Our Lady of Good Aid Cathedral Primary School

Classes across the school had the opportunity to try out judo on 21st and 22nd March. Judo builds fitness levels and increases coordination, flexibility and agility. The children had great fun and hopefully some of them will decide to take up judo as a long-term sport.

As parents and carers will have read in previous newsfeeds, Cathedral Primary is currently working with ‘Respect Me’, Scotland’s anti-bullying service, to review and refresh the school’s approaches to preventing, reducing and responding to bullying behaviour.

Cathedral staff and the Parent Council have revisited and made revisions to our anti-bullying policy and we are now in a position to put this out to the wider parent body for feedback. The policy has also been condensed into a leaflet for parents and carers.

Please click on the links below to access each document:

Cathedral anti-bullying policy March 2023

Bullying information leaflet for parents and carers

A link to a short electronic feedback questionnaire will be sent out early next week.

In advance of developing this year’s Tackling Poverty Strategy, North Lanarkshire’s Tackling Poverty Team wants to ensure children and young people have a voice and the opportunity to help the council shape its services. A group of Primary 6 and 7 pupils worked with the Tackling Poverty Team on Monday 20th March to explore how the cost of living is affecting them and other families and suggest what the council could do to help. The team were very impressed with the children’s insight and ideas.

Cathedral Primary recognises that these are challenging financial times for many of our families. If you are having difficulties, please take a few moments to read the leaflet below to find out what help is out there in North Lanarkshire.

https://www.northlanarkshire.gov.uk/sites/default/files/2022-11/NL%20Money%20Worries%20Leaflet.pdf

As part of our recent work with ‘Respect Me’, Scotland’s anti-bullying service, Cathedral Primary has developed ‘Bullying Drills’ and these were piloted in all classes on Thursday 16th and Friday 17th March. Regular fire drills ensure pupils and staff know exactly what to do in the event of a real fire. Likewise, the purpose of our new bullying drills is to remind pupils at the beginning of each term exactly what to do if they experience bullying behaviour or see someone else being bullied.

Pupils and staff had the opportunity to provide feedback on the presentation for their class. Once final changes have been made, bullying drills will take place in every class at the beginning of every term.

Pupils and staff brought a burst of colour and fun to Cathedral Primary on Friday 17th March with this year’s Crazy Hair Day. As you can see from the photographs – one from the nursery and one from each of our four learning streets – there were some absolutely amazing creations across the school!

Most importantly, of course, the day raised more money for our two Lenten charities, Missio and SCIAF.

Primary 5’s current topic is The Scottish Wars of Independence and, as part of their learning about the different battles,  the children researched and built replicas of Stirling Bridge.

Mr Young, Mrs Campbell and Mrs Duffy visited the three classrooms on Friday 17th March to see the models for themselves and were blown away by the children’s effort, skill and attention to detail. It came as no surprise, then, that there was so much positive feedback being written on the peer assessment sheets.

Well done, Primary 5!

Cathedral’s bespoke ‘Rose Trainer Achievement Award’ has a section for pupils to capture their wider achievements and these three children were reaching for their record cards on 17th March.

As you will have read in an earlier newsfeed, one of our Primary 6 girls recently participated in an international gymnastics competition in Lisbon, Portugal. She came an impressive 16th out of all participants from across the world , which is an absolutely phenomenal achievement!

Two other pupils, one from Primary 6 and the other from Primary 7, were recently awarded trophies from their football club, Villa Park: one for progressing to diving when saving goals and the other for scoring the first goal of the match.

Well done to all of you!

Mr Calum Croughan, one of North Lanarkshire’s Digital Pedagogy Practitioners, visited Primary 4b on Thursday 16th March to do a bit of team teaching with Mrs McCulloch. Mr Croughan was very impressed with the class’s engagement and digital skills, observing the children accessing and utilising the class One Drive through GLOW and using it to share their learning.

Mr Croughan will be back in Cathedral during the summer term to do more team teaching in Primary 4b. 

Our website newsfeed celebrated its first birthday on Thursday 16th March… and what an incredible year it’s been! Here are just a few of the highlights:

• March 2022  New library opened by Ross McKenzie; official launch of the ‘Rose Trainer Achievement Award’.
• April 2022  Local artist draws caricatures of Cathedral pupils to raise money for Ukraine.
• May 2022  Primary 7 pupils enjoy residential trip to Lendrick Muir.
• June 2022  Sun shines for two-day sports event. 
• August 2022  Pupils treated to theatre performance of ‘The Jungle Book’.
• September 2022  Ca-Fi Connections tours begin.
• October 2022  Special Mass in Cathedral as we say a sad farewell to Fr Chromy and Fr Mark.
• November 2022  Cathedral pupil makes it onto front cover of ‘Scottish Catholic’ magazine. 
• December 2022  Choir sings in city centre shop. 
• January 2023  Cathedral pupils complete Young Leaders training. 
• February 2023  Family Learning workshops receive an enthusiastic response from parents. 
• March 2023  Cathedral, Firpark and Clydeview team-up to support local food bank

Cathedral school community has so much to celebrate and be proud of over the past twelve months, so please do take the opportunity to enjoy a trip down memory lane by clicking on the link below:

https://blogs.glowscotland.org.uk/nl/olga/

Fifty-five Primary 3 pupils celebrated their First Reconciliation in Our Lady of Good Aid Cathedral on Tuesday 14th March. Fr Lamb and Fr Stephen were joined by Fr Keiran from St Brendan’s parish to hear the children’s confessions and a candle was lit for each pupil by their teacher as they stepped up into the sanctuary to celebrate the sacrament.

Despite a few initial nerves, the children did themselves, their parents and their teachers proud, and there was barely a dry eye in the church as they closed the liturgy with a beautiful and prayerful thanksgiving hymn, ‘When I think about the cross’.

We keep the children in our prayers as they continue on their journey of faith.