Sts Peter and Paul Primary School - Garran
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59 Wisdom Street
Garran ACT 2605
Subscribe: https://stpandp.schoolzineplus.com/subscribe

Email: stpandp@schoolzineplus.com
Phone: 02 6281 1932

PRINCIPAL'S MESSAGE

Dear Parents and Carers

Enrolment Period

For Catholic schools in the archdiocese, the period of May 4th – May 22nd is our enrolment period. Sts Peter and Paul is enrolling now for 2021, for Kindergarten and for all grade years. If I could please trouble our parent community to visit our Facebook page and view our video, and perhaps leave a recommendation or a positive comment, it would greatly assist us in our efforts to reach as many people as possible. As well as having its immediate, designated enrolment suburbs, Sts Peter and Paul is also able to enrol children from across Canberra, due to the unique location of the school. Our school website, which includes links to the enrolment pages, can be found at https://www.stpandp.act.edu.au/ and our school’s Facebook Page can be found at https://www.facebook.com/STPPGARRAN/

Return to School

A reminder to our parents that all children are returning to school next week, from Kindergarten – Grade 6. All staff are eagerly looking forward to the return of the students. We have all missed them a great deal and it will be wonderful to have them back.

The staff have been preparing for the return of the students and there are a number of operational procedures that require our attention, as the COVID-19 pandemic has changed the way many things in the school run.

One of the main areas that requires communication is around cleaning and hygiene. From next week, the school will maintain its normal cleaning routine, as well as instigate the following measures for the remainder of Term 2:

School actions/preparation

  • A deep clean of the whole school is taking place this weekend, in preparation for the return of all of our students.
  • An additional cleaner has been contracted to clean and wipe down all surfaces, including tabletops and door handles, 3 times a week, on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.
  • Our Groundsman, Kerry Marsham, will clean the playground equipment and outdoor seating areas daily.
  • All classrooms and learning areas have been supplied with large quantities of hand sanitiser. Children will be asked to sanitise their hands, by their teachers, at frequent intervals throughout the day.

Home actions/preparation

  • I would ask all parents to please supply each child in the family with a labelled hand towel, which they can use to dry their hands, as all children will be also using soap and water more than usual, in order to keep their hands clean.

Another aspect of the children’s return to school is around their social and emotional wellbeing. The staff are well aware of the children’s need to reconnect with their peers, after being away so long. For some children, they have been absent for almost a school term, if you are to include the 2-week holiday break. There will be a strong need to enable the children to reconnect with their peers and their teachers, and to ensure that they have a strong sense of social and emotional security. To that end, teachers are planning, with their grade and stage colleagues, to make sure that the teaching days have activities that are designed to help children connect with each other and continue to build a sense of class community.

Parents can assist with the return of children to school by talking to their children and getting them ready, in a psychological sense. I encourage all parents, between now and next Monday, to discuss next week, and what it is your child is looking forward to. Remind them of their friends, their lessons, their opportunities to play on the equipment; remind them too of Library, Music and Japanese lessons. Tell them it is ok and normal if they feel a little nervous – everyone will be feeling nervous – but those feelings will go away. Above all else, please assure your child that every staff member at Sts Peter and Paul is very excited about him or her coming back to school and we will make sure that each child has a very special week. We are in the final stages of working out celebration activities, to celebrate the fact that we are all back together.

In this matter, as in all matters, I thank you for your support of the school, the staff and the students.

Have a wonderful week with your families and we look forward to seeing all children on Monday May 18th.

Best wishes

Cameron Johns

Principal