All families will have received a form in the post to fill in and return to school as soon as possible. This is to review our decile status - which ultimately determines our level of funding. Tongan and Chinese families have forms in Tongan or Chinese. You don't have to put your family name and everything you write is confidential and will be destroyed after collating. Please return the forms now. We need the input of all families. Thank you.
Junior Swimming
The junior school has completed 10 lessons of a Swim safety program. This excellent program helped all our swimmers quickly gain confidence in the water environment. The focus was on water safety and awareness and children learned safety and survival skills. They used equipment such as life jackets and practiced stamina and floating long distance. An excellent experience!!
Cross Country
Well done to all of our children who represented St Joseph's at the North Otago Cross Country this week. I'd like to draw attention to young David Kilgour who had a smile on his face right through the race and prepared himself for the race by practising at home and running up Ashburn Street. He says, "We ran through a big creek with tonnes of water in it and I nearly fell over. If you were in Year 4 &5 you got to climb over jumps that slowed you down but were fun. I was puffed at the end and i felt proud that I finished the race."
Writing about God
Our year 7 & 8s have two RE assessments a term and since essay-writing is such a big part of high stakes assessment (NCEA and tertiary education) we are teaching them to write essays for their RE assessment. As well as teaching them the writing skills to demonstrate their learning, it also shows them that Religious Education can be a serious and academic subject.
This is an excerpt from a year 7 writing about God.
"God has revealed himself in many ways and still does in the world today. While He revealed himself in many ways to the people of the Old Testament, the biggest way he showed himself was through Jesus. We can see God in other people every day, especially when they show virtues. Virtues are qualities that God has given us. Examples of virtues are courage, loyalty, justice and compassion. To truly show these virtues we must be faithful to God. Jesus was the model of all virtue since He showed love and compassion to people and God every day. We as God's people strive to be like Jesus. Through God's grace, we can turn away from sin and be that one step closer to being just like Jesus. God has created us to grow and change. This doesn't just mean physically. We can grow in our faith and change our ways to be closer and more faithful to God. To find out more about God we can read the Bible, pray or go to church."
Uniform
Our uniform policy is up for board review in term 1 next year. We welcome ideas and feedback from parents. We would be particularly interested in seeing modifications other Catholic schools have made. Please provide ideas/feedback/modifications by the end of week 1 of next term. These should come to me and you can leave them with the office staff or make a time to see me. The board will consider the feedback/forward and appropriate ideas will be presented back to the community for further consideration.
Mainland Uniforms have a range of Catholic uniforms including tartan culottes for girls. They also have tartan scrunchies and headbands which meet our uniform code.
God Bless and Aroha
Lorraine Frances-Rees
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