Sattler Christian College Newsletter From The Principal

Principal Allan Long

Ph.8983 1268

Fax. 8983 1297

15 Sattler Crescent Bees Creek

P.O Box 1138

Coolalinga NT 0839

Email: admin.scc@ntschools.net

Website: www.scc.nt.edu.au

Term 2 Week 7

In this newsletter:

Principal Message

School Birthday

Celebrations

Year 5 Election

School Chaplain Page

Term 2 Calendar

Sports Carnivals

All my life I have loved sport. I enjoy watching it, and even more I enjoy doing it. I enjoy the challenge of striving with and against fellow competitors. I enjoy the thrill of the contest, truly appreciating my competitors and being grateful that they are helping me to achieve my best, regardless of whether I finish in 1st or 144th place.

Last Friday morning we had our school cross-country at Fred’s Pass. It was great to have lots of parents come along and cheer, and to volunteer their help in the running of the event. I know that the students really appreciated your encouragement.

On Tuesday we also enjoyed our ‘2-part’ Athletics carnival. It was another wonderful day and the emphasis was on participation, ‘having a go’, achieving your own personal best, and celebrating everyone’s efforts and achieve-ments. The ‘spirit’ of the day was very positive. Again it was very pleasing and helpful to see so many parents come along to assist and encourage. Many thanks.

The results from these carnivals will be used to select students to go on to compete at the regional (PARRS) carnivals for athletics and cross-country.

But is competition, be it in sport or some other competitive situation, really good or bad? Most of us have had some negative experience of competition where we have felt disappointed or even devalued. Can everyone be ‘winners’? Can competition become simply a means of ranking people, where people are ‘measured’, and categorised as outstanding, average, or inade-quate. If competition is used in this way a person’s self esteem can become falsely inflated or alternatively take a considerable beating. I have known some people that have as a result of negative experiences dismissed all forms of competition as unhelpful. I personally feel that such a perspective is extreme. However, I certainly recognise that competition can be a negative experience for people. I think that is especially true if:

Only winners are celebrated

The contest is very one-sided, unfair or unrealistic

People base their worth, or the worth of others, on achievements/success

Competitive situations though do not have to be negative. They can be very positive when the following is the case:

All competitors are celebrated and affirmed for their participation and effort

The contest is fairly even and reasonably achievable

People are valued and appreciated for who they are (much loved and precious children of God) rather than for what they can do

Competition can be unhelpful if we put the wrong emphasis on the results. The results do matter but must not be allowed to become all important. It is more important that we create a ‘culture’ in which people feel free to ‘have a go’ without fear of failure or ridicule. Competition can bring out our best or our worst. It has the potential to develop character, resilience and teamwork. Continued over the page

SCC Newsletter 2016

continued

It can be a helpful motivator and the joy of the contest (regardless of who ‘wins’) can be a bless-ing to all who compete. Let us reclaim competition.

In the recent Sattler carnivals we are striving to ensure that competition at Sattler is a positive experience and a source of growth and encouragement rather than one dominated by boastful-ness or insecurity.

Allan Long

CHEER SQUAD

SCC Newsletter 2016

Sattler Christian College

Queen’s Birthday long weekend 2016

Family Birthday Party - Friday 10 June

5 - 7:30pm

Formal Dinner Celebration - Saturday 11 June

6:30 - 10pm

Payment and RSVP for dinner due tomorrow

(Friday 27 May)

- 3 course catered dinner

- celebrating memories from the past

- entertainment

- delicious food

- great company

SCC Newsletter 2016

Our 20th Anniversary Celebration weekend is fast approaching.

PLEASE SHARE THE PROGRAM BELOW WITH ANYONE YOU KNOW WHO HAS

BEEN THROUGH THE SCHOOL. We would love to see as many people as we can!

RSVP & payment for the dinner is due THIS FRIDAY for catering purposes.

Please contact Alayne at the front office to reserve your place.

SCC Newsletter 2016

Year 5 Election

Last week, the year 5’s had a ‘Play Election’.

Our Class learnt a lot of things such as: If you don’t vote

(when you’re enrolled) you get fined lots of money, you

have to be over 18 to vote and you have to number the

ballot number instead of ticking. We also learnt lots of new

words like candidate, electorate, ballot, scrutineer, repre-

sentative and polling booth. The Primary School was divided

into 5 electorates and Year 5 was divided into two political

parties (Rainbow Party and Aussie Party).

We will now hear from an Election official and our newly

elected Prime minister.

Election Official Edith:

Did you know that being an Election Official is really fun?

As an Official Election Official I got to wear a badge,

mark the election roll, hand out the ballot papers, cable

tie the ballot box and make sure people didn’t cheat.

As a scrutineer, I sorted the votes into the different

electorates after the election and made sure the voting

counts were accurate.

Mr. Prime minister: Jack. B

To become PM, first I had to be a candidate, which

required nomination paperwork. As a candidate (for the

Rainbow Party) I had to campaign so I could win in my

electorate. I did this with posters, giving kids high fives

and also giving a speech. When I won the campaign in the

Campbell electorate, I became their representative. To

become the PM I also had to be the leader of my party

(rainbow Party), which required my party’s votes.

It is very fun being Prime minister but I have to do lots

of speeches, we even had a press conference.

If you ever get to ‘play Election’ you should be either an

Election Official or a Candidate, that’s what we found fun.

SCC Newsletter 2016

From the Chaplain Last week I read an article, one of those ones that find their way around to Facebook. I thought it might be something worth sharing with the parents through the School Newsletter. 4th Grader Comes Home With Disturbing News—Then Mom Realizes Her “Worst Nightmare” Is Coming True It wasn’t pretty, but I prevailed… By Leslie Blanchard I will never forget the day my daughter told me that Bethany, a girl in her 4th grade class, was annoying her. “What is she doing to you?” I questioned, instinctively protective. “She’s following me around on the playground and sitting by me at lunch!” she quipped, as if that would sum things right up and get me squarely on her side of the matter. “You mean she’s trying to be friends with you?” I asked incredulously. I realized immediately that I had a problem on my hands. I was raising my own worst nightmare. Smack dab in the middle of my brood of five kids, was a charismatic, sassy, leggy, blonde, dance-y, athletic girl oozing confidence … and apparently annoyance, directed toward another little girl that wasn’t lucky enough to be her. Inconveniently for my daughter, her own mother WAS Bethany in grade school. Freckled of face and frizzy of hair, I was an Army brat, always the new girl clamoring for a friend, drawn to the natural confidence of girls like my daughter. This conversation found me vacillating between heartache and fury, but one thing I knew for sure: Mama was about to put her money where her mouth had been all these years. The battle of two very strong wills ensued at my home the next morning. It wasn’t pretty, but I prevailed. My daughter attended a private Catholic grade school, where on any given day, she and a handful of her cohorts ruled the roost. One quick phone call to Bethany’s mother that same evening confirmed my worst fears. My daughter and her posse were using everything short of a can of “Cling Free” to rid themselves of the annoy-ing Bethany. I’m sure there are parents out there who will say I overreacted. But, I firmly believe we’ve got to start to ad-dress our country’s bullying epidemic right at the heart; by re-defining bullying at its very core. To me, the rejection and complete lack of interest my daughter and her “clique” displayed toward Bethany was the begin-ning of a subtle type of bullying. It is true (confirmed to me by Bethany’s mom and teachers), that there was no overt unkindness or name-calling, etc., just rejection; a complete lack of interest in someone they wrongly concluded had nothing to offer them. After experiencing childhood myself and raising five of my own, I’ve been on every side of the bullying social dynamic, and I am convinced this is where it begins. A casual as-sessment and quick dismissal of an outsider. We would serve our children well, in my opinion, if we had a frank conversation with them about Social Dar-winism and what motivates human beings to accept and reject others. It happens at every age and stage of life, race, creed and religion. It has its roots in our own fears of rejection and lack of confidence. Everyone is jockeying for their own spot on the Social Food Chain. I feel like I have experienced demonstrable success with my children by tabling this dynamic right out in the open. Parents need to call it by name, speak it out loud, shine a bright light in its ugly face. We need to admit to our children that we too experience this, even as adults. Of course it’s tempting to ‘curry favor’ and ‘suck-up’ to the individual a rung of two above you on the Social Ladder, but every single human being deserves our attention and utmost respect. In spite of this, we have to constantly remind our children and ourselves that everyone can bring unexpected and unantici-pated value to our lives. But we have to let them. It’s simply not enough to instruct your children to “Be Nice!” You’ve got to be more specific than that. Kids think if they aren’t being outright unkind, they are being nice. We know better. Connect the ugly dots. Explain the Darwinistic social survival instinct that’s often motivating and guiding their impulses. I promise you, they can handle it. They already see it on some level anyway. They just need YOU to give it a voice and re-direction. As for my girl, I instructed her that she was going to invest some time and energy getting to know Bethany. I assigned her to come home from school the next day and report three cool things she found out about Betha-ny, that she didn’t previously know. My strong-willed child dug in. She did not want to do that. I dug in deeper. I refused to drive her to school the next morning, until she agreed. It seemed that, at least until now, I had the car keys and the power. Her resistance gave us time to have the Social Darwinism conversation. I walked her

SCC Newsletter 2016

through my “ATM Machine Analogy.” I explained to her that she had social bank to spare. She could easily make a withdrawal on behalf of this little girl, risking very little. “Let’s invest!” I enthused and encouraged. She got dressed reluctantly and I drove her to school. She had a good day—what was left of it. But, she was still buggy with me when I picked her up, telling me that her friends’ mothers “stay out of such matters” and let their daughters “choose their own friends!” (Such wise women.) And then she told me three cool things about Bethany that she didn’t previously know. I checked back in with Bethany’s mother by phone two weeks later. It’s called follow through. (I don’t think enough of us are doing that. We “helicopter” over our kids’ wardrobes, nutrition, sleep schedules, hygiene, science fair projects and then pride ourselves on how “hands off” we are on social issues. If I had a dollar for every time I wanted to say, “Seriously? You micro-manage the literal crap out of every thing your child does from his gluten intake to his soccer cleats, but THIS you stay out of?” No wonder there’s zero ac-countability and a bullying culture!) Bethany’s mother assured me that she had been welcomed into the fold of friendship and was doing well. Bethany’s family moved to another state a few years later. My daughter cried when they parted ways. They still keep in touch through all their social media channels. She was and is a really cool girl, with a lot to of-fer her peers. But the real value was to my daughter, obviously. She gained so much through that experi-ence. She is now a 20-year-old college sophomore, with a widely diverse group of friends. She is kind, in-clusive and open to all types of people. When she was malleable, impressionable and mine to guide: —She learned her initial instinct about people isn’t always correctly motivated. —She learned you can be friends with the least likely people; the best friendships aren’t people that are your “type!” In the world of friendship, contrast is a plus. —She learned that there are times, within a given social framework, that you are in a position to make a withdrawal on behalf of someone else. Be generous, invest! It pays dividends. But, most importantly, she learned that, while I may not be overly-interested in what she gets on her Sci-ence Fair project, couldn’t care less if she’s Lactose Intolerant or whether her long blonde hair is snarled, she’s going to damn well treat people right. Parents—your kids are going to eventually develop the good sense to wear a jacket and eat vegetables, invest your energy in how they interact within society. If we insist on being the hovering Helicopter Parent Generation, let’s at least hover over the right areas. http://www.faithit.com/worst-nightmare-raising-the-bully-leslie-blanchard/ About the Author: Leslie Blanchard is a wife and mother of five, who tattles on her husband, her own moth-er and her children by chronicling the insane and mundane in all of their lives in a fairly public way. Collec-tively, her family more or less rues the day they purchased her an iPad. Now that she’s officially a blogger, Leslie lies in the tub, neglecting her considerable responsibilities and muses about marriage, motherhood, friendship and other matters of life outside the bubbles. Read more from Leslie on her blog A Ginger Snapped: Facing The Music Of Marriage And Motherhood May you walk in peace, know joy and always have hope. Dianne Jackson Chaplain

We Love Apple Slinkies!

Bring your own apple or firm crispy pear to be made into a Slinky Tuesday and Friday at recess

Outside the Year 1/2 room on the verandah

YUM!

SEMESTER TWO

TERM 3 - Monday 25th July to Friday 30th September

TERM 4 - Monday 17th October to Thursday 15th December

Term 2 Calendar 2016 Week Mon Tues Wed Thurs Fri Sat Sun

7

23rd - 27th

May

23 24

SCC

ATHLETICS

CARNIVAL

25

NT Senior

College Visit

26

Year 6/7

Museum

Excursion

27

MS

Immunisations

28 29

8

30th May -

3rd June

30 31 1

Year 1/2

Assembly

2 3

CELEBRATE

CREATION

DAY

4 5

9

6th - 10th

June

6 7 8 PARRS

CROSS

COUNTRY

9 10 PARRS PS

ATHLETICS

11 12

10

13th - 17th

June

13

QUEENS

BIRTHDAY

HOLIDAY

14 15

Transition/

Year 1

Assembly

16

Information

Session about

MS for Year 5

Families

17 18 19

11

20th - 24th

June

20 21 22 23 24 LAST DAY

of TERM

SEMESTER 1

REPORTS GO

HOME

25 26

SATTLER

20TH BIRTHDAY

CELEBRATIONS

SUSHI DAY

WE HAVE A FACEBOOK

PAGE Please Like our Sattler page

and watch it develop.

Keep an eye out for new posts.