From The Principal
Dear Parents and Carers,
Let me start with the story of The Butterfly:A man found a cocoon of a butterfly. One day a small opening appeared. He sat and watched the butterfly for several hours as it struggled to force its body through that little hole, until it suddenly stopped making any progress and looked like it was stuck. The man decided to help the butterfly. He took a pair of scissors and snipped off the remaining bit of the cocoon. The butterfly then emerged easily, although it had a swollen body and small, shrivelled wings. The man didn’t think anything of it and sat there waiting for the wings to enlarge to support the butterfly. But that didn’t happen. The butterfly spent the rest of its life unable to fly, crawling around with tiny wings and a swollen body. Despite the kind heart of the man, he didn’t understand that the restricting cocoon and the struggle needed by the butterfly to get itself through the small opening were God’s way of forcing fluid from the body of the butterfly into its wings. To prepare itself for flying once it was out of the cocoon.
The moral of the story: Our struggles in life develop our strengths. Without struggles, we never grow and never get stronger, so it’s important for us to tackle challenges on our own, and not be relying on help from others. (This version of the story is from https://wealthygorilla.com/10-most-inspirational-short-stories/)  To achieve this target we use strategies and pedagogy to support the growth of each learner. These include: Weekly coaching in class for each student in Reading and Writing – this helps each child’s progress through the naming of the specific next steps in their learning. No Hands Up (except to ask a question) is a ‘minds on’ strategy that tells all learners we expect them to think. The ‘Learning Pit,’ is an approach that encourages cognitive wobble in the process of acquiring knowledge and understanding. We avoid ‘rescuing’ and instead throw out supportive lifelines to help the children to process their thinking. At St Patrick’s we challenge learners to face the struggles and challenges in their learning so that like the butterfly, strength is developed.
Kindergarten Enrolments 2020 We are now accepting enrolments for 2020. Enrolments have moved to an online process. You can find the link to the form under the ‘for parents’ tab on our website.
Blessings for a restful weekend. Jo
|