Aoife's Message

Good afternoon Holy Cross families,

We have had plenty of action around our school in the last fortnight. From incursions to excursions to activity nights there's plenty to read about in our 'Holy Cross happenings' section of the newsletter. Our Learning & Teaching news is designed to share a snapshot of our current learning areas with families, you are always very welcome to talk all things education with our lovely staff. 

Professional Development

We take pride in being a staff who are life-long learners. As a team we continuously reevaluate our teaching practices to ensure we are meeting the needs of our children. Last Friday we gathered as a whole staff to explore the possibilities for Discovery and Inquiry practices in 2024. We're excited about our future plans which aim to further increase student engagement and student voice. You may also recall from a previous newsletter that our Year 3/4 team have been engaged in an 'Improving Writing' project this year. This project was run by MACS and our team was very well supported with professional learning opportunities. Sian, Sheree, Tracey, Emily and Susan have been implementing a rigorous series of lesson plans, supported by Zoe our Literacy Leader and Kate our Learning & Teaching Leader. Sheree, Emily, Zoe and Kate recently represented the wider team at an Improving Writing Symposium where they received extremely positive feedback on the practices in place to engage and challenge our students. We will be further developing this learning in 2024 and will look to sharing this knowledge as a whole staff. 

PFA - Fortnightly Afternoon Tea Market Stall

Our enterprising and hard working PFA have been busy brainstorming ways to enhance community connection and fundraise to support our children. They are hoping to begin a new tradition at Holy Cross by running an Afternoon Tea Market Stall after assemblies. Please see the PFA News section of the newsletter for more details. 

Parent Webinar - Thursday 16th November

Throughout the year we have partnered with Inform & Empower to deliver cyber safety lessons to our children. We have also committed to three parent webinars to support families with a variety of everyday challenges. The third and final webinar in the series is called 'Tackling Tricky Conversations' and will be presented by Carley McGauran. Please see below for further details. The cost of the webinars has been paid by Holy Cross, we encourage all interested families to register. 

WORLD TEACHERS DAY 

We celebrated our fantastic team of teaching staff on Thursday.  I’d like to thank our staff, for the commitment and dedication they show to our children and our school community. Our staff have experienced much change over the last two years and they are to be commended on their resilience, flexibility and willingness to engage in dialogue about best practices. Hats off to you all! 

Have a relaxing weekend,

Aoife