Dear Families and Friends,

As we draw near to the end of the Term I would like to thank parents for the great support you have given to our school. There are many positives to take from the term and as a school community we have much to celebrate. Our students have been involved in numerous educational, sporting and cultural activities and have represented our school community wonderfully.

Parents and grandparents have been involved in working on the playground and equipment, swimming and cross country carnivals, transporting our students to events, assisting in the classrooms, canteen, Community Council, the upcoming street stall, fundraising and Easter ceremonies. As a school community we flourish when we work together with a focus on the wellbeing of our students and the wider community.

I would like to congratulate our Kindergarten for the fantastic start to the year. They are a very settled, happy and cooperative group of students and are working very well. Thank you to their Y6 buddies who have shared the responsibility for assisting them around the school and making them feel at home.

Supportive Playgroups at St Patrick’s Primary School

Open to all Parents/carers of pre-school students and held on Fridays from 9:00am - 10:30 am for 8 weeks starting on the 11th May.

This is an opportunity for parents of pre-school children to be involved in an inclusive and supportive playgroup that has a focus on engaging families in their children’s learning. The playgroups focus is to support parents/carers to “see” the learning that occurs in everyday play and to build awareness of how they can positively influence their child’s learning.

The Supportive Playgroup Program is open to all Parents/carers of pre-school students regardless of whether or not you are attending St Patrick’s Primary.

The Main themes that will be covered include: Talking together, Reading together, Singing together, Playing together, Laughing together, Belonging and Learning together.

Parents may wish to continue the Playgroup throughout the year and utilise our new “Parent Hub” room that has been refurbished to support parent activities.

The Playgroup program has been designed to transition into the “Little Learners” preschool experience which will begin in Term 3. 

What are the benefits of Playgroup?

For Parents/Carers:

• understand the learning children do through play and other learning experiences.
• receive ideas for activities that they can do at home to support their child’s learning
• have the opportunity and a place to interact with each other, share knowledge and experiences and build parenting and friendship networks.

For Children: 

• become familiar with set routines, learning expectations and environment.
• have the opportunity: to develop literacy, numeracy, social and emotional, fine and gross motor skills.
• to develop good transition skills as they move into a new learning setting.
• to develop learning habits of mind, such as cooperation, purposefulness and persistence.

If you would like more information about this program please call me on 0423452072 or email vincent.powell@cg.catholic.edu.au

If you would like to register you may go online at SUPPORTIVE PLAYGROUPS or contact the school office.  

Two great parent/student support websites

1. The Student Wellbeing Hub      https://studentwellbeinghub.edu.au/

The resources available on the Student Wellbeing Hub help to create learning communities that promote student wellbeing and the development of respectful relationships.

1. The Learning Potential     http://www.learningpotential.edu.au/     

The site has great activities you can do with your child to help develop their literacy and numeracy skills. Browse by your child’s year level, or search for a topic, and the website will suggest ideas, activities, games and videos you can use to support your child’s learning. The Learning Potential App can be downloaded from Google Play or App Store. This app has lots of useful tips and ideas to help you make the most of those small opportunities in your busy day.  

Making Jesus Real  

One of the Making Jesus Real student activities this term involves the theme of, “Build a bridge and get over it”. This is a great activity for students to explore the benefits of having a positive mindset and not getting bogged down with some of life’s challenges that come our way and to move forward. This seems an appropriate metaphor for Gundagai; just as the community in the past built a great bridge to overcome the geography of the flood plain and the subsequent isolation of the Southside community. The reality of this metaphor is a challenge to the St Patrick’s community to continue the tradition of building bridges. Bridges of reconciliation, acceptance, tolerance, social justice, truth and hope. We hope our students will reach out and continue to be “bridge builders” - building bridges of truth, tolerance and hope!

St Patrick’s Street Stall

St Patrick’s Street Stall will be held this Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Thank you to our organisers and to our parent community for volunteering to sit at the stall, your hamper donations, raffle ticket sales and cooking. We greatly appreciate the support that you continue to give this event year after year.

ANZAC Day

ANZAC Day will occur in the second week of the school holidays. Once again we are asking parents and students to support this national event by marching on ANZAC Day. We will meet as a school group in front of Lott’s Hotel at 10:15 am to prepare for the march. Students will wear full summer uniform including hat. Parents will collect their children following the march at Carberry Park.

Thank you in advance of your support on this significant national day of remembrance.

Farewell to Maya, Shannon, Finlay and Abigail Bock who are moving to Darwin as of next term. It has been a pleasure to have Finlay and Abigail at St Pat’s and we wish you all the very best. Thank you to Maya and Shannon for your significant contribution to St Patrick’s and the wider Gundagai community. On behalf of our school and town community, I wish you all the very best; that you have great adventures, meet new friends and have lots of happiness.

Enjoy our term break

Wishing students, parents and staff of St Patrick’s, a restful and safe holiday break.

Principal