Dear Parents and Carers,

Well, Covid-19 keeps on challenging us all. With very little notice, all our students moved to remote learning on Wednesday. We would like to sincerely thank all our parents for their positive approach to this and willingness to comply with the changes. The teachers are extremely happy with the way the children are coping with the change and managing any issues that occur. We have received very positive feedback from our parents regarding the learning that we are providing and our communication, which is very much appreciated. The teachers have worked extremely hard to ensure that the learning provided is challenging and tailored to every student.
Parents, please ensure you email your child’s attendance to the class teacher by 11am each day. If a class teacher does not hear from a student, they will be marked absent. When a class teacher is rostered for supervision at school, the teacher won’t be available, online, that day for their own class. Each class teacher will inform their class when their rostered day will occur so you will have plenty of notice. The CE encourages a minimum of staff at school, which we are observing. We want to keep everyone safe and well.

We are strongly urging that children stay at home. There are currently cases of COVID-19 in six Canberra schools resulting in closures - so this makes our hygiene practices and care of one another's safety even more important.
If your child must come to school as the child of an essential worker (and you have no other option for care at home) we will have the following arrangements in place:

• School will be open from 8.30 am - 3.10 pm with minimum supervision ratios
• Students are to be dressed in winter school uniform
• There will be no canteen or catering (bring own food and drink)
• All learning will be remote/online with minimal physical access to teachers
• All students are to bring their own headphones
• Social distancing measures will be in place for the classroom and playground
• Remote learning packs will be available for collection from 2pm to 4pm every Friday or the following Monday. They will be left inside the school gate for ease of collection. Year 6 are all working online at home and do not require remote learning paper packs.

Unfortunately, last Sunday we had to postpone First Eucharist. Many of our Year 3 and 4 families were on stay-at-home orders as they had been in Canberra from August 5 and were unable to attend. On Saturday afternoon, a letter was emailed to all parishes in the Canberra-Goulburn Archdiocese cancelling all masses until further notice. Once the restrictions are lifted, we will arrange for the children to make their First Eucharist. We thank our parents for being so understanding about this.

This week we received the news that Mr Ged Galvin has made the decision to resign from his position at St Bede’s, at the end of the year. We are extremely grateful to Ged for taking on the position of Year 4 teacher and Assistant Principal. We will have an opportunity to say farewell and thank Ged before the end of the year.

Parents we encourage you all to read the newsletter and all notes sent out on Schoolzine. The situation around Covid is ever evolving and can change very rapidly.

Please continue to keep in your prayers all those communities that have been adversely affected by this recent COVID outbreak. We pray that all in our Braidwood community stay safe and well.

God Bless and Stay Safe

Marylou Gorham

Sacrament of First Eucharist

Thank you to all our families for being so accommodating with the sudden change to our celebration. We are unsure when we will be able to celebrate this sacrament, but we are hopeful that we will be able to have the children receive their First Eucharist during Term 4.

Acts of Kindness Challenge

We will all be spending a lot of time with the members in our households over the next few weeks, the below activities are a great way for families to come together and spend some quality time.

Keeping Your Child Safe Online

What can I do to keep my child safe online?

• It’s strongly recommended that you only share images of your children with people you know and trust
• Use strong privacy settings on all social media accounts
• Review you ‘friends’ or ‘followers’ on all social media accounts and remove anyone you don’t know
• If another person is taking photos of your child, consider having a discussion around how the photos will be used and how they will be shared

All students from Years 3-6 will participate in the school based round of the Northern Region Public Speaking Competition. There is one topic per year level.

Year 3 - Goals are good for you
Year 4 - What makes the world go ‘round
Year 5 - If Only
Year 6 - Being young is over-rated

Speeches will be judged on the following criteria:

• Delivery
• Suitability and Audience Interest
• Content and Creativity
• Organisation
• Timing

Timing for speeches:

Years 3 & 4 : 2 minutes; with a warning bell at 1 minute and 30 seconds and at 2 minutes
Years 5 & 6 : 3 minutes; with a warning bell at 2 minutes and 30 seconds and at 3 minutes

Speeches will be presented in class towards the end of Week 8 or Week 9. Class teachers will provide specific information to their class. Two students will be selected to represent the school from each year level.
St Bede’s will host the NR Public Speaking Competition in Week 2 next term. Successful students may then be selected to represent the region at the Archdiocesan Competition to be held online in Week 4 next term.