To celebrate the Feast Day of St Catherine, Siena Catholic Primary School Lucas, shared in a fantastic day of prayer, language learning, food and activities. Siena CPS is a Teacher as Co-Learner school where students are immersed in Italian language with our staff on a daily basis.

The school has recently appointed Donato as a Language Assistant, who originates from Crispiano, Italy and was a head chef across multiple countries as his past profession. Due to the fantastic skills of Donato, students from all grades participated in hands-on language learning opportunities. This included creating various types of pasta from scratch, bruschetta and passata, with all the fresh vegetables and herbs coming straight from our school garden. Bellissimo!

Throughout the day the students were immersed in a variety of cultural and religious activities, learning more deeply about St Catherine, table fellowship- sharing in a pizza lunch and learning further Italian words and phrases.

As part of the town Siena in Italy, students delved into the ‘contradas’ (the Italian word for a district or neighborhood) of Siena, from which the school house groups are named, Torre/Tower, Onda/Dolphin, Leocorno/Unicorn and Drago/Dragon.

The day was finished with a beautiful liturgy to celebrate St Catherine of Siena, followed by our annual mock ‘Il Palio’ horse race. The students raced on hobby horses around our quadrangle, mimicking the famous bi-annual horse race between the Contrade of Siena in the Piazza del Campo.

Overall it was an incredible day of learning and fun! Fantastico e divertente!

Article written by Tim Gilbert, Language Leader and Grade 3 Teacher, Siena Catholic Primary School, Lucas.