ABOUT - Term 3 Week 5 - 21 August 2025

THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK

Come Holy Spirit
Fill the hearts of the faithful and kindle in them the fire of your love

CONFIRMATION

This Sunday, 24 August - 9:30 a.m.

We can't wait to celebrate our Confirmation Mass this Sunday, 24 August at 9:30 a.m.  The Sacrament will be administered by Bishop Michael McKenna. This is such an important event at our school and we invite and encourage everyone to be at church on Sunday to celebrate with our Year 6 leaders. It would be fabulous to have lots there for this great occasion. Please keep our Confirmation class in your prayers: Darcy Adams, Mitchell Beaton, Ryan Faulder, Estelle Hazelton, Chloe Heffer, Charlie Howard, Mack Hutchison, Sophie Lacey, Clancy Larkin, Jakirah McKenzie, Oscar Medd, Adelaide Mudford, Tex Mudford, Braxten Towns, Jackson Towns, Neve Walker, Caitlin Younghusband.

WORKING BEE FOR YEAR 6 PARENTS TO CLEAN THE CHURCH

Tomorrow, Friday, 22 August from 3:00 p.m.

A working bee for the Year 6 parents to clean the church in preparation for Confirmation will be held tomorrow, Friday, 22 August at 3:00 p.m.  Thank you to those parents who have indicated they can attend the working bee.  It would be great if as many parents as possible could lend a hand to ensure the church is cleaned as quickly as possible.

BOOK WEEK - INFANTS DRESS UP DAY

Thank you to all the infants students and staff who participated so enthusiastically in dressing up and parading for Book Week today.  We had a wonderful morning and thank you also to all the families who attended the parade and prepared the costumes.  "There is more treasure in books than in all the pirate's loot on Treasure Island" - Walt Disney.

DIOCESAN ATHLETICS CARNIVAL

Best of luck to the 13 Joey’s students who are representing the Western Region at the Diocesan Athletics Carnival in Dubbo tomorrow, Friday, 22 August.  Our competitors include:  Darcy Adams, Katie Colwell, Thomas Colwell, Estelle Hazelton, Chloe Heffer, Charlie Howard, Jack Howard, Rose Howard, Clancy Larkin, Archie O'Connor, Hannah Peart, Jackson Towns, Layla Walker.

ICAS MATHS COMPETITION

The ICAS Maths Competition will be held next Monday, 25 August for those children who have entered this competition.

KINDER LITURGY

Kinder will celebrate a class Liturgy next Thursday, 28 August in St Joseph's Church at 10:30 a.m.  Everyone is welcome to attend.   Morning tea will be served after the Liturgy and we ask if you could please bring a plate to share.

NO PARKING IN FRONT OF THE CHURCH

St Joseph's Parish is concerned about child safety around the church area at school drop off and pick up.  Please DO NOT park on the driveway (including the grassed areas), from the Wrigley Street entrance, in front of the church.  The parish is happy for parents to drive through this area and drop children off, but please DO NOT park here. 

There is a carpark on the Wamboin Street side of the church, where parents may park their vehicle whilst waiting for their children to come out of school, or if parents need to come into the school.

If you have questions, or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact the school.

SPORT DURING WEEKS 7-10

As mentioned in last week's About, in Weeks 7, 8, 9 and 10 this term, the WHOLE school will be participating in AFL sessions for sport each Friday.  This means that all years, from Kinder to Year 6, are required to wear their sport uniform to school each Friday from Weeks 7-10 and their normal school uniform each Thursday.

TRANSITION FROM WINTER TO SUMMER SCHOOL UNIFORM

All students are to continue wearing the full WINTER school uniform until Monday, 1 September (Week 7).  From this date children may wear either their summer OR winter uniform for the remainder of Term 3, depending upon the weather. 

FATHER'S DAY STALL

ONLY 2 WEEKS AWAY

Our Father’s Day Stall is only two weeks away and will be held on Friday, 5 September. The stall is run along the same lines as the Mother’s Day Stall.  Each year parents are asked to donate gifts for the Father’s Day Stall.  This gives the children the opportunity to purchase a gift for their fathers and grandfathers that they have selected themselves, whilst raising money for our P&F Association. Your contributions can be sent in at any time and left at the school office.   Ideas for the stall include chocolates, keyrings, mugs, caps, pens, tools, hose fittings, car care items, beanies, socks, etc.  We are very short of gifts at the moment. It would be wonderful if we could have enough gifts for the children to purchase 2 gifts each.  Please keep an eye out for presents no matter how big or small….it all helps!  If the gifts could be wrapped in clear cellophane, that would be greatly appreciated.  

FATHER'S DAY RAFFLE

A raffle is being run in conjunction with the Father's Day Stall.  Tickets are $2.00 each and a book of five tickets was sent home with each family on Tuesday.  There are some amazing prizes up for grabs, as can be seen below.  Extra tickets are available to purchase from the school office. We thank the following local businesses for supporting our P&F Association: Western Farm Machinery, Victory Lap Sports, Johnsons Butchery, Rohrs Home Timber & Hardware, Ultra Fuel, Gilgandra Pharmacy, Gil News & Gifts, Diggs Butchery, IGA Supermarket, Mitre 10, Gil Ag & Auto Parts, Ag N Vet, Three Rivers Machinery, Cooee Tyres, Inland Petroleum, Gilgandra Post Office.  The raffle will be drawn at the conclusion of the Father's Day Stall on Friday, 5 September.

FATHER'S DAY STALL WORKING BEES

Two working bees will be held in the lead up to the Father's Day Stall. The first will be held next Friday, 29 August and then another the following Thursday, 4 September, from 9:00 a.m. to wrap and price gifts for the Father's Day Stall.  If you can help out for an hour or so, please sign in at the office and then head to the school hall.

NEEDED FOR FETE - A COW (OR PODDY CALF!)

We need a quiet cow, or poddy calf, that can be led around the yard for the Cow Pat Lotto which is held at the fete each year.  If anyone has a suitable cow and can help out, could you please let us know.

FOOD HANDLER TRAINING LINK FOR CANTEEN VOLUNTEERS

Please click on the below link to undertake the Food Handler Training required to be completed by all of our canteen volunteers. 

www.foodauthority.nsw.gov.au/training/food-handler-basics-training 

CANTEEN POLICY

Please find below a link to the St Joseph's School Canteen Policy. Due to various changes with Food & Safety Handling, we have been required to update our school's policy. Would all of our canteen volunteers please take the time to read through this document to ensure they are aware of the changes that are now in force.

WHAT'S ON IN WEEKS 6 & 7

MERIT AWARDS

Congratulations to the following students who received Merit Awards at Assembly on Wednesday:

KINDER:  Elisha Robin for great work in Geography, Harrison Hammond for being a super mathematician when solving take away problems and Max Godber for an excellent effort with his homework.

YEAR 1: Darcy Morrissey for writing great paragraphs about cirrus and cumulus clouds, Ellis Starr for writing a great paragraph about stratus clouds, Arthur Peart for enthusiastically reading time to the half hour and Charlie Burrell for expertly devising lengths to model halves, quarters and eighths.

YEAR 2: Chase Hodges for thinking carefully about spelling choices, Esther Jijo for always being bright and cheery and Bridie Jordan for great work telling the time on an analogue clock.

YEAR 3: Molly Adams for fantastic contributions to our class novel, “Rowan of Rin” and Piper van den Ende for super spelling in 'Buzz Off Buddy'.

YEAR 4: Billy Jeffery for writing a terrific free verse poem about his family, Bridie Moeris for a fabulous effort in Spelling and Sterling Newton for great contributions to class discussions based on our novel.

YEAR 5: Bella Hammond and Laycee Hazelton for creating the longest magnetic paperclip chains in Science. 

YEAR 6: Chloe Heffer for correctly identifying the ‘ow’ ‘oa’ ‘oe’ ‘ough’ ‘eau’ ‘o-e’ sound in our Spelling words and Mitchell Beaton for calculating the area of a triangle with speed and accuracy.

CLASSROOM NEWS

Kindergarten

Wow! What an amazing day Kindergarten has had dressing up as their favourite book characters. Everyone looked fantastic as they showed off their costumes in our book parade. Thank you to all the parents who came to watch us. This week in Religion we heard the story of Simeon and Anna and the presentation of baby Jesus in the temple. We are also busily preparing for our Liturgy next week, so please practise the readings that are stapled in the children’s homework books. During Writing this week we constructed some great recounts and wrote some very entertaining stories about a pirate. We continued separating quantities in Maths and focused on the correct formation of our numerals. In Science we enjoyed identifying the ‘silly’ materials that objects were made of - a car made of marshmallows, balloons made out of wood and a book made out of glass!! We are looking forward to celebrating Confirmation with our Year 6 buddies this Sunday. Hope to see you all there. Have a great weekend!

Mrs Alison Newstead & Mrs Julia Jeffery                                                                            

Year 1

We enjoyed reading about what Year 1 did on the weekend in their recounts this week. We also defined persuasion and discussed, for example, when people share their opinion, they express their point of view and when people are writing to persuade they include arguments to strengthen their opinions. To further explore persuasive texts and arguments we looked at a poster titled, ‘Save the Bees!’ and wrote an argument about why we should plant a bee friendly garden. We also read the text, “Hey, Little Ant!” and listed the arguments for and against squishing the ant from the perspective of the boy and the ant. We then wrote our own argument on why the boy should or should not squish the ant. In Maths we have looked closely at the mathematical symbols for plus, take away and equals. We used counters to model how we can use addition to solve subtraction number sentences. We also found out that addition problems have commutative properties, meaning that changing the order of the numbers will not change the answer. During Geography, we read the Dreamtime story of “Tiddalick" and discussed how it is a story that has been passed down over many generations of Aboriginal people to teach the next generation how to show their respect for the land. In Religion we read and sequenced the story of Moses. The students enjoyed writing about and illustrating their favourite part of the story. We hope you have a wonderful weekend and many thanks for dressing Year 1 up in the amazing book week costumes we saw in our costume parade today. A big thank you to Mrs Jeffery for organising such a fun event! Our thoughts are with our Year 6 friends as they celebrate the Sacrament of Confirmation on Sunday. It would be wonderful if we had some Year 1 students at Mass on Sunday to help celebrate with the Year 6 students.

Mrs Phillipa Haling & Mrs Haylee Barry

Year 2

We kicked off the week writing a procedure on how to make a ‘Frog in a Pond’.  We made them  on Tuesday and it was a great day on Wednesday as we got to eat them. Yum! We have a new Literature unit book which we will focus on for the next couple of weeks, which is called “Out”. This is a story about a little girl and her family who had to flee their home country because of war. We have had a lot of discussion about the life of refugees before and after they arrive in Australia. During Maths we have been revising different strategies to solve addition and subtraction problems. We took a virtual tour of the Great Barrier Reef in Geography where we were able to get up close to the beautiful coral and vibrant animal life. We will be doing a research project over the next two weeks about the diverse marine life that live on the reef. We all had a fantastic day today celebrating Book Week, thank you to everyone for the effort to organise your book characters. We hope Year 6 has a lovely day on Sunday as they celebrate the Sacrament of Confirmation.   Have a lovely weekend!

Mrs Nikkola Thomas

Year 3

How are we already halfway through Term 3? The weeks have definitely flown by. This week in English, we continued reading “Rowan of Rin”. The whole class has been on the edge of their seats, following the travellers’ exciting journey up the mountain. In Maths, we explored 2D shapes, learning the difference between regular and irregular polygons and even had some fun making chatterboxes! In Religion we read another parable that showed us how Jesus loved everyone and performed miracles for those who believed. We celebrated a beautiful Mass this morning with the theme, ‘ Loving One Another’.  A big thank you to all who joined us.  Our Year 6 class has also been in our prayers as they prepare to receive the Sacrament of Confirmation on Sunday.   Finally, Book Week costumes were a highlight of the day, everyone looked amazing, especially the Infant teachers! Wishing you all a wonderful weekend.

Miss Abigail Dobson

Year 4

Our novel is keeping us intrigued. We have read a few more chapters this week and recorded important events on a character development timeline for Quin. We planned and wrote a diary entry from Quin’s perspective of the important events. We’ve finished our Maths unit on time and have begun our new unit,  ‘2D Shapes and Angles.’  So far this week we've looked at parallelograms, trapeziums and polygons. During Religion we discussed the Annunciation and wrote a diary entry from Mary's perspective of the event. We all agreed that Mary would have felt confused and worried.  Congratulations to our Year 6 friends who will receive the Sacrament of Confirmation on Sunday.   It was lovely to watch our excited Infants friends today as they paraded their Book Week costumes. Enjoy the weekend!

Mrs Melinda Morris

Year 5

On Tuesday we enjoyed our day in Dubbo at the Emmanuel Workshop, where we were joined by Years 5 and 6 students from other schools. During Writing, we wrote a discussion text about going on a holiday to Thailand and in Maths we are focusing on 3D shapes, where we explored cross-sections by cutting plasticine models and sketched the front, side and top views of various 3D objects. Gravity versus wind resistance was the topic of discussion in Science. We watched a documentary on the invention and evolution of the parachute and we will design and create one of our own parachutes next week.  In Art we experimented with craft glue and food colouring to create some marbled suncatchers. All the best to our fellow classmates who are participating in the Diocesan Athletics Carnival tomorrow and a big thank you to the Year 5 parents and family members who are helping serve the Confirmation breakfast on Sunday. Your help is truly appreciated. Enjoy your weekend.

Mrs Meichelle Schier

Year 6

Another week is done and dusted! We have been busily preparing and can't wait for Confirmation, which is this Sunday! We hope to see everyone there to celebrate with us. In English we have begun writing our own factual newspaper articles, focussing on ‘argument’ and ‘authority’. Students had the freedom to choose from a range of topics based on individual interests. In Maths we have continued calculating the area of triangles, parallelograms and composite shapes. We have finished this unit and can definitely say we are making calculations with more speed and accuracy. We completed our Christmas Artworks this week and congratulate those students whose artworks were chosen to enter the next stage of the competition in Bathurst. We wish those who are competing at the Dio Athletics Carnival the best of luck- may they compete with great sportsmanship and ‘Give Of Their Best’. Have a wonderful weekend!

Mrs Jess Morrissey & Mrs Donna Colwell

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