Head of Campus

Dear Families

I hope you all enjoyed the long weekend which is timely as we reach the half way mark of the term. 

On Friday all staff engaged in a day of professional learning with Michael Edgecombe from "Doing Life Together". The focus of the day was Emotion Coaching and Kimochi's. 

A growing body of research emphasises the importance of wellbeing for both individuals and communities, especially within the classroom and through emotion coaching we can promote healthy wellbeing and foster a positive learning environment. Kimochis®  is the Japanese word for feelings and this program helps children and adults identify and express their emotions and build social skills with an emphasis on relationships.  This learning is created through the use of characters and we will share more about this amazing program throughout the year. It was a highly interactive day and I know staff all left feeling inspired with new emotional literacy to  support all of our students. 

It was wonderful to connect with so many of you during our PPL meetings last week. We truly value our partnership in supporting your child's learning and encourage you to continue the conversation beyond these meetings.

Today we have been very fortunate to welcome visitors from AssitiveWare who are the developers of Proloquo. They are here to attend the International AGOSCI conference being held in Adelaide this week and it is such a privilege to have them come to St Patrick's and see the incredible work our educators do everyday to enhance communication.  One of our visitors was Jordyn Zimmerman and  I really recommend watching the short CBS interview with Jordyn (linked below) as a brief snippet into her story, she's an amazing advocate for disability and inclusivity of AAC in education! I am excited to be presenting at the conference with Kelly to share the St Patrick's journey of AAC and Proloquo. 

This week we will celebrate our first school Mass and you are all warmly invited to join us on Thursday 13 March at 2pm. I hope to see you there.

Kind regards 

Cathy Sires

Head of Campus