Welcome Back!

Dear Parents and Carers, 

I am delighted to spend another year learning and growing alongside the students, staff and parents/carers of this wonderful St Brigid's community. I look forward to a great year of learning and joy with the students. Let's hope we have more opportunities to connect with our parents and carers this year, as we very much value your partnership in your child's education journey.

DIGITAL LESSONS FOR ISOLATING STUDENTS

As we are once again restricted by COVID-19 and NSW Health requires that household contacts of confirmed COVID-19 cases are to isolate for 7 days, we are determined to ensure learning continuity for all the students, so teachers have now created digital learning tasks to be accessed via the student's Seesaw accounts (Year 1-2) or Google Classroom accounts. These tasks can be accessed using the Seesaw Home Learning code and the Google Classroom class codes (teacher shares with students). The tasks are available from this week up to and including Week 5 at this stage. Please feel free to access the tasks if your child is isolating at home. If your child becomes sick, there is no obligation to complete these tasks. Below is some information about these tasks:

• Digital tasks will be available to access from Term 1, Week 3
• Digital tasks can be accessed using the student’s Seesaw accounts (Years K-2) or Google Classroom accounts (Years 3-6)
• Seesaw Home Learning Codes will be provided to students once the Responsible Use of Technology Agreement has been signed and returned to school
• Google Classroom codes will be emailed to parents or shared with students
• There will be a minimum of 4 digital tasks to complete
• Digital tasks will be in line with the class teaching and learning program
• Students are also expected to access their EPIC Home Reading accounts with reading material assigned to each student
• Teachers will provide feedback on the digital tasks submitted by students

If you need any support with these tasks or require any further information, please contact the office and we will do our best to support you.

GOING TRASH FREE EVERYDAY

Last year our Student Representative Council (SRC) led a great inititative called TRASH FREE TUESDAY. This was a great success with students and families making a conscious effort to bring plastic free, fresh food or nude food to school every Tuesday. Across the school, there was great enthusiasm for this initiative and all classes at some stage during the year won the St Brigid Peace Lily. Some very lucky classes were crowned the Trash Free Champions and at the end of the term, they were rewarded with free play at the oval and an opportunity to sample some of the fresh produce from the school garden. This year our newly elected SRC members from each class will lead a new waste free initiative where they will promote waste free lunches being brought to school everyday. They will provide the students with some examples of what a waste free lunch box can look like and how they can help to pack their own plastic free lunches. They will also do a tally of their own class on a random day of the week to authentically determine which class has the most waste free lunch boxes. The class with the most amount of waste free lunchboxes as a percentage will win the St Brigid's Peace Lily for their class to look after for the week. This initiative will begin half way through this term so be on the look out for when it starts. in the meantime, here is some information for you about NUDE FOOD and how you and your child/children can have waste free lunchboxes.

SPOTLIGHT ON LEARNING 

This year I would like to showcase the wonderful learning that is taking place in each classroom through the Brigid Bulletin. This means that one class will have an opportunity to show you all they have been learning throughout the school term. You will see examples such as:

- videos of students enaging in their learning 

- videos of students sharing their thoughts and ideas about their learning and using the language of learning

- student work samples

The following is a timetable for when your child's class will have the SPOTLIGHT ON THEIR LEARNING in the Brigid Bulletin.

Be on the look out for your child's class.

GROWING YOUR MIND - A POSITIVE START TO THE NEW SCHOOL YEAR

During the holidays I listened to a few of these wonderfully inspiring podcasts about how children become aware of their feelings, how to mangage their emotions, be courageous and resilient. I loved the way the authors used animals to describe how our mind and bodies react when we are hurt, challenged, sad and happy. I have included the first episode of the 'Grow your Mind' Podcast which covers topics such as gratitude, friendships, courage, movement and hope. It is only 10 minutes in duration and I encourage you to listen to it and to get your children to listen to it too.