14 February 2024

From the Desk of the Acting Principal

Week 4 , Term 1

School Board Formation: If you want to get involved in the school, but are not sure how, perhaps the School Board could be for you?

The School Board works with Townsville Catholic Education Office and the Diocesan Education Council to help formulate and adopt policies, guidelines and procedures. The Board meets once a month, usually on a Wednesday evening. At Good Shepherd, our School Board incorporates the
Catholic Identity Committee.

The annual School Board Formation Day will be held on Saturday 17 February from 8.30am – 1pm. If you are interested in being part of the Board, and can attend on Saturday, please express your interest via email to rsmssn@gstsv.catholic.edu.au and use the subject: School Board. Expressions of interest close on Thursday 15 February, 2024.

Naplan 2024: NAPLAN tests for students in Years 3 and 5 will take place from Wednesday 13 March
until Monday 25 March. 2024.

Naplan consists of four tests – writing, reading, conventions of language and numeracy – with all tests conducted online with the exception of Year 3 writing. It is expected that all students participate, however if you are concerned about your child sitting the Naplan tests, please speak to your child’s classroom teacher as soon as possible.

Friendology: We are excited to introduce a new friendship and resilience program across our school
this term. Frendology teaches children the difference between different behaviours and how to respond to “friendship fires” and “mean moments”. This term, students will take part in eight Friendology lessons, which align with our Health and Physical Education curriculum.

Extra Pupil Free Day: As advised last year, Townsville Catholic Education Office has approved an additional professional development day in 2024. The date will be Friday 26th April, 2024 and will be a pupil free day. This day follows on from the ANZAC day public holiday on Thursday 25th April. The reason for granting this additional professional development day is to provide the time and opportunity for all teachers to prepare for the implementation of V9.0 of the Australian Curriculum at the commencement of 2025. This planning day will focus on supporting teachers to have a deep understanding of the changes to content and assessment from the current Australian Curriculum to the newly revised curriculum. There is much planning already occurring in all schools to ensure all teachers are well placed to provide rich learning experiences for their students. This additional professional development day (pupil free day) will only occur in 2024.

Maxine Nolan

AP

mnolan@gstsv.catholic.edu.au

From the Desk of the Acting Assistant Principal Pedagogy and Learning

Talofa lava parents, carers and students!

It’s hard to believe that we’re already nearly half way through the term already. It has been wonderful to see all the learning in action happening in each of the classrooms and hearing about it in planning meetings with teachers.

Please see below for what’s happening around our school at the moment.

Curriculum News

This year marks Good Shepherd’s second year of engagement with TCE’s Writing Project. Mrs Weaver (4A) and Mrs Bulmer (2A) are involved in the project which aims to develop consistent, high quality learning and teaching of writing across our school. All teachers also received professional learning in the elements of effective writing at the beginning of the school year.
You can help your child at home by talking about writing and being a role model by showing them how you write for different purposes and audiences eg. Writing shopping lists, writing notes, writing cards, writing emails….

Sports News ⚽️ 🏀 🏈 ⚾️ 🎾 🏐 🏉 🎱

Swimming Lessons continue for our Year 4, 5, 6 students, with Year 3 students starting swimming next week.

We hope to see you at the Swimming Carnival tomorrow!

School Events  

Ex NRL player James Tamou from the Townsville Blackhawks along with his colleague Tim Nugent have been working with some Year 6 students in the Townsville Blackhawks Resilience Program.

The program is designed to help kids bounce back from adversity, setbacks or challenges. 

It involves adapting positively to difficult situations, learning from experiences and maintaining mental and emotional well-being despite hardships, to help be more positive, more enthusiastic and more determined with their attitude with schooling and home life. 

Keep an eye out on our Facebook page to see the Blackhawks Resilience Program in action.

Have a wonderful week ahead and please come and say talofa or hello when you see me around!

Rebecca Rowan

AAPA

rrowan6@gstsv.catholic.edu.au

From the Desk of the Assistant Principal Religious Education

Shrove (Pancake) Tuesday

Tuesday 13^th February

Pancake Day, or Shrove Tuesday, is the traditional feast day before the start of Lent on Ash Wednesday. Lent – the 40 days leading up to Easter – was traditionally a time of fasting and on Shrove Tuesday, Catholics went to confession and were “shriven” (absolved from their sins). Shrove Tuesday always falls 47 days before Easter Sunday, so the date varies from year to year and falls between February 3 and March 9. In 2024 Shrove Tuesday will fall on February 13^th. On Shrove Tuesday people traditionally cook and eat pancakes. The reason for this was to use up foods such as fat, eggs and milk before Lent. We look forward to celebrating this special day with our students next week.

SACRAMENTAL PROGRAM 2024

RECONCILIATION – CONFIRMATION – HOLY COMMUNION

Congratulations to all those children who have enrolled to make the sacraments of Reconciliation, Confirmation and Eucharist this year.  Kathy, from the Parish Office has emailed parents/carers notifying their Group Leaders, day, time and location for sessions.  The program starts this week; parents are to meet their Group Leader at the allocated session day, time and location to collect the student book for Reconciliation. If families do not know which group, day, time and place to meet please phone Kathy at the Parish                                                                  Office: 4723 9844.

Thank you to the teachers who have volunteered to lead the groups.

Kindness is a powerful tool for nurturing the well-being of everyone at Good Shepherd Catholic School. It's a significant step towards empowering our students to be their best selves through kindness. Science has proven good reasons to prioritise kindness, backed by evidence of many physical, emotional, and mental health benefits. Many impressive benefits support teaching kindness in schools to decrease negative behaviour:

1. Happy, caring children
   Endorphins produce the good feelings that we experience when being kind. They activate areas of the brain affiliated with pleasure, connection, and trust. Acts of kindness also help us form connections with others, reported to be a strong factor in increasing happiness.
2. Greater self-esteem
   Any small act of kindness can increase happiness, uplift energy, and give an incredible feeling of hope and self-worth from the rush of endorphins.  
3. Greater sense of belonging
   Everybody has a fundamental need to belong and feel connected to the people around them. Being part of a community ensures support during difficult times and helps to increase a child's awareness of connection. Our teachers here at Good Shepherd Catholic School actively promote a culture of kindness that leads to improved friendships and feelings of belonging.
4. Better concentration 
   Kindness increases a positive outlook, so children have greater attention spans, are more willing to learn, and are better creative thinkers with better results at school.
5. Improved health and less stress
   Being kind has many physical and mental health benefits, including increased happiness and reduction of stress. 

For Semester 1, we are focusing on kindness through the curriculum (URStrong Program) and various activities during our ‘A.R.K – Acts of Random Kindness’ lunchtime club for the students. We will be working with the students throughout this time to promote kindness towards others and within each of us.

Rebecca Kershaw

APRE

rkershaw@gstsv.catholic.edu.au

What's Happening in Year 1

Year One has had a productive start to the year. We have investigated Zones of Regulation and the different tools students can use to bring them back to the Green Zone, such as blowing bubbles, five finger breathing, going to our calm down space etc. Some time has been spent with the ‘Good Shepherd Flock’ at the front of the school reflecting on the Good Shepherd Gospel Values. Students have participated in various hands-on activities such as finger painting numbers, reading, making patterns, and getting to know each other in order to work together as a class community. We have visited our PALs class to form new friendships and are looking forward to working together.

We are also beginning to conduct science experiments in class! These include exploring ice blocks, spaghetti and chocolate to learn about chemical changes in our everyday lives. The students are enjoying becoming mini scientists as they observe and describe the effects of interacting with materials and objects.

Library

Breakfast Club and Running Club

Both Clubs will run every morning. Breakfast Club will run from the Tuckshop from 8:10am and Running Club will be held on the Junior Oval from 8:10am as well.

The Good Shepherd Way

Term 1, Week 3

This week our Good Shepherd Way Gospel in Action value is Endeavour where I challenge myself to do my best.

Our Endeavour prayer is below:

Term 1, Week 4

The Good Shepherd Way Gospel in Action for Week 2 will be Hope where I see good all around me.

Our Hope prayer is below:

The GSCS Way

The GSCS Way is our positive behaviour support program here at Good Shepherd Catholic School.

All in our community are encouraged to:

• Give My Best
• Show Respect
• Compassion and Care
• Safe Responsible and Fair

Each week we focus on a different area of our matrix.

This week we are focusing on: In the eating area. 

In Term 1, Week 4 we are focusing on: On the playground. 

Environmental Tips

Tuckshop

Wednesday - Thursday - Friday

Please contact the school office or Ann-Maree at Tuckshop with any enquiries.

CUTOFF time to order TUCKSHOP
from FLEXISCHOOLS
is 8:30am.

PLEASE NOTE THAT ALL ORDERS ARE TO BE PLACED ONLINE AT THE LINK BELOW. Please visit the website to set up your account if you are new to Flexischools.

Flexischool How To Guides for Parents and Caregivers
• Online help is available any time at Flexischools via the link below.
• Phone between 8am - 12pm (AEDST) on weekdays or on the parent phone line (1300 361 769). 

How-To Guides for Parents
Flexischool has spent some time over the holidays developing some quick how-to guides for  parents. If you'd like to see these, please click the link below.
They include: 
•    Introduction to Flexischools;
•    How to Register; 
•    How to Top-Up;
•    How to Place an Order. 

Teacher Contacts

Parent Portal

If you have any problems accessing please send an email to the school office at rsmssn@tsv.catholic.edu.au. 

The Parent Portal allows you to:

View your child’s timetable and the school calendar
View up to date attendance information for your child
Enter details of upcoming absences or explain past absences or late arrivals for your son or daughter
Access your child’s Semester reports
Make bookings for Parent Teacher Interviews
View a news feed of school announcements, alerts and updates
Provide consent for school events/excursions
Communicate by email with your child’s teachers
Update your contact details (email and mobile phone number).

The parent portal is a web-based system that can be accessed by clicking this link:

An app called Compass School Manager is also available for both iPhones/iPads (via the App Store) and Android phones/tablets (via the Google Play Store). When you have installed the app, search for “Good Shepherd Catholic School – Rasmussen”.
The browser version of the Parent Portal contains more features than the app.  Please click the link below to access the Compass website which has an online guide and video for the Parent Portal.

Community News