Term 1 Week 5 Newsletter

Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of Lent 

Ash Wednesday begins the forty day season of Lent that leads to Easter. On Ash Wednesday, we came together  to acknowledge the times that we have turned about from God and the need to ask for his forgiveness. Our Ash Wednesday service was slightly different this year with students, staff and guests receiving a sprinkling of Ashes on their heads rather than the tradition mark of the cross. Regardless of the change in procedures, we were able to reflect upon how we can have a change of heart and follow Jesus during this Lenten period.  Thank you to those who were able to join us for our Ash Wednesday services. 

Project Compassion 

Thank you to those families who have already been able to make a donation to Project Compassion. Students were very excited to be able to take home their Project Compassion donation box last week and classes have started to explore the work of Project Compassion. 

We begin our annual Lenten Project Compassion journey by learning about the story of Jamila and her family. Jamila, 22, is a Rohingya woman, living in the world’s largest refugee camp in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh. A single mother, she fled armed conflict in Myanmar to save herself, her elderly mother and eight-month-old baby.  

With the support of Caritas Australia, through Caritas Bangladesh, Jamila was able to access emergency food and shelter. She also received counselling, emotional support and learnt sewing skills, to help her earn an income.  Jamila now feels less alone, with a sense of community around her. She is able to ‘Be More’ to her little family.   

At the moment 860,494 people remain in the densely populated camps, in desperate need of humanitarian assistance, especially due to COVID-19. (UNHCR)  

Watch a short film about Jamila’s story here. 

“Aspire not to have more, but to be more.”

Please support Project Compassion: lent.caritas.org.au 

Sacramental Program at the Parish Hall 

The Sacramental Program has resumed for 2021 with a growing group of students form St Catherine's and surrounding schools. We have welcomed them and their families and enjoyed undertaking the preparations for their upcoming Reconciliation which will be held on Tuesday March 9th at St Matthew's Church. We were able to hold our first workshop for the year in the newly built Hall at St Matthew's Church and will continue to hold our preparation workshops in this beautiful setting. 

Garden Produce/Ecology 

We have been thrilled to be able to share some of the school grown garden produce with our school community this term. We successfully help our first Garden Market Stall which raised over $45. This money will go towards future garden projects. We look forward to having more of these stalls across the year and hearing about the wonderful things families have cooked with the produce. 

Ecology Representative Group 

This year each class will have 2 students as Eco Reps each semester. These students will help with Ecology initiatives around the school. This continues to be a priority with our commitment to care for creation as we are inspired by the words of Pope Francis 

I would like to congratulate these students on their commitment to this aspect of our school values and very much look forward to working with them this semester. They have already started working hard brainstorming ideas and being proactive in improving the recycling behaviours of our school community. You may like to also adopt the milk bottle plastic recycling initiative by recycling small hard plastics within the clean milk bottle. 

SAPSASA Swimming Carnival 2021

Congratulations to the 14 students that competed at the SAPSASA Swimming Carnival on Thursday 25th February in at Mt Barker Pool. The students participated in 3 weeks of trials and training sessions at Woodside Pool in preparation for the Carnival with students in Years 4-6 (Born in 2011, 2010,2009) competing on the day.

Special mention to the following students:

Ava – 4th Breastroke – Hills District

Oscar – 4th Breastroke – Hills District

Hamish – 5th Breastroke – Hills District

Mackenzie – 5th Breastroke – Hills District

Nathan – 5th Breastroke – Hills District

Thank you to Mrs Pat Wheeler for all her expert help with training sessions and at the carnival and to all our fantastic parent volunteers that assisted with officiating on the day:

Janelle Stevenson, Rachel Hutton, Sharon Nakandi, Emma Beare and Michael Bates.

REMINDER – Catholic Schools Swimming Carnival

A reminder that all students selected in the Catholic Schools Swimming Carnival will be notified next week. There will be one more training session for these students in week 7, Wednesday 10th March at Woodside Pool. The Carnival Day for these students will be in week 8, Wednesday 17th March at Marion Pool.

SAPSASA Athletics Carnival

A reminder to all students in Years 4-6 (Born in 2011, 2010,2009) the SAPSASA Athletics trials will begin this Monday and Wednesday at lunch time and during PE lessons. A break of the trails is below:

Week 6 - Monday lunch 100m and 200m. Wednesday lunch 800m

Week 6 - PE lessons – High Jump/Shot Put/Long Jump/ Discus

Week 7 – Monday Public holiday. Wednesday Catholic Schools Swimming Carnival – No training

Week 8 – Final trials – If Children have missed any sessions

Week 8 – PE lessons High Jump/Shot Put/Long Jump/Discus – TEAM SELECTED

Week 9 – Lunch time training sessions for selected students

Week 10 – Carnival Wednesday 31st March – Oakbank Area

Mr De Giovanniello (Physical Education Teacher/Sports Coordinator)

This term in 2F we have been learning about many interesting and fun topics.

In HASS we have been learning about our families. We have been observing family photos are using these to compare the similarities and differences of life over time. From this, we have created ‘family portraits’ that show who is in our families. We have also been utilising our family photos to create family books that contain information and images of our families. The Year 1’s and 2’s have created ‘family cubes’ that highlight the many concepts of our families ranging from who is in our families to things we enjoy doing with our families.

In maths we have been learning to count to and from 1000. To help us effectively count and add large numbers, we have been using place value mats and pop sticks to help facilitate our counting. We have also been learning about ordering numbers and are becoming experts at ordering and recording numbers up to and beyond 1000.

In Religion we have been exploring prayer and the many ways we can talk to God and build our relationship with God. We have learnt that praying is important to Christians and we can use prayer to seek help, pray for ourselves and to pray for others. This was expressed through our ‘Prayers from out hearts’ task where the children wrote a prayer they wanted to share.

In English we have been learning how to write a recount. We know that a recount must include who, what, when, where and why, as well as a correct sequence of events followed by a personal summary. The Year 2’s have produced many amazing recounts that involve a variety of creative characters.

In Science we have been learning about the natural resource of water. We have undertaken experiments of using our 5 senses to describe water and observing what happens to water when poured onto various surfaces. The children are really engaged in the topic and excited to learn about how water is used in our school, through the help of Gerry. 

Positive Education

Positive Education is one of the approaches that we are introducing at St Catherine’s to help us achieve a strong community that values belonging and connection.

Positive Education refers to the way that education settings have been able to apply the research and practice from positive psychology to their own contexts. Some schools have sought to embed simple, research-based practices into their classrooms, staff rooms and playgrounds. The purpose is to build positive emotions, engagement, relationships, meaning, accomplishment and health (PERMAH), in order to boost wellbeing.

For quite some time St Catherine’s staff have already been using language of Positive Education in practice everyday. You can hear staff asking students to reflect on their choices rather than telling them what not to do, reminding them to make positive choices and enabling them to take control and responsibility for their behaviour choices. You will also hear staff supporting children to choose how they feel about their interactions, issues and challenges, and how a positive approach usually results in a better outcome.

Character Strengths

Last week, we launched Positive Education with the children by introducing them to Character Strengths. Character Strengths are the positive parts of your personality that impact how you think, feel and behave and are the keys to you being your best self, and the things you might want to work on.  In other words, they are the positive human qualities that serve as pathways for living a good life.   Martin Seligman and a team of social scientists worked together to identify a set of six virtues and 24-character strengths.  We have the 24-character strengths on display in the Treehouse.

Character Strengths are not about things that you are good at - although knowing your strengths may help you recognise the things that you are likely to be good at. Classes will continue to investigate Character Strengths so that children can confidently identify and describe their strengths.

Whilst, children were introduced to Character Strengths, staff who had not already undertaken Positive Education Level 1 Training completed this professional development.

Further information on Character Strengths can be found at http://www.viacharacter.org You can also take the free questionnaire to find out your own character strengths.

Some of our newest students in Reception were able to explain how they have demonstrated their strength of bravery, creativity and kindness.

Photos are of buddy classes working together to share ideas on how they display their character strengths.

Melinda James

Leader of Learning - Wellbeing

Raising Kids with Grit

It was a great sense of community engagement to have 50 parents join our teaching staff at Bill Hansberry’s workshop in Week 3. Bill shared his knowledge of how we can strengthen resilience in our children. He provided strategies and gave examples of language that we would use to support the development of resilience in our young people whilst entertaining us as well.  

Bill gave suggestions on how to develop the 10 C’s of resilience: competence, confidence, courage, conversion, connection and Relationships, Conversation, coping coaching, competition and common sense. Bill reminded us of what are qualities that help us to show resilience and shared strategies on how we can all support our children (and ourselves) to develop resilience.

Criteria of resilient qualities

Someone who can bounce back from setbacks
Interprets life’s disappointments as challenging to unravel rather than awful stresses to be avoided.
Has a switch to turn on confidence and determination.
Has a deep desire to find constructive ways forward.
Can set goals and stick with them.
Is self-aware, knows where their strengths and challenges lie, and what they can do to find solutions.
Can laugh with others and can laugh at themselves.
Share’s thoughts. Ask for help and follows advice.
Enjoys building relationships and connecting with peers.
Likes to give back, to help and be supportive of others.

Bill presented the school with our second copy of his book “Raising Beaut Kids”.  Parents are more than welcome to borrow this book.

We look forward to the possibility of being able to offer further workshops for parents in Semester 2. 

Melinda James

Leader of Learning - Wellbeing

Debating 

We have had a wonderful amount of students nominate to be part of our second year in the Debating SA competition. We have registered 6 teams to participate. Every Wednesday after school, 20 students from Years 5 and 6 will be training to learn about debating in preparation of the competition, which spans over Term 2 and 3. The students learn lifelong skills such as: 

Thinking and research skills.

Analytical thinking skills. 

The ability to think clearly under pressure. 

A strong sense of curiosity and a love of learning about issues and the world around them. 

An ability to gather and evaluate information from a range of sources. 

Informed exchange of ideas. 

Initiative in applying thinking skills critically and creatively. 

Communication skills 

Coherent and confident expression of ideas in collaboration with teammates. 

The ability to coherently and convincingly argue a point of view for their team, which they may not personally support. 

Public speaking skills. 

Word power and strength of language. 

Social skills 

Self-esteem and self-confidence. 

A sense of understanding, tolerance and acceptance of different views on issues. 

Respect of the right of others to hold differing and alternative ideas. 

Sportsmanship 

Generosity of spirit between participants, across all school sectors. 
Teamwork and sportsmanship. 

Valuing participation more than the outcome. 

A sense of responsibility to be humble in victory and gracious in defeat. 
The ability to respond appropriately to constructive feedback. 

Corey Lewis 

Leader of Learning - Curriculum