1. Principal's News - Term 2 Week 1 2017

Welcome to Term 2

Science - Stimulating Curiosity
Miss Tangney has collected science resources and tools to help our students start to think about aspects of science.   The resources can be used in a variety of ways with a variety of students.

The starting points for our learning across the school are:

Water - Forces - Planets/space - Habitats - Chemistry - Electricity - Extreme weather

The aim of these resources is to spark the children's curiosity and get them to think like scientists so they can start to explore the nature of science.  Miss Tangney has been having ongoing discussions with St Kevin's about the type of science learning that will be most beneficial to prepare for high school and beyond.  She has also had recent professional development in best practice in science learning for primary so we are very lucky we have her to lead the staff with our science practice.  This video partially explains what is meant by the "nature of science" - the type of thinking we will be directly teaching:

Mindfulness
Mrs Jones-Hogan underwent a two day training in the holiday to become a Mindfulness facilitator. It is more than a selection of catchy phrases -it is a significant commitment to changing thinking patterns which requires some degree of expertise.   Our school is an extremely vibrant and complex social environment, drawing from a variety of geographical areas, cultures and lifestyles.  This is a very special part of who we are.  Our fabulous mix can also mean we sometimes need to learn to be calm, resilient and thoughtful so that we can all be our best selves.

Mrs Jones-Hogan explains:

"The Mindfulness course I attended in Christchurch in the holidays, is all about giving our children the tools to deal with emotions/anxiety/stress/ and life in general.  The key phrase is Pause, Breathe and Smile.  It is about being present in the moment as so often we can come at a situation whether it is in the playground or our learning and have a lot of anger, anxiety or low self-esteem and this helps children (and adults) deal with the situation that is happening for them at that moment in time.  

So I have trained to become a facilitator for this (a wonderful opportunity I am very grateful for).  It is aimed at year 4 and older and I will be teaching the year 4, 5 and 7 classes how to do this over the next 8 weeks.  Then next year I will roll it out with my new year 7 class (the present year 6s) and continue to roll it out with the year 4s each year."

Mrs Jones-Hogan will run an information and taster session on Mindfulness for parents on Thursday 18 May at 6.30pm in the staffroom - parents of children in years 4, 5, and 7 are particularly invited, and everyone is welcome

Home and School Chairperson
Due to extensive commitments, Rachel Fowler is needing to step down as co-Chair of the Home and School.  We are sincerely grateful for the commitment she has given to the school over the last few years and particularly in the development of our very successful Multicultural Food Fair.  We need someone to step up to take this lead role.  You don't have to have had experience on the Home and School, you just need to be willing to give it a go.  There is a dedicated committee to help you.  It would be a significant voluntary role to add to your curriculum vitae and you get the satisfaction of knowing you are doing good for the school and helping to build our community.  Please let Rachel or myself know if you are interested.

Our Published Author
Congratulations to Anika Winders who has published her short story, "The Keepsake of Time" in a compilation of science fiction short stories called, "Beyond the Back Yard."  Anika will read her story at assembly on Friday.

How we teach health within a Catholic context
We need to consult with our community every 18 months regarding our health curriculum.  As a Catholic school we teach health through a Catholic lens, guided by the national Religious Education curriculum.  I believe the outcome is a beautiful approach to well-being.  You can view this at Health Program and if you wish to make any comments for consideration please send them to principal@stjoseph.school.nz.

Absences
If your child is absent from school please let our office know before 9am.  The best way is to text 0272 434 8860 or you can ring and leave a message on the answerphone.

We need to know where all the children are and if there are a large number of students absent without messages, it can take us a long time to go through the contacts and locate someone to tell us where the child is.  In the meantime there may be a child missing that we need to know about and do something about.  So to help keep all our children safe please let us know before 9am.

We also need the reason.  If there is no reason we have to put it down as unjustified absence and if there are more than 10 half days unjustified absences in a term, we have to follow up.

Thank you for your cooperation with this.

A Thoughtful Prayer
Well done to Eva Keno who wrote this lovely five finger prayer earlier this week:

Thumb: I pray that my family has a good day.

Pointer: I pray that Miss Mulholland helps me use good choices today.

Index: I pray that the government gives money to those with no water, food or clothes.

Ring: I pray for those who have no shelter.

Pinkie: I pray that I am a good friend to everyone.

Eva Keno

God Bless,
Lorraine Frances-Rees