26 April 2024

PRINCIPAL’S REPORT

Hello St Patrick’s families, I hope this finds you happy and well.

Like any well managed organisation, policies and procedures play a vital role in making clear the processes and responsibilities the different stakeholders in the St Patrick’s community adhere to, to ensure the smooth and equitable operation of our school. In recent months, some of the key policy documents for our school have either been updated or created to reflect changes in the day-to-day operation of our school. Please see below, for information regarding some of these important changes.

Toowoomba Catholic Schools Parent Engagement Charter for 2024

St Patrick’s, and all Toowoomba Catholic schools, believe the partnership between parents and staff of schools is key in achieving our purpose of 'enabling full and flourishing lives' for students, staff, and families. To help facilitate a shared understanding of the responsibilities we have as carers for your children, the TCS Parent Engagement Charter describes what parents can expect and what is expected of them as stakeholders in this partnership. The charter provides a point of reference for staff and parents as they work together to provide the best possible education for all students and build a community in which everyone belongs, feels valued and can succeed. Please take the time to read through this charter (using the link below) and feel confident in reaching out to your classroom teacher to continue building the relationship you share in supporting your son or daughter’s education.

Queensland Catholic Schools Staff & the Right to Disconnect

Earlier this year, all Catholic schools in Queensland settled on the final details of the staff enterprise bargaining agreement that will govern our conditions of employment and remuneration for the next three years.

In this latest round of enterprise bargaining, a new provision was added to the EB that legally recognises the right of all Catholic school staff to disconnect from work outside of business hours. This provision is titled the 'Effective Management of Work-related Electronic Communications’ but is more commonly known as the 'Right to Disconnect'. This provision states:

• That all school staff (school officers included) do not need to respond to workplace communication outside the hours of 8am and 5pm, Monday to Friday, if they so choose.
• This can be in relation to work-based communication from other staff, parents or other stakeholders associated with your employment and includes communications via emails, texts, telephone calls and messages and video calls.
• People may still make communication to school staff outside of work hours, but it is not an expectation that the recipient responds.
• There will be certain circumstances (emergencies, etc) where it is appropriate that staff do respond to communication outside of the Monday-Friday, 8am-5pm window.

This provision has been put in place across all Catholic Schools in Queensland and recognises the right of employees to make clear delineations between work and their home lives with family and friends. It will officially start at St Patrick’s from Monday April 29^th, 2024.

So, what does this mean for you as parents?

As stated above, you can still reach out to school staff outside of these times, but you may not get a response until the next working day. And our staff will continue to value and respect the important partnership they share with you in the education of your children but ask that you also respect their need to disconnect from work and focus on the other important aspects of life – family, friends, pastimes, spirituality – that fulfill them personally and spiritually and allow them to come into the workplace feeling refreshed and ready to lead your children.

If you have any questions regarding this new provision, please reach out to me directly and I will be happy to speak with you about this further.

Prep 2025 Interviews

2025 seems a long way away, but for the school we are already putting processes in place for next year’s Prep class, including identifying how many applicants we have and finalising our prep cut-off numbers.

If you have a child you wish to enroll for next year, now is the time to ensure you have gone on to our website and done so via our electronic enrolment link.

Although we do preference siblings when identifying Prep enrolments, their online enrolment must still be lodged! Prep students with older siblings cannot be offered a place if there is no application for them!

The school will begin enrolments early in Term 3. We look forward to seeing our new families soon and meeting our future Preps.

ANZAC Day March – Thankyou St Patrick’s Community

I want to finish my newsletter with a sincere thanks to those parents who joined us on Thursday for the ANZAC Day march. The St George RSL do a wonderful job of organising a heartfelt, community driven commemoration that pays genuine respect to all the men and women who have served our nation in times of conflict. I was so proud to see so many of our students and their families turn up (looking great in their uniforms!) and march for our school, in the name of remembering our nation’s heroes. Thankyou St. Patrick’s.

Take care,

Jim Wren
Principal

PARENT PORTAL

Download & Use the App Now!

In recent weeks you will have seen communication from the school regarding our transition to a Parent Portal for more streamlined communication with parents. The transition took place on Monday 5^th February, so if you haven’t already, make sure you follow the instructions recently emailed out to all parents, or view the pdf link below, on how to register on the Portal. If you are having issues registering, please contact the school office so we can help with the process.

Warm Regards,
Jim Wren

OUR PRAYERS…

Let us support each other in Prayer, especially for the Sick and the Deceased and those who are suffering Hardships, in our Parish and School.

APRE News

Sunday this week was the 4th Easter Sunday, and this is also known as Good Shepherd Sunday. The focus of the Word of God is, God is the Good Shepherd. This image is very powerful and significant. This implies an essential and intimate bonding.

Like a true shepherd, God protects us, is attentive and sensitive to us, deeply caring and concerned toward us. We matter a lot for him. Our safety, growth and happiness are his priority concern. His shepherding is not a mere duty as a shepherd. It is a passion. That is why, for our sake, for our safety and wellbeing, he goes to any extent, even to the point of dying for us.

This is what Jesus did for us: he protects us from every attack of the evil. He safeguards and guards us against every snare of the enemy. He directs and guides us in the right path. He leads us to safety. He preserves and sustains us in clear and steady ways.

In the light of this image of shepherd and sheep, it is for us to check sincerely and see how much we nurture and grow this bonding with the shepherd. How deep is our belonging and closeness with him? How ready and willing we are to be guided and led by him? How loyal and committed we are to follow him and walk in his footsteps?

This week, we have also commemorated ANZAC Day.  This was the first ANZAC Day my family and I have witnessed in St George, and what an honour it was.  I was so impressed with the whole event. For me, there was a true feeling of community spirit, respect, and honour.  My husband and I grew up in Townsville.  As a garrison city, we have participated in many commemorative services over the years – however we have both been moved by the intimacy of the experience yesterday in St George. Thank you to everyone who joined us in the march along The Terrace.  I also would like to acknowledge the Year 5 class who led us in a beautiful prayer liturgy on Wednesday afternoon in St Patrick’s Church.

How blessed we are.

Lest we forget.

Learning Support

In Week 6, we will have a visiting Audiologist to the school.  More information to come!

Take care,
Mrs Anna Chandler
(Assistant Principal Religious Education & Learning Support)

MASS TIMES

St George-Dirranbandi Parish

Priest Administrator: Fr Antony Samy 0409 278 968 Email: balonneparish@bigpond.com 

TUCKSHOP

Please click the links below for our new and updated uniform price list and tuckshop menu. When ordering food on the Flexischools app please be mindful that the cutoff time is exactly 8:00am on Friday mornings (at 8:01am your order will not be accepted).

Regards
Sue Hopkins

MLCC News

How do children learn to read? 

For many years, researchers have argued over this question. Most of the discussion has centred on the very beginning stages of the reading process. Some experts believe that reading is a natural process, like learning to speak. If children are surrounded by good books, they will pick up reading on their own. Others suggest that reading is a series of strategic guesses based on context and that children should be taught these guessing strategies. 

Research has shown, however, that reading is not a natural process nor is it a guessing game. Instead, written language is a code where combinations of letters represent certain sounds. Over the last few decades research has shown that teaching young children how to crack the code by teaching systematic phonics is the most reliable way to make sure they learn how to read words. 

Of course, there is more to reading than seeing and pronouncing words on a page and so there is more to teaching reading than just phonics. Reading requires the reader to make meaning out of texts and this needs children to have background and vocabulary knowledge. Eventually, they need to recognise most words automatically so that their reading is fluent. They need to attend to grammar, punctuation and sentence and text structure. 

Teaching systematic phonics (the “code”) is the approach many schools are now using and is a journey that schools in the Toowoomba Diocese, including St Patrick’s are embarking on. Over the coming months you will see a lot more about this approach and there will be opportunities for parents to engage in some information sessions so watch this space for more details. 

Annette Colley 
Middle Leader/Curriculum Coordinator 

CLASS News

Health & Drama

Welcome to Term 2 Health and Drama 

I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter holiday and looking forward to a great Term 2. Thank you to Sharyn and Natalie for taking my classes during week 1 whilst I attended to matters following my unexpected Fathers passing.  

This Term in Health/Drama will be focussing on our personal qualities and Identity/Change. The students will be continuing to contribute to building a positive school environment utilising the Zones of Regulation program to continue to foster self-regulation and emotional control to enhance positive behaviours and relationships. 

Lower School 

Prep - Personal qualities and Identity. 

The students will participate in discussions and learnings to Investigate who they are in their world. They will explore some of the identities and cultures and discuss what it means to be included and feel like they belong at school. They will learn about family structures and cultures and reflect on their own family and what is special to them. Students will continue to develop their understanding of empathy and respect towards others and participate in important inclusion discussions. They will be encouraged to share own their experiences to reflect on who they are and the people in their life that is helping to shape their identity. 

Years 1 & 2 - Personal qualities and Identity. 

The students will learn how to ‘describe their personal qualities and those of others and explain how they contribute to developing identities’ They will investigate how health can impact their lives and strengthen dispositions for learning including curiosity, confidence, cooperation, investigation, and transfer. They will learn how personal qualities contribute to identities and describe further how emotional responses affect their own and others’ feelings, and they will demonstrate skills and describe strategies required to build and develop respectful relationships. 

Middle School 

Year 3 & 4 - Identity  

The students will explore the concepts of identity, change and ‘Investigate how success, challenge, setbacks and failure strengthen resilience and identities in a range of contexts.’ 

They will continue to extend on from Term 1 strategies to cope with the different changes and transitions they may experience with their own relationships whilst maintaining respect and empathy. The students will investigate and ‘describe how choices and actions can be influenced by stereotypes.’ 

Upper School 

Year 5 & 6 - Identity  

The students will explore the concepts of identity and ‘explain how identities can be influenced by people and places, and how we can create positive self-identities.’  They will continue from Term 1 to ‘investigate resources and strategies to manage changes and transitions’ with their own relationships and by continuing to being kind, displaying empathy and respect.  They will also ‘investigate how the portrayal of societal roles and responsibilities can be influenced by stereotypes.’ 

Enjoy your day! 

Regards
Mrs Jane Webster

Peeking into PrepM

Week 2– Pria Curtis, Ellie Frelek.

Dear Parents, 

What a wonderful first week back we had. The Prep students settled back into our routines very quickly and displayed a positive mindset towards all that we did. Well-done Preppies!  

A show and share schedule were given to students earlier in the week. Please take the time to take note of when your child is scheduled to present, however there is no expectation that all students need to participate if they are not comfortable doing so. Several Prep students have asked to bring in their pets for share. I am more than happy for this to happen on their share day, however, ask that you just let me know if this is going to happen. Students are welcome to bring in toys to share with as long as they are aware that these items will stay on my desk and cannot be played with during the school day. 

This week homework commenced for all students. Homework will look different for some students depending on where they are up to on their learning journey. I will also send home a copy of the letters we will learn this term (the initial explicit teaching will happen in the first three weeks) with ongoing practice all term. I cannot encourage you enough to find time to practice these sounds each day with your child. At this stage homework will go home on a Monday and is to be returned on Friday. If you find it difficult to complete during the week, please don’t hesitate to let me know. 

Letters of the week – this week we will introduce the letters g, o, and c as well as continuing to practice s, a, t, p, i, and n.  

Mathematics – The numbers for this fortnight are 12 and 13 and the concept is Days of the Week. Students need to identify how many days are in a week, be able to sequence the days of the week, identify the days of the weekend and identify things that they do in the morning, in the afternoon and at night.  

Wishing you all a wonderful week of term 2. 

Kind regards,  
Nichole & Courtney

Year 1H

Students of the Week

Week 2– Ava Lamb, Wyatt McArthur.

Welcome to week 2 of Term 2.  We have had a busy two weeks getting back into routines and beginning new units of work. 

In English, we are focusing on the sounds m, d, o, g, k, (c, k and ck), e, u, and r. We will be using these sounds when reading and writing words during our literacy block.

We are looking at nouns, adjectives, verbs, and adverbs. We have discussed what they are and how we use them when writing.  Looking ahead, we will also be identifying them in texts and understanding how we, as an author, can use them in our writing. 

In Math, we are working on patterning of numbers (skip counting) and repeated and growing collection patterns. This week we counted in 2’s, 5’s, and 10’s and discussed how to continue these patterns. 

In Science and Technology, we are continuing to work on our insect Diorama’s.  If you have not sent in a box, could you please do so on Monday as we will be working on them during the day.   

Have a wonderful weekend. 
Mrs Fiona Harch

Year 1/2D

Week 1– Bailee Hill.
Week 2– Will McIntosh, Makenzie Hyland.

Dear Year 1/2D parents and carers, we have had a great start to Term 2! 

Learning for this fortnight: 

Math – We continue each day to learn about numbers and all the different skills in which we explore numbers. Now we are working on recognising and naming numbers up to 1000. We have also learnt about shapes in our environment and how we can describe shapes. Keep an eye out for our shape artwork at the St George show! This week we are learning about patterns, in particular number patterns. 

English – Earlier this week I sent home information regarding Decodable Readers Australia, if you did not receive this please let me know. Additionally, if you have any questions at all regarding this please don’t hesitate to ask. Last week we revised our sounds that we learnt last term and this week we learnt about the /ph/ sound as in dolphin. We are also looking at words such as chill and buzz that have a double consonant and that we only need to say the sound once, not twice.  

Religion – This term in Religion we are looking into Jesus as a healer and a forgiver. We are exploring what this looks like for us and how we can follow in Jesus’ way.  

Science – Our first science unit for the term is all about light and sound. We will explore the sources of both light and sound, how these are created and sensed. Further, we will explore how some sources of light and sound are natural or man-made.

HASS – Our history unit this term looks at how life has changed over time, in particular the technologies, transport and toys that were used.  

Important: 

• With colder weather quickly approaching us, just a reminder to please label jumpers and jackets. Sometimes during the days if it is getting warmer the girls like to take their stockings off. A spare pair of socks for them to pop on would be great.

Upcoming dates: 

• Labour Day holiday – Monday 6^th 

Kind Regards,
Miss Beth Daly

Year 2G

Students of the Week

Week 2– Jimmy Easton, Avril Easton.

Welcome to Week 1 of Term 2! I hope you have all had a fun, relaxing and restful break!

Here are some of the things we will be focusing on this term:

Math: We have started learning about patterns, representing, identifying, and recognising a variety of patterns; these patterns include repeating and growing patterns; we have explored this concept by making “fruit loop pattern necklaces” and finding the missing number, shape, and object in a variety of tasks to continue the pattern.

English: We have started analysing news reports and writing our newspaper report following the critical elements of a newspaper report. In the coming weeks, as part of our end-of-term focus, our classroom will turn into a newsroom, and 2G students will transform into journalists, so be prepared for lots of superstar reporters! The students have shown great excitement towards this term focus thus far, which is exciting to observe.

HASS: We will be analysing the term with the focus of looking at Technology Over Time. This includes identifying how technology has resulted in changes in travel, communication, leisure time, school, home life, and toys.

Science: We will be exploring the physical sciences of “Push and Pull.” Students have experimented with their own push and pull experiments using stretch and rubber body bands with a partner and hypothesised how certain items would either push or pull on a diagram.

Religion: We will be connecting, reflecting, and identifying the theme of “Who is Jesus” the qualities, actions and students will explore in-depth stories in the New Testament that depict Jesus as a healer and forgiver, making connections between Jesus’ healing ministry and the Church community’s celebration of the Sacrament of Penance.

Digital Technologies: We will begin analysing the concept of digital technologies by listing the features of technologies that influence design decisions and identify how digital systems are used.

Question to ask your child: Have you seen a door that says “Push” or “Pull” when going out to the shops?

Notes: A note with your child’s Decodable Readers login will be sent home next Monday (29/4) with Week 3 homework. Please have a go at trying to login in using your child’s login and password and please tell me if the login does not work. This program is a great program to use at home, with stories to read and activities for your child to do. We use this program every day at school as part of our phonics and reading.

Kind regards
Miss Merryn Gaggi

Year 3C

Students of the Week

Week 2– Tilly Willoughby, Ollie Easton

Welcome to Term 2. Year 3 are already back in the full swing of learning and engaging in new learning as follows:

English: Wandi is proving to be a very popular story with the Year 3 students. We are learning to summarise each chapter using the sentence starters first, then, later, finally. We have also started to create a bank of interesting verbs that we can use in our writing. This week we are revising the long o sound and explicitly learning about the graphemes that make the long /u/ sound.

Maths: This week we are focussing on adding more than 2 numbers and making that easy by looking for number bonds that make 10. Students are working with Mrs Harrison looking at angles that are right angles. 

Religion: The book of Psalms in the Old Testament contains many prayers of praise and thanksgiving so we are reading lots of Scripture and thinking about we would like to praise or thank God for. 

HASS: Our HASS lessons this week are about natural and human features of Australia. We are watching video clips from around the country to identify the natural and human features we can see. 

Kind regards
Mrs Annette Colley

Students of the Week

Week 2–Madison Hannah.

Welcome to Term 2! I hope all families had a restful break and are ready for another term full of learning and fun. 

During my time in the classroom, we have begun an introduction to our new units of study for the term. 

In Maths, the students have been working hard to identify angles in our environment, and then classify and sort them according to their size. We have proved very capable at quickly identifying right angles! 

In Science, we have begun our Biological Sciences unit, which encompasses exploring specimens and classifying them as living, non-living or once living. We will continue determining what features specimens must possess to suit their classification. 

In our Visual Arts time, we have been busy creating some abstract self-portraits which will be on display at our local show.

Kind regards,
Mrs Angie Harrison

Year 4R

Students of the Week

Week 2– Jake Kingston, Noah Ballin.

Welcome back to Term 2! I hope everyone had a delightful Easter Holiday, shared with friends and family. It was lovely to hear all your stories upon the students return.  

Subject Update: 

Maths 

We are learning about the AM and PM notation as well as how to calculate the duration of time and we are consistently focusing on our timetables in class. I encourage all families to work on these at home as well. 

English 

Year 4 has begun exploring their new novel, "Kensuke’s Kingdom" by Michael Morpurgo. The students have been investigating and expanding their vocabulary with new words they've encountered in the text. They've been exploring different sentence types and learning about finding key information and locating statements for a persuasive argument. 

Religion 

Year 4 has started to explore the composition of the New Testament and the different types of text they can find within it. We've mainly focused on Parables and understanding their nature. Students read "The Parable of the Lost Sheep" and discussed its underlying meaning. 

Science 

In the first week, students completed the Term 2 Unit "Magnetic Moves" by testing their magnet games with friends and assessing their game against a set of criteria. The class had a fun day playing each other's magnetic games. The students have been introduced to their new Chemical Science unit, "Package it Better". They've started to investigate new scientific vocabulary and understand natural and processed materials. 

HASS 

Year 4 started their new HASS unit on Geography. The students will learn about the main features of the continents Africa and South America and their major countries. They will also learn about the importance of environments, including natural vegetation, to animals and people. We've already started to explore Africa, where the students learnt how to map Africa using the mapping conventions called BOLTS. 

Design and Technologies 

In Year 4, the students started a new unit to investigate food and fibre production and food technologies used in modern and traditional societies. In our first lesson, we learnt about food and fibre and discovered the primary locations of wheat and sheep production in Australia. 

This is a busy term with lots of special events and holidays. Please keep an eye out for my emails and school updates.  

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me via my email at alice.rathie2@twb.catholic.edu.au  

Kind Regards,  
Miss Alice Rathie

Year 5W

Students of the Week

Week 1– Ty’Lee McNamara, Audrey Donges, Pippi Cott.
Week 2– Brooke Hams, Hannah Acton, Karlie Alderman.

Good afternoon, Parents and Caregivers of Year 5W,

What a great start to the new term we have had. Students are enthusiastic and are completing tasks well. They are listening to, and following instructions and it is pleasing to see some initiative being used as well.

Homework has started again this term. Please send back your child’s book even if the work is not completed. I can then adjust or make modifications where required.

On Wednesday 24^th April, our Year 5 class presented the ANZAC Liturgy at 2pm in the Church. It was lovely to see our parents and family members, in attendance.

Big push for the next few weeks is READING, before your child is tested in Week 3. Check in on your child’s reading for reading accuracy, slowing down, and reading each word carefully and checking whether they understand the text by asking questions. Encourage your child to locate the key words in the question and then to locate the same key words in the text and then to read on and read back, linking any pronoun referencing. Also please continue to encourage your child to borrow each week from the library.

Please do not hesitate to make contact if you have queries.

Kind regards
Mrs Christina Wardle 

Year 6M

Students of the Week

Week 2– Henry McCosker, Rory Southern.

Welcome to Term 2, week 2 newsletter! Term 2 is a very busy term for year 6 students with public holidays and sporting trials.  

Maths  

In Maths, students have been creating their own school timetables and interpreting itineraries and different graphs. They are working towards dividing by the powers of 10 and adding and subtracting with decimal numbers.  

English  

In English, students have continued looking at persuasive text features and creating their own persuasive text. They are using the paragraph structure and overall persuasive text structure that includes an introduction paragraph, 3 main supporting detail paragraphs and a conclusion. Students have been working on editing their own work, ensuring they have included subjective and objective language, high modality, and emotive vocabulary.  

Science  

In Science, students are exploring reversible and irreversible changes to materials. We have started by looking closely at condensation and evaporation and where this happens in the real world.  

HASS  

In HASS, students have been examining the rights of Indigenous Australians and child migrants throughout the 20^th century and identifying different perspectives at the time. They will be moving onto their business and economics unit in the next couple of weeks.   

Religion  

In Religion, students have started looking at different types of prayers, communal, personal, and meditative. They have been classifying prayers into petition, sorrow, thanksgiving, and praise. Students will be creating their own prayers using the you, who do, through process.  

Have a good weekend!  
Mrs Claire McDonnell 

Sport & Library News

Eley Elite

Week 2– Parker Gale.

SPORT 

Welcome back to term 2.  Although there are not as many district trials this term there are still children participating in district sport from selection in term one.

SW Touch Football

Last week children travelled to Chinchilla for the South West trials for Touch Football.  From all reports it was a big day.  Congratulations to Reagan Cross and Georgie Nott who were selected as shadows for the South West Touch team.

Balonne Cross Country

On Friday 26^th April several students travelled to Hebel to participate in the Balonne Cross Country trials.  Successful competitors will travel to Tara on May  15^th, to attend the South West trails.  Good Luck to all these Students.

Soccer

Soccer trials will be held on Tuesday 7^th May.  Please keep an eye out for these forms. 

LIBRARY 

Book Fair Week

Thank you to everyone who supported the fair this week.  Funds raised come back to our school and are used to resource the library, so thank you.

All classes will be borrowing on Thursdays.  Please ensure you child has a library bag for borrowing.  Book return day is Wednesday so the books can be processed before borrowing again on Thursday. 

Reading is Power and Knowledge.

Happy borrowing and reading,

Binnie Eley & Julie Pike
(St Patrick’s Library Staff)

COMMUNITY NEWS

St George Show 2024

OSHC Newsletter