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Dear Parents and Carers,
Sunday 21 March marked the passing of St Benedict. The children have remembered him in their classrooms with this short video.
Benedict is most famous for the Book he wrote - The Rule of St Benedict. This document has been foundational for many Christian traditions and communities. It is through the rule that we have drawn our commitment to a Love of Learning and also the 5 Mission Behaviours.
Take some time to watch the clip with your child as they come to know and understand the life of St Benedict and his legacy to Catholic communities across the world.
As we journey through the week, together, with Jesus,
Toni Sillis
Principal
School photos will be taken on Thursday 22 April 2021. Students will wear their full Summer school uniform for the photos this year.
Please note that if you have not given photo permission consent, your child will not participate in the class photo.
When does my child start to wear Winter School Uniform?
Students are expected to wear their full Winter school uniform from Monday 10 May. Prior to this date in Term 2, if we experience cold weather, it is parents’ discretion as to which uniform is worn.
CLAIM THE DATE!
Good Samaritan staff will be participating in a Staff Development Day on Friday 21 May. This will be a Pupil Free Day so students do not attend school on this day. Teachers will be working with the newly released Personal Development Health & Physical Education (PDHPE) Syllabus.
Easter Hat Parade:
On Holy Thursday, 1 April, students will participate in an Easter Hat Parade. All students are invited to participate. The Easter Hat Parade has its historical roots as a fancy head covering that people wore in readiness for the Easter celebration. During the Great Depression the Easter Hat was a simple luxury. It represents the harmony associated with having something new and the new life that we, as a Catholic community, celebrate at Easter.
Long Service Leave:
I will be taking a period of Long Service Leave beginning on Monday 29 March. I will return to work following the Princial’s Retreat on Wednesday 5 May. During this time, Mrs Sharon Smithers will be Acting Principal.
NAPLAN ONLINE 2021:
The National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) is a point in time assessment of literacy and numeracy skills that are essential for every child to progress through school and life. Students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 participate in the annual NAPLAN tests in writing, reading, conventions of language (spelling, grammar and punctuation) and numeracy.
Our school will be participating in NAPLAN Online between 11 and 21 May 2021.
In preparation for NAPLAN Online, our school will also be participating in practice tests on Thursday 25 March 2021. The practice test is a trial-run and key preparation activity for NAPLAN Online in May. It is not an assessment of student ability and the tests will not be marked.
Excessive preparation for NAPLAN Online is not recommended. Students can use the public demonstration site (https://www.nap.edu.au/online-assessment/public-demonstration-site) to familiarise themselves with the types of questions and tools available in the NAPLAN Online tests.
Compulsory Parent/Caregiver Meeting Confirmation Programme, 2021
The Sacramental Programme for Confirmation will begin with the Parent Meeting on Wednesday 24 March and Thursday 25 March, 2021 6.30pm in the St John Vianney Co-Cathedral, Fairy Meadow.
Parents/caregivers must attend either one of these meetings to enrol their children for the Confirmation Programme. Please bring a copy of your child’s Baptism Certificate. The cost for administration and materials for the Confirmation Programme is $40.
Holy Week
Find ideas for families here: https://teachingcatholickids.com/holy-week-ideas-for-families/
Below is a Stations of the Cross for Children that you could use on Good Friday as a family reflection.
Father,
Help us to be like Jesus. Change our selfishness into self-giving and bring us to eternal life.
Amen.
The Solemnity of the Annunciation celebrates the coming of the Angel Gabriel to the Virgin Mary to announce to her the special mission God had chosen for her in being the mother of His only son.
Celebrating Holy Week and Easter
Next Wednesday, 31 March and Thursday, 1 April we will gather as a community to remember Jesus’ journey through Holy week and the joyous celebration of his rising at Easter. Some of the activities will be for Kindergarten or staff and students only. For some activities the whole school community is invited. Any limitations on parent participation are due to COVID-19 restrictions and while we love having our parents gather with us we are still bound by the square metre rule in how many people we can have indoors.
Please look below to see what is planned for our children and which activities some or all of our parent body are able to attend
Wednesday 31 March
Easter Raffle: 2:00pm
Location: Under the shade cloth on the Primary Playground
Participants: Students, staff and Parents (weather permitting)
Thursday 1 April
9:15 Kinder Craft Morning
Participants - Students and 1 parent from each family
Location - Kinder rooms
The day begins for Kindergarten and their parents with a Kinder craft morning commencing at 9:15am in the Kinder classrooms with one parent per child allowed to attend due to COVID 19 restrictions.
Thursday 1 April
11:40 Holy Week Liturgy
Participants: Students and staff only
Location: St John Vianney’s Church
The focus of the liturgy will be on Jesus' actions at the Last Supper when He demonstrated to the disciples how He wanted us all to live as people of service. He demonstrated this by washing the feet of his disciples. Jesus asked them,
“Do you understand what I have done?”
Go and do the same
Thursday 1 April
12:30 Easter Hat Parade
Participants: Students, parents and staff (weather permitting)
Location: Under the shade cloth on the primary playground
Get your creative ideas flowing. We had such a lovely time with our drive through hat parade in 2020 that we wanted to share in the fun again. All parents are invited to celebrate with us. Please don’t go to too much expense. This is just for fun. Each class will have the opportunity to parade their hats in front of the school.
Sunday 28 March - Sunday 4 april
Holy Week In Our Parish and Pastoral Region
Holy Week begins this Sunday with Palm Sunday. You are welcome to join your parish or any Church in your Pastoral Region to remember and pray the journey of Jesus. Please see the times below
|
Celebration |
St John Vianney’s Co-Cathedral Fairy Meadow |
St Francis Xavier’s Cathedral Wollongong |
St Brigid’s Gwynneville |
Mater Dolorosa Balgownie |
Palm Sunday |
Mass: 8:30am Mass: 10:00am (Italian Mass) Mass: 4:30pm (Vietnamese) |
Mass: 7:00am Mass: 10:30am MAss: 5:00pm |
Mass: 9:00am |
Mass: 10am Mass: 11.30am (Syro-Malabar) |
|
1 April Holy Thursday Mass of The Lord’s supper |
Mass: 6:00pm |
Mass: 7:00pm |
Mass: 5:00pm |
|
|
2nd April Good Friday Stations of the Cross |
Liturgy: 9:30am |
Liturgy: 10:00am |
Liturgy: 9:00am |
|
|
2 April Good Friday Passion of the Lord |
Liturgy: 3:00pm |
Liturgy: 3:00pm |
Liturgy: 3:00pm |
|
|
3 April Easter Vigil |
Mass: 6:00pm |
Mass: 7:00pm |
Mass: 5:30pm |
|
|
4 April Easter Sunday |
Mass: 8:30am |
Mass: 7:00am Mass: 10:30am Mass: 5:00pm |
Mass: 9:00am |
Mass: 10am |
Congratulations to our 2021 School Captains
&
Vice Captains!
Following a full review with students of the Good Samaritan Student Leadership structure we are very pleased to congratulate our School Captains:
Matisse Schettino & Christian Lopresti
Our congratulations is also extended to our Vice Captains:
Finley Cole
Mikayla Gaudiosi
Noah Kennedy
Evie Purcell
Cohen Vazey
Emma Wells
Premier’s Reading Challenge 2021
The Premier’s Reading Challenge officially began on 1 March.
All students from Kinder, Year 1 and Year 2 complete this challenge within their classrooms with their teachers.
Years 3 - 6 are challenged to complete it independently by the 20 August. All students from Years 3 - 6 will fill in the books they read using the online reading log. We are finalising log-in details for students this week. This has involved showing the students how to navigate the site and checking that log-in details provided worked. I am most grateful to Mrs Medina in her support with this.
Students can also use the Premier’s Reading Challenge site to explore books from the book lists that apply to their stage and remind themselves of the rules, especially for personal choice and series books.
As an extra incentive this year, we are going to be rewarding the class that has the most students complete the challenge with a class prize. It might be a pizza lunch, it might be popcorn and a movie, it might be……... it will definitely be a surprise. The small print of this is though that in each class EVERY student has to have borrowed and read 5 different books from their stage book list from the library. Mrs Medina and Mrs Cook will be checking the reading logs and library loan history to verify that the winning class has met this criteria.
CONGRATULATIONS
Congratulations to our first student to complete the Premier’s Reading Challenge for 2021, Issa From Year 5. Students are allowed to include books that they have read since last October and Issa has read a lot of the school holidays. Awesome work, Issa!
Now Mrs Cook has the challenge whether Issa can finish the Premier’s Reading Challenge twice. That means, can he read another 20 books, making a total of 40 books from the close of last year’s Premier’s Reading Challenge to the end of this year’s Premier’s Reading Challenge. We have only ever had one other student that was successful in trying this challenge and she is now in Year 9.
What’s been happening in YEAR 1
Year One has had an excellent start to 2021! Due to COVID, their first Year at Good Samaritan was a bit unusual to say the least, but now that restrictions have started to be eased, the students are enjoying lots of activities that are new to them that other grades may take for granted. Recently Year One participated in their first Cross Country Carnival, and they were very excited and did amazingly well! We also had a mini Olympics with lots of different activities (due to their age and the Summer Olympics being postponed many didn’t know what the Olympics were).
Now that students across stages can mix we can have Year Five Buddies!! It is wonderful to see the Year One and Year Five students interacting with each other. There are smiles all around and it is great to see everyone having a lovely time. Their Year Five buddies are so kind and friendly and it is wonderful to hear the words of encouragement and praise.
What’s been happening in YEAR 2
Year 2 Gold has been busy learning how to write simple and complex sentences correctly in their Writing lessons.
They have also been reading lots of different texts focusing on narrative structures and friendship themes. They wrote simple and complex sentences using adjectives to describe different parts of the Rainbow Fish story. They’ve also created some amazing artworks to accompany our writing.
In Mathematics, 2 Blue have been learning all about measuring length! They have been measuring and comparing the length of various items in the classroom using handspans, centimetres and metres.
Canteen News:
The Uniform Shop is now open on
Tuesday mornings 8.30am to 9.30am
Thursday afternoons 2pm to 3.15pm
Appointments Only
Winter Uniforms are now available
In order to manage the physical distancing requirements, parents will continue to make appointments at the uniform shop to purchase uniforms.
This can be done through the Compass Portal.
If you would like to place an order with the uniform shop an order form has been added to the school website under parents/uniform.
Please complete the form and return with payment to the school office.
These orders will be filled on uniform shop days.
On Monday Ava, Matisse, Gemma and Samantha represented Good Samaritan and the Wollongong Diocese at the MacKillop Swimming event.
The girls came 1st in their event and will now head to PSSA State Swimming Championships.
In addition, Gemma will compete in the 50m and 100m freestyle and Matisse will compete in the 50m breaststroke PSSA State Swimming Championships.
PB4L Day
On Friday we had our first PB4L day celebrating all the great things that are happening at GSFM and explicitly reteaching PB4L routines & expectations. Each grade had the opportunity to unpack their understanding of respect and consent, then explored 5 Social Norms that help support respectful interactions on our playground. After this, the whole school had an opportunity to model these behaviours while playing respectfully on the playground.
These are our GSFM Social Norms for our Playground
Social Norm #1: Meet and greet politely.
- Say greetings, introductions, and goodbyes.
- Politely offer and receive compliments.
- Be able to start and finish conversations.
Social Norm #2: Take turns talking.
- Listen when others are speaking and look them in the eye.
- Wait if adults are talking.
- Respond appropriately and at the right time.
Social Norm #3: Pay attention to others.
- Stop what you’re doing so you can listen.
- Read people’s emotions through their body language and facial expressions.
- Change your behaviour to match what other people are doing, such as quieting down with the rest of the room.
Social Norm #4: Think about others before acting.
- Ask for consent.
- Respect personal space.
- Wait your turn.
- Stand a comfortable distance away when talking.
Social Norm #5: Cooperate with others.
- Follow directions when you’re asked to.
- Ask for help when you need it.
- Apologise when necessary.
- Be flexible and open to new ideas.
FROM THE SCHOOL HANDBOOK:
The school newsletter/bulletin is the major form of consistent communication between the school and parents/carers. The newsletter is the means by which the school acknowledges all that is done within classrooms at the grade, class or individual level, on playgrounds and within the community.
It is also an opportunity for me, as Principal, to reflect on our community and how we can work toward further improving all that we do. As a Catholic school principal it is most important that this is done within the context of our faith, hence the references that are written to the Sunday Mass readings, theological reflections or information about spirituality. This is one aspect that works toward keeping the Catholicity of our school at the front of our minds.
The newsletter is the place from which the school is able to ensure that parents, and the community, have a good understanding of the processes and procedures of the school. This is done through reminders, excerpts from the School Handbook, publication of School Policies etc. Some may feel that this is unnecessary but in any school it is most important that we maintain as much consistency as possible. This helps to ensure a safe and supportive environment for all within the school.
For some parents the newsletter is the only contact that they have with the school. This may be due to work commitments or to family/personal circumstances so the newsletter has to cover a wide audience hence, some parents may feel that certain aspects of the newsletter may not be needed or be relevant. However, they may just be aspects that are of great relevance to another parent or family.
I continue to encourage parents to read the newsletter regularly to know what is happening within the school.
P&F News
March
- Monday 22 March - Year 6 Student Leadership Day with Cameron
- Tuesday 23 March - Touch Football Trials
- Tuesday 23 March - Touch Football Trials
- Thursday 25 March - Year 5 St Joseph Liturgy with Fr Bernard
- Friday 26 March - Easter Egg Raffle returns due
- Monday 29 March - Holy Week Begins daVinci Decathlon
April
- Holy Thursday 1 April - Last Day Term 1 - Easter Hat Parade -12.30pm
- Friday 2 April - Good Friday
- Sunday 4 April - Easter Sunday
- Monday 5 April - Easter Monday
- Monday 19 April - First Day Term 2
- Tuesday 20 April - Easter Liturgy in the Co-Cathedral (Students & Staff)
- Thursday 22 April - School Photos
- Friday 23 April - ANZAC Day Prayer
- Tuesday 27 April -Diocesan Cross Country
May
- Monday-Tuesday 3-4 May Principals’ Overnight Retreat
- Thursday 6 May Mother’s Day Liturgy
- Monday 10 May P&F Meeting 7pm School Hall
- Friday 7 May Mother’s Day Stall
- Tuesday- 1-20 May NAPLAN testing
- Friday 21 May PUPIL FREE DAY Students do not attend school on this day
- Saturday 22-Sunday 23 May Confirmation Weekend
- Sunday 23 May Pentecost
- Monday-Friday 24- 28May Screens Down Week
- Wednesday 26 May -National Sorry Day
CEDoW School Director Peter Hill visit to GSFM
- Monday 31 May Reconciliation Week
June
- Thurday 3 June MABO Day
- Monday 7 June GSFM Athletics Carnival
- Tuesday 11 June Term 2 PB4L Day (Mufti Day)
- Monday 14 June Queen’s Birthday Long Weekend
- Tuesday 15 June Sth Coast Netball Gala Day
- Friday 18 June Semester One Reports distributed to Parents
- Monday-Friday 21-25 June Parent Teacher Interview Week
- Friday 25 June Term 2 concludes
TERM 3 DATES:
JULY:
- Wednesday 12 July Feast of St Benedict
- Thursday 16 July Grandparent’s Day
AUGUST:
- Tuesday 3 August Sth Coast Region Athletics
- Thursday -Friday 5-6 August Year 6 Camp
- Monday 8 August Feast of St Mary of the Cross MacKillop
SEPTEMBER:
- Friday 3 september - Father’s Day Breakfast & Prayer
Father’s Day Stall
- Monday 6 September Students return to wearing Summer Uniforms
- Wednesday-Thursday 8-9 September Assistant Principal Overnight Retreat
- Thursday-Friday 9-10 September Basketball Gala Days (Junior & Senior)
- Monday 13 September MacKillop Athletics Carnival
- Friday 17 September Term 3 Concludes