Around The Primary

Dear Parents

A sincere and heartfelt thank you to all our wonderful Dads and special father figures for making the effort to come to our early morning Mass dedicated to Fathers. It was a great way to start the day! 

Special thanks to Fr Sean Fernandez from St Mary’s Cathedral who shared the Eucharist with us and reminded everyone about the important role of parenting as we nurture children’s growth and guide them in God’s ways.

There is really nothing better than having you all at the College with your children at the one time! Looking out over a sea of smiling faces in the St Louis Sports Centre enjoying each other’s company was simply magical!

The celebration was friendly, relaxed, and happy. It was also a lovely opportunity for Dads to connect with their children, other Dads, and staff. Below is a clip of photos from today’s celebrations that hopefully will keep on inspiring you to be the best dad and the best person you can be!

The Year 3-6 Athletics Carnival takes place next Friday 9 September. Everyone is welcome to come along and cheer on the students!

We wish all our families a very happy and relaxing day on Sunday!

Kind regards

Antoinette De Pinto

Head of Primary 

Dates to Remember

Please check the College Website to note all the important Primary school events for your family calendar http://www.johnxxiii.edu.au/view/for-parents/calendars and subscribe to the Primary Calendar.

Book Week

This week we welcomed Gabriel Evans, award winning Australian author and illustrator, to the Library for Book Week. The students enjoyed hearing all about how Gabriel creates his stories and draws his sketches. The students loved sketching their own animal characters under the guidance of Gabriel. 

Congratulations to all students who entered our Book Week competitions. The Book Week Bake Off and Poster Competition were very popular, and we had so many amazing and creative entries! Our posters are on display in the Library, and you are very welcome to come and see the fantastic artwork.

Book Week Bake Off Winners

Book Week Poster Winners 

Ms Sasha Cattapan

Primary Library Specialist

Wildlife Experience

There was great excitement in Pre-Primary on Monday when WestOz Wildlife came to visit! 

The children were able to have a close-up experience with some native animals and learnt how important it is to protect and care for these animals in the environment. The children asked some fantastic questions to the wildlife experts!  They each had a turn of giving the koala, dingo and goanna a pat and were even able to hold a python snake! 

Clare Peirce & Hannah Kolbusz

Pre-Primary Teachers 

Sports Update

The Year 3-6 Athletics Carnival takes place on Friday 9 September on the Secondary oval and with just one week to go, the excitement is building.  Pre-Carnival events have been taking place and we have already seen some school records broken!  The Program of Events will ben issued next week.

The coffee van is booked, and we would love to see lots of parents and grandparents to cheer our athletes on.   Please remember to wear your Parent Badge and if time permits, we will have the parent/teacher race.

Please note that Tuesday 6 September is the final athletics training session and therefore no training on Thursday 8 September. 

Congratulations to our Year 6 Boys School Sport WA Cross Country team who were presented with the ‘SSWA Boys Year 6 Champion School Shield’.  Out of the 350 runners our team had the highest average finishing place.  Well done boys.  

If you have any queries about anything sport related, please contact me via email steve.williams@cewa.edu.au 

Mr Steve Williams

Primary Sport Coordinator

Primary Music

Catholic Performing Arts Festival

Congratulations to Primary Singers who received an award of ‘Excellence’ and to Wanju Voices who received an ‘Outstanding’ award from the Catholic Performing Arts Festival for their recent performances.

Choir Rehearsals

Please see below for rehearsal times next week. With the choirs commencing new repertoire, it is a great time for new members to join. Students who are interested do not need to register prior interest, simply attend the rehearsal next week! 

If you have any queries regarding Primary Music, please contact me via email: catherine.haydon@cewa.edu.au

Mrs Catherine Haydon

Primary Music Teacher

Counsellor’s Corner

Children’s friendships can be complicated, and it can be difficult as parents to know the best way to offer support when things may not be going well. We are using the URSTONG program to teach children skills to make and keep healthy friendships. Below is this month’s blog from URSTRONG which offers some useful tips on dealing with high conflict friendships. Parents are welcome to a FREE Parent Membership to access hundreds of resources from the URSTRONG website. 

If you have any concerns about your child’s friendships, don’t hesitate to get in touch by email or pop into my office (next to Mary Ward Primary) on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and also Thursday mornings.  My direct number is 9383 0469 and I can be contacted anytime by email:  anne.murphy@cewa.edu.au 

Mrs Anne Murphy

Primary Counsellor

Inspire

Expressions of Interest: New Inspire Representatives – Primary 

The Inspire program at John XXIII College was instigated in 2013 in response to a request from the College Leadership to promote more parent engagement and to address arising social issues affecting the students and their parents/guardians.

We are looking to appoint two new Inspire representatives one each for Primary and Secondary. Inspire representatives seek to provide high quality presenters with excellent reputations in their field. The successful candidates will work with College Leadership to seek presenters / educators that support the curriculum of the students, ensure the correct procedure for Funding Submissions is followed and report back to the Parents’ Association meetings each term.

If you are interested in an Inspire representative role please forward your expression of interest to the Parents’ Association President, Paula Hackett, on parentsassociation@johnxxiii.edu.au.

Sacramental Certificates

Parents are requested to email a copy of their child’s Sacramental Certificate (Reconciliation, Eucharist or Confirmation) to Mrs Petsos in Main Administration nancy.petsos@cewa.edu.au for our College records.