Dear Parents and Carers,

We have had a fabulous week of connecting, reconnecting and of course learning this week. Our new students have quickly assimilated into the St Pat’s way and are enjoying their new class and school community.

We have especially enjoyed welcoming our Kinder students in KF. They have been on many adventures around the school to get to know more about St Pat’s and being St Pat’s kids. Yesterday their adventure led them to my office, around the school office and also to the senior building. They were on a number hunt and they saw and recorded many numbers large and small!

Mrs Val Sheahan  

        

Mrs Stephanie Noack                    

Mrs Renee Lightly

Student Leaders 2021

Congratulations to our Year 6 student leaders 2021 who were inducted into their roles at Mass today. 

Playground

Thank you to Mr Bateman for everything he does, and a special thanks for putting together the climbing frame igloo for the junior students. While the playground is unavailable we are looking at ways to engage the children in happy and fun play experiences. The igloo seems to be a hit!

Catalyst Last week our teaching and support staff attended the Catalyst professional learning day. The staff from the other 55 schools in the Archdiocese of Canberra and Goulburn also attended this day that was managed via zoom and MSTeams.

Catalyst provides a professional learning program for all teachers. A program designed to transform lives through learning. The Catalyst program is informed by the Science of Learning and will help St Patrick’s and all 56 system schools to realise the system bold goals:

1.   Every student is a competent reader.
2.   High Impact Teaching Practice is visible in every classroom.

During the day teachers heard presentations from internationally renowned speakers:

Ollive Lovell – Cognitive Load Theory in Action.

Toni Ann Vroom – The Writing Revolution

Tom Sherrington – Rosenshine’s Principles for High Impact Teaching Practice

We are already on the way to some transformations, notably the implementation of the synthetic phonic program InitiaLit in Kinder to Year 2.

Blessings 

Jo

LOVING LITERACY

InitiaLit K-2 Over the next 2 weeks Kinder to Year 2 students will begin the InitaLit program. InitiaLit is an evidence based whole class literacy program which will provide children with the essential core knowledge and strong foundations to become successful readers and writers. All K-2 teachers received intensive professional learning over 2 days at the end of 2020 to learn how to implement the program successfully. Students will be grouped according to their current  literacy skills to ensure the teaching of the components of phonics, vocabulary, oral language and listening comprehension is within their zone of learning.

Soundwaves Years 3-6 To continue to build and strengthen the literacy skills of students in years 3-6, St Pat’s will be incorporating the Soundwaves spelling program into the literacy block. Sound Waves is a whole school word study program to develop spelling and reading skills using the phonemic approach. The phonemic approach focuses on the sounds and aligns very well with our K-2 program. Recognised as one of the most effective ways to teach spelling and reading. Students in Year 3-6 have participated in PAT Spelling Assessment this week. The results allow teachers to allocate a Soundwaves book to the correct level for each student

Thankyou to the St Pat’s community for your continued warmth and enthusiasm in welcoming me to your school community. I feel very blessed to have the opportunity to get to know your students and am keen to work towards ensuring St Pat’s continues to be a thriving learning community. Val

Religious Education & Student Support

Upcoming events & dates

Staff Commissioning Mass Sunday 14th February 9:30am

2021

This year St Pat’s will be focusing on Pope Francis’ Laudato Si’.

 “LAUDATO SI’, mi’ Signore” – “Praise be to you, my Lord”. In the words of this beautiful canticle, Saint Francis of Assisi reminds us that our common home is like a sister with whom we share our life and a beautiful mother who opens her arms to embrace us. “Praise be to you, my Lord, through our Sister, Mother Earth, who sustains and governs us, and who produces various fruit with coloured flowers and herbs”.

With God all things are possible - Mark 19:26

Mini Vinnies

Mini Vinnies meetings will begin in Week 4. Mini Vinnies is a team of students who help facilitate events to support the community and St Vincent De Paul.

From the Vinnies Term 1 Newsletter:

NCCD

Each week I will share information and/or tips from the Nationally Consistent Collection of Data on School Students With Disability.

If your child uses a Stickybeaks Lunch Bag, please update your child’s current class on the bag.