Dear Parents and Carers,

The term is moving quickly along and we are grateful that to date, we have been able to operate in a reasonably regular capacity. Thank you to parents for their continued support in keeping children at home when they are unwell. It is greatly appreciated. The email that went home yesterday in regard to preparation for the possibility of returning to a Remote Learning Platform, was just to gather information about our families and students teachnological needs. I would like to emphasise that at this point of time, there is no indication from CE that we will need to go to Remote Learning but we do need to be prepared for the possibility. Please return the notes as soon as possible to assist us in understanding and meeting the needs of our families.  If you are unable to print the form from home please contact Jacki in the office and she will send home a hard copy of the form that needs to be returned. 

Our Little Learner’s Program has had a very positive start with approximately 10 children attending the program last week. Thank you to Tash Smith for providing an exciting program each week for our little people. Little Learners runs every Friday from 9.00am until 11.00am and is open to all 2022 Kindergarten students.

Our St Patrick’s School Choir launched it’s first singing session last Tuesday under the guidance of Ms Katie Campbell. Approximately 30 students, ranging from Kindergarten through to Year 6 students, attended the first session and thoroughly enjoyed the experience. Under current restrictions, choir can only occur outdoors, so weekly sessions are very dependent on the weather conditions each Tuesday. The choir began learning songs for our upcoming ‘Alice the Musical’ production. Some very talented singers have already been spotted.

Congratulations to all our Year 3 to Year 6 students who presented their Public Speaking speeches last Thursday to their respective classes. We are very proud of all our students for the effort and application they put into preparing their speeches and in delivering them so professionally in front of their class mates. Public Speaking is not an easy task but it is a great life skill to have. Congratulations to Riley, Taite, Charlotte, Abigail, Hugh, Sophie, Jess and Juliette on making it through to the next level of competition. Special thanks to Mr Peter Gain who has volunteered his time to coach our speakers in preparation for next Tuesday’s speak off against McAuley.

Please continue to keep in your prayers family and friends who are in lockdown in Sydney and surrounding areas.

Christine Baron

Principal

Confirmation

Our Confirmation candidates have been working very hard in their preparation for the Sacrament of Confirmation. Each session they come prepared and have participated in great dialogue and sharing of ideas. This is a great group of children who are committed to their faith. We thank the children and their parents for the commitment they have displayed during this preparation.

We have one more lesson this week (Tuesday) and will meet again next Wednesday, 11^th August for our Preparation Day. The children will spend the day going through the important procedures of receiving the Sacrament of Confirmation and completing our booklets.

The children will come to school out of uniform and bring their own Recess and Lunch.

This preparation has had to face many hurdles due to the COVID restrictions. Archbishop Christopher Prowse has advised he has had to cancel his participation in our Confirmation celebrations this year, in light of the current and uncertain circumstances. Fr George has been given authority to administer the Sacrament of Confirmation. Two Confirmation Masses will take place on Saturday 14^th August – 3pm and 5pm. Due to restriction numbers, each Candidate may have five guests to celebrate with them. We thank Father George for all his assistance and guidance during this Sacramental preparation and for the difficult decisions he has had to make.

We thank everyone for their patience and support.

Year 1/2 Religion News

In Religion we have been studying God‘s creation and why we should look after our world.

We had to draw our favourite images of God‘s creation and explain why we liked the image we drew.

After this we visited the Year 5/6 class and interviewed the children about their favourite part of God‘s creation and why they chose what they did.

We compared responses and discussed how our responses were similar or different.

We enjoyed working with the Year 5/6 children and they said our work was excellent.

By Year 1/2

 Feast of St Mary of the Cross – 8^th August

On Sunday we celebrate the Feast Day of St Mary Mackillop – Mary of the Cross. Mary is Australia’s only saint and on Friday in our School Mass Year One/Two will honour her. St Mary of the Cross devoted her life to God and to the service of others.

Mary’s devoted faith, her determination to provide an education for everyone and her sense of justice and fairness for all make her a wonderful role model for us all to follow. One of our Confirmation Candidates has chosen Mary as the Saint they aspire to.

       Mary’s motto was ‘never see a need without doing something about it’.

May we all be inspired by the good deeds of St Mary of the Cross.

Kate Howe

REC

Community Council Report

The Community Council (CC) met last week. Email addresses have been set up for the CC, uniform shop and tuckshop. Parents can use these addresses to contact CC members, or the tuckshop or uniform shop organisers. This will streamline communication and remove the need for Jacki in the office to pass on messages.

The email addresses are as follows:

communitycouncil.stpats@gmail.com – Kate Graham and Kim Paton will monitor the inbox

uniformshop.stpats@gmail.com – Bec Gaskin will monitor the inbox

tuckshop.stpats@gmail.com – Alicia Hargreaves will monitor the inbox

The tuckshop is very busy this term, the children are enjoying the winter menu and lots of orders are coming in each week. Thank you to the new volunteers who have joined the roster. Alicia is looking into some online ordering systems to phase out the brown paper bags. The meat raffle is unfortunately on hold for now due to COVID restrictions.

Online ordering for the uniform shop is ready for use. There is a link to access on the school website under ‘Parents’ à ‘Uniforms’ or via st-patricks-primary-school-gundagai.square.site . Please remember to contact Bec Gaskin if you need to organise a time to try on uniforms.

The CC is looking at different ideas for fundraising as we cannot hold face to face events at the moment due to COVID restrictions. The Crazy Camel fundraiser has been sent out, thank you to Lauren Gailey for continuing with the organisation of this fundraiser. We are also in the process of organising a rose bush fundraiser with Bunnings. Thank you to Simone Jones for her initiative with this great idea. Hopefully dinner at the school play can go ahead if restrictions allow. We really need your support with these smaller fundraisers as they are not as profitable as the larger events, so we all need to pitch in and spread the word to boost our profits.

The playground upgrade is continuing with the cultural space starting to take shape. Thank you to Jeremy Pearce for the donation of the sandstone blocks to be used as seating. Murals, story poles, a dry riverbed and native edible plants are part of the plan, however some maintenance issues with the learning hub need to be fixed first. Thanks to Renee Lindley and Emma Peterson for your continued help with this project.

Furthermore, the CC has written to the CE on behalf of the parent body to query some of the COVID restrictions placed on the school which seem to be in excess of the restrictions placed on public schools within the region. We would like the CE to review the restrictions to bring them in line with other schools and the NSW public health orders.

Kate Graham

Secretary, Community Council

Just a reminder about our 'Crazy Camel Fundraiser' information packs have been sent home recently.  We hope all the children are busy designing their artwork.  Orders are due back at the end of the term (10th of September) 

On Wednesday 15 September,  we will celebrate Book Week and 70 Years of "Alice in Wonderland".  The children can come to school dressed in their "Alice in Wonderland" costumes from our Week 9 performance, go on a parade walk down Sheridan Street and then have a "Mad Hatter's" Tea Party on the oval at lunch.

We are looking forward to this exciting event. 

We continue to prepare for our school musical ‘Alice the Musical’ despite current restrictions. At this stage we are still planning to produce our play in Week 9, however that will be very dependent on the restrictions going forward.

The classes have been allocated the following scenes/characters for the play.  Your child's class teacher will send a more detailed note home with costumes required for individual students or class groups. 

Kindergarten-Caucus Race - a variety of animals

Year 1/2 - Royal Procession/Croquet Song - mainly card costumes/some hedgehogs

Year 3/4 - Lobster Dance / Pig & Pepper - mainly sea creature costumes

Year 5/6 - Major and supporting characters

Trintiy Murrumburrah School have kindly lent some costumes to us.  Once we receive these costumes Mrs Wilson will let parents know which costumes may still be required. 

Miss Bethany Bruce is currently undertaking her Bachelor of Education through CSU Wagga. As part of her teaching degree, Miss Bruce is required to undertake teaching practicums. We are delighted that Miss Bruce will undertake her next practicum here at St Patrick’s School. Miss Bruce will work in the Year 3/4 classroom with Mrs Flanagan and Mr Ferguson as her support teachers. Miss Bruce begins her practicum teaching session next Monday 9^th August and will conclude on Friday 17^th September. Year 3/4 are very excited to be welcoming Miss Bruce as a teacher to their classroom.

We would like to thank Suncorp Netball NSW for drawing our school out as one of eight Team Girls competition winners to win a HART netball training kit.

We are looking forward to putting it to good use.

Mrs Wilson

Team Nomination forms for the 2021 Spring Competition are available from Pie in the Sky Bakery and Sportspower or www.tumut.basketball.net.au. Active Kids Vouchers can be redeemed for Miniball and Basketball. Team Nominations from Kindergarten aged boys and girls through to Mens and Womens teams close on Thursday 12th August,2021.

Please submit by email tumutbasketball@gmail.com Any registration enquiries can be made to the Registrar, Trish Day on 0427474768 or through the Tumut Basketball Facebook page. Further information for the upcoming comp can be found on the website or on our Facebook page.

Congratulations to our weekly class award recipients.  Keep up the fantastic work

Week 2 Term 3 (23rd July) 

Kindergarten - Archie Peterson for great number work 

Yr 1 / 2 - Savannah Manns for working hard whilst writing 

Yr 3 / 4 - Darby Jones for being more engaged in his learning 

Yr 5 / 6 - Akacia Winchester for continually seeking out and acting on feedback to enhance her learning

Week 3 Term 3 (30th July) 

Kindergarten - Harrison Barton for fabulous writing and spelling 

Yr 1 / 2 - Mackenzie Little for trying very hard with her writing 

Yr 3 / 4 - Corby Rose for her participation in class and helping other class members 

Yr 5 / 6 - Juliet Pearce for an innovative and thought provoking speech on "Stronger Together" 

Congratulations to our Week 3 WildCat Class Awards

Week 3 - Term 3

RESPONSIBLE:  AB Ryan, Taite Johnson, Nick Little, James Reardon 

RESPECT: Amy Cotterill

SAFE: Nate Tozer, Taite Johnson, Harry Crowe, Tahlira Rose, Hugh Ryan