St Joseph's Parish School Weipa eNewsletter

Dear St Joey’s families and friends,

It’s been another wonderful week here at St Joseph’s and I am blessed to have so many students come and share their fabulous work with me. We have a number of students who have shown great improvement in their learning.

Keep up the fabulous work kids!

Road Safety Week - URGENT SAFETY WARNING

Road safety is something we cannot not take lightly. It is important that our children learn road sense as soon as possible. To do this, they need to know the dangers of the road and how they can avoid these dangers.

Riding a bike to and from school is a healthy travel option. With more than 50 of our students riding, we constantly remind our bike riders of road rules, safe riding strategies including wearing helmets, use of shared pathways and taking a safe travel route.

This week, tragedy was avoided when a vehicle narrowly missed hitting one of our children as they rode past the service station. There are several safer routes students can take to get to and from school.

In addition to road safety messages the students receive from the school, if parents could remind and reinforce safe bike use with their child that would be appreciated. The more times children hear the safety messages and see safe road use modelled, the better their chances of avoiding harm.

For more information and some great little videos and activities, please check out the RACQ Streets Ahead website: https://www.racq.com.au/cars-and-driving/safety-on-the-road/educational-programs/primary -school-program#educationalvideos

Up Coming Events

Pupil Free Day in Term 4 St Joseph’s has a scheduled Pupil Free Day in Term 4, Week 3, Monday the 19^th October 2020.

Josh Arnold – School Song We are all excited and looking forward to week 9 when Josh Arnold will arrive and work with our students to create our own school song.

Year 6 Retreat and Student Leadership Induction Mass Our Year 6 Leadership Retreat and Induction Mass is coming up in week 9. This is a very exciting time for our Year 6 students who will be integral in helping to write our school song with Josh Arnold.

School Photos School Photos where scheduled for this term but our photographers have postponed till term 4. We will confirm the new dates by the end of this term.

Staffing News

Long Service Leave -Mr Simmons will be stepping in for Mrs Turner while she is on long service leave weeks 9 and 10.

Maternity Leave -Amanda Rowe is expecting to have her baby any day now. We will keep you posted for the happy news.

Father’s Day

On Sunday we will celebrate Father’s Day. It is a day more than a card, gift or special breakfast. It’s a time that gives us all an opportunity to stop and reflect on how important Fathers are to our growth and development. A father is a father, not because of himself but because of the special relationship he has with some very important people.

What Makes a Dad

God took the strength of a mountain,

The majesty of a tree.

The warmth of a summer sun,

The calm of a quiet sea,

The generous soul of nature,

The Comforting arm of night,

The wisdom of the ages,

The power of the eagle’s flight,

The joy of a morning in Spring,

The faith of a mustard seed,

The patience of eternity.

The depth of a family need,

Then God combined these qualities,

When there was nothing more to add,

He knew his masterpiece was complete,

And so, he called it……Dad

Author Unknown

HAPPY FATHERS DAY TO ALL OF OUR FATHERS

AND GRANDFATHERS AT ST JOSEPH’S!

God Bless and best wishes for the week ahead.

Megan

This week let us also include in our prayers…..

Those male father figures in our lives. That they may continue to live their lives by following the example of St Joseph.
That the leaders of our State, our Nation and our World listen with open hearts and enquiring minds to the needs and concerns of their constituents.
That those who are sick, alone and anxious experience care and love that can ease these pains.

May these prayers and all those we hold in our hearts, be felt by those who need them most.

Sunday’s Gospel- 22^nd Sunday in Ordinary Time

Please find shared in this week’s newsletter: the Sunday prayer at home which has some wonderful resources to unpack this week’s readings in a family friendly way.

In this week’s gospel we see Paul and Jesus bringing us some tough teaching. There is a choice before us. Do we allow ourselves to take the easy path and conform to what is expected of us, to just fit in with the way of the world? Or do we choose the way of Jesus which is more often than not a more challenging road. It is a huge risk, to let go and follow a difficult path, however, that is what is being asked of us… to let go and follow God’s way, not societies. For more commentary of weekly lectionary readings, please feel free to click the link. Reading Reflections

Father’s Day

This weekend we celebrate and give thanks for fathers and father-like figures in our lives. Over the week, I will spend some time reflecting on the many gifts that my Dad gave me: my love of the great outdoors and the fine art of hitting a golf ball; the joy of smelling a good red; the delight in whiling away a lunchtime barbeque. I also give thanks for the gift of spirituality that both he and Mum gave me and my siblings. He loved helping others and was an integral member of community groups. He was also the first person to help during a disaster, always happy to lend a hand. He also loved sitting in quiet contemplation reading a book or discussing world politics with us. Like many of you, I am so grateful for the guidance and wisdom my father has shared with me. He has helped shape me into a strong, independent woman, who grew up with the belief that she could be anything.

Week 9 Year 6 Leadership Retreat & Mass

Week 9 is shaping up to be a very busy week. We will be having our Year 6 leaders retreat on Thursday the 10^th September. This day is designed to develop our Year 6 leaders’ skills around servant leadership. The students will be undertaking a series of workshops that follows the notion of engaging the students minds around what is servant leadership, then their hearts to ignite the emotions around the Catholic call to be leaders and finally to take actions with their hands as a call to action to be a servant leader at our school. We are fortunate to have both Father Dariusz and Rachel McLean from CES Identity and Outreach team join us for the day. The day is followed by the Leadership Mass at 9am on Friday the 11^th of September. We invite the parents of our Year 6 leaders to join us in the church as we recognise our Year 6 leaders, and all bear witness as they make their pledges and receive their leadership badges.

Book Week Parade

It was wonderful to see everyone dressed up as their favourite book character. This year’s theme Curious Creatures and Wild Minds was well received with lots of fantastic costumes. Please find attached the link to a short video of this year’s parade. Book Week Parade 2020

May St Joseph smile on you,

Meg Newell

APRE/CST

family_prayer_wbw_22_ordinary_time_1 pdf 921.48 KB

National Child Protection Week - 6-12^th September

Child protection is everyone’s business.

At St Joseph’s we are mandatory reporters and we have policies and procedures in place to ensure the safety of all children at the school.

Along with our PB4L focus, we have wellbeing, Pastoral Care and Child Protection Policies.

We greatly value the support of parents and careres in providing a safe school environment.

The National Association to Prevent Child Abuse and Neglect (NAPCAN) is an organization dedicated to preventing Child Abuse and neglect.

Their website has lots of useful resources, contacts and information to inform, guide and assist parents in this important area.

Check their website for more details https://www.napcan.org.au/

COVID-19 Update

The current advice from Catholic Education Services with regard to maintaining community safety during the COVID pandemic is explicit and follows government guidelines. The key points continue to be:

Maintain hand and respiratory hygiene as well as social distancing recommendations. Here is a link to some tips from the Queensland Government: COVID Advice

If you have any of the symptoms of COVID-19 (found at the following link), COVID SYMPTOMS , stay home, self-isolate, get tested and remain in self isolation until the results come back. During self-isolation, rest and recuperate.

These requirements apply to all members of the community - students, parents and staff

To all our St Joseph's Families,

During these uncertain times, it is normal for our children and adults to respond in unique ways.

It can be helpful to focus on the aspects of our lives that we can control like caring for our physical health, safety and emotional wellbeing.

There are things you can do to support yourself, your friends and your family:

Listen - to your needs and your own advice
Offer kindness - for yourself and others
Stay connected - with others by phone and online
Keep informed - just enough information from reliable sources
Maintain a healthy routine -diet, activity and sleep
Focus on the things you can control -versus the things you can’t
Reflect on past success – recall a stressful time and reflect on the things that helped
Learn a new skill and make plans
Help others - when you can
Seek support - It’s okay to ask for help and advice
Build hope - Focus on 3 things you are grateful for.

Remember, we cannot pour from an empty cup, we need to look after ourselves, so that we are able to help our children.

For more information about supporting children with change, please refer to www.goodgrief.org.au

Have a wonderful week.

Warmest regards,

Tosca Grainger-Dee

School Counsellor

Dear Parent and Guardians,

This Term in History we have been working on a unit called ‘Could memories be as precious as gold’. We have been reading the story: Wilfrid Gordon McDonald Partridge by Mem Fox and Julie Vivas. The students have been sharing some of their memories with each other and explaining how it makes them feel.

In literacy we are continuing to focus on expanding our writing skills and learning interesting facts about different animals. We have also introduced new tricky words which we have been practicing in class. The tricky words can be found in the back of the term 2 and term 3 reading log books that I sent home last week if you would like to practice them at home.

In art we have been having lots of fun creating jungle and ocean scenes using warm and cool colours.

Reminders

Library Day is Wednesday – please ensure Library bag is packed on that day

Health and Physical Education

Teacher: Melanie Turner (Thursday)

Health Lesson

Teacher: Joe Simmons (Thursday)

Auslan

Teacher: Megan Newall (Thursday)

Communication

If you have any questions or queries, please email me on

aknight1@cns.catholic.edu.au

and I will endeavour to return your email within 24 hours.

This week the students have been learning about conjunctions and shortening two words into one. An important element of this is being able to identify that the apostrophe signals a letter/s is missing. The students have been building their stamina to write longer sentences and even paragraphs. Hand strength activities such as rolling play dough, fine motor sorting using tweezers and manipulating small leggo will help us to build the muscles required to write more for longer.

In Maths we have been learning how to use rainbow facts, doubles and counting on/back to solve addition and subtraction problems. We are now moving on to money and being able to identify, sort and order coins according to their value. We will extend our understanding by solving addition and subtraction problems using coins.

In Technologies we have been continuing our marble runs. We decided that we could improve our designs by joining our marble runs together to make SUPER marble runs. We are looking forward to videoing and sharing our creations.

In Religion we have been learning how to care for God’s creation (people, plants, and animals). The students have explored ways we can be kind and empathetic to our friends and family. We have identified the importance of nurturing our plants and keeping our oceans clean. The students have enjoyed sharing the ways they care for their animals at home. We will sing a song about God’s caring hands and share our prayers for creation at assembly. Ms B will video this and share it with you.

Hello Families,

Over the past week in Year 2 we have been very busy with extra activities! On our assembly in week 6, Year 2 presented a short presentation on what the houses, food, transport and clothes were like during the time of Jesus. We had 4 speakers who did an excellent job describing the 4 topics, and each student contributed to making our posters. I hope you enjoyed the video of our presentation!

In maths we have been learning about halves, quarters, and eighths. We found these three types of fractions in the classroom, and then we went outside to take photos using our iPads. We used Seesaw to upload our findings, and split the objects in halves, quarters, and eighths using our drawing tool.

We are continuing to write persuasive arguments in English and are almost up to starting our assessment about a controversial topic in Weipa! Stay tuned for some excellent persuasive writing!

I hope you all have a fantastic week.

Kind Regards,

Emily

Year Three have been enjoying cashing in their St Joseph’s points to receive a reward for being Respectful, Responsible, Resilient and Ready for Learning in class. Some of the most popular prizes have been lunch with the teacher, ten minutes free time and no homework. We also had over twelve students receive a wristband for receiving seventy points. Keep up the great work Year Three.

There was certainly a lot of excitement in the air for Book Week in Week 7. It has been inspiring to see the students so passionate about reading and eager to share their books with one another. Hopefully you have been able to listen to your child read some of the books they have purchased or have borrowed from the Library.

In HASS, we have been looking at the qualities of a good citizen and why volunteers are important in the community. If you are a volunteer in the community please get in touch as we would love to share your story and the work you do in Weipa.

During Art lessons, we have been creating a range of artworks which link to other key learning areas. After looking at arrays in Mathematics, Year Three created an artwork of array buildings using coloured paper to create arrays for the windows. We also have created our own scratch artwork based on the topic of Day and Night in Science.

I would like to wish all our Fathers and Dad-like role models a wonderful Father’s Day on Sunday. May God guide you in all the work that you do and grant you many special joys that mean a lot to you.

In Faith,

Mrs Michelle Gear

Dear Parent and Guardians,

This Term in Science we have been working on a unit called ‘Beneath our Feet’. Thursday the 20th of August the students were looking at the soil samples that they have brought into class. Part of the classroom activities around these samples were to contribute to discussions about different soils and how this knowledge might help communities. Further forward than that, students worked in teams using equipment to observe features of their soil.

Reminders

Library Day is Wednesday – please ensure Library bag is packed on that day

Health and Physical Education

Teacher: Melanie Turner (Thursday)

Health Lesson

Teacher: Joe Simmons (Thursday)

Auslan

Teacher: Megan Newall (Thursday)

Laptops – Please remember to charge Laptops at home each night

Communication

If you have any questions or queries, please email us on

mturner@cns.catholic.edu.au and sulanas@cns.catholic.edu.au

and we will endeavour to return your email within 24 hours.

We have gone Minecraft mad in Year 5 these past couple of weeks. Our Gold Rush worlds are starting to come along. We had to have a check in with Miss Edmonds to show how we were progressing and received some feedback on the things we need to focus on so we can keep on track to presenting a great world.

In our Math lessons we have been challenging ourselves with division and we know that this is a concept we will continue to look at throughout the year. We started ordering and comparing fractions this past week as well. Knowing how to put them in order from smallest to largest was important in us understanding that even though the denominator may be a big number, it doesn’t always mean that it is the biggest fraction. Equivalent fractions were a little tricky at first but once we could see a visual representation, we were fine. We are pretty good with our multiplication and repeated addition now so that helped a lot.

We have also started to look at our narrative poems on the Gold Rush. We need to be able to tell a story about the life on the goldfields using certain language that we usually only use for poetry. We know how to tell a story but adding in the language features it’s proving a little tougher than we thought. We are a resilient group of students, so I think we will get there in the end. We are thankful that we have a few weeks to write it.

This past week we have been presenting our class prayers to the class during our Ready, Set, Go! morning routine. It is nice to be able to watch our peers share hymns and prayers of thanks that mean something to them. We will continue to present our prayers until the end of term.

We are very excited about our Book Parade costumes! As a class we have decided to go as a theme and we can’t wait to see what everyone arrives in to make Yr 6 look awesome!

Many of us have purchased items from the Book Fair, it just goes to show you are never too old to get excited about reading and using novelty writing items to add a bit of oommphff to our day and our learning.

We have started on our English assessment writing piece for the term. We are writing a persuasive article/letter about an issue that we are interested in. We need to find evidence to support our argument and obviously target a key audience. So far we have planned out our main ideas and gathered some evidence. We have been working on research skills and the importance of referencing any websites used for information.

Once our final draft is complete in Week 8 after conferencing several times with Miss Libby and adding persuasive devices into our writing, we will then present this in class or to our audience in Week 9. This will take lots of practice and using specific speaking skills as well.

Our Maths work has been tricky, we have been working hard on decimals and how they are used in real life situations. Things like estimating, calculating money quantities, adding subtracting multiplying and dividing decimals. We have moved onto the connection between fractions, decimals and percentages. We are all working hard to consolidate our learning and understand it.

We continue to explore electricity, it’s sources, components and symbols used in Science. This week we designed our own electrical circuit using a switch to make traffic lights work. It was all about teamwork and solving problems together. Next week we get to do our own circuit!

Our HASS focus about immigration has been interesting, learning about why people migrated to Australia and how many immigrants have made a better life here. Lots of discussion about refugees and the conditions they have had to endure.

Makes us realise what a great country we live in and what an amazing lifestyle we have here in Weipa!

In ICT we have loved the WeDo Lego App that is helping us code and connect real life situations with technology. Lots more to do in the next few weeks.

From Yr 6.

Sunday 6 September is Father's Day!!

Our annual Father’s Day Stall, coordinated by the P&F, will be held on Wednesday 2nd September and Thursday 3rd September. There is a variety of $10 & $5 gift packs available for students to choose from with plenty of great gifts for Dads!

Every student will have the option to purchase at least one gift pack, any remaining packs will be offered to those who would like to purchase more than one. Please send students with correct money in a zip lock bag.

Fathers_Day_Stall.pdf

Fathers_Day_Stall _pdf 704.57 KB

Friday 18th September 2020 - End of Term 3

Tuesday 6th October 2020 - Start of Term 4

Monday 5th Oct - 9th October 2020 - Year 6 School Camp

Monday 19th October 2020 - Pupil Free Day

Friday 27th November 2020 - End of Term 4

BOOK WEEK - CURIOUS CREATURES WILD MINDS

WOW! What an outstanding array of costumes on display; we could see the characters popping out of the books. We would like to congratulate the students and parents/guardians for your creative effort.