Pelican Post

Term 2 Week 4 2023

Principals Report

Updates around Athletics

This Term every Friday we have Richard coming in to work on Athletics Skills with students in K-6 as part of class sport. Richard has years of experience of working with athletes and was a regular here at Cattai PS before COVID. Each class will have a 40 minute lesson with Richard where they will be explicitly taught discus, shot put, high jump and long jump and running skills in preparation for our carnival later in the term.

Speaking of our carnival I have some exciting news to share on the 18th May I meet with my MMWaC Principal Colleagues (MMWaC: Maroota, Macdonald Valley, Wisemans and Cattai) to discuss having a combined MMWaC athletics carnival on the 21st of June. This carnival will replace our school based carnival and students will get to compete against students from the other schools. Although racing against each other on the day, students will still receive ribbons and qualifying times to smalls schools based on how they faired against other Cattai PS students not against the other school schools. This is another amazing initiative from our MMWaC network of schools that I am very proud to be a part of.

 

Welcome Mrs Huckel to Cattai PS and our C3 Class

On Thursday the 11th of May Mrs Huckel came for a tour of the school and met staff and students. This is in preparation for teaching C3 for Terms 3 and Term 4 whilst Mrs Jones is on maternity leave. Although new to teaching in a primary setting, she comes with years of experience teaching in day care. I am very excited to be able to find Mrs Huckel and Mrs Bushell who are two very enthusiastic educators that love working with kids.

In the spirit of transparency our entire staff line up from day 1 Term 3 will all have less than a year's worth of teaching experience. This may from one perspective be quite concerning. But I assure you, I met with or phoned up 13 candidates when filling these 2 positions and they were the best of the best. I have always recruited for the school with the mantra that teaching is 95% personality and 5% everything else. Both of our latest recruits have personality in abundance and have already fitted into the 'Cattai Culture' well as instant hits. Skill can be taught but personality is more innate. I have the utmost faith that the wrap around support from Miss Diener, Mrs Sherott and myself will bring Mrs Huckel and Mrs Bushel up to speed in no time. Cattai has a good track record here, Miss Mees is a great example who is already at a level of teaching quality that I didn’t reach until having taught for at least 5/6 years. Both Mrs Huckel and Mrs Bushel will also be visiting the school for 2 paid casual days each to shadow Mrs Jones and Miss Maley as well as the option to come in for more volunteer days where needed. This will allow them to hit the ground running and make for a smooth transition. These decisions I have made both as a Principal and as a parent and wouldn’t have brought them onboard if I didn’t feel our students would flourish under their guidance.

 

SRC Rewards Day

On Tuesday the 16th of May Miss Mees in collaboration with the SRC (Student Representative Council) hosted our first SRC rewards day for the year. After working hard all Term 1 and Term 2 to fill up our whole school marble jar it was time to start negotiating rewards for this effort. The students decided to do group rotations including board games, technology time and sports/sock wrestling. We finished up the day with a whole school game of hide and seek. My favourite part was when one of our students hid under the clothes in the lost property bucket. Archie's mum got quite the fright when looking for a lost jumper and a random head appeared from between the clothes. What a great way to celebrate all the hard work since the start of the year. 

Spotlight on C2

Cattai Public School attended the Hawkesbury Show on Friday 28th April. 

C3 had a fantastic time at the show watching the sheep demonstration, the cow show, the reptile show and the pig races. 

A great day had by all! A huge thank you to our parents that helped us on the day. 

Term 2 Calendar