St Paul’s is a small Lutheran primary school with a big heart! We are blessed to have a wealth of facilities, outdoor play areas and modern flexible learning spaces. Our current enrolment is 41, with 3 teachers and 2 learning coaches. This term, we were thrilled to announce that Anna-Marie Bothe, Interim Principal, had been appointed Principal (she is also Principal of St John’s Lutheran School, Jindera). We are so happy to be able to continue building the relationships which we have built with her since the start of the year.
This term, we launched our new School Values, co-created by our staff and based on Lutheran Education Australia’s Free to Flourish. We saw this as a meaningful way of connecting Growing Deep’s elements of Culture, Capabilities and Vocation to our own contextualised values statements about our approach to contemporary education and school culture. Each of our new School Values has a Bible verse, definition and statements on what it looks like in everyday life at St Paul’s. Thank you to Maree Svanberg of Mad Mouse Designs for the graphics that reflect our unique school context.
At St Paul’s Henty, we have a strong focus on being part of our community. Here is just a snippet of how we have been involved in our Henty community.
Our school community has been involved in all our sporting activities this year. We held our Swimming Carnival at the town pool, Cross Country at the Henty Golf Course, and our Athletics Carnival at St Paul’s College, Walla Walla. Our parent and grandparent community always support their children and grandchildren at these events.
We have continued to hold mainly music sessions once a fortnight, where up to 20 pre-schoolers enjoy coming along and singing and dancing. This is one of our key outreach programs for sharing God’s love with our local community. Parent volunteers plan and lead sessions, provide morning tea and celebrate birthdays, Easter, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day and Christmas with special gifts. We have been encouraging our mainly music families to become more involved in our school community by inviting them along to school activities. We thank NSW & ACT District Church Council, for assisting with a grant to help this mission continue.
Some members of the community decided to knot and crochet some beautiful poppies, hoping they would be able to be used for Anzac Day. We made a wreath and also a beautiful poppy display which was prominent at our Anzac Day service.
We have continued to develop our relationship with Myoora, our local aged care facility. Each class will visit once a term, to connect and strengthen this bond. In May, the K-2 class visited as part of their project-based learning unit, playing Uno and reading some of their readers to the residents. The time went so quickly, as everyone was having such a great time!
We are excited to begin planning a new playground and outdoor learning areas. The students have been involved in this planning process and we can’t wait to see the final product!
We love being a part of our Henty community, serving others to make a positive impact!
