Our Lady of Good Aid Cathedral Primary School

Our Lady of Good Aid Cathedral was packed with family and friends as Primary 7 pupils received the Sacrament of Confirmation on Wednesday 20th November. Each and every pupil participated attentively and prayerfully throughout the liturgy and the beautiful music, led my Mr Greechin and Cathedral school choir, added to the prayerful atmosphere.

Many thanks to Bishop Toal and Fr Lamb for celebrating the liturgy, to parents and families for accompanying the children on their on-going faith journey, to Miss Cameron, Mrs Shevlin and Mrs Allison for preparing their classes for the sacrament, and for all those – from the school and from the parish – who worked so diligently behind the scenes to ensure everything ran smoothly on the night.

We continue to keep all those pupils who received the Sacrament of Confirmation in our prayers.

Primary 7a learners were very excited to receive video messages from their penpals in South Korea on Wednesday 20th November. The initial connection was established when Miss Cameron visited a teacher friend in South Korea during the summer holidays.

This Cathedral pupil was thrilled to hear from his penpal, finding out that his birthday is on 14th June, that he enjoys soccer and that one of his favourite foods is apple. The questions his Korean friend wanted to ask included, ‘How do you say hello in Polish?’ and ‘What is your favourite football team?’.

How amazing to have friends at the other side of the world!

Cathedral Primary hosted visitors from St Andrew’s Primary, Falkirk, and St Mary’s Primary, Bo’ness, on Tuesday 19th November.

Four pupils, two teachers and the Head Teacher from St Andrew’s Primary, who we have been working in partnership with for over a year, carried out a learning walk of the school to evaluate how effectively we use our various learning spaces to support high-quality adult-led, adult-initiated and learner-led learning. Two of our Primary 7 pupils led the learning walk and there was some great bouncing around of ideas amongst the group. It has been an absolute pleasure working with St Andrew’s to help them get Active8 up and running in their own school and we wish them well on the next part of their journey.

Meanwhile, four teachers from St Mary’s Primary spent the morning in different Primary 4 – 6 classrooms finding out how Cathedral’s Active8 approach works. They then popped down to the Play Zone at the beginning of the afternoon to see Primary 1c engaged in their various activities (play, of course, lays the early foundations for Active8). All four teachers were extremely impressed with the engagement, enthusiasm and independence of Cathedral learners across the school and are looking forward to taking what they saw, heard and learned back to St Mary’s. We look forward to welcoming another two teachers from St Mary’s Primary to Cathedral on Monday 25th November.

Pupils, staff, families and parishioners celebrated Education Sunday at the vigil Mass in St Luke’s on Saturday 16th and the morning Mass in OLGA Cathedral on Sunday 17th November. Cathedral pupils led the bidding prayers and offertory and senior pupils from Our Lady’s High School the readings and Catholic Education Week address. Cathedral school choir also led the music at the Sunday morning Mass.

Across our schools and parishes, we celebrate and give thanks for the precious gift of Catholic Education which seeks to develop and nurture the whole person, build a community between home, school and parish and continue the Church’s mission of calling young people to discover and enter into a living relationship with Jesus Christ.

The four schools which make up Our Lady’s Cluster have put together an electronic newsletter for Catholic Education Week, which can be accessed via the link below.

https://sway.cloud.microsoft/2XK5G0isKPTwwL5G

To round off their knights and castles topic, Primary 2 learners donned their crowns on Friday 15th November and travelled to the Great Hall for a glamourous medieval ball. The classes in Brainbox Boulevard gathered to wave to the princes and princesses on their way past. Our young royals enjoyed dancing and party games before sitting down to a banquet and then having their photos taken next to the golden carriage. What a grand end to a fantastic topic!

These two tech-savvy Primary 3 learners popped along to Mr Young’s office on Thursday 14th November to share some of their literacy work. The boys had programmed the Chatterpix app to make the mouth of the character on the front cover of their book move in time to a recording of them retelling the story in their own words. Impressive!

Our Play Zone was a hive of activity on Thursday 14th November for the second day of Family Learning, this time for our Primary 2 classes. Once again, Mr Young began each individual class’s session with a presentation on Cathedral’s approach to play and then parents and carers had the opportunity to visit the Play Zone and learn alongside their child.

Feedback from Primary 1 and 2 parents and carers over the two days was exceptionally positive:

“An excellent way for children to develop skills and lead their learning.”

“It was great to watch Lucas design his teapot and describe to me what he was learning.”

“It was lovely to see the children interacting together in such a controlled but fun way.”

“Harper loves coming out to the play area. She has really enjoyed showing me her writing today.”

“I loved seeing how engaged they all were.”

Forty nine Cathedral pupils participated in the North Lanarkshire Active Schools cross country trials at Shotts playing fields on Tuesday 12th November, with many of our young athletes qualifying for the finals. A special mention goes to two Primary 5 pupils who both won second place in a race involving well over 100 runners.

Congratulations to all pupils who took part and many thanks to Mrs Tominey and Mr Hamill for coaching our cross country team.

Go Come Clubbing @ Cathedral!

Schools across Scotland will mark Catholic Education Week during a two-week window, beginning on 16th November (the feast of St Margaret of Scotland) and ending on 30th November (St Andrew’s Day).

This coming weekend, Cathedral and St Luke’s parish will mark Education Sunday, with Cathedral Primary pupils directly involved in the 4.30pm vigil Mass in St Luke’s (Saturday 15th) and the 10.30am Sunday Mass in the cathedral. All families are warmly invited to attend one of these Masses and pupils are encouraged to wear their school uniform.

The four schools in Our Lady’s High School cluster have put together a joint newsletter to mark Catholic Education Week. This can be accessed via the link below:

https://sway.cloud.microsoft/2XK5G0isKPTwwL5G?ref=email

Please also click on the link below to read a pastoral letter from Archbishop William Nolan, Bishop President for Education:

Pastoral_Letter_CEW_24 final

Primary 1 parents and carers had the opportunity to attend a play Family Learning event on Tuesday 12th November. Each individual class’s Family Learning session started with a presentation from Mr Young outlining the importance of play and how it is organised in Cathedral Primary School to facilitate adult-led, adult-initiated and child-led learning. Parents and carers then had the opportunity to visit the Play Zone to learn alongside their child.

Similar Family Learning sessions will take place on Thursday 14th November for Primary 2 parents and carers.

We are currently developing our January – June Parental Engagement & Family Learning programme. Watch this space!