Term 4 Week 9
Principal's Message
Baptism
Last Wednesday was one of the most special days I have been involved in during my time at St Bernard's. It was an honour for us all to be part of the Baptism of nine of our tamariki and three of their younger sisters. Our newly baptised children were so proud as they became members of the Catholic Church. I was lucky to stand as godmother for Marco and touched to see Amelia wearing the dress my mum made me for my First Communion. Our children looked beautiful and handsome, and celebrated respectfully. I think Fr Doug would have a needed a rest after the Mass!
Nativity Play
This Wednesday at 6pm we will be holding our annual Nativity Play and end of year event. Children all have parts in the play. If your child will not be able to attend, please let us know as soon as possible. Children will be provided with the main parts of their costumes, a letter containing details of what they will need to wear on the night will come home today.
This will be our last newsletter for the year and so I wanted to say a huge thank you to everyone for your support, particularly in the second half of the year. I appreciate that you are all sticking with us and joining us in our keep calm and carry on attitude as we continue to do the best we possibly can for your children.
Lisa
Faith News
End of Year Mass
Please come and join us for our end of year Mass this Wednesday morning at 9am in the school hall.
Parish Newsletter
This week’s Parish newsletter is available here
Keep the Christ in Christmas
At this very busy time of year it is important that we do not forget that Christmas is about the birth of Christ. Remember to keep the Christ in Christmas.
Last Day 18 December 12.30pm – Come Dressed in Red and Green
Children are reminded of the school tradition of coming dressed in the Christmas colours of green and red for the last day. Find those Christmas hats, reindeer antlers etc. and get them ready for the day.
Remember school finishes at 12.30pm.
Thanks So Much!
We really can’t thank all our wonderful parents who have kindly helped with transport and supervision on various trips and visits during the year enough. Without you, a lot of these trips would not have been possible. We really appreciate the time and help you have given us. Thank you!
School Reports & 2025 Stationery Lists
End of Year Reports
This years school reports will be emailed to all parents as a Google Doc on the last day of term, please email Mrs Small (principal@stbernards.school.nz) if you do not receive a report for your child/ren, or can not open the document.
2025 Stationery Lists
Please see below for links to your child/rens stationery lists for 2025
These are also available on the school website click here, in store/online with Warehouse Stationery, and online with Officemax.
We ask that all children return to school with their full stationery order.
The tissues you are asked to supply are made available in classrooms. This helps to reduce the risk of infections from children not using handkerchiefs. Please supply a large box of tissues.
A note from teachers: If your child still has room in their books from this year, we are happy for them to use the rest of the pages at the start of 2025.
Birthday Wishes
Special birthday wishes to Nicky, Jacob, Jordiya, Riley, Isabella, Danica, Ishaan, Mason and Inigo who all have birthdays over the school holidays. We hope you all have wonderful, fun filled birthdays.
2025 Term Dates
Term 1 - Mon 3 Feb to Fri 11 April (Waitangi Day 6 Feb)
Term 2 - Mon 28 April to Fri 27 June (Kings birthday 2 June, Matariki June 20)
Term 3 - Mon 14 July to Fri 19 Sept
Term 4 - Mon 6 Oct to Wed 17 Dec (Labour Day Oct 27)
Room 1 Learning
Our maths work last week involved revision of shapes and measurement....and look what we made!! Gingerbread houses. There were a few steps involved. First we had to carefully cut out the shape templates. Then trace around two of each shape onto cardboard( a great way to recycle). The cutting out was the hard part, tough work for small hands cutting stiff cardboard...but we kept trying and we did it! Room 1 looked pretty messy after that, but we are awesome at tidying up!!
Then Ms Parsons hot glued our houses together ( and didn't burn her fingers) and when they were dry, we painted them beautiful colours.
We are still learning about capacity and weight in Science ( and it's maths too!) and we had rotation activities with Mrs Harper on Friday. We had to fill jars with the plastic teddies, weigh classroom objects and compare with unifix cubes, and complete a worksheet showing that we understand most and least, and filled containers various containers with water to see which ones held the most water and the least water...
Room 2 Learning
To finalise our writing project on New Zealand birds, Room 2 have been writing chapter stories about native birds. We have now nearly completely finished our stories and the end results have been really fantastic. Not only have the class shown lots of creativity, but they have worked hard to improve their punctuation and spelling skills. We've learned about so many different native birds this term and I can tell that the class have really enjoyed and grasped what they've learned. Room 2 should feel really proud of their progress and hardwork!
Room 4 Learning
Room 4 has been very busy over the past couple of weeks learning their lines and developing their characters for our Nativity play. The children play characters from the Nativity story, including Joseph, Mary, the Eastern Men (Three Wise Men), shepherds, an angel, a Roman ruler and his trusty assistant (tribune). It has been a focused effort to learn lines, speak them clearly, and decide how they want to express their characters. This has also included preparing props and setting up scenes. We have already had one whole school practice and have two more scheduled before Wednesday. Room 4 is excited to present the Nativity along with Rooms 1 and 2 on Wednesday at 6 pm. It will be a wonderful celebration, and we know our school community will enjoy seeing the children perform their roles.
Holiday Programme Ideas
Harbour City Gymnastics - Holiday programme
Looking for some extra time to go get shopping done ? Why not drop your children off at our Christmas themed holiday programme. We'll be running a bunch of fun gymnastics games and activities, and flexing our creative muscles too with festive art projects.
Sessions are running from 9AM - 3PM on Wednesday 18th, Thursday 19th & Friday 20th December.
You can register via this link
For enrolment information for 2025 gymnastic programmes please contact office@hcg.org.nz or head to our website https://hcg.org.nz/