Issue 16 - 13 October 2015

Newsletter Articles

ST RITA’S SCHOOL PRAYER

O compassionate God,
look on me today with tenderness and give me the grace
to walk on the path of mercy and kindness.
May all I do today reflect our school values
of learning, respect, community and faith.
St Rita, pray for us.

PRINCIPAL’S PEN

Dear Parents and Carers,

Welcome back to St Rita’s! I hope you had the opportunity during the school holidays to have a relaxing and enjoyable break. The staff has returned to school refreshed and eager to begin a very busy and eventful Term 4. We welcomed back our Counsellor, Mrs Carmel Parisi, last Friday. Carmel, it is wonderful that you are well again and working with the St Rita’s team! Although it is a short term, we are organising many exciting events for our school. Please mark your calendar for the first one, our Grandparent’s Day celebration, on Monday 26th October!

I was pleased to return to St Rita’s and hear about all the wonderful things that had happened during my absence. The Father’s Day social evening was very well-attended and enjoyed by all. I was sorry to have missed the fun! However, my husband and I had an exciting trip around Europe and we thoroughly enjoyed the seven countries that we visited. I would like to thank Mrs Bec Burns for successfully filling the role of Acting Principal during my travels.

The first week of Term 4 was an incredibly busy and exciting one at St Rita’s as we threw ourselves wholeheartedly into the Babinda Harvest Festival celebrations. Our Trivia Night fundraiser, which was held last Wednesday, was a fun social evening for everyone. I must acknowledge the hard work of Lisa Calcagno and Donna Lauridsen who organised the event. We also appreciated the help of Steve Calcagno, who kept the evening running smoothly as the M.C.

If you couldn’t make it this year, I urge you to come along next year to join in the fun. Getting a team together, dressing up for fun, and finding out how how much you know or don’t know, is all part of this fun social event. Congratulations to the Babinda State School team the ‘Stragglers’, who won for the third successive year after beating the ‘Swinging Belles’ by a mere one point. Game on next year Stragglers!

Staff needs also to be congratulated for organising a vibrant school display and colourful parade float for the Harvest Festival. Everyone had to ‘hit the deck running’ last week to complete these extra tasks before Saturday. I would like to especially thank Russell Lauridsen and Mirriwinni Lime for once again supporting St Rita’s by providing the vehicle for the street parade. Our float was made larger and more effective this year by the generous loan of a trailer by Curly Lauridsen. Thanks from St Rita’s!

I appreciate that older children are often not ‘keen’ to participate in a street parade, so staff was pleased to see a good turn-out of our senior students this year. Representing the school with pride in community events sets a good example to younger students. Well done Mrs Masina and the Year 4/5/6 class!

This term we are fortunate to have cricket and Australian Rules football lessons organised by the Innisfail District Cricket Association and the Cairns AFL Junior Development Officer. Mr Brenton Edwards visited the school last week and the children eagerly participated in his cricket clinic. AUSKICK will once again be offered this term and further information about this program will be made available shortly.

Have a good week and I hope to see you around the classrooms.

Judy Billiau
Principal

NATIONAL NUTRITION WEEK

11 - 17 October 2015

Did you know?

95% of Australians don't eat enough fruit or vegetables*.

National Nutrition Week 2015 is all about getting all Australians to enjoy more fruit and vegetables every day with Pick Right. Feel Bright!

Whether they're fresh, frozen or canned, eating more fruit and vegetables is one of the easiest things we can all do for better health and wellbeing. Fruits and vegetables burst with flavour and they're packed full of important vitamins and minerals, disease-fighting antioxidants and gut-healthy fibre. And they're so versatile. They can be eaten raw, cooked, poached, baked, mashed, grated, chopped, diced, sliced - you name it!

During National Nutrition Week 2015, we are encouraged to ‘Make a pledge to eat more veg!’ and take the Try for 5 challenge and see if you can eat five serves of vegetables every day for seven days! Visit www.pickrightfeelbright.com for a bunch of recipes and fresh ideas
to help you buy, grow, cook and enjoy fruit and vegetables.

APRE THOUGHTS ……..

Welcome back to Term Four! This is a busy and exciting term for Christians everywhere as they begin to prepare for Christmas and the birth of Jesus. A part of the Catholic tradition in preparing for Christmas is looking at how we can reach out to those who are less fortunate than ourselves. At St. Rita’s we will have two focuses this term. The first is World Mission Month (October). The focus here is alleviating poverty, with the theme of ‘Sock it to Poverty.’ This week there is a whole school focus on the positive work that is being carried out by Catholic Mission in many countries across the world. We will culminate on Friday with ‘Crazy Sock Day’. We ask each child to wear their craziest socks and bring a gold coin donation to help support the work of Catholic Mission. The second event is the St Vincent de Paul Christmas Hamper. We will start collecting donations for this appeal between week 5 and 8 with the hampers being presented to St Vincent de Paul Representatives at our final school assembly.

In SEL news, the key for Term Four is Persistence. As children begin assessment it can be a time where they may feel like it is all too hard and they wish they could just quit. Bernhard states that “Persistence is revealed when students continue to stay engaged in frustrating or difficult work until it is completed” (2001). It is not about staying engaged with the tasks we do enjoy, but rather with the tasks that we may find tedious or difficult. Program Achieve states that Persistence relates to the following Positive Habits of the Mind; Working Tough, Giving Effort, I can do it and Being Independent. These habits will assist a child’s achievement and social-emotional and behavioural well-being (Bernard, ‘You Can Do It’ Education).

Irene van der Zande, Kidpower Founder and Executive Director of Kidpower gives the following tips for ways Adults can support the development of persistence skills:

• Give children opportunities to take on challenges where they can be successful;
• Offer guidance rather than taking over for them when children ask for help;
• Acknowledge unhappy feelings without letting children give up on themselves;
• Give children practice in supportive settings so they can rehearse the skills they need to learn;
• Provide in-the-moment coaching in how to keep going;
• Break a challenge into smaller steps when children get stuck; and,
• Motivate children to keep going even when they don’t feel like it. (https://www.kidpower.org/library/article/teaching-persistence/ accessed 6.10.2015)

The full article and more information and ideas can be found at www.kidpower.org

Have a great start to Term Four!

Bec Burns
Assistant Principal (Religious Education)

CASTING THE NET

The teaching of little children

In recent Sunday Gospels, Jesus encourages his disciples to become like little children if they want to enter the kingdom of God. How are we to take this up? As parents, teachers and guardians, we know well enough the challenges of encouraging our children out of their childish ways. Some scripture experts state that in Jesus’ time, children were the powerless and without rights and that when Jesus encourages us to be childlike, he is calling us to be humble. But there is more to that, surely? In the situations where Jesus calls us to be childlike, he shows a deep affection and delight in children – something we often experience.

All of us cherish the times when our children charm our hearts and open us up to the mystery and glory of life. Their questions give us a fresh perspective. Their trustfulness melts our hearts to tender care. Their sense of joy renews our delight in life. As an aunt of many nieces and nephews I could fill many pages with cute stories that would delight me and probably bore you….because you have your own stories of your own children. These are important! God wants you to dwell on them and learn from them. The qualities that delight you are the very qualities that God would delight in finding in you.

Our challenge is to relearn the mystery and magic of being childlike. We can do this by remembering our own experiences with children and then imagine how we could translate that into our behaviour as adults. Then we will discover that we have grown up into the kingdom of God.

Loving God, give me the wisdom to learn how to be childlike from my children. May their lives lead me into the fullness of your life. I ask this in Jesus’ name confident that you will hear me.

Sr Kym Harris osb

COUNSELLOR’S CORNER

Inner Strength

Dear Parents,

Being able to access our own inner strength is an important part of being human. Too often we wait for times to be tough and then we search our soul for answers, pray every day (or sometimes twice), cross our fingers and wish very hard for our life to miraculously turn into happy days, everyday.

Our inner strength is always with us and always available to be accessed, whether we are happy or sad. It often does not hurt to practice accessing our inner strength on a good day, so you know where to find it on a tougher day.

Our inner strength can be located by sitting in a quiet place and focussing our attention to our inner self. This means we allow ourselves to learn more about how we solve dilemmas… Do we know how to solve problems? How did we solve our last dilemma? What are we good at? What strengths do we have? Who did we ask to help us? Who do we have to support us? Did we reflect on whether this was effective and if not, how to make changes for next time?

If we don’t know the answer to some off these questions, then we should spend some time thinking about it. Getting to know what we have and what we may need. That way in times of difficulty or stress, we can remember what we have inside of us to help pull us through this tough time and back into happiness.

Yours in Counselling,
Carmel Parisi

AROUND THE CLASSROOMS

Babinda Harvest Festival

On Saturday the 10th October, Babinda celebrated the Harvest Festival and the theme was ‘Flower Power.’ St Rita’s School participated in the parade.

It all started with the parade at 3:30pm. The streets were crowded. The surrounding schools were involved in the parade. Our school joined in the celebrations. Our float was decorated as a combi van painted with brightly coloured flowers. The students and teachers were dressed as hippies.

The Harvest princesses, the colourful gold and red Chinese dragon and lions, Japanese drummers, tractors, the Army, Airforce Cadets, Firefighters, the Police and the Ambos all participated in the parade.

After the parade, the crowd went to the showgrounds. There were many food and cake stalls, school displays, Art works, the sugar bowl competition, crazy fruit critters, and fruit and flower displays. A helicopter flew over the showgrounds dropping lollies onto the oval. All of the children ran out onto the oval and picked up all the lollies off the ground.

There was lots of entertainment at the Harvest Festival. The children played laser tag and went on pony rides, the climbing wall, the jumping castle, the big slide and Tommy the train. There were many stage events like dancing, singing and the Fashion Show.

I loved the Babinda Harvest Festival!

By Harrison Stone
Year 2

Fun at the Festival

On Saturday 10th October, St Rita’s Primary School participated in the 2015 Babinda Harvest Festival. The theme of the festival was Flower Power and our school entered a float that looked like a Combi van in the parade. The students and staff dressed in costume to look like we were from the 1960’s. We wore colourful shirts covered in hearts, rainbows, peace signs and flowers. The girls wore flowers and ribbons in their hair.

Firstly, we lined up in our spot and we started walking in the parade down the streets of Babinda. We played music, threw lollies and waved to the people along the sides of the street. Everyone looked really happy and waved back to us. The Harvest Princesses rode on the backs of utes and they wore pretty dresses. My favourite thing in the parade was the orange and yellow Chinese Dragon because it looked really cool when they used the sticks to make the dragon look like it was moving.

Next, a group of my friends walked over to where the festival was being held. There were so many things to see such as the Jumping Castle, a Rock Climbing Wall, and a Petting Zoo. The Petting Zoo had lots of animals including a pig with really stiff fur and a goat with beautiful soft fur.

Before long, I was hungry and I chose a yummy hot dog with cheese and runny tomato sauce. While I ate my hot dog, I went to see the school displays and the Sugar Bowl entries. Unfortunately, while I was looking at the bowls I missed the lolly drop from the helicopter flying over us.

Lastly, the fireworks started and they were cracking! They shot up in the air and exploded in colours of red, pink, yellow and white. Then it was time to go home. The Babinda Harvest Festival was over but it had been great!

By Max Schep
Year 2

SWIMMING PROGRAM

Swimming is an integral part of the H.P.E. curriculum provided by St Rita’s. It is expected that all students participate in the six-week swimming program during Weeks 3 - 8 of this term. It is a safety requirement that slip-on style footwear (such as thongs) be worn when walking to and from the pool, and that a sunshirt or t-shirt provides sun protection during the lessons.

We encourage all students to have their own roll-on sunscreen in their school bags so it can be applied before leaving for the pool. Because of the possibility of allergies to specific sunscreen products, the school cannot provide sunscreen to students.

H.P.E. is not an optional subject, so students will need to bring a note (written in student diary) if they are sick and unable to participate in a lesson. Students who are well enough but are not swimming will walk to the pool and read quietly while the class is swimming.

TRIVIA NIGHT

Friendly rivalry was thick in the air and competition was fierce, but the big winner of the night was the sense of fun experienced by all who attended last Wednesday’s Harvest Festival Trivia Night.

Congratulations to ‘Stragglers’, the winning team for the third year in a row, winning by a margin of just one point!

A huge thank you to all competitors and to our generous sponsors, Sugarworld, Babinda Munro Theatre, Cynthia’s Seafood Innisfail, and the Mellick Centre Innisfail. We also appreciated the support of our wonderful families who contributed the delicious supper.

DATE CLAIMERS
Term 4
Tuesday 13th October	Pre-Prep program commences Newsletter Issue 16 Homework Club 3:00 - 3:30 pm
Friday 16th October	Swimming program commences Tuckshop resumes Tennis coaching 3:00 - 3:30 pm
Monday 19th October	Student-Free day
Tuesday 20th October	Homework Club 3:00 - 3:30 pm
Wednesday 21st October	AUSKICK 1:15pm - 1:45pm
Friday 23rd October	‘Crazy Sock’ Day – Gold coin donation Swimming lessons Tennis coaching 3:00 - 3:30 pm
Monday 26th October	Grandparent’s Day celebration
Tuesday 27th October	Newsletter Issue 17 Homework Club 3:00 - 3:30 pm
Friday 30th October	WORLD TEACHER’S DAY No Tennis Coaching

2015 TERM DATES
TERM 4	Tuesday 6th October - Friday 4th December 2015 9 weeks
	2016 TERM DATES
TERM 1	Monday 25th January - Thursday 24th March 2016 9 weeks

STUDENTS OF THE WEEK

St Rita’s School congratulates those students who were awarded ‘Student of the Week’ at Assembly on Friday 9th October 2015.

Prep/Year 1	Lara Godden	Working hard and having a fantastic ‘I can do it’ attitude.
Year 2/3	Georgina Stone	Persisting with difficult work in Maths.
Year 4/5/6	Emerson Burns	Showing persistence to improve organisational skills.

BIRTHDAY CONGRATULATIONS

St Rita’s wishes Melina Musumeci and Lachlan Mellick all the very best for their recent birthdays. We hope you had a wonderful birthday celebration. Congratulations Melina and Lachlan!

ACHIEVEMENT AWARDS

We congratulate the students who successfully contributed to the Cairns Post ‘Post Ed’ feature on Tuesday 15th September 2015. Melina Musumeci, Mitchell Forrest and Andy Pham wrote a recount of their excursion to Cairns and the inspiring ‘Courage to Care’ Exhibition.

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK

P & F NEWS

Dear Parents,

Thank you so much to everyone who helped at the Harvest Festival on Saturday. It was such a great night and with a combined effort we made a good profit, which we will announce in a few weeks.

Our next P & F meeting is this Tuesday, 13th October, beginning at 5:00pm. We hope to see you there!

Have a great week.

St Rita’s P & F Committee

COMMUNITY NEWS

ELIMINATE DENGUE FEVER UPDATE

Eliminate Dengue will be conducting some mosquito monitoring over the next few months in Babinda to check that Wolbachia levels are remaining high as expected.

In 2013, we released Aedes aegypti mosquitoes that carry Wolbachia, which is a type of bacteria that reduces the mosquitoes’ ability to transmit dengue. The mosquitoes then breed with the wild mosquitoes and pass on the bacteria to the next generations. From the last monitoring, we were pleased to see Wolbachia remaining at high levels in the local mosquito population and no local dengue transmission.

We conduct periodic monitoring to check if Wolbachia is remaining at high levels and over the coming months some residents will host a mosquito trap on their property. We will service these traps weekly over the next 3-4 months. Thank you to everyone who has agreed to host a trap - we greatly appreciate your support. If you have any questions or concerns please contact 1800 811 054 or cairns@eliminatedengue.com. For further information visit eliminatedengue.com/cairns

SCHOOL DENTAL SERVICE PLANS

Cairns and Hinterland Oral Health Services would like to make you aware of some changes to our service. These changes are designed to improve access to our service and ensure we continue to be able to treat your children in a safe and supportive environment.

We have now introduced a Central Booking Service which will now make all dental appointments through a 1300 phone number. When it is time for your child/children to have a dental examination, we will no longer send out forms to complete and return. We will instead send out a postcard with the Central Booking Service phone number on it – 1300 300 850. Please call this number to arrange an appointment.

To ensure we provide the best care in a safe and supportive environment, we now require a parent or legal guardian to attend every dental appointment for a child at primary school and at least the first appointment for children at secondary school. Your child’s medical history will be completed at the first appointment.

Thank you in advance for your support during this transition.

Oral Health Services
Cairns and Hinterland Hospital and Health Service