Nau mai, haere mai St Joseph’s Whanau

Week 6 of Term 3 and there are blue skies, sunshine and yellow daffodils under the trees in the corner of the school field. Children are enjoying the change in weather, and there is a renewed brightness in conversations and the smiles given through the day. This of course benefits learning and our children’s energy for learning is buzzing. I encourage you to take the time to ask your children what they have been learning each day and to encourage them in their learning adventure.

Cultural Festival Performance: We are extremely proud of our Year 5 - 8 Kapa Haka team who represented St Joseph’s School at the annual Catholic Schools’ Cultural Festival in Hamilton. The team gave a strong performance and impressed the 11 school audience with their Kapa Haka performance and singing. Special thanks to tutors Matua Rawiri Henere, Emma Hyde, Kerry Horan, Jemma Van Eijk and Jeff Bennett. A video and photos can be seen on the school facebook page.

Awards Badges and Honors Badges (cont): This week we again recognised the great efforts of Awards Badge recipients. There has been a renewed enthusiasm for gaining Badge recognition. We certainly have some fantastic role models in the school.

Catholic Inter-School Cross Country: We wish the St Joseph’s Year 7/8 Cross Country Team all the very best as they compete tomorrow (Wednesday). The team have been training daily at school and are fit and keen to compete. We are cheering for you team!

Whole School Mass this Sunday: As well as being Father's Day, it is Whole School Mass at 9:00am this Sunday. It is a valuable opportunity for us to worship together and show our children the strength and the support of our worshiping community. We look forward to seeing you and your family at this special once-a-term occasion.

Next Week:

• Photo Monday Sept 5th - school photos - individual photos - family photos

children come dressed in your full regulation school uniform for 9am start,

proper sports uniforms should also be brought if you are in a school team.

• Wig Wednesday Sept 7th - wear a wig or crazy hair day

Bring a gold coin to be donated to the Child Cancer Foundation

Further ahead:

Week 9 … Poetry Recital Years 1 and 2 - Parents please support your child practicing at home

... Kaimai Catholic Schools Speech Competition Yrs 6 to 8

A prayer for the coming week:

Dear Lord,

We thank you for the beauty of the world around us

For the rain, sunshine and beautiful colours.

Help us to be a ray of sunshine in the lives of people around us.

Help us to shine with Your light in all we do.

Amen

Every blessing and have a great week.

Paul Cooper

Relieving Principal

Welcome to Our School:

Dexter Carney has joined us today in Akonga Hub. A special welcome to you and we are sure your big brother Alex will help guide you into school life at St Josephs.

On Friday our Year 5-8’s performed at the Waikato Catholic Kahui Ako’s annual Cultural Festival, Te Hui Ahurea. We are a large group of performers and had set the bar pretty high in 2021 with our impressive Kapa Haka performance. The group performed really well again in front of a much larger audience this year.

We had hoped to stay on and watch both colleges perform later in the day but they were running over time and the rain had interfered with our best laid plans.

We would like to thank all Matua Rawiri Henere for all the hard work he puts into preparing our students to perform, the teachers for the organisation behind the scenes and on the day, and to the kids for bringing their a-game to the performance and being flexible when plans needed to change.

Here are some photos of our day out…

Treat others the way you would like to be treated, speak to others the way you

would like to be spoken to.

This week at our Gospel Hui we listened to the reading from Luke 14 7-14 .

Jesus teaches us how to be humble and always put others before ourselves.

But what does this really mean for our students and our families and our busy day to day lives?

Kindness is the word that sums it all up, just imagine a world where we all strive for kindness in all we think, do and say. How amazing would it be?

Kindness is the most important part of who we are, no one will remember who won the speeches or the rugby game, all people remember about you is if you were kind.

This week I challenged the students to be kind at school and home, in all they think, do and say.

To open the door for someone, to give someone a compliment, to help with the dishes or to include a new friend in a game.

With the beautiful sun shining down on us I hope that we can be a kinder school by the end of the week.

We have a special School and Parish Mass on this Sunday 4th Sept, I am hoping to see you all there.

Students are to wear uniforms please. There is also a morning tea afterwards that you are all welcome to join us for.

Have a peaceful and kind week.

Aroha Mai

Mrs V

To help us in our planning, the Parish Pastoral Council would like to hear from you!!

As a Parish, we are looking for ways to spend time with our school communities, so please speak to Michelle Hinton with all your great ideas of what we can do together, as the Parish of the Holy Family: Michelle Hinton mliddington@xtra.co.nz 021 122 6691

Thank you

Father Mark