Another fantastic week at St Benedict’s with Book Week celebrations this week. Our Librarian, Mrs Whalley has truly set a very high standard for future years with the activities she provided. Our students have been fully engaged in the joy of reading with library lessons and lunchtime activities including a game show called ‘Student Squabble’, rhyming and colouring or drawing activities based on the shortlisted books for Book Week, an author visit from Matt Zurbo and of course our Book Week Parade yesterday. As always it was especially wonderful to see so many parents come along to join in and to assist with preparing the students with amazing costumes. Everyone looked fabulously creative. This week has certainly reminded us all of the magic in books, the characters we grow to love and to despise, the adventures and journeys we undertake and the absolute joy of the written word. Please continue to embrace this love for books and for reading as it continues to enrich us all throughout our lives. Thank you so much to all who have contributed to such a special week at St Benny’s, especially Mrs Whalley and our Book Week Parade MC - Pirate Captain Christie.

Over the next couple of weeks our teachers will be released from class to prepare their planning for next term. This is a really important time for the teachers to reflect on how students are progressing in their learning journey and to create innovative and engaging ways to support and challenge their students further. While not having our regular teachers can feel disruptive, it is important for our students to be resilient and to know the expectations for their behaviour and participation remain the same. Please also check your emails for the link to make a time for Parent Teacher interviews that are coming up in Week 9.

Our P & F are currently organising our very first School Disco for Thursday 6 September from 6.00pm - 7.30pm. We are having a country theme with all profits from the night going to support our farmers through Drought Angels so please come along and enjoy a boot scootin boogie, some pizza and a couple of games. This is not a drop off event and while teachers will be there, parents are responsible for supervising their children. We’ll have an area set up where you can all socialise and get to know each other a bit more.It should be another great opportunity to build our school community.

Next week we invite students to participate in Run Club which will be offered every morning before school from 8.00am - 8.15am. Students will be supervised doing laps in an effort to give them more opportunity to develop their personal fitness and speed. Run Club is not racing, it is based on setting personal goals to achieve ie. 2 laps this week to 3 next week etc., feeling fitter and stronger etc. Teachers supervising will mark the number of laps completed on each students hand and classroom teachers will record on a school spreadsheet so we can acknowledge students at different milestones- 50 laps, 100 laps etc. Students can still choose to play in the Hall if they don’t wish to join Run Club but there is no play on the oval in the morning- only Run Club. Students can also choose how many days per week they wish to participate. If your child would like to participate, please have them meet the teacher at the pathway to the oval at 8.00am on any morning.

I hope you all have a fabulous week.

Cheers

Penny