Dear Parents and Carers,

Week 10 is here already and as such, another term has almost been completed. This week is a nice quiet lead into the school holidays.

Thank you to everyone who helped us celebrate Catholic Schools Week (CSW) last week. Hopefully you had the chance to come along to one of the special activities that were being hosted and enjoyed spending time with your child/ren. I am very grateful to the staff of St Mary’s for the extra work undertaken to have a special activity each day to help celebrate the wonderful learning at St Mary’s.

Many thanks are also in order to the students who sang at the Opening of the Batlow Rural Fire Shed. The opening was a special celebration of a wonderful service provided to our community. Our presence was very much appreciated by the commissioner and staff.

Please remember our excursion tomorrow to the McAuley Booktopia Play. The bus will leave St Mary’s at 9.45am. Students are asked to please return permission notes ASAP. There is no cost to attend the play.

We are moving to an online newsletter through the Schoolzine Platform. Parents and carers are asked to download the Schoolzine App to their personal phones or ipads/laptops ASAP to ensure you have access to our newsletters and school information. Schoolzine is also updating our school website and we are preparing to go live very shortly.

Wishing everyone a most relaxing and enjoyable two week break.

Christine Baron

Principal

Wednesday we created an art space on our playground for Catholic Schools Week. Our butterflies represent change and joy. The blue ‘wind’ captures our mission to spread joy in our school and community. We then walked around the outside of the school to view the scene.

Thursday - "Fiver for a Farmer" students came dressed as a farmer and donated to help farmers in need.

Everyone shared fruit and veg at Crunch and Sip.

After lunch students had a dance session on the oval, lot's of boot skootin and flossing.

Friday students had an assembly with the focus on our 5 students who were to receive the Sacrament of Holy Communion on Sunday.

Congratulations to Sophie, Ted, Sarah, Emily and EJ for receiving their First Holy Communion on Sunday.

A special thank you to Mrs Murray for preparing the students for this very special occasion.

The Bradfield family are asked to supply the cake for the cake raffle this Friday 28th September.

The Tainio and Shang families are our cooks for this Friday 28th September.

Thank you to all the families who have cooked for Home Cooking this Term. Proceeds go to the end of year whole school excursion.

K-6 will attend the "Wakeup Booktopia" Performance TOMORROW 26TH September.

The students will travel to and from Tumut with Goodes Coaches. The bus will leave Batlow at 9.45am and the students will have morning tea at the Wynyard Centre Park. We will then walk to the Montreal Theatre. After the performance students and teachers will walk to Richmond Park for lunch.

The bus will pick up at 1.45pm and students will be back at St Mary's for normal pick up and buses.

PLEASE PACK PLENTY TO EAT AND DRINK AND A SCHOOL HAT.

Anyone who has not signed the permission note sent out last week MUST be at the school before 8.30am tomorrow.

STUDENT OF THE WEEK

Kinder/Year 1

Lucas M for excellent work making hexagons and triangles using other shapes.

Liam C for sitting quietly and showing excellent listening skills.

Year 2/3

Jasmine for fantastic effort in Literacy and her impressive knowledge of homophones.

Annie for tackling tasks with great attitude.

Year 4/5/6

Oscar for great reasoning when using percentages and fractions.

Jade for using punctuation more confidently when editing.

Daniel for investigating electrical circuits in Science.

"Let's give drought the boot"

Grab some mates and join us for a 2 course meal - Entree and all you can eat Pizza.

Live entertainment and pleanty of laughs.
Friday 12th October 2018

Meet and greet Batlow Hotel

5.45pm for 6.15pm departure

Cost: $45.oo per person

RSVP: 5th October

Lisa: 0427569592     Rachelle: 0448980039

BSB; 062371  ACC: 10005174  (Please put last name as reference)

Congratulations to our very generous St Mary's Community. An amazing $444 was raised for "Fiver for a Farmer". Every dollar makes a difference. A fiver can make a huge difference to our farmers in need.

Rural Aid - A central point of focus to provide assistance and relief for Farmers in distress and poverty.

Drought Angels - A unique service offering drought relief through support for rural families in need. A small charity run by big hearts.

Term 4 begins on Monday 15th October and concludes on Tuesday 18th December.

School Photos - Tuesday 23rd October

2018 Awards Evening - Monday 17th December

Year 6 Graduation Mass - Friday 14th December

Operation Christmas Child boxes and $10 per box if you have not already paid are due back THIS week

Thank you to the generous families who supported the drive this year.

Parents/Carers are asked to please cut up any fruit that is sent to school for Crunch and Sip, recess or lunch. This is to ensure student safety during the current fruit contamination issue. Students will not be permitted to eat whole pieces of fruit. Thank you for your support.

Mrs Joanne Shore has resigned from her permanent teaching position at St Mary’s. We thank Mrs Shore for the contribution she made to St Mary’s during the past 5 terms. The permanent position has been advertised and parents/carers will be advised when the position has been filled.

Students are asked to wear a school hat now that the weather has warmed up so quickly.

Please also provide sunscreen for your child to wear each day.

School hats will be COMPULSORY from Term 4 onwards.

School photos for 2018 will be held on Tuesday 23rd October (Week 2 Term 4). Each child was sent home a personalised envelope last week. Sibling envelopes were also sent home for those wishing to have family photos. These envelopes must be here on photo day with payment having been made online or payment with the envelope.

Full summer school uniform, dresses for girls.

This week is ham & cheese toasties $3.50 per serve or 2 serves for $5.

Other options are Zooper doopers 80c and icecream cones $1.

Kinder/Year 1 will have a Movie afternoon on Friday, celebrating our great work this Term.

The movie will be "Trolls"

Parents are reminded that the correct school uniform is to be worn at all times. Black shoes for both boys and girls must be worn on non sport days.

Grey socks for boys - white socks for girls. There is a uniform order form attached to this Newsletter.

Birthday wishes go to Rebecca who turned 8 on the 20th September. Also to Elise who turns 6 on the 27th and Jasmine who turns 8 on the 30th September.

Holiday birthday wishes go to Liam C who turns 6 on the 1st October and Sophie who turns 9 on the 9th October.