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- Principal's Message
- RE News - Haley Stonham
- Saint of the Week - Haley Stonham
- Parish Sacramental News
- Remote Learning Readiness - What would a students day look like?
- Protective Behaviours - Luke Donnelly
- Mathematics - Ryan Matchett
- Library News - Veronica Melville
- Sport News - Ryan Matchett
- Mini Olympics - Melinda Brown
- Chess News
- Happy Birthday
- Canteen News - Wendy Regan
- Community Council News - Evelyn David-Hoole
- School Fees - Term 3
- Parent Corner
- Parentline ACT - Support Program
- COVID-19 Updates
Dear Parents
Boorowa Carnival
Due to the current uncertainty regarding travel and ongoing hotspots occurring around NSW we have elected not to participate in the Boorowa Carnival again this year. We will improve on the round-robin in-school carnival we ran last year during Term 4. This was a big hit with the children and allowed for more children to be engaged in various sporting activities offered. This year we plan to seek parental help with the refereeing of the various games. More to come!
It's Hats On again!
We continue to support the Leane Family
Today I had the special privilege of presenting Michael and Louisa with a beautiful gift created by the thoughts and donations made by families in Kinder and Year 2. The gift basket was filled with lots of beautiful baby items, as the family await the arrival of Baby Leane in September, and several very special gift vouchers that were purchased from donations we received. Gift packs were also purchased for Larissa and Isabella. Thank you to the amazing group of mums for coordinating this gift. It has been a very very busy week in the office as Mrs Flynn has been away sick. We are all very much looking forward to her return on Friday.
Continue to stay COVID safe and may God's blessing be with everyone.
Principal
Critical and Creative Thinking in the RE Curriculum – What does this look like at St Monica’s?
Last week I explained how, at St Monica’s, we facilitate critical and creative thinking in Religious Education through careful planning using the Australian Curriculum and the Brisbane Curriculum. It is important to show you how it can look in our classrooms.
This week, Year 4 began organising their thoughts around the concept of ‘REVELATION’. Instead of telling students what the concept means and how it relates to religious education, we carefully designed a learning experience called a ‘provocation’. A provocation can be a hands-on experience that provokes student’s prior knowledge and to engage their critical and creative thinking to imagine and wonder about the concept in relation to their own lives.
Year 4 used the thinking routine ‘See, Think, Wonder’ to engage with images, QR codes, words and scripture that were related to the concept, ‘Revelation’. They documented what they could SEE, what they THOUGHT and what their WONDERINGS were in a Google Doc. There was much discussion between students in each group as they shared what they noticed. As I walked around, my job was to question to help deepen their connections or wonderings. Using the question, ‘tell me more about that’ or ‘why do you think that?’ or ‘what makes you say that?’ helps students to explain and justify their thinking.
Name: St Joseph
Lived in Bethlehem 1st Century
Patron Saint of the universal Church, unborn children, fathers, workers, travellers, immigrants
Feast Day: March 19
Bio: Everything we know about the husband of Mary and the foster-father of Jesus comes from Scripture.
We know that he was a carpenter, a working man and wasn’t a rich man. Despite this, we do know that Joseph came from a royal lineage.
In the Gospel’s of Luke and Matthew, they both say that Joseph is a descendant of David, the greatest King of Israel (Mtt 1:1-16 and Lk 3:23-38). We also know this because when the angel, who first tells Joseph about Jesus, greets him as “son of David” a royal title also used for Jesus.
We know Joseph to be a caring and compassionate man because of the way he looked after Mary while she was pregnant and by the way he was a loving Father to the child, Jesus.
We also know that Joseph respected God. He followed God’s commands in looking after Mary and Jesus. As Joseph doesn’t appear in Jesus’ public life, at his death, or resurrection, many historians believe Joseph had already died before Jesus had entered his public ministry.
Prayer:
‘Saint Joseph, patron of the universal Church, watch over the Church as carefully as you watched over Jesus, help protect it and guide it as you did with your adopted son. Amen’
Sacramental Program 2021
Sacrament of Confirmation for eligible Year 6 students – will be celebrated on:
- 7 September in St Michael’s Church at 6pm
- 8 September in St Monica’s Church at 6pm
- 9 September in St Monica’s Church at 6pm
Registrations – are now closed and no further registrations will be accepted.
Retreat Day - is on this Thursday 12 August (this is a change to the advertised date in the timeline) and it will be held at St Francis Xavier College in Florey.
Candidates from St Michael's and St Monica's schools will be bused to and from SFX for the day. Candidates should bring their own water bottle and Pizza will be provided for lunch.
Child/Parent Formation night – is on this Thursday 12 August at 6pm in St Monica’s Church.
Trybooking – are now open for you to book your family for the service you have chosen. The links to book the service are listed on the parish website at www.cg.org.au/belconnennorth
Saint’s Name and Sponsor – If you have not indicated this information on your registration form – could you please send an email to sc.belconnennorthg@cg.org.au with the information as soon as possible.
Further Information – please contact the Sacramental Program Coordinator at sc.belconnennorth@cg.org.au or check the parish website for updates at www.cg.org.au/belconnennorth
After experiencing remote learning in 2020 we surveyed our community to receive valuable feedback, should we have the need to return to remote learning again during the pandemic. With the evolving situation in NSW the teachers have spent time preparing for remote learning so that we could transition to it with short notice.
One of the significant pieces of feedback we received from the community was that there was too much demand on the students during the day. Too much work set to get through, too many new concepts to get their heads around and too many online connections over MS Teams, particularly for our larger families.
We listened to this feedback and have revised our daily routine to include 4 learning tasks in Reading, Writing, Mathematics and Conceptual Inquiry. In addition to these learning task teachers will give suggestions for wellbeing activities. Families requiring additional work for their children will be able to find online resources and printable worksheets on the St Monica's Remote Learning Website. Here is what the daily routine would encompass:
Now that the entire school is back to face to face teaching we will recommence our protective behaviours units.
Next week our teachers will support students in understanding what private parts are and that there is safe and unsafe touching.
It is important that we use the correct language when talking about private parts and that this isn't seen as funny or silly.
Often our younger students feel empowered by knowing they are the boss of their bodies. Perhaps you could have a conversation with your students about private parts and the fact that they are the boss of their body and have the right to say no to any unwanted touch.
Maths Questions
Here are the questions for this fortnight. Please email ryan.matchett@cg.catholic.edu.au with your responses.
K-2
If you have ten counters numbered 1-10, how many can you put into pairs that add to 10? Show me how you got the answers.
3-6
After a party there were some glasses to wash. There are fewer than 150 glasses in total. When lined up in pairs, there was one left over. When lined up in threes, there were two left over. When lined up in fours, there were three left over. When lined up in fives, there were four left over. When lined up in sixes, there were five left over. When they were arranged in sevens there were none left over.
How many glasses were there?
Children’s Book Council of Australia Book Week will be held from 21 -27 August (Week 7). The students have started looking at the Shortlisted books and engaging in a wide range of activities that help them explore the themes and illustrations in the books. The theme this year is “Old Worlds, New World, Other Worlds” which has inspired the Book Week artwork by Shaun Tan. During Book week there will be lots of fun activities happening that will allow students to engage in reading.
Book Week Parade
Friday 27 August students will be able to dress up. This is a chance for the students (and their mums and dads) to be creative with the theme in designing their costumes. The theme opens a world of possible whether it be other cultures, an ancient world, or aliens or a book character from an old world, new world or other world. They may design a whole costume or just a mask or hat.
Street Library
“Street Libraries are a window into the mind of a community; books come and go; no-one needs to check them in or out. People can simply reach in and take what interests them; when they are done, they can return them to the Street Library network, or pass them on to friends.” (https://streetlibrary.org.au/what-is-a-street-library/ )
Our Street library has been undercoated, and our Year 6 Arts leaders are busy finalising their designs to decorate it. They have incorporated the Book Week Theme "Old Worlds, New Worlds, Other Worlds". Thank you to Street Library and Children's Book Council of Australia for supplying the Library. If you have books that you would like to donate to the Street Library they can be left at the school library.
Belconnen Athletics
We are only 1 week away from the Belconnen Carnival. So far I have only had 3 parents offer assistance for the carnival. If you are able to help please get in touch with me.
The weather was stunning last Friday and the atmosphere at St Monica’s was amazing. Our Mini Olympics was a huge success!!
We started our day with an inspirational presentation from Dion Russell and Nick Kimpton both ex Olympians. The students listened attentively as they shared their experiences. Of course, every student at St Monica’s now wants to represent Australia at the Olympics. Thanks so much for giving up your morning to inspire the children.
At 9:30 the students started their Olympic events which they rotated through for most of the day. A big thank you to our wonderful Year 6 Sports Leaders and SRC who organised and ran these events.
Miss Markovic organised an amazing game of trivia through MS Teams for the Year 3-6 students. The cheers and laughter could be heard from around the school and the students are still talking about it. Thanks Miss Markovic!
The students enjoyed their grade races and the teacher’s race was a hit with Mr Matchett taking the gold home for New Zealand.
After lunch, our day finished with a medal ceremony and a parade for each country.
Every student was a winner by participating in this fun day!
Go St Monica’s!!!!
ACT Junior Chess League’s Primary Open Chess Championships – Belconnen Zone Ribbons
Participation ribbons will be handed out to Sarah 5MM, Michael 6M, Rohan 6J, Annalene 5E, Brando 4SG, Jett 4M, Zarah 4SG, Emanuel 3CF at the Star Awards presentation.
Happy Birthday to the following students celebrating a Birthday this week
Alessandro A, Emerson P, Elliott B, Jacqueline S, Olivia B, Quinn A, Nathan M & Liam W.
Thanks so much to last week's volunteers Katherine O'Sullivan, Sarah Clarke, Fiona Steinberg, Chris Regan, Angela Hose, Jane Rabbets and Katrina Ciampa. We also have year 6 service leaders on both Thursday recess and Friday recess, they are doing a great job.
Can you only spare half an hour, but would love to volunteer? Our busiest times are at 9am, 11am and 1pm - an extra set of hands for half an hour at these times is so valuable. Feel free to contact me via email if this is something you would like to do. I am short of help on Thursday morning at 11am and Friday afternoon from 12:30 - 1:30, if anyone with a WWVP can help for one of those times, I would appreciate it.
Please click on the following web link (or copy it into your web browser if clicking doesn't work) to go to the signup sheet:
To sign up, just follow the instructions on the page. Thank you for volunteering!
Wendy Regan
wendy.regan@cg.catholic.edu.au
If you have any ideas or concerns please email them through to our Secretary Noel Chan at council.stmonicas@cg.catholic.edu.au
