Newsletter 2022/26 ~ 2 September 2022

As partners in Catholic Education and open to God’s presence, we pursue the fullness of life for all.

St. Patrick’s School is committed to the safety and wellbeing of all students.

St. Patrick's School is a child safe school.

We respectfully acknowledge the Traditional Owners of Country throughout Victoria and pay respect to the ongoing living cultures of First Peoples. 

This newsletter comes to you from the lands of the Wotjobaluk, Jaadwa, Jadawadjali, Wergaia and Jupagalk Nations.

From the Principal

Our newsletter has been published a couple of days late this week due to some computer issues on Friday.

It was wonderful to welcome so many of our fathers and father-figures to join us in celebrating Father’s Day together at school on Friday afternoon.  I know the children had been excitedly anticipating our games of tee-ball and other activities - almost as much as they had been looking forward to the hot dogs!!

To all Dads, we hope you had a very happy Father’s Day on Sunday.

Pope Francis has some beautiful words to all father-figures in our life: 

Nothing could better express the pride and emotion a father feels when he understands that he has handed down to his child what really matters in life, that is, a wise heart. This father does not say: “I am proud of you because you are the same as me, because you repeat the things I say and do”. No, he does not say anything so simple to him. He says something much more important, which we can understand in this way: “I will be happy every time I see you act with wisdom, and I will be moved every time that I hear you speak with decency. This is what I wanted to leave to you, that this one thing become yours: the attitude to feel and act, to speak and judge with wisdom and decency. 

Pope Francis June 15th 2020.

God of blessing, God of life, 

We thank you for the gift of our Fathers 

and those who are like fathers to us. 

We place them in your loving care 

and trust that you will give them 

all that they need for life. 

Amen 

CURRENT & RECENT EVENTS

School Wide Positive Behaviour 

During play times, staff have been monitoring for students demonstrating aspects of Respect, Responsibility and Safety within the school yard.  Names were collated and shared during yesterday’s assembly.  A draw then took place from the names within each category and that student’s House received a token for their House jar.  The House with the most tokens later in the year will be rewarded.

Congratulations to all children who were recognised for their actions around the school over the past week.   Xavier (Joseph), Marnie (Joseph) and Declan (MacKillop) were randomly drawn from the names listed for Respect, Responsibility and Safety, and have added tokens to their respective House's tallies.

Season of Creation

The Season of Creation begins on September 1, World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation, and ends on October 4, the Feast of St. Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of ecology beloved by many Christian denominations.

The theme for the Season of Creation 2022 is “Listen to the Voice of Creation”. The burning bush is the Symbol for the Season of Creation 2022. 

In this Season of Creation, this symbol of God’s Spirit calls us to listen to the voice of creation, to the voices of those who suffer the impacts of climate change, to the voices of those who hold generational wisdom about how to live gratefully within the limits of the land. These are voices of the Earth. The global Christian family is called to awaken to the urgent need to heal our relationships with creation and with each other and to encourage our parish (and schools) communities to do the same, “for we know that things can change!” (Laudato Si’, 13).

NAPLAN Results

Year 3 and 5 students sat their NAPLAN tests in May and the results have been sent out to schools this week.  These results will be forwarded to parents in the coming days.

I remind parents that the NAPLAN assessment should be seen as a guide to your child’s performance as results may be affected by factors such as health, personal or family issues, or other extenuating factors prevalent at that time. Whilst the NAPLAN results provide an indication of your child’s progress, school-based assessments provide a more balanced overview of your child’s learning. 

Father's Day

It was wonderful to have so many dads, grandpas, granddads, pas and significant father-figures available to attend our Father's Day afternoon on Friday.

They joined with our children for an afternoon of hot dogs, tee-ball and other activities.

We are so pleased you were able to join us and we hope you had as as the children did!

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UPCOMING EVENTS

Junior Class Excursion

Mrs Creek’s F-1 class will travel to Kaniva on Wednesday to visit the Kaniva Puppet Shop and other local surrounds of the town.  We look forward to hearing about their excursion when they host our assembly next Thursday afternoon.

End of Term

A reminder that students will finish the term at 3.15pm on Wednesday 14 September.

Staff members will be attending two days of professional learning in Halls Gap on the Thursday and Friday.  This professional learning will be focused on our Catholic Identity and Faith formation.  The two days will be facilitated by consultants from Catholic Education Ballarat.  Staff from Our Lady Help of Christians, Murtoa, will also be participating in these two days.  This will be a great opportunity for us to have some face-to-face professional learning in Religious Education as this has been a challenge for us the last two years due to the pandemic.

SIMON Everywhere Important App Update

SIMON and Hordern IT have done significant work improving the functionality and reliability of the SIMON Everywhere app.  Consequently, new versions of the app are now available on the Apple and Google Stores and the existing SIMON Everywhere app will no longer function.

It is important that users of SIMON Everywhere uninstall and then re-install the SIMON Everywhere app to ensure that they have the latest version with all of the new improvements. If you have been having issues accessing PAM through SIMON Everywhere, this process will be the solution.

The following image sets out how to complete this 5-minute process.  Please contact Karen at the school office if you have any questions.

Casual Relief Teachers

I am interested to hear from any suitably qualified and registered teachers who are available for Casual Relief Teaching during Term Four.  Expressions of interest can be forwarded to me at principal@spnhill.catholic.edu.au or call 0419929271 for further information.

Brigidine Asylum Seekers Project

The Brigidine Asylum Seekers Project, a project lead by Sr Brigid Arthur, is currently collecting donations of small toiletry items that have been collected from hotels (shampoo, conditioner, soap, body wash).  These items are then provided to refugees and asylum seekers.

If you have items that you are happy to donate, these can be dropped in to the box in the front foyer at school.  Thank you to those who have already dropped items in.

Something so little to us can make a big difference to someone else.

Sunday’s Gospel Reflection

Luke 14:1, 7-14

In Sunday’s Gospel, Jesus was invited to dinner by an important person and everyone was carefully watching him throughout the dinner.  Jesus pointed out that we shouldn’t show favour to people just so that they will return the favour to us.  Jesus advises hosts not to invite people who would be expected to repay them to dinner but to invite those who could not repay: the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. This is where real blessings can be found.

Do I sometimes do good things without expecting return favours?

How can I share friendship with people who are not in my family or group of friends?

Who is welcome at the banquet in God’s kingdom?

Our Josephite Heritage

The Sisters of St Joseph of the Sacred Heart, often called the "Josephites" or "Brown Joeys", were founded in Penola, South Australia, in 1866 by Mary MacKillop and the Rev. Julian Tenison Woods. In 1949, three Josephite sisters arrived in Nhill to open St Patrick’s School. In 1978, the Sisters of St Joseph informed the Nhill Parish that they would no longer be able to maintain their role within the school.

We endeavour to honour our Josephite heritage through the regular presentation of the Little Joey awards at our assemblies. In support of this we also include a reflection from Mary MacKillop on our newsletter each week.

Classroom and Student News

Junior Class

Mrs Creek

Our Big Book shared story this week is called Birds in the Billabong by Mike Ingram. This is the last in our series showcasing Australian animals and birds in the style of Aboriginal art. These books have been culturally informing us, as well as, giving us information about our unique wildlife. Our class has continued during writing time to discuss and write about two of the book week stories titled Walk of the Whales and Iceberg. Hannah E. and Liberty have been reading about Games across the world in their reading rotation. In Japan they learn about clapping games. I invited Marnie and Claire from Miss William’s class to show two of the rhymes they knew. In Mathematics our time focus has been days of the week, events, and months of the year. During spelling we are creating rhyme, and looking at long vowels.

Middle Class

Miss Williams

This week in the Middle Class we have been reading Olga the Brolga by Rod Clement. It is a rhyming book that we have been using to focus on the verbs and what the verbs are telling us. We have also been using verbs in our writing by changing the tense to past, present or future verbs.

In Writing we have continued to work on verbs and also continued to finish off our information reports. Most of us now are bringing our work together to create good copies with many wonderful paragraphs and sentences.

In Maths we are continuing to work on multiplication through using arrays, repeat addition and through solving worded problems. Year 2 students have been working hard on learning the 2, 5 and 10 times tables, and the Year 3 students added the 3, 4 and 8 times tables on to that as well. 

In Art this week some of us finished off our robots while others began working on creating little sections we can put together digitally to create a backdrop. We had hoped to have this production ready by the end of term, but with many interruptions and illness we are looking at the start of next term. 

We were very excited to celebrate our fathers and father figures on Friday. We made some lovely presents and cards and hope you enjoyed them!

It was also very lovely to hear how beautifully the class works together and helps each other when different teachers are in the classroom. Well done Middles and it was great to hear how well you work in the two days I was away.

Senior Class

In Sport we played touch football, we didn’t know how to play, so we watched a video of people who played touch football and we are getting a little better.

By Jody

This week in the senior class we have been preparing for the upcoming Father’s Day. We have been making special presents for our Mum, Dad or significant other. In Maths we have moved on from fractions to decimals focusing on addition and subtraction of decimals.

By Lexi

On Friday the Father's Day is happening, we are vs the Fathers in a tee ball. I hope the kids win. At 1.30 we start the match. Before the game we all get hot dogs, not a real dog that is hot obviously.

By Jonas

For the last few weeks in writing, we have been finishing health reports.  My group did alcohol.  Did you know alcohol can lower blood sugar levels?  Did you know alcohol can shrink your brain?

By Olive

Science Week! 

On Monday we went to Horsham with the Nhill College and the Nhill Lutheran School. We got into groups and participated in the Science Week Activities. There were many different groups and activities, these include making towers to survive an earthquake, building your own hand, making a strong bridge to survive many different weights, making secret messages, building a mars buggy, a string along activity, making your own water wheel and much more. We ate lunch and then went to our second science activity. After our second activity the winners were announced and our school managed to come third!

We all had an amazing time and we all really enjoyed it!               

By Jack, Jet, Sienna and Stella!

Important Dates and Reminders

Term Dates

Term 3 11 July to 16 September**

**Students' last day is Wednesday 14 September

Term 4   3 October to 20 December

School Calendar

SEPTEMBER

Wednesday 7

Junior Class excursion to Kaniva

Monday 12

F-2 Athletics

Wednesday 14

Last Day Term 3 for students- dismissal time 3.15pm

Thursday 15

Student free day - staff professional development

Friday 16

Student free day - staff professional development

OCTOBER

Monday 3

First day Term 4

Tuesday 4

School Advisory Council Meeting 7.30pm

Thursday 13

Local public holiday - Nhill Show

Reminders

Lunch Orders

Lunch orders should be written onto an envelope with correct money sealed inside.  Please don’t use plastic bags or waxed bags.  The writing wipes off these and the staff at the bakery find it hard to read.

Wimmera Bakery has advised that they have recently reviewed their prices, and the price of some items will increase in the near future.  We will provide an updated price list when this happens.

Parent Access Module (PAM)

We strongly encourage parents to use the Parent Access Module PAM (SIMON Everywhere) to inform us of student absences. These notes can be set in advance (if, for example, you know that your child will be absent a week in the future). Notes written in the diary are for communicating with teachers. Absent notes need to be directed to the office.

Please speak with office staff if you have any questions about PAM.

Simon Everywhere

The Simon Everywhere app delivers instant notifications to parents' mobile phones, delivering the functionality of PAM (SIMON Parent Access Module) in an easy to navigate app.  

We request that all parents please download the Simon Everywhere app, add St Patrick's School, Nhill and login using your existing PAM credentials.  

We will use Simon Everywhere for all important notifications.  

You will be able to manage all your day-to-day school needs from the Simon Everywhere app - notify us of absences, view the lunch orders menu, read the newsletter ...

Please contact the office with any questions.

Bus notes

Parents of bus travelling students please note that Nhill College has requested that any changes to travel arrangements (e.g. if you are picking up your child after school) be notified before 3.00pm on that day.  You can do this by -

• calling our school office 53911575
• sending an email to principal@spnhill.catholic.edu.au or krintoule@spnhill.catholic.edu.au
• use the Bus Change Notification Form on their website - this is a quick and easy process on your mobile phone (hint: add this as a quick link on your phone's home screen)

Remember to follow us on Facebook

Those who are on Facebook are encouraged to follow our page at St Patrick's School, Nhill.  'Like' our page, enjoy our posts, and share them with your friends.  Stay connected through our Social Media page.

Coronavirus information - Term 3 update

Rapid antigen testing

• The Victorian Government is providing up to three further deliveries of rapid antigen tests in Term 3 and again in Term 4 to schools.
• It is recommended that rapid antigen tests are used by students and staff when symptomatic.
• Household contacts are required to test negative using a rapid antigen test on at least 5 out of 7 days if they are attending or working at a school onsite.
• If staff or students receive a positive test result at any time, they must report this through the Department of Health system (a link is provided below) or via the coronavirus hotline at 1800 675 398.
• Students (or their parents) must also report a positive result to their school by phone or written notification; this is so the school can support them, record that they will be absent while in 7-day isolation, and let the rest of the school community know there has been a positive case onsite and that they should monitor for symptoms.
• Students and staff who have tested positive for COVID-19, have completed their 7-day isolation period and are subsequently asymptomatic do not need to undertake surveillance testing for four weeks.

Face masks

• Current advice from the Victorian Government on the wearing of face masks is available (see the link provided below)
• Wearing a face mask can help protect you and those around you. Face masks stop droplets spreading when you talk, cough, sneeze and laugh, which lowers your chance of spreading or catching the virus.
• The advice also strongly recommends the wearing of face masks in indoor settings (noting that exceptions to the recommendation apply to teaching circumstances when clear enunciation or visibility of the mouth is essential).  Further, the Victorian Government is recommending that, through to the end of winter, students aged 8 and over and staff will wear masks when in class.
• Household contacts attending school who are over 8 years of age are required to wear face masks indoors unless they have a valid exception. 
• Everyone including students aged 8 years and above must wear a face mask when travelling on school buses, public transport, taxis or rideshare vehicles.
• If face masks are required, they should be worn for up to four hours and replaced after this time.

Practise good hygiene

• All staff, students and visitors to schools should undertake regular hand hygiene, particularly on arrival to school, before and after eating, after blowing their nose, coughing, sneezing or using the toilet.
• Hand sanitiser is available at entry points to classrooms.
• Sharing of food is not permitted.

Stay home if unwell

• The most important action school communities can take to reduce the risk of transmission of COVID-19 is to ensure that any unwell staff, parents / carers and students do not attend school sites even with the mildest of symptoms and get tested.

School Advisory Council

Parent Representatives

Helen Cannell

Moo Khu James

Zanther McEldrew

Emily Gladdis

Nathan Wheeler

Appointed Representatives

Ann Munro - Parish

Ex Officio

Mons. Glynn Murphy - Parish Priest

Kingsley Dalgleish - Principal

Next Meeting

Tuesday, 4 October at 7.30pm

Our Mission