Nai mai, haere mai, welcome to Week 1. We are so excited to have you join us this term.

We welcome Charles and Eliza to Okatia 1 - we wish you and your family /whanau many happy school blessings. We also welcome Miss Smith to our school - as our new entrant teacher/kaiako. We are thrilled you have joined our team.

HUB, HERO and HEALTH

Our wonderful Middle and Senior Hub will be host an evening for families today TUESDAY 18th OCTOBER at 5.30pm. If your child is in Room 4,5,6 or 8 please come along.

You will have the chance to look around classrooms, your child can share their learning and then the teachers will talk to you about their programmes for Term 4, the Health Curriculum and how to use the HERO app effectively.

TERM 4 DATES

Tuesday October 18 - Middle/Senior school Parent evening 5.30-6.30pm

Sunday October 23 - Mission Sunday

Monday October 24 - LABOUR DAY - school closed

Tuesday October 25 - School Library bus

Thursday October 27 - National Shake out day

Friday October 28 - Middle school Eel trip

Sunday October 30 - Welcome to the church - come along and support our children

Monday October 31 - Pet Liturgy Parade/Blessing 2-3pm

Tuesday November 1 - All Saints day

Wednesday November 2 - All Souls mass @10am

Thursday November 3 - Basketball session #1with Coach Miles

Saturday November 5 - Parihaka remembrance

Tuesday November 8 - Fire Engine visit at 2pm

Thursday November 10 - Basketball session #2 with Coach Miles

Sunday November 13 - FIRST COMMUNION, please join our school

Tuesday November 15 - Library Bus

Thursday November 17 - Basketball session #3 with Coach Miles

Monday November 21 - Swimming begins this week weather permitting

Thursday November 24 - Basketball session #4 Coach Miles

Friday November 25 - SCHOOL ATHLETICS 9.30-11.30 at school

Thursday December 1 - Christmas in the Park

Friday December 2 - Road Patrollers movie

Tuesday December 6 - Okatia Junior rooms trip - Place Based learning

Wednesday December 7 - OLOL Senior mass/children performing for our wonderful parishioners

Monday December 12 - Whanau fun day

Tuesday December 13 - Graduation Mass for Year 6 and families

Wednesday December 14 - Final mass @11.30, SCHOOL CLOSED FOR THE YEAR @ 12.30pm

As you can see we have a busy term ahead - but an exciting one. Please make sure you continue to read the newsletter to keep up with everything that is going on.

Breakfast club is thriving with children/tamariki enjoying this healthy breakfast of Weetbix and milk every Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

Mā te Atua koutou e manaaki

May God keep and bless you

The OLOL Team

Please bring a pet to our special liturgy honouring St Francis, patron Saint of all animals and God's creation.

All creatures - great and small welcome:

• Parents/caregivers please arrive at school from 1.45pm with your pets, liturgy to start at 2pm.
• There will be a set up area under our trees on the field
• We ask animals to be on a lead or in a suitable carrier/cage, no free range animals
• We ask dogs to be muzzled or kept at a social distance
• All animals to be under the control of an adult
• This will be completed by 2.45pm

This year’s theme for Faahi Tapu he Vagahau Niue – Niue Language Week is - Fakatūleva e Vagahau Niue mo e Tau Aga Fakamotu ma e Tau Atuhau, which means - Sustain Niue Language and Culture for Future Generations.

Vagahau Niue has been registered with UNESCO as an endangered language, so one of the challenges is the preservation of Vagahau Niue and Niue culture.

It is vital that we preserve, sustain and maintain the vagahau Niue and culture for many generations to come. Niue leaders and community groups are working hard to explore, discuss and formulate strategies to ensure that the vagahau Niue and culture are protected and sustained for future generations.

Connect online by visiting the Facebook pages for Niue Wellington Community: https://www.facebook.com/NiueWellington/ and NZ Niue Language Week: https://www.facebook.com/niuelanguageweek/

We are truly grateful to those in our community and school who have offered their gifts and talents to serve on our Board of Trustees. See below for the first introductions of this wonderful team

Week 1: 17 Oct-21 Oct

DID YOU KNOW:

The Rosary is a Scripture-based prayer and we have a focus on the rosary in October each year. It begins with the Apostles' Creed, which summarizes the great mysteries of the Catholic faith. The Our Father, which introduces each mystery, is from the Gospels. The first part of the Hail Mary is the angel's words announcing Christ's birth and Elizabeth's greeting to Mary. St. Pius V officially added the second part of the Hail Mary. The Mysteries of the Rosary center on the events of Christ's life. There are four sets of Mysteries: Joyful, Sorrowful, Glorious and, added by Saint John Paul II in 2002, the Luminous Mysteries.

LITURGICAL YEAR

On Monday 17 October we celebrate the memorial of St Ignatius of Antioch. The second Bishop of Antioch, Syria, this disciple of the beloved Disciple John was consecrated Bishop around the year 69 by the Apostle Peter, the first Pope. A holy man who was deeply loved by the Christian faithful, he always made it his special care to defend "orthodoxy" (right teaching) and "orthopraxy" (right practice) among the early Christians.

Last term we had some amazing children/tamariki who said YES to a new learning challenge. This assesses children from across New Zealand in Maths and English. We are always proud of our all our children who have many gifts and talents - let us congratulate these wonderful Year 5/6 in Maths and English:

Kiwi English

Merit - Milo, Oliver, Amelia,

Achieved - Mia, Luke, Mikaela, Leiana, Charlotte Jane

Participated - Kellan, Stella, Cameron S

Kiwi Maths

Merit - Mikaela, Milo,

Achieved - Mia, Andrick,

Participated - Amelia, Oliver, Cameron S, Luke, Kellan

I am writing to ask if you could find some time to highlight moments with the children in your school to share something about Mission Sunday. It's a day that we celebrate our being missionaries, for we all are baptised. You will find some materials on our website (Mission Sunday 2022 - MissioNZ). Our Mission Poster shows how good leaders lead. They are the first ones at prayer. It was taken in Rome. Pope Francis gathered them to pray for the end of the pandemic and the war in Ukraine. Please download the poster from the website and hang one or the other in a prominent place in your school. If you do not have a coloured photocopier in your school, I will be more willing to post you some copies.

Some other resources are in the other MISSIO Offices like Australia (Catholic Mission Homepage) Ireland (Home - Missio Ireland) Canada (https://www.missionsocieties.ca) Germany (missio – International Catholic Relief Organization | missio (missio-hilft.de)) Austria (https://www.missio.at) England (https://missio.org.uk). I hope you find some stories that may interest some children in your school. You never know,one day one or the other child from your school could be a missionary.

God bless you.

Fr Bernard Espiritu, SVD

We are excited to share with you the results

Taking time to notice and be grateful for the good stuff every day increases your chances of getting through hard times, and can make you happier in the good times.

Gratitude magnifies positive feelings and experiences and prevents us from taking things for granted. Not only does practising gratitude improve our mental health, but it can improve the quality of our relationships as well as our physical health.

Whether it’s friendships, weekends, pets, crunchy peanut butter or a flushing toilet, there are lots of small (and not so small) things we can all be grateful for.

We love these tips from the book, The Gratitude Project - How the science of thankfulness can rewire our brains for resilience, optimism, and the greater good, edited by Jeremy Adam Smith, Kira Newman, Jason Marsh, Dacher Keltner, PhD:

Health benefits of gratitude
Across two decades of research, gratitude in its various forms seems to have wide-ranging benefits for our mental health, our relationships, our physical health, and our self-improvement.

In one study, more grateful participants reported fewer health problems (such as headaches, gastrointestinal problems, respiratory infections, and sleep disturbances); in another, more grateful participants reported fewer physical symptoms (including headaches, dizziness, stomachaches, and runny noses). People of all ages and various nationalities who have more grateful dispositions have fewer health complaints than their less grateful counterparts.

Taking time to smell the roses
Grateful people also notice the fragrance of the coffee, the bread baking in the oven, the aroma of a new car—whatever gives them pleasure. Loyola University psychologist Fred Bryant finds that savouring positive experiences makes them stickier in your brain and increases their benefits to your psyche—and the key, he argues, is expressing gratitude for the experience

Gratitude journals
It’s so easy to get used to the good things in our lives that we really need to put effort into appreciating them, even when they’re little things. Gratitude helps us savour our positive experiences and prevents us from taking things for granted. And tasks like the gratitude journal are an easy way to encourage the regular practice of gratitude.

Perhaps this suggests that writing gratitude letters produces better mental health by shifting our attention away from toxic emotions, such as resentment and envy.

Be grateful for people and experiences, not just things
If you want to cultivate a more grateful disposition, buy more in the way of experiences and purchase fewer possessions. This does not mean that you need to swear off all material goods and live the life of an ascetic. By all means, continue to enjoy your material possessions. Just shift your expenditures a bit more in the experiential direction and a bit less in the material direction, and you’re likely to find yourself enjoying the many psychological benefits that come with being more grateful.

Thank you for your ongoing support for our school through shopping at New World. We truly appreciate it.

October 17 - Term 4 begins

October 18 - Middle school hub, HERO evening

October 25 - Public Library bus

October 27 - Basketball with Coach Miles for all classrooms. Every Thursday for 4 weeks.

National Shakeout - school participation

October 30 - Welcome to our parish - six of our children are participating in this

November 1 - All Saints Day

November 2 - All Souls Day

November 15 - Public Library bus

Term 4 - Monday 17th October - 14th December @12.30pm

TERM 1 DATES 2023

Term 1 begins - January 31st.

Email: office@olol.school.nz
Website: http://www.olol.school.nz/
Location: 96 Shamrock Street, Takaro, Palmerston North 4412, New Zealand
Phone: +64 6-358 9727
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Our-Lady-of-Lourdes-School-317253155895069