Dear Parents and Carers,

Despite the drizzly weather on Tuesday our Year 3 - 6 students enjoyed competing / participating in the annual school swimming carnival. Thank you to Mrs Harnett for her organisation of the carnival ensuring the day went to plan.

Thank you to the parent helpers on the day!

We congratulate Penola House for winning the house trophy. Captains Oliver and Ella proudly received the trophy.

Congratulations to the swimming age champions:

Junior Girl: Eva Ridley

Junior Boy: Drew Duncan

11 Year Girl: Monique Canavan

11 Year Boy: Nate Irvin

Senior Girl: Ivy Smith

Senior Boy: Lincoln Thompson

Congratulations to the Michael Rheinberger Award winner – Ivy Smith!

Well done to all the nominees Monique Canavan, Amber Phillips, Braydan Sharman, Logan Creek, Will Herbert-Scott, Ella Taylor and Blake V for being noticed as demonstrating the characteristics of Michael Rheinberger during the carnival day.

GOOD LUCK! We wish our swimmers well who are competing in the zone carnival in Narooma today.

Staff:

We welcome Mrs Harmony Morrow to the office team as the part time office administration assistant.

Catalyst: High Impact Teaching Practice

Principle 2. Present new material using small steps. Presenting new information in small, bite-sized chunks increases the progress made by the students. Introducing too much at once will see progress rates fall as they can only process so much at one time. This reduction in cognitive load allows metacognition to take place (it allows them to think about how they are thinking about the task).

Principle 3. Ask a large number of questions …and to all students. Questions are a teacher’s most powerful tool, they can highlight misconceptions, keep a lesson flowing and challenge students to think deeper into a subject. The greatest value of questioning though is that they force students to practice retrieval, this strengthens and deepens memory. At St Patrick’s we strive to be a ‘No Hands Up except to ask a question’ school. Teachers pose a question and then pick a student’s name from the ‘pop stick cup.’ This is a minds-on strategy that lets all students know they need to listen, think, and be prepared to respond.

LENT began on Wednesday, as we begin our journey to Easter your children will be talking about the messages from Fr Luke at Mass this week about prayer, giving, and giving up. Ask them what they remember from Fr Luke’s homily.

Blessings on your weekend.

Jo