Wellbeing News

At St Augustine's, we are committed to fostering a safe, inclusive, and respectful environment for all students. As part of our whole-school approach to Respectful Relationships, we are focusing on two key topics this term:

1️⃣ Emotional Literacy – Helping students recognize, understand, and express their emotions in a healthy way. By building emotional awareness, children develop empathy and positive communication skills.

2️⃣ Personal and Cultural Strengths – Encouraging students to appreciate their own unique qualities while respecting the diverse backgrounds of others. This helps build confidence, resilience, and a sense of belonging within our school community.

Through engaging lessons and activities from Prep to Grade 6, we aim to equip students with lifelong skills to build respectful relationships with others. We encourage families to continue these conversations at home and support our shared values of kindness, inclusion, and respect.

Thank you for being part of this important journey!

Prep Respectful Relationships

Every Monday in Prep we have been learning about different emotions and why we feel certain ways.   The students have been participating in role plays where they have acted out scenarios where they have felt happy, sad, angry, excited and anxious.

• Students named some emotions that they experienced. 
• Students showed how they expressed emotions through their body language.
• Students  practiced ways to show what they are feeling with their bodies and faces.
• Students named emotions they can see in other people’s faces and bodies.

Grade 1/2 Respectful Relationships

Every Monday in the Year 1/2s, we have had the opportunity to learn about and explore our emotions. Students have been participating in a wide variety of activities and tasks that allow them to identify and recognise different emotions and explore why they may have felt that way. The emotions we have looked at so far include happy, angry, sad, and excited, along with the different ways these emotions can be triggered.

We have also been learning about what it means to be a good friend and what this looks like in different situations. The students have been exposed to various scenarios and had the opportunity to act these out. Furthermore, they have explored the concept of kindness and what it means to be kind, whether during a sports game or while playing together in the yard.

This week, we brought all of this learning together by discussing what it means to demonstrate good teamwork. The Year 1/2s were challenged to work in pairs or small teams to walk around the classroom while balancing a pencil on their fingers. Through this activity, we explored the importance of communication skills, cooperation, and encouragement when working together towards a shared goal.

Ziggy Our Therapy Dog : Onsite every Thursday!

Ziggy is a 3yr old kelpie mix who had a tricky start to life. He was surrendered both as a member of an unwanted litter and again at a year old when his family were unable to look after him. In a lovely twist of fate, the first foster dogs Alex originally found homes for were Flash and Arrow- Ziggy’s brothers! Having not met Ziggy as a puppy, Alex and her family met him as a cheerful young dog looking for a family who could love him, and his energy. 

His fabulous temperament and boundless enthusiasm for meeting people were quickly evident and Alex and her family foster failed. He now lives with them, his human and fur siblings, a colony of ants, a lizard, whatever foster is in residence at the time and several tanks full of fish! 

Ziggy completed his training in 2023 with flying colours, a mere 3 months after coming to live with Alex, and quickly proved a natural in schools. 

Ziggy is very intuitive and is quick to make connections with people. From the most outgoing to the quietest in the room Ziggy will find you, work out who you are and what you need, then go about improving your day. 

Nicknamed Ziggle McWiggle (on account of his enthusiastic butt wagging!) you are guaranteed a grin as he wiggles his whole body in excitement at the sheer joy of seeing you. 

In his spare time Ziggy loves to be read to, chase a tennis ball, and is an excellent soccer player and snuggler. He also enjoys a good game of boop-ball and he eagerly shares this passion with the students at St Augustines.  

Ziggy loves his work, recognises when Alex is getting ready for them to go out and runs to the garage, ready to jump in the car and eager to come and see you all. He has already helped so many students learn and develop and can’t wait to see you!