Dear Parents and Carers,

Easter

This week sees us enter our last week for the term. We also celebrate Holy Week, the most solemn and important week in the Church’s Liturgical Year. Holy week is important as we remember and celebrate the events that led to the death and resurrection of Jesus.

On Palm Sunday we remember Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem. Holy Thursday we celebrate the Last Supper and the institution of the Sacrament of the Eucharist. Good Friday, a day to reflect not just on Jesus' death but on the fragility of our human nature. Good people, who welcomed Jesus as a king into Jerusalem just days before, turn on him. In the rage of a pack mentality, they call for his crucifixion. Even his closest friends who had followed him for years run and hide.

This Good Friday I encourage you to stop and remember Jesus’ journey to the cross, but also ask yourself, how can I stand up for what we believe as Catholics? How can I ensure I don’t continue the crucifixion of Jesus today? The week culminates with our celebration of the resurrection on Easter Sunday. It is this event that gives meaning and purpose to the lives of Catholics everywhere. We are a people of the resurrection, a people of hope, a people who can live life to the full knowing that there is something more for us when our time here is done. This liberating aspect of new life enables us to fully live as God wants us to live, knowing that in Jesus we have the promise of being called to new life with God.

This Easter, celebrate with friends and family, and make a commitment to live life to the full as God intended and reach out to help at least one person over the course of the year.

CariTaps

A huge thank you to Taylor James for organising CariTaps this year. It was a great way to have fun and raise money to help people both here and around the world to set up businesses and start to be a full part of their communities and create a life for themselves and others. I thank the parents who made generous contributions to make sure the whole event was a success. I know that I had a ball getting wet and the children certainly seemed to enjoy throwing water over me and Mrs Porter and Miss James. Have a look at the pictures in Taylor James's RE Corner later in the newsletter.

Facebook

If you are a Facebook user, don’t forget to drop over to our Facebook page, follow us and give us a like. Whilst I am not a huge fan of social media it is another tool that we use as a school. We mainly use Facebook to let the wider community know what is happening in our beautiful school community. I try to update it regularly with photos and little commentaries about our activities.

Enrolments Open

2024 enrolments are now open. If you have a child who will be starting Kindergarten (or any other year level) in 2024, please get in contact with the front office so they can give you an enrolment pack. If you prefer, you can email us at admin@kilabenbay.catholic.edu.au and we will book an appointment or send an enrolment pack home with a sibling. If you have friends who want to enrol their children please tell them to get in contact with us. We will be holding an information night on Wednesday 3rd May at the school to showcase our excellence in learning and what a great community we are!

Important Dates

See "Dates to Remember" later in the newsletter.  Also a Term Planner has been sent out on paper to each family this week.

Communication

The main form of communication is Compass. However, I regularly email parents,

particularly if your child will be receiving an award. I have been told that my emails have been going to the junk mail. Please check you junk mail. If you find an email from me in your junk file add me to the safe senders list so you get it direct. If you would like to contact me directly my email address is:

brad.fuller@mn.catholic.edu.au

Take care, celebrate often and go gently

Brad Fuller

Principal

The Way of the Cross:

Thank you to the students who attended and took part in The Way of the Cross with me. It was a lovely way to take part in the stations and act out the Lenten journey with the community.

The Way of the Cross is a traditional devotion in honour of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. Known also as Stations of the Cross, the Way of the Cross had its origins in the Holy Land, but it did not become popular around the world until the 17th Century. In a sense, the Way of the Cross is a mini-pilgrimage through the events that covered the final hours of Jesus’ life on earth. In most Catholic churches there are painted or carved images depicting the Way of the Cross. At our St Joseph’s parish, we are lucky enough to have large crosses scattered around the beautiful parish grounds, that we are able to walk around, to assist this idea of a mini-pilgrimage, and also why our parish is the chosen parish to hold the Way of the Cross most years.

Holy Week:

Thank you to all of the students who help to act out and celebrate Holy Week through our three liturgies this week. Kinder did a fantastic job at leading the first liturgy for Palm Sunday. Palm Sunday marks the first day of Holy Week and is the day that Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a donkey, to the shouts of “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!”. It was a celebration, because people knew that Jesus was coming to rescue them from their sins. It’s also a reminder that no matter what might be happening in our lives, God is always with us and will never leave us.

Year Two Blue then did a fantastic job at leading us for Holy Thursday. Holy Thursday is the commemoration of the Last Supper of Jesus Christ, when he established the sacrament of Holy Communion prior to his arrest and crucifixion.

And today we celebrated Good Friday with Stage 3. On Good Friday, God gave all of our sins to Jesus, His only son, so our sins would be forgiven forever. Good Friday is a day to remember how powerful forgiving someone is — a friend, an enemy, anyone who has wronged you. This is perhaps the biggest part of the season leading up to Easter.

Year Two Maroon will lead us in a liturgy for Easter Sunday on our first day back at school on 26th April at 11am.

Caritas:

Congratulations to all students and families, together we have raised $485.00 for Caritas’ Project Compassion!!!! Thank you to Mr Fuller and Mrs Porter for getting wet with me and everyone for having some fun along the way for the fun CariTAP activity!  Enjoy some photos of our fun time!

These funds raised will help to assist people living in some of the most vulnerable communities across the world. A huge thank you to all those who donated! 

Wishing you all a safe and happy Easter break!!!!

Term 2 dates for the calendar:

• Wednesday 26th April: ANZAC Day Liturgy 9am (COLA). Easter Sunday Liturgy 11am (Church).
• Friday 12th May: Mother’s Day Liturgy.
• Tuesday 17th May: Catholic Schools Week Liturgy.
• Friday 26th May: National Sorry Day Liturgy 9:15am.
• Tuesday 6th June: Winter Appeal/Earth Day Liturgy.
• Friday 30th June: NAIDOC Liturgy.

God Bless,

Taylor James

RE Co-ordinator

As you would be aware ANZAC Day is approaching, traditionally the school participates in this event. The school will be taking part in the ANZAC day march again this year. We will be joining Australian Service men and women with a variety of schools and community organisations to continue to honour our Fallen heroes.

We would like as many students as possible to attend. We will meet at 10:40am in front of Toronto Diggers club. We then will march with the community to Goffet Park, with the ceremony starting at 11:00am. (Tuesday 25th April).

If your child/children are able to attend we ask that they are in full school uniform and if you can email Mrs Fuller and let her know that you will be there.

Our Year 6 leaders will lead us in the march carrying our school banner and will lay a tribute on the school community’s behalf.
Hoping to see lots of children in attendance.

Yours sincerely
Angela Fuller

angela.fuller@mn.catholic.edu.au 

I can’t believe we have finished Term 1 already. During this term in Library we have enjoyed reading, researching and exploring technology. Stage 1 (Year 1 and 2) have been introduced to Scratch Junior where they have explored coding as they create animations.

Many parents and carers often wonder if a book is appropriate for their child. A great resource to help with this is Common Sense Media. This website allows parents/carers to search books, games, apps, movies and websites to view whether it is age appropriate and what its content contains.

St Joseph’s has a wonderful collection of books that we encourage all students to borrow. Part of our collection is Premier’s Reading Challenge books for all ages. Any students who wish to complete the challenge are able to get all of their books from our library. I’m so proud of the students who have begun the PRC and are continually reading to complete it.

The Library is open during lunch times on Wednesday – Friday. The children love coming in to enjoy books, chess, games and writing or drawing. It is a great social activity for them and it’s lovely to watch them interact with each other and enjoy creating. Students are also able to borrow during these lunchtimes. Students are currently enjoying our Lego display.

Library Borrowing

Library borrowing occurs weekly for students.

Students are able to keep the books for two weeks, although most return them for new ones each week. If students would like to keep books for longer than 2 weeks, we ask that they bring them to the Library and renew them.

Infants borrowing day is Monday.
Primary borrowing is Tuesdays.

All students need a library bag to borrow from our Library. This helps protect our lovely books.

School Library bags are available for $14 for anyone who needs one. Kinder students do not have to buy a bag, as the school will provide them one.

Library Helpers

I am very blessed to have some wonderful helpers in the library. Our Library monitors volunteer at lunchtimes to help organise resources, put books away and keep the Library neat and tidy. THANK YOU to those students.

PRC

The Premier’s Reading Challenge is an initiative by the NSW Government that encourages a love of reading in students from Kinder to Year 9. It is not a competition but a challenge to each student to read widely and enjoy reading. Students are each given an individual username and password to log onto the PRC website. There they can add the PRC books they have read to their reading record. Students who complete the challenge will have their names displayed in the library and the newsletter. At the end of the year they will receive a certificate to show their achievement. At St Joey’s we also like to celebrate with a Pizza Party for those students that complete the challenge in term four. The challenge continues until 19th August.

The PRC Website can be found here:

Students in Infants that are participating in the PRC can count the books read in Library as part of their PRC reading records. This term during Library lessons, students have read the following PRC books:

Kindergarten

 Spot's First Easter by Eric Hill

The Wrong Book by Nick Bland

Year 2: Archie M.

Year 3: Mason U.

Year 4: Tobias D.

Year 5: Lilly K.

Year 6: Kaitlyn G. Evanna S.

Sora

St Joseph’s has a subscription to SORA. Sora is an eBook and audio book Library. As part of the Australian Catholic Education Network (ACEN) member collection, your child can access eBooks and audio books through the Maitland Newcastle Diocese.
All you need to do is to download the SORA app or go to the website and sign in through the
ACEN membership, then you and your child can enjoy some terrific books on your devices at home.

One of the great features of SORA is the inclusion of a Premier Reading Challenge book section. Graphic novels, Fiction and Non-Fiction books are also available.

Log in and explore today.

If you have any questions about anything in the Library, feel free to send me an email.

Happy reading,

Leah Hannan

Teacher Librarian and ER Teacher

leah.hannan@mn.catholic.edu.au 

Cross Country Running

Congratulations to all the children who ran in our school cross country. You can all be very proud of what you achieved. We are!

We congratulate the following children who qualified to represent St Joseph's at the Diocesan Cross Country Championships in Maitland on the 10th May.

Thanks to Mr Douglas and the wonderful Year 6 crew!

Well done!

Mrs Woollett

Swimming

We were finally able to acknowledge our many swimming carnival winners at a recent assembly. All event placegetters received a ribbon and our overall champions received their trophies:

The winning house was Hunter and their captain Evanna was grinning from ear to ear when she accepted the trophy on behalf of her house.

Ajay has continued through the levels, representing Joeys at Polding level at Homebush last week. He has had an outstanding season.

Athletics

Our next big event is the Athletics Carnival which will be held at Fearnley Dawes Field, Newcastle West on Monday 5th June 2023. Notes will be sent home in week 1 next term. If you are able to assist on the day please let me know; we have a lot of jobs to be done!

Yours in sport

Anne Neems

Primary Co-ordinator

We have 50 keen students ready to take up the University challenge. We had a visit from our Coordinator, Ave from Newcastle University, last Thursday and she answered all of our questions. Students can collect activity books for the holidays from me on Wednesday. All students have been issued with their passports and are busy accumulating time to be logged. From Wednesday week 4 (next term) we will meet at lunch time to update our passports and have some special activities.

There are lots of school holiday activities that count towards passport hours, these can be found on the portal.

Wishing everyone a safe and happy Easter,
Anne Neems
Primary Coordinator

What a fantastic term it has been!! So much learning and fun.

Please take care over the break and look after one another. Remember, self-care for you and the family. Self-care is anything you do to take care of yourself so you can stay physically, mentally, and emotionally well. Its benefits are better physical, mental, and emotional health and well-being. Self-care can look different for everyone, but to count as self-care, the behaviour should promote health and happiness for you.

I want to wish you all a blessed, wonderful, and safe Easter, and very happy and restful holiday break.

Take Care

Mel Dobosz
Pastoral Care Worker

As noted by Brad Fuller in the Compass post, here is the information for St Nicholas OOSH Vacation Care and also care for the pupil free day on 24 April:

Disco!

A great time was had by all at the disco.  This is more a social event than fundraising but a small profit was made to go towards our general fundraising.  See the school Facebook page for photos of the fun!  

Easter Raffle!

A big thanks to families for supporting the Easter Raffle in your generous donations and ticket purchases.  The children had a fun time at the Hat Parade and the prize draw.  Congratulations to all winners!  Prizes were handed over immediately to the winners and those not here were contacted direct to collect your prize from the school office.

Your generous support helps fundraising for your child/ren's school!  Thank you.

P & F Association

Please note that slushies are available again

But we also have Nippy's frozen cups (kids call them Ice Crushers).

Supply of hash browns is very difficult and we have had to temporarily delete them from the menu.  They will be reinstated as soon as supply is available.

Here is the latest menu for your reference.  Please send any questions to admin@kilabenbay.catholic.edu.au or call the school office on 4959 1355

Unfortunately, due to increases in supply prices, there will be a very slight increase in the price of some hot food items.  These will be advised early next term.

Some reminders:

Pre-ordered frozen beverages

Supply Changes

Please note that vegemite scrolls are no longer available and bacon and cheese rolls have not been popular enough for them to stay on the menu.

Lunch Order Issues

Volunteer Roster

Every helper is so appreciated and we extend our sincere thanks to our wonderful regulars, together with the new volunteers who are just starting out.  Although a couple of new people have registered (big thanks!), we will need more people.  As with any volunteer position at school you must be registered.

If you are able to offer help, please send an email to admin@kilabenbay.catholic.edu.au and Margaret Livingstone or Susie Doran will help with your volunteer registration.   

See the Roster below.  Thank you to our wonderful volunteers!  Your children would not benefit from all the canteen has to offer without you!!

If you are unable to make it on your rostered day, please either text Tracey or call the school office:

Week 1

26.4.23 - Michelle Cherniayeff

27.4.23 - Yasmin Every-Burns, Jade Davison

28.4.23 - Jacqueline Hansen, Jenny O'Reilly

Week 2

3.5.23 - Andrew Edwards

4.5.23 - Maryanne Cartwright, Lyn Moseley

5.5.23 - Jenna Lorriman, Emily Sault

Over the Counter Sales / Recess Qkr ordering

Some healthy snack items are available for pre-order and payment on Qkr for Recess.

If you would like your child to have a recess snack, please place a comment in the "note to staff" section when selecting your item.

Thank you

Margaret Livingstone

and Tracey Ryan-Ward

Would you child like to learn guitar?  We have a guitar group here at St Joseph's where children receive tuition from professional teachers at school.  For more information, please contact Ricky direct on 0407 534 944:

Please note a paper Term Planner was sent home with each family this week - the dates below are a reminder only:

Thanks very much to our lovely families (and also some former families) for your generous donations!  As the children grow older, there seems to be a bit less wear left in the clothes, but still need larger sizes (Size 12 - 16) if you have any at home (or know a former family who is having a clean out).

The new format of our pre-loved uniform shop continues with items of clothing presented in a much easier way for purchase.  Current prices are:

- All “good quality” clothing - $5 a piece, except sports jackets, which are $10.

- All “ok quality” clothing is still a gold coin donation.

Of course we will always look after those families who need it the most.

DONATIONS ARE GRATEFULLY RECEIVED, so please check through your child's uniforms to see whether they are growing out of them and send surplus ones in to the school office (on carline drop off is fine).  A reminder that the larger sizes of good quality uniforms e.g. 12, 14, and 16 are needed. Thank you! A Lowes pricelist is attached to remind you of the cost of new uniforms.  It's a reminder that PLUS runs a very cost effective service that supports our school.

To make credit card payment for your items, please download the Commonwealth Bank Qkr app (see school office staff for details) and choose 

P & F - PLUS - Pre-loved Uniform Shop + New Hats

and type in the total amount for the items you are purchasing

A reminder there are two suppliers for new school uniforms, particularly as the children are in their winter uniforms now:

> Verdun Hiles have stocked St Joseph's uniforms since the school's beginning.
They carry a full range of stock except girls' shorts (they haven’t got the girls shorts in yet as they are awaiting a sample).  The majority of their items are Australian made, resulting in a top quality finish.  Also a good option when Lowes are out of stock.
> Call in and check it out.  They also stock the same colour but thicker winter stock of girls pants than the Lowes brand.  So if you want to support local, you have the choice.

> See Val at Verdun Hiles
> 88 The Boulevarde Toronto
> Ph 02 49591258

Also Lowes Glendale stock a full range.  Some sizes go out of stock from time to time but we wanted to let you know that you may be able to get it at Verdun Hiles instead. 

Lowes, Stockland Glendale - 20% off next thursday and Friday 4 and 5 August.
387 Lake Road
Phone 02 4956 8570

If you're looking for a particular uniform item, please try us first as sometimes we’ve had items with the price tags still attached.   Please email direct to the P & F Volunteers on joeyspandf@hotmail.com or the school office admin@kilabenbay.catholic.edu.au and we will pass on your message PLEASE INCLUDE YOUR CHILD'S NAME AND CLASS in the message as our volunteers do not have access to the different family surnames to make connections to students - therefore please use your child's name as well as your name.

Thank you!

THE PLUS TEAM