Dear Parents and Carers,

Holy Communion

Our Year Three students have been participating in lessons in preparation for the Sacrament of First Holy Communion on Sunday 6th November at St James’ Parish. This will be an 8.30am Mass. I would love for this to be a community event. Staff, other students and families and parishioners are more than welcome to attend this special celebration in the lives of Primrose, Ollie, James, Billy and Henry.

Christian Meditation

One of our three key goals in our Annual Improvement Plan relates to improving staff learning in Religious Education. Part of this involves the implementation of Christian Meditation throughout the school. Christian Meditation gives us all an understanding of what it means to know ‘God within’.

Research has shown that stillness and silence help create a space where children are open to the presence of God. This:

• Helps to strengthen children’s relationship with God
• Offers a sense of personal agency in spirituality which can renew faith

This term, staff and students will be implementing this practice on a regular basis, starting every Monday in two large groups. The regularity and length of these sessions will potentially increase as the term progresses.

End of Term Mass and Presentation

St Joseph’s End of Year Mass will be held on Tuesday 13th December at 9.30am. This will be followed by our Presentation Day and concluding this, the Community Council would like to host families for lunch so that:

• our families can gather as a way of celebrating the end of the school year
• they can thank everyone for the enormous fundraising contribution that has been made by our school community through as number of events this year.

We look forward to seeing families on this day!

School Sport

Athletics

We are really proud of Nate, who made it through to the NSW PSSA Athletics Carnival, where he participated in the 13 years boys 100m. Staff and students watched him run his race live from the big screen in Year 4/5/6.

Goal Post Pads

Over the school holidays, we were fortunate enough to receive funding from the NRL for some goal posts pads.  Confirmation of measurements have been passed onto the necessary NRL staff and awaiting confirmation of how these will be ordered and delivered.

Preston and Nate: Beanies for Brain Cancer

A reminder that next Wednesday 26th, Preston and Nate are running their Beanies for Brain Cancer Day to raise funds for the Mark Hughes Foundation. Students are asked to bring a gold coin and wear a beanie or hat, along with their favourite football jumper. The boys have decided to have two little competitions running on the day:

• Guess the number of lollies in the jar (50c a go)
• Football Player silhouettes (free)

Preston and Nate will be informing students more about the Mark Hughes Foundation in the coming week. Well done boys!

Enjoy the remainder of your week,

Ryan Forsyth

Acting Principal