Dear Parents

This week we enter into the holiest week of our church liturgical calendar. Holy Week celebrates the events of Palm Sunday, The Last Supper, Good Friday and culminates with the joy of Jesus’ glorious Resurrection on Easter Sunday. The students from K-6 will re-enact the Holy Week events this Thursday commencing at 11.30am. Parents, grandparents and friends are welcome to join us in the school grounds for this very special occasion.

While we reflect back across Term 1, we are very proud of the super efforts of all our students for embracing their learning with great eagerness and giving their best to all aspects of school life. We are also very grateful for the opportunities to be able to participate once again in school, community and sporting events and to be able to welcome our families back on site.

Thank you to all our families for the very generous donations of Easter Eggs for our Easter raffle. We have been overwhelmed with such wonderful support. We look forward to celebrating our term achievements at this Thursday’s whole school assembly and the drawing of our Easter raffle. Please join us in the school hall at 2:15pm.

Our administration building continues to show progress and over the holidays the cement flooring will be laid. We are hoping that once Term 2 begins, Year 5/6 will be able to resume direct access to their classroom. At this stage we are unsure when we will have access to our school canteen, so arrangements will continue under the same organisation for now. A very special thank you to Alicia Hargreaves and all parent helpers for continuing to provide canteen options for our students in the interim.

We wish all our families a safe, happy and Holy Easter break and look forward to another exciting term commencing on Tuesday 20th April for all our students.

Best wishes

Christine Baron

Principal

St Patrick and St Joseph pray for us.

Holy Week

This week we begin the most important week of the Church’s calendar. On Sunday we celebrated Palm Sunday commemorating when Jesus rode a donkey into the city of Jerusalem. The crowd rejoiced and hailed Jesus as the King, the Saviour. They waved palms shouting, “Hosanna, hosanna to our King.”

On Holy Thursday, Jesus and His Disciples prepared for the Passover Feast. Jesus washed the Disciples feet in preparation for the Feast. At the table Jesus blessed, broke and shared the bread and then took the cup, gave thanks and drank from it. These actions initiated the first Mass. The same words and actions are celebrated each time we go to Mass.

On Good Friday Jesus was trialled, sentenced to death and crucified on the Cross. Jesus gave His life for us. Jesus was then laid in the tomb.

On Easter Sunday we remember Jesus glorious resurrection, His triumph over evil and celebrating new life.

Journey with Jesus through Holy Week reflecting on the Stations of the Cross

On Holy Thursday we will celebrate our School’s portrayal of Jesus’ journey through Holy Week and the Stations of the Cross. We invite all families to join us in this moving performance by our children. We will begin at 11:30 am. The children have been practicing their part of the Easter Story, reflecting on the true meaning of Easter and the supreme sacrifice Jesus made for us.

Easter Celebrations at St Patrick’s Church

• Holy Thursday – 6 pm Washing of the Feet
• Good Friday – Stations of the Cross 10 am

                             - Passion of Our Lord 3 pm

• Saturday Easter Vigil Mass – 6 pm
• Easter Sunday – 8 am
• Altar servers will be needed at each service so if you are able to assist please let Mrs Howe know as soon as possible.

Sacramental Program

We are happy to be able to announce the dates for the Sacramental Program for 2021. Three Sacraments will be celebrated in our Parish this year. If your child will be a participant in any Sacrament, please place these dates in your diaries so that we can be fully prepared in our preparation.

Please contact Madeline Ryan – Parish Secretary at gundagai@cg.org.au for an application form.

Reconciliation - Term Two

Lesson 1 - Tuesday 11^th May - 3:30 pm to 4:30 pm

Lesson 2 - Saturday 15^th May - 3:45 pm 4:50 pm

               - and Commitment Mass NB Mass at 5 pm

Lesson 3 -Tuesday 18^th May - 3:30 pm to 4:30 pm

Lesson 4 - Saturday 22nd May - 3:45 pm 4:50 pm Mass at 5pm

Sacrament of Reconciliation - Wednesday 26^th May 9:30 am

Confirmation - Term Three

• Saturday, 17^th July introduction meeting 4:15 pm before 5 pm Mass – Commitment Mass for candidates.

Lesson 1 - Tuesday 20^th July - 3:30 pm to 4:30 pm

Lesson 2 - Saturday 24^th July - 3:45 pm to 4:50 pm and Mass to follow

Lesson 3 - Tuesday 27^th July - 3:30 pm to 4:30 pm

Lesson 4 - Saturday 31^st July - 3:45 pm to 4:50 pm and Mass to follow

Lesson 5 - Tuesday 3^rd August - 3:30 pm to 4:30 pm

Preparation Day – Wednesday 11^th August 9:30 am – 3:15 pm

Sacrament of Confirmation – 14^th August – 5pm Mass

• Children will be Confirmed by Archbishop Christopher Prowse

 Eucharist - Term Four

 Lesson 1 - Tuesday 19^th October - 3:30 pm to 4:30 pm

Lesson 2 - Saturday 23^rd October - 3:45 pm - 5 pm for Commitment Mass

Lesson 3 - Tuesday 26^th October - 3:30 pm to 4:30 pm

Lesson 4 - Saturday 30^th October - 3:45 pm - 5 pm for Mass

Lesson 5 - (possible Tuesday 2^nd November if another lesson is needed)

Lesson 6 - Wednesday 3^rd November Preparation Day – 9:15 am – 3:15 pm

Sacrament of First Holy Communion - Saturday 6^th November 6pm Mass

Wishing you and your family a happy and holy Easter season.

Kate Howe

REC

Holy Week and Easter Mass times for St Patrick's Church 

Holy Thursday Lord’s Supper: 1st of April 6.00 pm 

Good Friday 'Stations of the Cross': 2nd of April 10.00 am 

Good Friday Passion of the Lord: 2nd of April 3.00 pm 

Easter Saturday Vigil Mass: 3rd of April 6.00 pm 

Easter Sunday : 4th of April 8am 

Our Year 3 and 5 students will participate in the online NAPLAN assessment in Week 4 of Term 2.

The following dates for the assessments are outlined below. It is extremely important that ALL Year 3 and 5 students attend school on the dates listed to ensure participation in the national assessment program.

Tuesday 11th May-Writing (paper based)

Wednesday 12th May-Reading

Thursday 13th May-Language Conventions

Friday 14th May-Numeracy

Each assessment goes for approximately 40-45 minutes. Students will undertake a practice session prior to participating in the assessment program. Parents of Year 3 and 5 students will receive a parent information letter.

Each year the school focuses on 3 main goals for improvement. The 2021 goals are outlined below together with a short summary of the goals of the three areas.

1. Mission and Vision and alignment to new RE Curriculum: Staff are working to develop a new Vision and Mission statement that reflects the current school context of St Patrick’s school. We look forward to sharing this with our school community once it has been finalised. Staff will also undergo Professional Learning on Monday 19th April on developing their pedagogical understanding of Conceptual Inquiry to support Religious Education curriculum development.
2. Explicit Literacy Agenda- Introduction of the InitiaLit program K-3 and continued focus on quality literacy instruction in Years 3-6.
3. Using quality instruction and student data to inform practice-Utilising PAT R, PAT M, NAPLAN, Dibels and in-class assessment data to drive the learning agenda with a focus on quality programs such as InitiLit, STEM, ELSA, Mathsburst etc to improve student performance.

On Thursday last week, the 5/6 boys went to Tumut to participate in a Rugby Gala Day run by the Brumbies. 

We won 2 games and lost 2 games on the day.  

Even though we didn’t win all our games we all had fun which is more important than winning. Thank you to Mr Ferguson for coaching us, Rhianna and Tom for doing skill sessions and the Tumut Bullants for running the canteen and letting us use their oval. 

By Ollie Gailey- Year 6 and James Reardon- Year 5 

Year 3 and 4 Rugby Union Gala Day in Tumut 

On the 25th of March we attended a Union Gala day in Tumut. The first game we played was against McAuley 1, then Bongongo, McAuley 2 and finally Bongongo. It was an awesome day for us all and our team played very well.  

Thank you, Mr Leane, Tom and Rhianna, for training us. The team also want to thank Riley Smith for being our water boy and manager on the day. 

By Riley and Lachlan. 

The program will be held on Wednesday the 14^th of  April at Twickenham Oval, between 9am – 12pm.

http://bit.ly/TumutHolidayClinic

Year 5 / 6 Leadership Days will be held during the first week of Term 2.  On Thursday and Friday of week 1 the Yr 5/6 class will come in out of uniform on both days as they will be preparing to lead their peer support groups as part of our Leadership Initiatives - More information will be sent home with the Yr 5/6 class in week 1 term 2 (prior to Thursday 22nd April) 

Congratulations to our Week 8 and Week 9 Class Awards 

Week 8

Kindergarten : Harrison Barton for giving all class work 100% effort

Year 1 / 2 : Emma Brown for effort + results in her 'stop and spell' spelling tests

Year 3 / 4 : Emmy Gaskin for her increasing input into class discussions and application to classwork 

Year 5 / 6 : Oliver Gailey for his leadership duties in and around the school. Thank you Ollie 

Week 9 

Kindergarten : Kingsley McDonnell for great class participation 

Year 1 / 2 : Lachlan Hargreaves for a positive attitude towards all school work 

Year 3 / 4 : Andrew Cole for engaging in history lessons with effort 

Year 5 / 6 : Akacia Winchester for thoughtful reflections and responses to novels read

W I L D C A T    A W A R D S 

Week 8

RESPECTFUL : Montanna Manns 

RESPONSIBLE : Molly Lott 

Thursday 1^st April: 11.30am-Easter Story-presented by K-6

Thursday 1^st April: 2.15pm-Student of the Month Assembly

Thursday 1^st April: 3.15pm Conclusion of Term 1

Monday 19^th April-Student Professional Learning Day

Tuesday 20^th April: Term 2 resumes for K-6

Sunday 25^th April: 10.30am ANZAC Day parade

Monday 26^th April: 2.00pm David Enever Concert for K-6

Tuesday 18^th May: Mortimer Shield Years 5/6-Tumut

Tuesday 25^th May-My Body, My Life-Years 5/6

Friday 25^th June-Term 2 concludes

We wish all of our families and community a Happy Easter. Enjoy your 2 week school holiday break, be safe and see you all on the first day of Term 2 - Tuesday 20th of April