Term 4, Week 7, 2022

Dear Families,

Congratulations to Mr Maglai, our staff and all the students for a great Sports Day yesterday. A big thank you to all those parents, grandparents and other family members who were able to join us for the day. We were blessed with beautiful weather and some fun activities for our children to enjoy. Well done to our Champions: Fitzpatrick and our Spirit Trophy winners: Coolock. It was a close competition all day and right up to the last events any of the teams could have won. Congratulations to our individual winners: 100m Boys – Eugenio, 100m Girls – Tayla, 800m Boys – Hassan and 800m Girls – Rahwa. Well done to our R-3 students who then backed up for their excursion to Morialta on the very next day! I am sure they will sleep well this weekend.

Thank you to those families who have indicated that their child(ren) will not be returning in 2023. If your child(ren) will not be at St Mary Magdalene’s next year, can you please let us know asap via email: info@smm.catholic.edu.au or drop in and see me. This information is very useful for our planning.  If you know of families looking for a school then please let them know that we are here as we do have places in most year levels. Thank you to all those families who spread a ‘good word’ about our school to others, it is greatly appreciated and has resulted in some new families joining us for 2023.

Our 2023 Reception students have enjoyed their first two Transition mornings with us and will have their final one next Wednesday. Thank you to our Reception teachers for setting up this program for us. Thank you also to our new parents (some who already have older siblings with us) for joining us for Session 1 and Session 3.

Remember that we are in the church season of Advent, where we see the ‘serious’ colour of purple around the place. It is a time of preparing and waiting for something really important to happen. It is also a time for us to change ourselves for the better. I wonder, is there something about you as a person that you could do better? Are you kind and welcoming to everyone you meet? Do you go out of your way to help others? Do you keep in touch with family and friends? Is there someone you have a ‘broken’ relationship with? Advent is the time to mend these relationships or to change ourselves and do better. Jesus was on about relationships, how we care for people, how we care for the earth. He calls us to be ‘the one’ who makes a difference, to be brave, to say sorry and make things better. I encourage you to think about what you could do this Advent.

Our next newsletter will be after our Year 6 students have finished. I would like to congratulate them on being fine young people and wish them well for their last week and a bit of Primary School and for their new adventure at Secondary School. I thank their parents for entrusting them to us for these important years and thank each student and family for the contribution they have made to St Mary Magdalene’s School in the years that they have been with us.

Working in Partnership

Peter Mercer

Head of Campus

‘Our Charity is to be cordial … something that renews, invigorates and warms. Such should be the effect of our love for each other.’ ~ Catherine McAuley

The Premiers Reading Challenge  

This year between Term 1 and Term 3 our students participated in the Premier’s Reading Challenge.  The task was to choose and read 12 books from a set of Challenge books for the year level. Students completing this challenge received an award.

In the first year of completing the challenge the award is a certificate.  In the second year a bronze medal, third year a silver medal and fourth year a gold medal. For the fifth year the award is the champion medal, sixth year a legend medal and the seventh the Hall of Fame Medal.  

On Tuesday 22nd November there was an Awards Presentation for all the students who had participated. The Presentation began with a big surprise for Mr Mercer. The students had decorated a snazzy tie just like those that Mr Mercer wears. Congratulations to all who participated in the Premier’s Reading Challenge.  Here are some photos from our Awards Presentation. I hope that you enjoyed reading your books and have continued reading regularly.  It is such a valuable life skill to help you achieve your dreams.