9th December 2022

Principals News

We are in the Season of Advent 

I wish you all a good Advent journey made up of many small gestures of peace every day: welcoming gestures, gestures of understanding, closeness, forgiveness, and service... Gestures from the heart, like steps towards Bethlehem, towards Jesus, the King of peace.

Pope Francis 6.12.22

On Sunday we will enter the third week of Advent and the pink candle on the Advent wreath will be lit. This candle symbolises "JOY" it is pink . It is called the “Shepard's Candle,” and is pink because rose is a liturgical color for joy. The shepherds’ section of the Christmas story is very much about joy. The shepherds are mentioned in Luke 2:8-20. In this scripture passage, they were watching sheep in their pastures when an angel appeared to them. As many people in the Bible reacted when angels showed up, the shepherds were frightened, so the angel said, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger” (Luke 2: 8-20). The next moment a whole group of angels appeared around the first one, praised God, and then disappeared. The shepherds immediately went into Bethlehem and found Joseph and Mary with their baby. The birth of a child is a mopst joyful experience in life and as Catholics we prepare our hearts every Advent to celebrate the birth of Our Lord Jesus Christ at Christmas. 

In our End of Year liturgy Fr James asked the children if they knew what the liturgical colour of the cloths in the church meant and many hands shot up quickly. I was very proud of their enthusiasm to share their knowledge and understanding of the Advent Season. Each class has listened to and learnt about the Christmas Story as shared with them through the Children's Bible in their Religious Education lessons. All our students are welcome to come to the Parish masses to celebrate as a faith community with our parishioners over Christmas and every Sunday. 

I would like to take this opportunity to truly thank all our families for their support and enthusiasm for building our school community into the warm, welcoming and friendly environment we are so very proud of.  We have enjoyed being able to have parents and carers join us for so many celebrations and events this year and we look forward to 2023 where we will continue to partner with you as together we educate your children. 

Thank you especially to each of our volunteers! To Natalie Radford and her team of generous volunteers who manage to keep the canteen running so the children have that most wonderful childhood experiunece of going to the canteen to buy something and have a lunch order. Thank you! Thanks to all our volunteers - Athletics carnival, cross country events, various excursions, class helpers, library helpers, helpers who wrapped gifts for mothers day and fathers day for us...you are all so thoughtful and helpful. Thank you to Mr Pat Sharkey who tirelessly volunteers his time and many talents to assisting us with numerous projects here at Holy Spirit. His latest gift is a beautiful bird house in the garden near the hall where it looks terrific. Thank you Pat! Thank you also to Fr James Lunn  our Parish priest for his continual support for the school, one of several in this Parish. We are blessed to have Fr James and indeed, the parishioners willingly supporting our Family Masses and our liturgies throughout the year.  The generosity of Spirit in our community is what makes our community so great! Thank you!

As this is the final newsletter for 2022 may I extend my sincere thanks to each of our teachers and our support staff for their incredible dedication and commitment to the students enrolled at our school.  We have a wonderful team of staff who work well together, always going above and beyond expectations and always, always their focus is the students. We are blessed to have a great team. 

We will farewell some staff at the end of this term who will be leaving us and we hope that they will take the Fruits of the Holy Spirit with them on their next journey.  Farewell and thank you to Mrs Nicola Matheson who has been our Learning Support Teacher 2021-2022 who will be taking up a similar position at Holy Cross Glendale next year. Thank you Mrs Matheson for all your hard work and support for our students with special learning needs; your support for the teachers and for the children' families. We wish you well. 

Farewell and thank you to Miss Cook and Mrs Knox, both teachers of Year 2. Your work with us at Holy Spirit has been sincerely appreciated and we have enjoyed having you as part of our great team. We wish each of you all the very best for your future endeavours. 

To each of our students at Holy Spirit Infants, you are the very reason that I come to work each day! Your big bright smiles, your warm welcomes and funny jokes, your excitement for life and your enthusiasm are the greatest gifts any principal could ever hope for! Our Year 2 students, I will certainly miss each of you and in my heart I know you will soon be settled into primary school and loving the new beginning you are about to embark upon.  You are a terrific group of students and we have enjoyed watching you grow and flourish! Our early learners continue to astound us as we celebrate their growth across an academic year -growth in knowledge and understanding, but even more importantly, growth in their own self confidence and self efficacy. Helping students perservere and believe in themselves, is what we do best! 

I wish each of your families a wonderful, peaceful and joy filled Christmas season. Thank you for supporting our St Vincent De Paul Christmas Appeal as we try to always help others in need.  Stay safe and rest a while. We look forward to seeing our 2023 new Kindergarten students, Year 1 and 2 back at Holy Spirit after a terrific summer holiday break! 

Thank you for a wonderful year of learning and growing together at Holy Spirit Infants! 

Kind Regards

Diane Murphy

Principal 

Staffing Update for 2023

We are currently undertaking a recruitment process for some classroom teacher positions at our school for next year. I will send through details of newly appointed staff as interviews are held. The children have had two Step Up days into their new classes for next year and everyone seemed excited for the year ahead. 

KW Miss Kristen Pryor

KB Miss Jessica Laczkowski (Mon-Thurs) and Mrs Kate Kreutzer (Fri) (returning from leave) 

1W Mrs Heather Porter - Kay and in term 1 Ms Hayley Stollard each Thursday

1B Miss Helena Elias 

2B Mrs Rebecca Kearns 

2W TBC 

Principal : Diane Murphy

Assistant Principal and Pedagogical Mentor: Rebecca Kearns

Religious Education Mentor: Jessica Laczkowski

Gifted Education Mentor: Heather Porter-Kay 

Teacher Librarian: Ms Evelyn Covita

EALD Teacher: Ms Nicolette Fredsall 

Learning Support Teacher TBC 

Support Staff: Leah Shakespeare; Amanda Focic; Lisa Bolam; Janelle Willimas; Dot Seamer and Bonney Lane; Kay Woods; Trevor Shakespeare (Cleaner and Maintenance) 

Sharing Our Faith

End of Year Liturgy

Yesterday, we held our school’s End of Year Liturgy in the Church. It was a beautiful liturgy, and we were so thrilled that many of our parents and families were able to make this special occasion. During the Liturgy we presented the Fruit of the Spirit awards to those students who display these special qualities in all they do here at school. Congratulations to our recipients!  

End of Year Liturgy & FOS Award Winners

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St Vincent de Paul Christmas Appeal

Over the past few weeks, we have been collecting donations for St Vincent de Paul’s Christmas Appeal, to help those less fortunate than us to have a happy Christmas with their families. Our students and families have generously donated to this initiative, and we are very excited to present this to our local Vinnies Conference next week.  

Carols by Candlelight

We are very excited about the response we have had for our performance at the Kurri Kurri Carols by Candlelight on this Sunday 11th December. Thank you for bringing in your RSVP's on time. 
Just some information for those who are able to make it: 

• It is on at Kurri Kurri Public School. 
• Gates open at 5pm for a 6pm start to the carols. 
• Our performance time is at approx. 7:00pm. We will be performing one song. 
• We will meet near the stage at 6:50pm so that we will be ready to go on.  
• The Choir from Holy Spirit Kurri Kurri Parish will be supporting the singing for our infants students. 
• We invite students to come dressed in Christmas colours.  
• Carols will conclude by 9pm with fireworks and a special visit from Santa, you are not required to stay for the duration of the carols, but you are more than welcome to stay for as long as you like. 
• Ms Murphy and Miss Laczkowski will be there to meet you. 

If you have forgotten to return the RSVP, that is okay, you are still more than welcome to attend and perform with the rest of the students on the night. 

Parish Mass Times

Saturday 10th December 

9:00am Mass – St. Joseph’s, Cessnock 

6:00pm Mass – St. Joseph’s, Cessnock 

Sunday 11th December 

8:30am Mass – Holy Spirit, Kurri Kurri 

10:30am Mass – St. Joseph’s, Cessnock 

4:30pm Liturgy of the Word – St. Francis Xavier, Abermain 

4:30pm Mass – Wollombi 

Saturday 17th December 

9:00am Mass – Holy Spirit, Kurri Kurri 

6:00pm Mass – St. Joseph’s, Cessnock 

Sunday 18th December 

8:30am Mass – Holy Spirit, Kurri Kurri 

10:30am Mass – St. Joseph’s, Cessnock 

4:30pm Mass – St. Francis Xavier, Abermain 

Christmas Mass Times

Christmas Eve 

5:30pm Vigil – Holy Spirit, Kurri Kurri 

7:30pm Vigil – St. Joseph’s, Cessnock 

Christmas Day 

8:30am Mass – St. Francis Xavier, Abermain 

10:30am Mass – St. Joseph’s, Cessnock 

12:30pm Mass - Wollombi 

Yours in faith,

Miss Jessica Laczkowski

Religious Education Coordinator

Disco for Infants students

Reptile Park Excursion

Watch out for the alligator, it’ll bite your toes! On Tuesday the 6^th of December we went on a whole school excursion to the Reptile Park. We had the opportunity to discover new and exciting animals. Our favourites of the day were visiting the snake pit, exploring the trees to find cuddly koalas and being able to touch slimy and scaly creatures. We asked lots of questions and saw so many interesting living things. The giant dinosaur playground was fun! We all gathered for the reptile show where Miss L was brave enough to volunteer to hold the snake. We all had a fantastic day and wanted to thank our amazing parent helpers. 

Reptile Park Mega Gallery

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Looking back on our year of learning...

Kindergarten - Year in Review

Kindergarten have had an amazing first year of school and have come so far with their learning! It is hard to beleive those students who came in not being able to write their name are now writing multiple sentences from stories to procedures. They are truely to be commended on the effort and enthusiasm they have put into their education. Kindergarten have enjoyed so many events throughout the year such as our excursion to Oakvale Farm, 100 days of Kindergarten, Science day, Pyjama Day, our school Showcase, the Zooom Performance at CPAC and not to mention our recent Reptile Park excursion. They have had a variety of different experiences that have allowed them to learn about the world around them and explore different interests that they have. Mr Flynn and Miss Laczkowski are so proud of our Kinder students and look forward to seeing them blossom next year in Year 1! 

Kinder Memories

Year 1 Blue - Year in Review

1 Blue has had a fantastic year! First, we travelled to Tocal for an excursion because the teachers knew it would we fun and we could learn about the olden days. We have also been swapping classes for reading groups and we have learnt a lot. In Maths, we have been learning a lot about capacity, 3D shapes, addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. In Library we learnt how to use computers and we also played Minecraft Education to build a Christmas tree. In Week 9, we all went to the Reptile Park and learnt about different animals. In 1Blue we have had a spectacular year and wish everyone a wonderful holiday!

Year 1 White - Year in Review

Year 2 - Year in Review

We have had a fun year in Year 2 and have been immersed in lots of fun excursions such as the Reptile Park and the Awabakal Education Centre. We also loved spending time at Kurri with our buddies! We have had incursions at school and dress up days such as Farm Day, Pyjama Day and Book Week. The best part of Year 2 was learning new things and making lots of new friends. Throughout Year 2 we have been able to be the leaders and role models of our fantastic school while supporting Kindy and Year 1. We love our teachers, and we don’t want to leave. Holy Spirit Infants is like a family to us and it feels like home.  

Year 2

Awards: Congratulations to....

Fruit of the Spirit Special Awards

On Thursday at the end of year liturgy we celebrated the wonderful efforts of the following students who received a Fruit of the Spirit Special Award for 2022. Demonstrating a Fruit of The Spirit often is about sharing a special gift God has given us with others. 

Congratulations to: 

END OF YEAR AWARDS: 

The following students were acknowledged at the End of Year Awards Ceremony on Friday 9th December. We are very proud of your efforts! 

Congratulations to: 

End of Year Awards

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Library News

Thank you for supporting the library throughout the year.

After pulling lending reports from the system, I would like to congratulate Kinder White for their commitment to borrowing and reading. Almost all students in this class borrowed on a weekly basis. A close second this year was Kinder Blue.

Keep up the great reading!!

As the holidays draw closer, try to keep in mind that reading for pleasure has been proven to be immensely beneficial to all ages.

Take the following scenarios:

Here’s What Happens When Kids Are Given Screens To Prevent Boredom

They tune out their surroundings and fail to make everyday observations and connection that are important for their development.

They do not learn to entertain themselves creatively.

They don’t learn how to self-regulate.

Their attention spans are diminished because they become dependent on flashy, digital learning and distractions.

They can become anxious and stressed when deprived of on-demand entertainment.

Compared to:

Here’s What Happens When Kids Are Given A Book To Read To Prevent Boredom

New neuro pathways are created. This brain connectivity can be seen in scans, days after reading. (Audiobooks are great too but not as effective as the physical act of reading.)

The volume of white matter in the language area of the brain increases.

They learn to use their imagination.

They learn to self-regulate easier.
Their attentions-spans will be increased.

Their working memory will improve.

It’s the little things we do, that can have a huge impact on our children’s lives and overall wellbeing.

Have a very Merry Christmas and a safe New Year!

Miss Covita, TL

Canteen News

Thank you for your support of our school canteen.    Thank you especially to Natalie Radford for her tireless efforts to make the canteen run so smoothly.

Amy Reed will be the new canteen coordinator in 2023 and Natalie will support Amy.  Canteen will resume on Friday 17th February once our new Kinders have  settled in.

New volunteers are always very welcome to assist.

Pizza Meal Day

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Dates for your Diary

Community News

Strive Award 2022:

We would like to sincerely thank "Strive for Autism Inc" for their support of our Strive Award for 2022. Families may like to visit the Strive for Autism Inc website for details about the Lower Hunter organistaion supporting children with autism and their families. Our thanks to maxine Baird. 

We would also like to thank the office of Clayton Barr MP for the contribution for the trophies and awards presented to our students in 2022. Clayton Barr MP is the NSW State Member for the Electorate of Cessnock in the NSW State Parliament for NSW Labor.

Wishing all our families a blessed Christmas! From Holy Spirit Staff