Dear Parents, Carers and Friends,

Welcome to the season of Advent where we prepare to celebrate the birth of Christ. Advent is essentially about gratitude, reflection and change. We are challenged to look back on the year and look to places in our lives where we may need to change – not just for our own good but for the good of others. It is with this mindfulness that we enter into the season of Christmas with a desire to make 2019 a year filled with hope and peace.

Staffing 2019

Being a student centred school requires staffing decisions based on the needs of the children and getting the best possible outcomes for them. Fortunately, at St Patrick’s we are blessed with a dedicated group of teachers who are flexible and skilled to work on any grade. Our staff are a great team and strive to work in partnership with you and your children.

The Catholic Education Office have allocated St Patrick’s, 4 classes in 2019.

The following staff allocation for 2019 will be:

K/1 – Mrs Carberry

Year 1/2 – Mrs Eccelston and Mrs Howe

Year 3/4 –  Mr Craig Ferguson

Year 5 /6 - Mrs Lisa Wilson

Library and Teaching Release - Mrs Justine Hughes

Learning Assistants – Mrs Heidi Luff and Mrs Kristi Frances

Supportive Playgroups – Miss Natasha Smith

Secretary – Ms Sharon McCarthy

Cleaner – Mrs Leonie Winters

Student Centred Learning and Religious Education Coordinator – Mrs Natasha Flanagan

Assistant Principal– Mrs Lisa Wilson

Principal- Mrs Chris Baron

Awards Day

Congratulations to all those students nominated for an award at our Awards Day Ceremony. Thank you for being exceptional role models throughout the year, displaying values of respect, responsibility, safety, determination, leadership, resilience and showing care and concern for others.

Congratulations to our outgoing School Captains – Abbey, Tom, Ally and Hugh. Together, they have competently and enthusiastically led the student body.

I would like to acknowledge the Gundagai business community and friends of St Patrick’s for donating the awards and supporting our students. Thank you Gundagai Real Estate, JMA Legal, WFI Insurance, Bendigo Bank, Bethany Tout Award - the Tout Family, Gundagai Pharmacy, Shirley Dean - Mrs Cheryl Levien, Veronica Lawson award - Mr Michael Howe and the Lions Club award.

Nativity

In our school community, these last few weeks, we have been preparing for our Nativity Concert to be held in our school hall on Thursday 13th December from 6 pm - 7 pm. Please note that we will no longer be having a 'picnic' therefore you will need to eat prior to or after the event. The change of venue is due to an inclement weather forecast for later in the week. We hope to see many of you there to share in the Christmas story. This will be a great evening for families to join in the Christmas spirit, singing along to some great carols performed by the students of St Patrick’s. All parents, grandparents and friends most welcome.

The overriding message we hear at Christmas is one of ‘peace and goodwill’ to one and all. Hopefully, our nativity will further remind you of this and the importance, that this message is not just for Christmas, but an underlying principle of our faith and a reminder, of what should be - a way of life. I hope that you will be able to leave our Nativity, further inspired to live out the meaning of Christmas, throughout 2019.

Welcome Chris Baron

To Mrs Christine Baron, St Patrick’s new Principal for 2019. I wish you all the very best and hope that the community of Gundagai will give you their full support as you lead St Patrick’s next year. All the very best Chris.

Farewell

To all parents and caregivers, I thank you for your wonderful support of our school and for entrusting St Patrick’s with the gift of educating your children. For everything you have done to support your own child’s education and also all the many contributions you have given to support the St Patrick’s community, through social activities, fundraising, tuckshop, classroom support, building and maintenance around our school, assisting with excursions, coaching our students, welcoming and supporting new parents to our school, cooking and organising celebrations. Your generosity and involvement in our school is highly valued and a role model for our children as it reinforces the values and responsibilities of being part of a caring community. We are better together and our achievements are a testament to this partnership. I would like to acknowledge the contribution of staff, parents and students to St Patrick’s in 2018.

In this my last Newsletter, I wish to acknowledge the support given to me and to the rest of the parish/school community, by my wife Kerri-Ann. Kerri-Ann has always contributed to the school communities, which we have served. At St Patrick’s she has led the students in “Cooking for a Cause”, cooking for Uralba residents and transporting students to visit residents. Running “Supportive Playgroups”, assisting me with “Little Learners’, “St Patrick’s Day” activities, transporting students to and from sporting events and looking after the school grounds and Bethany’s Garden. Thank you once again Kerri-Ann, for the support and care that you have given to this community.

On behalf of KerriAnn and Summer, we wish to thank you for your friendship over the past three years and the many wonderful memories that St Patrick’s has given us.

Here is our top 10 in no particular order:

1. Visiting Uralba and pre-schools
2. Little Learners and Supportive Playgroups
3. Cooking with the students, pancakes and fruit days
4. Tending to Bethany’s Garden and the magic yellow roses and sunflowers
5. Grandparent’s, Mother’s and Father’s Days
6. Year 6 camp
7. Masses, Liturgies, children’s beautiful voices and the Nativity presentation
8. St Patrick’s Day, Book Week and Snail Cup celebrations
9. Morning assemblies in the amphitheatre
10. The joy of the students and adding colour to St Patrick’s

Wishing you all a happy and holy Christmas followed by a New Year of promise and contentment.

Introduction of K/1 composite class in 2019

As you are aware, St Patrick’s currently teaches in Stages as per the NSW Syllabus Curriculum. Our present class structures are:

Early Stage One, (ELF, Kinder)

Stage One (1/2),

Stage Two (3 /4) and

Stage 3, (5/6).

The above class structures reflect the Early Learning Framework and NSW Syllabus, which allocates two years to complete the content for each stage.

Why this development?

Next year, due to the uneven pattern of the 2019 Kindergarten enrolment group compared to 2018, we will be forming a K/1 composite class group. By having a composite K/1 we are more effectively able to ensure no one class group has too many or too few children.

What is the make-up of the classes?

The makeup of these class groups includes nine 2019 kinder enrolments and seven of the 2018 kindergarten class. The remaining eleven 2018 Kindergarten students will form the Year 1/2 class. There will be sixteen students in the K/1 class and twenty-one in the Year 1/2 class. Class organisation is a very thoughtful process. We have spent considerable time creating well-balanced groupings for our 2019 K/1 and 1/2 classes. In formulating the class makeup, we consider many factors including social-emotional development, gender, learning and behaviour needs, siblings in the classes, friendships and physical development.

The most common fear for parents having a child in a composite class is that they will fall behind – that the teacher's attention will be split between the two years and they’ll get less overall learning time with their teacher. The research, however, does not agree. Whether a class is single, staged or composite matters less than the nature and quality of instruction in the classroom. Current evidence-based research tells us that it is not the class structure that effects learning. What makes a difference is the quality of instruction by the teacher. It is teachers who make the difference. Teachers who form great relationships with the children, personalise the learning, have high expectations, give quality feedback, incorporate inquiry learning, critical literacy and concept formation are the key to your child flourishing in school and beyond.

What does the research say?

• Research has shown there’s no disadvantage in academic achievement between children in split classes versus straight grades.
• As all parents and teachers know, a child’s age tells you nothing definitive about his or her development.
• Whether a class is composite or single-year matters less than the nature and quality of instruction in the classroom.
• Research demonstrates integrated groupings promote cognitive and social growth and split environments can motivate younger students while providing the older students with leadership opportunities.
• Proponents of composite classrooms adhere to the theory that children should be taught "by stages, not ages", pointing out that in life, age stratification does not exist.
• Role models and leaders can come from both the younger and older children; the children who excel at these traits do so irrespective of age.
• The key to understanding composites is realising that growth is determined in stages and not magically by ages. Children learn on a continuum rather than in discrete steps.
• They are a lot more like real life because you have different ages and abilities working together.
• 21st-century learning requires educators to move away from a focus on grade curriculum, towards a student centred and student driven approach.

What are the benefits of composite multi-aged classes?

• Composite classes have been shown to provide benefits to both the older and younger students in the class. Older students often take on a mentoring role, and benefit from helping younger students in cooperative learning situations, while younger students have the opportunity of enhanced learning experiences where they are ready for it.
• Composite classes can actually enhance development; students becoming more confident and assertive and learning to operate as part of a group while bolstering independent learning skills.
• Older students provide a model of appropriate behaviour for the younger students. This also means fewer behaviour problems in the classroom because younger students integrate quickly into established class routines as modelled by the older students.
• Younger students are able to seek help from a wider range of people rather than relying on the teacher to help them all the time.
• Students develop a greater respect for individual differences across the board.
• A continuous and dynamic learning. Unlike a traditional straight grade, where kids are expected to progress at about the same rate over the school year, children in a multi-age class should move along at their own pace, creating more fluidity in the classroom.
• Children become more confident, can operate better as part of a group, are more assertive, become more independent learners and better problem-solvers. They also make friends outside of their standard age-groups, develop tolerance & diversity; Multi-age grouping creates an environment at the school similar to that of home, resulting in greater continuity,
• Children in multi-age learning groups appear to be more caring and cooperative with each other. Diverse social groups provide opportunities for older children to reflect on the needs of the younger ones and they are more likely to see the younger children be in need of their care and help. Older children provide valuable role models for the younger children both socially and academically. Year by year as the classroom structure changes, all children gradually find more opportunities to develop and practice their own leadership skills.

Over the years, composite classes have been the source of controversy for some, with parents sometimes believing that their child is being disadvantaged in some way if they are placed in a composite class. Composite classes don't mean your child is struggling or a genius and it doesn’t mean that they will get work that is too hard or not hard enough. Our teachers are experienced working with staged multi-aged classrooms. They use a variety of grouping, teaching and assessment strategies to ensure that children are moving ahead in their learning, supported in a classroom with the older and younger peer. What matters is the quality of teaching and learning and the relationship between the child and the teacher.

In Summary, there are academic as well as social benefits to combined grade classes. Research has shown that combined classes allow students to learn from one another, provide models for younger students, help older students see what they have already learned, provide opportunities for a greater range of learning, encourage students to work together, promote social responsibility, help students become independent and foster a positive attitude toward school.

All of our teachers are thoughtful and purposeful in collaboratively planning teaching and learning activities. Both our K/1 and 1/2 teachers will work closely together to ensure opportunities for shared collaborative learning occurs and that all students’ needs are being met.

I thank you in advance for supporting us in the work we do.