is the time when he welcomed the children. Parents were bringing their babies and young children to Jesus so he could bless them. However, Jesus’ disciples were trying to discourage parents from doing this. As was the culture of the time, the disciples viewed children as insignificant and of little importance and thought that Jesus had no time for them. However Jesus reacted differently, he replied, “Let the children come to me, do not stop them for the kingdom of God belongs to them. Unless you become like a child you will not enter the kingdom”. This story is often interpreted in terms of who is welcomed into God’s kingdom, a person who has a child-like faith that simply trusts in the promises of God. Some Christians have also interpreted this story as alluding to baptism, Jesus welcomes babies and little children into his kingdom so faith is not mere intellectual assent but also that simple child-like trust.  

Yet another way of interpreting this story is in terms of our thread this week, the caring adults in the plot. Jesus knows that all children and young people need caring adults in their lives. That’s why the parents were bringing their children to Jesus. They knew too that their children needed connection with other trusted adults. Children and young people need the blessing of numerous adults in their lives apart from their parents. The disciples didn’t recognise it, but Jesus and the parents did. As the ancient proverb says, it takes a whole village to raise a child.

When these trusted mentoring relationships do happen for young people and they are questioned later in life about the impact, often the answer is simply that they made time for them. It’s not rocket science but it is challenging in our busy worlds. Make time to connect with young people and we will have a healthier community. 

Let’s pray; Lord God, thank you for the adults we have had in our lives who have encouraged and mentored us. Thank you for the impact those adults have had to our wellbeing and development. Use us to provide the same opportunities to the children and young people in our lives. Help us to give our time to connect with children who need support and guidance. Amen.  

Baptism Orientation Night

Any College parents who are interested in exploring baptism for their children or themselves are invited to an information evening on Tuesday 5th September. The information evening will be held in the College library and will commence at 6.30pm. Any questions can be directed to Pastor Tim Jarick on 5436 7353 or tjarick@pacluth.qld.edu.au.

Pastor Tim Jarick, College Pastor

From the Head of Staff and Students P-5

Year 4 Camp

Last week I had the pleasure of joining Year 4 students and teachers on their outdoor education experience at Alexandra Headland. Outdoor Education at Pacific is a sequential program extending from Years 3-12. It provides all students with the opportunity to develop a variety of interpersonal, leadership and problem solving skills in a challenging, exciting and carefully controlled outdoor setting. Research continues to suggest that such experiences can be the most significant, memorable and defining events for young people during their school years. Thank you to Dr Peter McMahon for coordinating and planning such an excellent program.

  

Year 4 students and teachers left the College on Thursday morning and returned on Friday afternoon excited, if not a little tired. Whilst away, students completed a variety of activities including raft building, initiative games and other experiences aimed at developing cooperation, teamwork and confidence. Students participated enthusiastically in all activities. Thank you to the Year 4 class teachers, Mr Terry Clark and Mr Steven Healy and Outdoor Education Aides Madi, Sue, Andrea and Josh for their care and supervision of students.

Chess Mates

As the popularity of chess continues to grow at the College, in Term 4 students will be offered the opportunity to participate in chess lessons with Chess Mates. Following is a link to news feature that Channel 7 did on Chess Mates last year: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rYnGPD1wjz0&t=2s.

Chess Mates specialises in teaching children of all age groups and skill levels in a fun and engaging way. Younger students learn through songs and stories, while older or more advanced students are taught openings, strategies and forward planning. The focus is on making new friends and having fun while learning.

Chess Mates will be held afterschool on Tuesday afternoons from 3.05pm to 3.50pm at a cost of $10 per lesson.

An email requesting expressions of interest will be forwarded to all families this week. Once an expression of interest is returned, parents will be forwarded the relevant documentation including permission forms. If you have any questions about the classes, please contact Ash from Chess Mates at info@chessmates.com.au or 0415 256 452.

Prep - Year 2 Athletics Carnival

Thank you to the many parents and family members who attended the Prep – Year 2 Athletics Carnival on Monday. Under clear skies, students participated enthusiastically in all events and cheered loudly for their houses. A special thank you to Mrs Natalie Campbell and Mr Darren Hooper for coordinating the event, HPE and grounds staff who assisted in the set up and pack up and P-2 classroom teachers for supervising and encouraging students during the carnival.

Mr David Druery, Head of Staff and Students P-5

Friends of Pacific

Connecting College and Community

Through the Ages Trivia Night – THIS SATURDAY!

A few reminders for our 200+ guests:

  • BYO food (but NO BYO alcohol).
  • 6.30pm for 7.00pm start.
  • Dress up to WIN!
  • Bring your cash/coins for raffle tickets as we have lots of prizes up for grabs on the night.

We hope some of our trivia buffs have managed to collect a lucky number from our Golden Suitcases at Mooloolaba Music and Ezyfit Kawana. Remember to bring it along on the evening!

A heartfelt thank you to our many sponsors: Mooloolaba Music, Ezyfit Kawana, Rumba Resort and 26 Degrees Bar, Fowler Lawyers, Rosetta Books, Sarah’s Unplugged, Maleny Dairies, Australia Zoo, McGrath Estate Agents, AR-T, Lifeflight, Emjays, IZBA Birtinya, Everything Good Glasshouse, The Happy Snack Company, Zarraffa's Currimundi, Wurtulla Fruit Shop, Laserzone Kawana, Coral Café, Pacific Lutheran College, Wendy Begg from St Mark’s Church and more.

Father’s Day Stall 

Our Father’s Day Stall was a great success with many excited buyers! Thank you to Sara Dent and all the Prep parents who assisted at the stall on Wednesday. Also thanks to Lisa, Mona, Lu and Sanet for their help in the lead-up. Our wonderful volunteer parents and staff make these events possible.

Stockland Caloundra School Rewards

Pacific Lutheran College finished in the Top 5 for Stockland Caloundra’s School Rewards program! Thank you to Stockland Caloundra for running such a great program and to all members of the Pacific community who supported it. Well done!

Mrs Jenny Lee, Friends of Pacific Chairperson

Library News

Term 3 Update

We are having a quietly busy week in the library after all the excitement of Book Week. Thank you to all the families who supported our great celebration – your children looked fantastic in their book character costumes last Friday!

  

Home Readers Prep – Year 2

We are in the process of restructuring the management of the Junior College Home Reader collection to make it easier and more accessible for children and teachers. We hope to have this completed by next week, so in the meantime children are taking a little break from taking readers home this week. We thank parents for their understanding on this matter.

Reading Challenge Term 4

Next week is the launch of our Spring Reading Challenge! Primarily this challenge is aimed at independent readers from Year 2 to Year 6/7. Further information will be provided via your child's class teacher and through the library. The challenge will run until the end of Term 4.

Student Book Clubs

During Tuesday lunchtime next week (5th September) any students from Years 5-8 who are interested in starting a book club are invited to bring their food to the library and express their interest. Our book club for older students, Choc Lit, will meet during Thursday lunchtime. This group has been extended to include Year 8-10 students. Please encourage your keen readers to come along and make themselves known.

Scholastic Book Club

Book Club orders are due back by 4th September or remember you can order online via LOOP.

“Reading should not be presented to children as a chore, a duty. It should be offered as a gift.” – Kate di Camillo

Ms Sue Warren, Teacher Librarian 

LLL School Banking

Savings Accounts

Pacific provides opportunities for children and parents to operate savings accounts with the Lutheran Laypeople’s League (LLL). The LLL is a non-profit financial institution established in 1921. All LLL Deposit Accounts are ‘at call’ accounts and there are no LLL fees or charges.  All LLL deposit accounts have an attractive rate of interest with no ‘Bonus’ rate hurdles to jump.

The LLL pays a $5 gift to the first savings account opened for the child.

Deposits can be made through the College’s Business Office each Tuesday before school. To find out more, visit the Business Office.

From the Head of Learning Enrichment

Options Day – CQUniversity

CQUniversity Noosa in partnership with Sunshine Butterflies invites all young adults with disability and their carers to attend Options Day. This special event features inspirational guest speakers, demonstrations, activities and an expo style showcase of local disability service providers and support agencies. Options Day is on Monday 11th September. Click here to download the full event information.

Mrs Jo Belchamber, Head of Learning Enrichment 6-12  

Junior College

Opti-AWESOME!

Last Saturday 26th August, two Pacific Lutheran College teams of Years 3-6 students competed in Division 1 of Opti-MINDS against 19 other Sunshine Coast schools. It was a long and yet extremely exciting day, filled with performances and a long term and a spontaneous challenge.

Our students undertook the Social Sciences Challenge called ‘Fruit Salad’ and the Science Engineering Challenge called ‘Flat-Packing’. Both teams had to collaboratively problem solve to create and develop a script, resolve an identified problem and perform their final presentation to an audience.

All participating students showed great enthusiasm and commitment both in the six weeks leading up to the event and on the day. The teams were outstanding in representing the College and we are very excited about learning from this experience, as this was the first year Pacific has participated for some time.  

  

Our amazing thinkers are listed below:

Social Sciences

  • Emily Creamer
  • Ella Mulhearn
  • Ruby Davis
  • Phoebe Shearer
  • Toby Creamer
  • Keeley Meade
  • Dan Whittingham

Science Engineering

  • Isabella Lee
  • Kahlia Taylor
  • Tamsyn Doyle
  • Olivia Boland
  • Jett Forman
  • Isha Wallis
  • Alex Lee

Well done to all of these students, you should all be very proud of yourselves.

Thank you to everyone who was a part of our 2017 Opti-MINDS journey – to all the wonderful parents for supporting this opportunity for their children, to the Shearer and Creamer families who volunteered to judge on the day and to Alicia Smith who helped with room monitoring. We are also grateful for the support and advice provided by Mrs Jo Belchamber.

Mrs Lu Pollard and Mrs Kirsty Ridley, Opti-MINDS Coordinators

Cultural News

The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe

Students have been busily rehearsing for our Junior College production of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, which will hit the stage in Term 4 at The Events Centre, Caloundra. Tickets will be on sale in early October, so stay tuned for further details!

Miss Anita Morton and Miss Ceilidh Peers

Junior Sport

SCISSA Gala Day 3

SCISSA Gala Day 3 will be held next Thursday 7th September. All students need to arrive at school by 8.15am and meet on the front oval for roll call. Buses will be departing at 8.25am sharp to ensure teams reach their venues in time.

The venues are as follows, parents are also welcome to attend and cheer on their children:

TEAM

VENUE

Basketball – Girls

Matthew Flinders Anglican College, Stringybark Road, Buderim.

Volleyball – Girls

Caloundra Indoor Stadium, North Street, Caloundra.

Soccer – Girls

Maroochydore Soccer Club, Kunda Park.

Touch – Boys

Noosa Touch Association, Shields Street, Tewantin.

Volleyball – Boys

Nambour Christian College, McKenzie Road, Woombye.

AFL – Boys

Maroochydore AFL Field, Fishermans Road.

5/6 Water Polo and Yr 4 Flippa Ball

Kawana Aquatic Centre, Sportsmans Parade, Bokarina.

5/6 Flippa Ball

Nambour Aquatic Centre, Petrie Park Road.

Kayaking

Starting at Pacific with a PT session from 8.30am – 9.30am and then travelling to Lake Kawana for a kayaking expedition.

Dance

Pacific dance room.

Students need to wear their full sports uniform, including their sports hat and are also required to bring a packed lunch and water bottle. Some venues will have a small canteen running but students should still bring lunch from home.

All students will be back at school for normal afternoon dismissal at 3.00pm. We wish all students the best of luck next Thursday.

Prep - Year 2 Athletics Carnival

On Monday this week, students from Prep – Year 2 were greeted with beautiful weather for their Athletics Carnival. Foundation College students had been preparing for carnival during their Physical Education lessons this term, developing their skills and coordination in a range of events.

Participation was the aim of the carnival, with all students having a go in the following events:

  • 60m sprint and relays
  • Shot put
  • Long jump
  • Potato planting relay
  • Ball games and sack races
  • High jump (Year 2)
  • 400m run

  

Students showed a high level of skill and there was a great atmosphere of support from both competitors and supporters.

Congratulations to Bula House who were crowned the 2017 Pacific Foundation College athletics champions! The final scores for the day were as follows:

  • Bula – 791
  • Mumba – 769
  • Wira – 680

Mr Darren Hooper, Head of Junior Sport

Club Sport

Pacific Soccer
  • Upcoming Events
  • Season Pack Up
  • Support Our U11 Eels
  • 2018 Season
  • Adermann Awards 2017
  • Pacific Soccer Sponsors
  • Six-A-Side Summer Competition
  • Pacific Soccer App
  • Pacific Soccer Contacts

Click here to download the Pacific Soccer newsletter for this week.

Mr Matt Gigney, Secretary – Pacific Soccer Committee

PLC Netball Club

Whilst the score board results may not have gone our way on the weekend, everyone walked away proud of the girls’ efforts. For the smallest club in the association, it was a great achievement to have four teams competing in the finals.

For our Ponies and Fillies, each and every player, coach, manager and parent can be proud of their efforts. In finals, there can only be one winner and on the day, it was not our turn. The task ahead of us is to grow from the experience as we move into next season. 

For our Arabians and Brumbies, they get a second chance with the Saturday games this week. The game details are as follows:

  • Arabians – 8.30am on Court 3; and
  • Brumbies – 10.30am on Court 4.

Everyone is welcome to come and support our teams!

Club Photos

Due to a number of factors, the date for our team photos has been changed to Wednesday 6th September starting at 3.30pm. There will be a separate photo for each team and a whole club photo. I appreciate that this time clashes with the Brumbies training, but we can work around that issue. Details for the photos are as follows:

  • Location – Pacific Gym;
  • Dress – Pacific netball dress; and
  • Time – 3.30pm.

If team managers and coaches could also make an effort to attend, it would be nice to have you in the photos with the girls.

Club Breakup

A reminder of the club breakup on Sunday 10th September at 5.00pm at Laserzone. Please be there by 5.00pm as we will be commencing the presentations straight away.

Mr Trevor Colton, President PLC Netball Club

Uniform Shop

Opening Hours and Online Ordering

The Uniform Shop is open from 8.00am to 9.30am every Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. Orders can be placed online via www.flexischools.com.au and will be delivered to your child the following day.

Mrs Peta King, Uniform Shop Convenor

St Mark’s Lutheran Church

Weekly Services

Pastor Ray Morris, St Mark’s Lutheran Church Caloundra

General Notices

Entertainment Books

Pacific Lutheran College is fundraising with Entertainment™ again this year. Order your NEW 2017 | 2018 Entertainment™ Books and Entertainment™ Digital Memberships today and 20% of the proceeds will go towards Pacific Lutheran Early Learning Centre! To order your book or digital membership, visit: https://www.entertainmentbook.com.au/orderbooks/230p536

Upcoming Dates

September
1 Celebrating Dad's Breakfast
2 Through the Ages Trivia Night (6.30pm)
3 Father's Day
4 Year 4-6 SCISSA Training (3.15-4.15pm)
7 Year 4-6 SCISSA Gala Day 3
8 Staff, Sport and Co-Curricular Photo Day
14 Year 6-8 Portfolios
  Year 4-6 Foundation Cup
15 K-12 Chapel
  P-5 Portfolios
  Term 3 Concludes
17-23 Senior Mountain Bike Expedition