RUST and NAVY

Da Vinci Decathlon

Last week girls from Years 5 to 11 competed in the annual da Vinci Decathlon virtually. Da Vinci is a highlight of Tangara’s Gifted and Talented Program. Run in the spirit of an Olympic

Decathlon, the girls work collaboratively in teams on some fascinating challenges from science,

engineering, philosophy, art, drama, poetry, cartography and mathematics. Thank you to Mrs Dirckze for the commitment and expertise she provides in helping to prepare our girls for this very rigorous competition. Congratulations to all our participants on being fine representatives of our school and for managing to claim success in the following categories:

Year 5 Poetry - 1st place and 10th place overall

Year 8 Creative Producers - 3rd place, Engineering - 4th place

Year 9 Art and Poetry - 1st place

Year 11 Cartography - 4th place

Forming persons not just educating students

We have our Open Week coming up next Tuesday 18 - Thursday 20 May. I always like to point out to prospective parents the Tangara difference. At Tangara we are not just educating students, we are forming persons. Part of our role as adults in forming young people is to help them to become discerning individuals. We know that children today have a world of information at their fingertips, thanks to the internet. However, information is not the same as knowledge. Knowledge requires discrimination between the true and the false, good and evil, the sacred and the profane, what’s beautiful and what’s ugly. We need to create in our children the habit of discrimination.

Parents play a critical role in teaching their children this habit, so that they grow into strong, independent thinkers. Education is much more than filling our children’s minds with facts – they must know how to evaluate facts! Developing the habit of discrimination requires practice. We can challenge our children in every-day situations: at the dinner table discussing current issues, talking through a movie, asking them about popular entertainment. What is it that you like about this song? What attracts you to this genre? Do the themes reflect reality? What message does this send about good and evil? Would you have made the same choice as that character? Of course, modelling a healthy discrimination in our own choices is the best teacher. 

Archdale Debating

Congratulations to all our debaters for successfully completing the first round of the Archdale Debating competition against Roseville College this week with a win for Year 8 and Year 9.

Tangara Basketball, Netball and Futsal

Our girls are off to a great season in basketball, netball and futsal. It’s wonderful to hear about the strong Tangara spirit and teamwork that takes place on and off the courts. Thank you to our parents who volunteer their time and skills to coach our teams and provide these healthy opportunities for our girls. I look forward to attending and watching some of the games and seeing our girls in action!

Final words from Pope Francis

I leave you with a tweet from Pope Francis this week that I think we can all take something from: “Everything we would like others to do for us, let us do for them instead. (cf. Mt 7:12) Do we want to be heard? Let us first listen. Do we need encouragement? Let us give encouragement. Do we want someone to care for us? Let us care for those who are alone and abandoned. 

Last Friday, during the Mother's Day Mass for Infants, we could do the blessing of the new Tabernacle. The restrictions didn't allow us to have more people attending such an important ceremony. 

In this 2 minute  video you can watch the part of the homily where I explain why we have a new Tabernacle and the moment when we left the Blessed Sacrament in it.

You can see in the photo what is engraved inside the Tabernacle:"Adoro te devote, latens deitas", Godhead here in hiding, whom I do adore. These words remind Him how parents, staff and students want to adore the Eucharist constantly. 

And don't forget that Jesus hidden in the Tabernacle, is sending his blessings to all Tangara families.

Why is it that St Joseph is often depicted holding a flowering staff? 

The tradition of depicting St Joseph with a flowering staff, often with a lily, comes from sources that are not historically certain, even though the tradition has received widespread acceptance in Christian art. Probably the earliest such source is the Protoevangelium of James, an apocryphal writing of the second century. It is from this work, by the way, that we have the names of Our Lady’s parents, Joachim and Anne, and the account of how Anne conceived Mary late in life after many years without being able to bear a child. 

This Friday, 14 May, there will be a launch of my latest book, Question Time 5 - 150 Questions and Answers on the Catholic Faith. Peter Rosengren, editor of the Catholic Weekly, will do the launch at St Michael's, Belfield, at 7.30 pm and all are welcome to attend.

May is a very special month at our school, a month dedicate to our heavenly mother Mary and our mothers here on earth. This year we had the inaugural Mother’s Day Mass where we welcomed mums to celebrate Mass with us and thank them for all that they do.

We were also privileged to have the blessing of the new tabernacle at this Mass. Tabernacle is a Hebrew word meaning residence or dwelling place, and during the time of Exodus it was the dwelling place of the Lord. Our tabernacle is also the dwelling place of the Lord, it is where the Eucharist, the body of Jesus Christ dwells. Truly we are blessed to be able to visit Jesus every day in this new home in this tabernacle; our boys and girls and their families will now be available to pay Jesus a visit all the time.

Despite the rain, our boys and girls payed special homage to Mary by participating in a pilgrimage around campus visiting the shrines of Our Lady. This has been a very special tradition at our school.

Please diarise the 27 May as the day when all our Infants parents and their children are invited to attend this term's Infants School Mass.  

Coding, algorithms and digital systems are all concepts that Year 1 Rust are becoming familiar with in Scope IT.

Each week 1R participates in the Digital Technology lessons as a component of the Science curriculum.  This week the students participated in practical experiences to help them understand what coding is used for. They were very pleased to hear that it is used to make games!

Communicating and working as a team on the computers is also an important part of the lesson. It is wonderful to see how Year 1Rust can work so well with their classmates.

The Virtue focus in the Junior School this week is: Fairness

I am practicing fairness when I:

• Treat others as I wish to be treated
• Play by the rules
• Take turns
• Think how my actions will affect others
• Share with others fairly

Selected students in Years 4-7 recently took part in the Bebras Computational Thinking Challenge which is run by CSIRO Education and Outreach.

The challenge presents Computational Thinking activities to students in a way that highlights student ability beyond Science or Maths skills.

Charlotte P scored the highest mark in the school and was awarded a High Distinction. Congratulations Charlotte.

Year 2 students have started the term with wonderful enthusiasm. The first weeks have set the tone with what we hope will be a terrific term.

We are investigating the properties of different material and their purposes. Our first Science investigation was to find out what would happen when glue and a magic activator were mixed together- SLIME!

We participated in a moving ANZAC ceremony and had the opportunity to listen to Colonel Lieutenant Andrew Lam who serves in the Australian Defense Force.

Healthy Harrold visited Tangara and we had a wonderful session with him called, ‘Growing Friends’.

We look forward to an action-packed term of learning with our friends

In class we took the challenge of making attractive hats out of newspaper. All students needed to use their measuring skills, planning ability and creative talent to produce flattering hats that could be worn whilst walking without falling off. Using a measuring tape at times was challenging but the end result was so on trend.

On Wednesday 21 April students from Years 7–12 participated in fun, stimulating STEM workshops that developed key skills in engineering design and mathematical thinking. In each of the activities the students were required to work collaboratively to plan, design, assemble and build structures using their knowledge of mathematics and engineering design. They worked in their house teams lead by Year 12 students.

Year 7 completed two challenges. The first task was the Pasta and Marshmallow Tower Challenge. The objective of this activity was to use only 1 marshmallow, 20 pieces of raw spaghetti, string and a 1m piece of tape in order to construct the tallest tower possible within the 18 minutes time limit.  There were a variety of styles the students came up with including cubed and triangular structures which helped distribute balance. This enabled a tall structure. They all did an amazing job with the highest tower reaching 86 cm. The next activity was the Sierpinski Triangle Origami Challenge which explores the various ways origami is used in engineering processes. The goal was to achieve the highest made total of Sierpinski triangles which in the end, were combined to make larger scaled triangles in which Year 7 made four. A special mention goes to a group of keen Year 7 students who spent many early morning and lunch sessions completing restoration work and assembling the final structure.

On Tuesday the 27 April, Year 12 embarked on our one night retreat to the Benedict XVI Centre. Upon arrival we were told that over the camp, we’d all complete an anonymous affirmation note for each girl in our grade in order to show our gratitude and support for one another. By the end of the camp, each girl had 40+ affirmations written to her which helped to encourage the spirit of unity within our grade, especially approaching the end of our HSC.

Not only did we bond with each other on the retreat, but we heard from 2 inspiring speakers, Daniel Assaf and Rachel Wong. Mr Assaf shared his powerful testimony and words of incentive in finding our purpose in life and determining what God is calling us to do. He urged us to look outside of ourselves and foster a life of prayer to help us reach this understanding. 

Rachel Wong ran a workshop the following day, that educated us on issues faced by modern day women and how we as women can fight such issues. She opened a discussion on issues such as abortion, stem cell research and surrogacy which allowed us to greatly deepen our knowledge and understanding on such potential issues. 

As a cohort, we all had a wonderful time on retreat in deepening our relationship with God, our friends, teachers and parents. A big thank you to Fr Felix, Mrs Montes, Miss Tropea, Miss Touma and Miss Miljak for all the time and effort spent on putting together our lovely retreat!

Elizabeth Fernandez & Isabella C

What a jam packed term we have in store! With preparations for events such as the Athletics Carnival, Inter-house, Buddies Day, May pilgrimages’ and Tangaras Got Talent are all well underway for this term. Year 12 are all excited to be sharing these wonderful experiences with the girls at Tangara! This term for the fortnightly “Lizzie and Izzy Show” at assembly, we are going to discuss how to be a good friend, adapting good study habits and our one of a kind “Tangara fashion show” will be making another appearance… but we won't give too much away just yet. 

Later in the term we also have a Mental Health week planned in order to spread awareness and destigmatize such an important topic that many young people struggle with. We will meet in our Big Sister groups to talk about support systems available to the girls to reach out to if in need of support with mental health. 

Year 12 is eager to make it a brilliant term and continue to spread school spirit!

Elizabeth F & Isabella C

School and Vice Captains 

In Science, Year 9 have been learning about the Nervous and Endocrine systems. As part of the unit, students created models of sensory and motor neurons to develop their understanding of the parts of a neuron and their functions. 

We are heading into Round 4 of Netball this week. The last few weeks of games have placed our Under 12s, Under 15s and under 17s in first position on the ladder. We are so proud of all the hard work and dedication of the players and coaches involved. We are looking forward to a great season of fun on the courts.

Round 2

TANGARA 10 defeated RHAC 17   9-3

GAZELLES 37 defeated TANGARA 9   15-9

TANGARA 8 defeated ST MICHAELS  31-12

GLENWOOD 34 defeated TANGARA 7   19-15

OAKHILL DRIVE 13 defeated TANGARA 6   37-7

RAMS 27 defeated TANGARA 5   28-11

TANGARA 4 defeated GLENWOOD 25   59-7

TANGARA 3 defeated RAMS 20   52-11

TANGARA 2 defeated GLENWOOD 18   37-19

Round 3 

OLLIES 7 defeated TANGARA 10   9-4

KELLYVILLE 24 defeated TANGARA 9   18-3

TANGARA 8 defeated RAMS 46   35-2

GAZELLES 28 defeated TANGARA 7   21-16

CUMBERLAND 6 defeated TANGARA 6   34-6

TANGARA 5 defeated CUMBERLAND 5   20-6

TANGARA 4 defeated RAMS 27   45-9

TANGARA 3 defeated KELLYVILLE 10   46-19

BHSC16 defeated TANGARA 2   36-24

The Premier’s Reading Challenge (PRC) aims to encourage a love of reading for leisure and pleasure in students and to experience quality literature. It inspires students to read, read more and read widely. The PRC reading list is extensive to cater for the social diversity and reading ability of ALL students in NSW. Please note that there are books on the PRC list which Tangara does not endorse. However, the PRC library collection at Tangara has only those books that meet the stringent criterion requirements of this school. 

Overdue notices have been emailed to all students and parents with books outstanding from last Term. Primary students have also received a print notice. If you have received an email, could you please assist your child in locating the item/s and returning them as soon as possible? The cost of any items not returned by Friday, 11 June, will be added to school fees for next term, together with a $5 processing fee per item.  Your assistance in returning wandering items would be greatly appreciated! 

Mrs Ellis and Mrs Beard had great fun celebrating Star Wars Day in the Library (May the 4th be with you)! It tied in beautifully with our theme for this term ... Discover New Worlds.