Issue 13 - 12th August 2020

Sunday Connection Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle A, Sunday, August 16, 2020

Gospel Reading Matthew 15:21-28

Jesus heals the daughter of the Canaanite woman because of her great faith.

Family Connection

Even when spurned by Jesus, the faith of the Canaanite woman makes her bold enough to argue and ask again for what she needs. Her persistence and great confidence that Jesus could heal her daughter reminds us of the confidence with which our children bring to us their own needs. In their faith and trust, we can find modern examples of how we might approach God in prayer.

As a family recall some times when a request for something was presented by one family member to another with confidence and persistence. If the request was denied, talk about why that was so. If the request was eventually granted, talk about what led to the change of heart. Then read together Sunday’s Gospel, Matthew 15:21-28. Was anyone surprised by Jesus’ response to the Canaanite woman? Why or why not? What makes Jesus change his mind and heal the woman’s daughter? When we pray, God wants us to be as confident in his mercy. Invite family members to identify the things that they most need from God. Pray these prayers of petition together as a family, confident that God will hear and answer your prayers.

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Miss Amy Pegg has been successful with her application for the PE/Health teaching position for 2020. Amy is due to complete her Bachelor of Education at the end of the year and has been granted a Limited Authority to Teach (LAT) by the Tasmanian Teachers Registration Board for St Peter Chanel. Amy holds a Certificate 3 & 4 in Fitness. Amy commenced her new role with SPC today, assisting at the pool.

• At this stage, due to COVID-19 operational limitations, we have been advised that it is unlikely that we will be able to go ahead with a Family Christmas Concert in its usual capacity. What this might look like is still yet to be determined. Once we have been advised we will let families know. 
• Accordingly, the SPC Athletics Carnival is unlikely to take place in its usual capacity. We will let families know decisions around this event in the coming weeks.

Thank you for your understanding.

Congratulations to the following students who were presented with 'Aiming High' awards at assembly last week:

Kinder -  Finn & Levi

Prep -  Bronte & Nirvana 

Grade 1 - Charlie & Carly 

Grade 2 -  Noah & Ellie

Grade 3 - Eliza & Reef

Grade 4 - Samuel & Jhett

Grade 5 -  Piper & Lillama

Grade 6 - Hunter & Aaliyah

Each week our centres and activities are designed to suit children from Birth - 5 years, with an open ended nature to allow their creativity and 'sense of being' to shine through. Here is a little snippet of some of the options available to our children and family, this week following the topic of ‘the desert’. Next Monday we will be exploring National Science Week!

Friendships & Conflict

by georgina@wellbeingforkids.com.au | Jan 17, 2018 | Blog |

During primary school children go through many stages of making friends and along the way will experience conflict at some stage.  It is very normal for children to experience conflict from time to time as this is a way of children discovering what works with friends and what doesn’t – put simply children are developing their social and emotional skills.   Some children may get confused when they have a disagreement or conflict with another person and may call this bullying.  There is a great difference between conflict and bullying and here is a simple way to differentiate between them:

•   Misunderstanding – usually problems around communication.
•   Disagreement – do not agree on something and both want their own way.
•   Conflict – people usually want to solve the problem. Can be over a period of time if not sorted properly.
•   Bullying – threatening, repetitive, targeted, deliberating wanting to harm, abusive, no attempt to resolve issue.

 If your child does experience conflict, this is a wonderful teaching moment to guide them and help them learn about how to get along with others.  Sometimes children can resolve conflict themselves, particularly as they grow into the upper years of primary, but when they are young they may need guidance and most importantly need emotional support.  The best way to give emotional support is to use ‘reflective listening’.  When we practice this type of listening, we listen to the content of what your child is saying and listen for the emotion and then we reflect back what they are saying e.g. “it sounds as though that really frustrated you when you did not get to play your game”.  We can then try to help them problem solve the situation by giving them lots of opportunities to brain storm a solution without stepping in too early to solve it for them.

Conflict teaches kids:

• How to give and take
• How to come to an agreement
• How to compromise                                      
• How to solve problems
• To build empathy                                           
• To understand others and their needs
• How to get along in a group
• How to develop successful, loving & healthy relationships as adults

This week we celebrate the International Day of Youth on the 12th August.  Pope Francis’ World Youth Day message for 2020 invites the youth “to take a risk and change the world”.  

In our classrooms students are learning about the Church.  I have included some photos of the work on display from our Grade 5 and 6 classes.

Thank you to all families who were able to attend our Family Interviews last Wednesday. If you were unable to attend but would like to make a time to discuss your child with their teacher, please contact them directly to arrange this.

On Thursday, we were able to return to our Cake Raffle fundraiser with our first cake going to Luca Smith! Congratulations Luca, our next cake raffle will be Thursday, 20th August. Tickets are just $1.00 available via the Qkr! App.

Our next Parents and Friends meeting will be Tuesday, 18th August at 3:00pm, in the Library. 

A reminder for families that supervision before school starts at 8:30am. Breakfast club is available in the Josephite Centre from 8:15am.

Orders for Canteen can be placed in advance and up until 9:00am on the day you wish to receive your order. If you are unable to order via the app, manual orders are to be brought to the office by 9:00am on the day.

Our Grade Six students will be attending their annual Marist Regional College visit on Friday, 4th September. Students will be travelling by bus departing school at 9:15am and returning at 2:15pm. A letter went home to Grade Six students with further details yesterday.

Term Dates for 2021 are as follows: 

Term 1 - Monday, 1st February - Thursday, 1st April 

Term 2 - Monday, 26th April  - Friday, 2nd July 

Term 3 - Monday, 19th July  - Friday, 24th September 

Term 4 - Monday, 11th October  - Thursday, 16th December

Student Free Days will be advised in 2021.

Grade Four and Grade Five families will receive a letter asking for donations of food and/or crafts for a Father’s Day Stall as part of the 2021 Canberra Fundraising.

The Stall will be held on Thursday, 3rd September with all classes given the opportunity to purchase from it.  Items will range in price from 50c to $5.

We still have outstanding money from Cadbury chocolate boxes from earlier this year.  We ask that these funds please be paid to the school.  A follow-up letter will be going home to those families from next week.

We appreciate that the families of the current Grade Six cohort have done a fantastic job with fundraising for the Canberra trip that unfortunately is unable to proceed this year.

The school will ensure that the Grade Sixes will receive benefit from some of this fundraising by utilising some of these funds for activities at the end of the school year.  Planning is in progress and families will be notified in Term 4.

As some of you would know, Ms Jessie Ollington is pregnant and will be taking Parental Leave from Friday, 28th August. We wish Jessie all the best as she welcomes a new baby into her family.   

Mrs Lisa Fraser has been successful as her replacement for  the position of Teacher Assistant and we welcome Lisa officially on Monday, 24th August.  Most of you would know Lisa as a Swimming Teacher and she has also been doing some Relief TA work throughout the school. We look forward to having Mrs Fraser with us.

Thank you to everyone for keeping students home when they are unwell. If your child has a cough or runny nose please ensure they remain at home until they are well. We have also had some students present with ‘Gastro’ symptoms, these students should be kept home for 24 hours after the last symptom presents. Thank you all for your understanding.