Religious Education
Religious Curriculum at St Thomas Aquinas
This week staff have been once again busy collaborating with staff across our archdiocese on drafting new units of work for Religious Education. A special thank you to Ella Barry and Sam Pigram who have again given of their own time to develop exciting learning opportunities for our students. This exciting project aims to utilise staff expertise in Science of Learning pedagogy and create new units of work using the Brisbane Religious Education Curriculum Scope and Sequence. All staff at St Thomas Aquinas are engaged in trialing these new units of work and are providing helpful feedback to modify units moving forward into 2025. Change is never easy in education and I sincerely thank the staff at STA for their enthusiastic efforts and professional and skilled work in this space.
Religious Life of St Thomas Aquinas
Advent Prayer Celebrations
As school finishes before Advent will, we have decided to hold our prayer celebrations a little earlier. The whole school will come together to reflect on the weekly Advent messages and all families are invited to join us in the church at 2:00pm each of the Thursday afternoons in Weeks 6, 7, 8 & 9 for these celebrations. We are looking forward to starting off with 6 Blue leading us this coming Thursday.
| Advent | Date | Class |
| 2 | 28/11 | K Blue |
| 3 | 05/12 | K Green |
| 4 | 12/12 | 5 Blue |
Christmas Appeal
This year we are hoping to contribute much needed food items to support those in our community who may find the financial aspect of Christmas challenging. We are working with St Vincent de Paul to collect items for Christmas Hampers. Below you will see a list of suggested items to be brought in with different grade levels being responsible for different items. All donations will be presented to St Vincent de Paul at our final whole school Mass on Thursday 5th December. Please send these non-perishable food/drinks into your child’s class where they will be kept until this Mass. Thank you in advance for the generosity this school community is known for.
| Year | Items |
| ELC | Christmas cake/puddings |
| Kindergarten | Chips, corn chips |
| Year 1 | Chocolates/lollies |
| Year 2 | Biscuits – sweet and savoury |
| Year 3 | Pantry items – sauces, salsa, mustards, spreads, pickles etc |
| Year 4 | Pantry items – cereal, rice, noodles, pasta |
| Year 5 | Drinks – soft drink, juice, cordial, iced tea |
| Year 6 | Christmas serviettes, bon-bons, paper plates |
Dignity Hamper
As part of our ongoing support of St Vincent de Paul and those in need in our own community we have established a new dignity hamper. Families are invited to donate to the hampers items to assist the homeless and those in need with hygiene items such as shampoo and conditioner, body wash or soap, deodorant, tampons and pads, incontinence aids and moisturizer. All donations can be place in the new cubes outside the Coordinators’ Office. These will be passed on to St Vincent de Paul as the cubes become full. Thank you in anticipation of your generous donations.
Graduation Mass
A special Graduation Mass for our Year 6 students and their families will be held on Friday 6th December at 5:00pm. Please keep them in your prayers at this time of transition as it holds excitement, trepidation and new challenges.
Living Witness
It was with joy I read an email from a parent this week outlining how her son had helped with a charity over the weekend. Cameron Campbell spent time this past weekend at a ‘Share the Dignity’ lunch in Sydney. Prior to enjoying the lunch Cameron and his mum, Stacey, were assisting with packing more than 200 bags intended for people experiencing poverty and homelessness. This is truly living out our Catholic values and I’m very proud to hear that an STA student is demonstrating such kindness and charity. Well done Cam and Stacey!
