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“We are but travellers on

this earth and in this life.”

St. Mary of the Cross

Mackillop (1867)

Term 3 Week 1 Newsletter

1 2 T H J U L Y 2 0 1 7

Principal’s Message

Welcome back to term 3. A warm welcome to Mrs Gina Lawrie who will be re-

placing Mrs Kirsty Ostwald on year 2 for the rest of this year. Gina has been

working regularly in our school as a supply teacher since 2016 and has already

worked with the children in year 2. She will be sharing the teaching load with Mrs

Cavanagh. This term myself, the learning support teacher and teachers from prep

to year 4 will be attending four days of professional learning focused on the

teaching of reading. This strategy revolves around the development of collabora-

tive professional learning communities and networks with the key purpose of

building capacity and focusing on learning and pedagogical improvement.

The school will be receiving ongoing support and follow-up in the form of model-

ling, classroom observation, feedback and coaching by a trained reading coach,

Mrs Katie Hauser, Mrs Hauser is an experienced early years teacher from Too-

woomba has been assigned to our school as a reading coach to help embed the

reading strategies into the daily practices of our classroom teachers.

This month is also proving to be extremely busy sporting wise. We have a team of

37 children attending the Catholic School’s Athletics Carnival at O’Quinn Street

on Friday 14thJuly followed by the Gore Highway Athletics Carnival at Bridgeman

Oval on Friday the 21st July. Finally, in Catholic Education Week we will be send-

ing netball and touch football teams to compete at the Toowoomba Catholic

Schools Touch and Netball Carnival. Thank you to Mrs Lee for her organization

and co-ordination of these sporting events and Mrs Lee and Mrs Arnold for

coaching the children in their lunch breaks. If you are able to come along and en-

courage and cheer our teams on any of these days we would appreciate it. We

may be small in size but we’re big hearted when it comes to competing on the

sporting field. Go team St Stephen’s!!!

God Bless

Janine

Student Protection Re-

sources for Parents:

For Free Legal advice-

1300 651 188

Child Safety Services

You can make a report of

voice your concerns-

1300 683 390

SCHOOL STUDENT PROTECTION CONTACTS

Mrs Janine Butlin

Mrs Suellen Dennis

Mrs Anna Lee School Councellor Ms Anne Woodcroft-Brown

School Banking THURSDAYS-

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YEAR SIX

WAYS TO SAVE THE EARTH

(EVERY LITTLE BIT HELPS)

Baking Soda:

Forget fancy cleaning products. They’re

expensive and we need contact with

some of the germs they obliterate to

keep up our natural defenses. Use

cheap and effective baking soda as an

all-purpose cleaner, scouring powder,

polish and fungicide. And if there’s any

left, do some baking.

Newspaper:

Newspaper is one of the easiest materi-

als to recycle. Every time you recycle a

pile of papers 1 metre high, you save a

tree from the chop.

Newspaper is one of the easiest materi-

als to recycle. Every time you recycle a

pile of papers 1 metre high, you save a

tree from the chop.

Image by Dorothy Woodward rsj /sourced from Literary Ritual prayer.com

Welcome back to the new term, I trust everyone had a

restful break and is ready for an exciting term. Term 3 is

already shaping up to be extremely busy with some im-

portant events over the next couple of weeks.

Next week we celebrate NAIDOC Week here at St Ste-

phen’s. On Wednesday the 19th we welcome Indigenous

Artist, Peter Muraay Djeripi Mulcahy who will be conduct-

ing workshops with the students throughout the day and

then will speak to the whole school at our Celebration at

2:30 (led by Year 2). The beautiful green and yellow art-

work in our MacKillop Hall was painted by Peter so we are

incredibly excited to have him come in person to work with

the students.

As part of our NAIDOC week celebrations, we will be hav-

ing a colouring n competition. This is open to all students

with some great prizes for each class. We will also have

for sale from Thursday the 13th, armbands for the students

to wear during WEEK 2 ONLY. These are $2 each and

will be available from the office.

Week 3 is Catholic Education Week. This week will be full

of lots of exciting activities to promote Catholic Education

in Queensland.

Tuesday 25th of July, the whole school will at-

tend the Catholic Education Week Mass at

9am in the Church. Mrs Dennis and the

choir have been learning the special Catho-

lic Education Week Song for 2017.

Wednesday 26th July, each class will participate

in a scavenger hunt around the school, find-

ing clues to lead them to a special mes-

sage.

Thursday 27th July, Yrs 4-6 students will be par-

ticipating in either the Netball or Touch

Football carnivals in Toowoomba alongside

the other Catholic Schools in the Toowoom-

ba area.

Friday 28th July, pupil free day – all staff will be

attending the Bishop’s Inservice Day in Too-

woomba.

God Bless

Lisa Cavanagh

APRE Year 6 News

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Macy, Jack, Ella and I would like to sincerely thank everyone for their support during this time. We will always be grateful for the love, kindness and generosity you have all given us. We are truly blessed to have so many beautiful people in our lives. Knowing that gives us strength and will stay with us forever. Our deepest thanks and love. Bec

Position Vacant-Cleaning Thank you from Bec Thompson

Expressions of interest are called for a re-

lief cleaner at St Stephen’s School.

Please submit your applications by 21st

July 2017 to the Principal at St Stephen’s.

Any queries please contact Kym at the

school office-4693 1627.

ST STEPHEN’S PREP

Accepting Enrolments for 2018 now!!

Feel free to come and have a look around.

This is a wonderful opportunity to

inspect the facilities and experience Prep

life first hand.

Contact Kym on 4693 1627

(during school hours)

Or email: pittsworth@twb.catholic.edu.au

Interviews will be on the 24/25 July 2017.

Week 2: Tuckshop starts

Week 3: Sausage Sizzle-Grade 5 Camp Fundrais-

er

Tuckshop News Yr 6 Camp Fundraising-Chocolates

Thank you to all the families for your support

and efforts with this Fundraiser.

All monies from the Chocolate Sales are to be

returned back to school by Friday 14th 2017.

If you are able to sell more chocolates please

contact Katrina Thompson 0427 722 645 or

Mel Smith 0448 636 101

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SKOOLBAG APP

There are many occasions at school that we need to get a message out to our school community immedi-

ately. We can post messages on our skoolbag app quickly and you are notified immediately our mobile

phone. Unfortunately less than 25% of our parents are using this service.

It is our preferred method of notifying parents as it is faster, cheaper and more time efficient that paper

notes ant text messages.

If you have haven’t got this free app on your phone I respectfully request that you download the App today.

Once the app is downloaded you will discover that it has newsletters, notes, tuckshop menus etc. available.

For a information sheet please contact Kym at the office. You are required to have a password to access

this app. Forward your request for this password to pittsworth@twb.catholic.edu.au

Ideally we are aiming to go fully digital by 2018 for our newsletters.

Instrumental Music Lessons

FLUTE, CLARINET, SAXOPHONE OR PIANO!!

Give the gift of music to your child! Instrumental music lessons are available during school time. If your child is in grade 4 or

above they can learn any of the wind instruments. Hire of these is available for $50 per term. Grade 2 is the starting point for

piano. Lessons are given in small groups of 2 or 3. Accounts are sent each term with each half hour lesson being $18. Pick up

and return a form at the school office. Email Chris at yougotbuckleys4@bigpond.com.au for more info.

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Darling Downs School Report

If you are interested in any of these trials please see Mrs Lee for nominations. Please be aware that you need to be playing these sports at a club and be of a high skill level to trial for these sports.

The Inner Downs Primary Sports calendar is set at the start of the school year. If you would like a copy contact Mrs Lee or Kym at the school office.

Lost and Found

A pink scooter was left at school on the last day of

Term 2. Please contact the office 4693 1627.

Volunteers Needed

A big thank you to all those who have been helping us at school with our literacy program over the past Semester. The staff and students appreciate your time. Due to necessary timetable changes, we have to draw up a new roster for the remainder of the year. If you have been a volunteer, Deanne Olischlager our Learning Support Teacher, will be in touch to negoti-ate suitable times for your assistance. If there is any-one else who is interested in assisting in this role,

If you are interested in becoming a Volunteer for the below roles, please indicate and sent this slip back

to the office.

Support Reader _______________________________________________________________

Student School Banking_________________________________________________________

Sick Bay Sheets_______________________________________________________________

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Josephite Association: An invitation is extend to

parishioners of St Stephen’s from Josephite Asso-

ciates, to attend a Reflection on the charism of St

Mary Mackillop & Fr Julian Tennyson Woods.

The gatering will be held on Saturday 22nd July.

2017. Morning Tea is at 9.30am in the Presbytery

Meeting Room, then we will adjourn to the

church to hear Joan Gilbert and Sr Moya Camp-

bell(rsj) sharing ideas about the future of the As-

sociation.

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TERM 3 Monday 10 July-Friday 15th September

Date Event Commences Class

13th July P&F Meeting 1pm Pittsworth Hotel Motel

14th July Lodge Mass 10.30am Yr 4-6 not attending Ath-letics will attend Mass

14th July Catholic Athletics Carnival 9am Yr 3-6

18th July Mass 9am Yr 5

19th July Peter Mulcahy-Aboriginal Aritist-Workshops

Prep-6

19th July NAIDOC WEEK Celebration 2.30pm Yr 2

21st July Gore Highway Athletics-Bridgman Oval

24-28 July Catholic Education Week

All

25th July CEW Mass

9am Yr 5

26th July Senior School Celebration 2.30pm MacKillop Club

27th July Catholic Touch (Kearny Springs) and Netball Carnival (Nellie Robin-son)

9am Yr 3,4,5-6

28th July Bishop’s In service day ****Pupil Free Day*****

8:45am All

1st August Church Mass 9am 4

2nd August Junior School Celebration 2.30pm 1

3rd August Lodge Visit 2pm 2

3rd/4th August Year 5 Camp-Emu Gully Yr 5

9th August Whole School Mass 9am ALL

9th August SOW from all classes 1 student-Mary MacKillop award Special Staff presentation

2.30pm All

10th August School Board Meeting

P&F Meeting

5.30-7pm

7-8.30pm

School Library

15th August Mass

9am Yr 3

16th August Junior School Mass 9am Yr 3

16th August Dance and Groove 5:30-6:30pm

6:45-7:45

P-2

3-6

18th August Meerkat Productions

All

21st /25th August Bookweek

All

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PO Box 285,

Pittsworth

QLD

4356

Tel: 0746931627

Fax: 07 46932156

Email:pittsworth@twb.catholic.edu.au

1st September Father’s Day Stall 9-11am Prep-6

3rd September Father’s Day All

6th September Senior School Celebration 2.30pm 5

8th September Lodge Mass 10.30am Prep

13th September Parent Teacher Interviews 3.30pm in M. Hall All

14th September P&F Meeting 7-8.30pm

15th September End of Term 3 Mass 9am All

15th September Last Day of Term 3 3pm All

22nd August Mass 9am Yr 2

23rd August Bookweek Dressup All

23rd August Senior School Celebrations 2.30pm Yr 4

27th August School Family Mass 9am All

28th August-31st August Year 6 Camp- CYC Burleigh Yr 6

29th August Mass 9am Yr 1

30st August Father’s Day Prayer Celebration 2:15pm in M. Hall Prep