Junior School

Emotional Regulation

While some would say that technology has made us more connected than ever, the authors of the book Teachers These Days, Jody Carrington and Laurie McIntosh, argue that we are in fact more disconnected than ever as a society. 

“The next time you call a child ‘attention seeking,’ change it to ‘connection seeking’ and see how your perspective changes.” 

This is a key message that is explored in the book as one of the most important things you will ever teach a child is emotional regulation. The skill to regulate emotion is the foundation to almost every other skill that matters in a child’s life. 

Carrington and McIntosh argue that no one is born with the capacity to regulate emotion well. In fact, the only way an individual can truly learn emotional regulation is for somebody else to show them how to do it. They can’t tell you; and you certainly can’t just practise it when you are calm and hope to have access to it when you are distressed. Instead, learning true emotional regulation requires someone to show you how to do it, again and again, until you start to take on that skill for yourself. 

As such, adjusting our view of young boys who ‘flip their lids’ from being attention seeking to connection seeking can be an eye-opening experience for adults and is well worth pursuing.

Year 6 Camp

Please note that all Year 6 parents/carers have been sent a letter outlining relevant information regarding the upcoming Year 6 camp to Somerset. All documentation for this experience must be completed by next week so that appropriate arrangements can be made to cater for students.

A reminder that there will be an online Teams meeting for parents/carers to join to hear more information about the Year 6 camp on Wednesday 19 October at 7:00 PM. Prior to this meeting, parents and carers have also been invited to submit any questions they have related to the Year 6 camp.

2023 Student Leadership 

In a few short months, our current Year 5 cohort will be the new leaders of the Junior School. While every single student will always have a leadership role to play through their daily actions, only a select number of students will be elected to represent the Student Leadership team itself. 

Many boys will choose to self-nominate for one of the specific leadership roles on offer such as the Junior School Captain or one of the two Junior School Vice-Captain positions. Students may also be selected as a House Captain or House Vice Captain across our six houses at the College. 

As a staff, we are very proud of the many achievements, qualities, and attributes of our newest cohort of boys this year and we recognise the reality that many wonderful candidates will unfortunately miss out on these elected positions. As such, it is important that we have this conversation with those boys who are intending to nominate for a leadership position and also discuss the joy that can come from sharing in others’ achievements and successes. We certainly encourage our families to have similar conversations at home, keeping the discussions centred on the important responsibility that every student has in representing and leading our wider College community.

As always, if you have any queries or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact me via email (glenn.stephenson@spc.nsw.edu.au) or phone (8705 9247) and I will endeavour to assist you in any way that I can.

May God bless you,

Glenn Stephenson 

Director of Junior School

Mission Mass and Fundraising

One of the great traditions we have at St Patrick’s College is assisting others who are in need. Over the next few weeks, we will be doing this in three ways and are inviting you to join us:

1. Mission Partners – St Edmund’s Wahroonga, Catholic Mission and Chetanalaya (located in Delhi, India) are organisations working to bring change in the world. Students will be learning about each of them and how valuable they are. Next week a letter will be shared with more information on these mission partners.
    
2. Selfless-Silence – In Week 4 the Junior School will spend two hours in total silence, teachers included. Through this activity we hope to have a small experience of the difficulties of the voiceless in society. 
    
3. Fundraising – The boys will also bring home a sponsor form for our selfless silence activity. We hope that you can support your son to seek sponsorship and by doing so spread the awareness of our mission partners. An experience of giving without expecting anything in return.

This will conclude with our Mission Mass on Friday 4 November where we can present these funds to representatives of the organisations. 

Thank you in anticipation for your support.

Stephen Cooper

Junior School Religious Education Coordinator

Year 6 Academic Assessment Services (AAS) Testing

All Year 6 students will sit the Academic Assessment Services (AAS) Testing on Tuesday 25 October in their classroom. The purpose of this testing is to measure academic growth from their 2020 test completion and to accompany internal assessment data to assist in the formation of Year 7 classes. 

Daniel Fields

Junior School Curriculum Coordinator