Goulburn North Public School Newsletter

Goulburn North is in the process of constructing our 2024 classes. We are changing our naming convention in 2024. All classes will be known as a particular 'Gem Stone' with the collective term of 'Northern Gems' to describe the entire school. 

A gem stone begins its life as a piece of mineral often in a crystallised state. These crystals are cut and collected, then shaped and polished into beautiful shapes that often are used in jewellery. This is very much like our aim at school, we work with every student and help shape and guide their time at school. We hope that all students evolve into brilliant and bright members of society ready to make a fantastic contribution as the leaders of tomorrow.

So when you hear your child say they are a member of 'Diamond' in 2024, this just our new naming convention. We are so keen to see what our 'Northern Gems' will do in the new school year. No doubt we will have some amazing experiences, memorable stories and fantastic learning experiences as we journey through 2024.

This term we have seen some adjustments to the school exit arrangements. Our side gates have been closed and students are now exiting from the rear gate. We appreciate that this has caused some issues and we are exploring options for improvement moving forward. 

We are also exploring some options with Goulburn Mulwaree Council for improving safety in Soho Lane. More information will follow when we have had these discussions with Council.

Our term has now seen quite a few students not adhering to the School Mobile Phone policy. We have now had to impose a ban on several students from bringing their mobile phones to school. 

We ask our community to once again, please discuss the school Phone Policy and guidelines. Please talk about how this applies to their children. 

Please also consider if your child actually requires a mobile phone whilst at school. If phones were not brought to school, these guidelines would not be required. If your child does not need a phone for the trip to and from school, we recommend keeping these devices at home.

Policy and Guidelines are found below.

Presentation Days will be held as follows:

K-2: Wednesday 6 December

3-6: Thursday 7 December

All members of the school and community are invited to attend.

Thursday 14 December

We now have 3 amazing volunteers to assist with Ethics Education in 2024. We still need someone to support with the management of the program and someone to support with Coordination. All training is provided. Please keep in mind that a teacher will be present to support with lessons. If you are in a position to support with this program, please contact the office and we will connect you with the Ethics Australia team. 

Sun Safety

You can protect your child from the damaging effects of UV radiation by:

• applying sunscreen each morning before they leave for school
• ensuring they are wearing a sun-safe hat
• packing sunglasses for your child to wear at school to protect their eyes from sun damage.

Slip, Slop, Slap, Seek AND Slide

• Slip on a shirt
• Slop on the 30+ sunscreen
• Slap on a hat
• Seek shade or shelter
• Slide on some sunnies.

Follow the link below for more information.

This information is taken from the ‘Digital Lives of Teens’ report compiled by the eSafety Commissioner (2020).

State of Play

• Teens spent an average of 14.4 hours a week online (boys 15 hours, girls 13.8 hours)
• Teens used an average of four different socia media services
• Top social media services were YouTube (72% of respondents), Instagram (57%) and Facebook (52%). The trend for these services has gone down since 2017. TikTok has had substantial growth in Australia (12% of respondents in 2017 compared to 38% in 2020).

Negative Experiences

• Just over four in 10 teens had at least one negative experience in the six months to September 2020.
• This increased to five in 10 for those aged 14 17
• These negative experiences included being contacted by a stranger (30%), receiving inappropriate content (20%), social exclusion (16%), receiving online abuse (15%) and having things said online to damage a student's reputation (15%)
• Almost one third (30%) said that their negative online experience related to bullying that occurred at school.

Digital lives of Aussie teens | eSafety Commissioner

The Cricket Blast clinic has been running now for 3 week, with next week being its last week. The students who have attended have enjoyed a well structured clinic teaching them the fundamental skills to play cricket.

All the feedback from students have been positive. They have really enjoyed the experience and it is certainly one we hope to offer the students again.

Have an amazing birthday!!!

Friday 17 November POSTPONED

We apologise for the short notice. Our whole school gathering this week we used for School Captain Speeches. To maintain continuity of learning we are postponing our whole school assembly this week. 

Additional assemblies for Term 4 will be held on the following date:

• Wednesday 6 December - K-2 Presentation Day commencing at 12.15pm
• Thursday 7 December - 3-6 Presentation Day commencing at 12.15pm.

This term 1L have been learning about music by focusing on how sound is made, how we can make different types of sound and how we can produce sounds on musical instruments. We made paddle pop stick harmonicas and experimented with the position of the paper strip to see how this affects the pitch of the sound produced. They had a great time learning how to produce sound on their harmonica.

Our Indonesian teachers have arrived.

5/6L and NLB are lucky to have some visitors to their classroom this week all the way from Indonesia, Pak Bayu and Ibu Devi.

They will be visiting other classes around the school to see how the Australian education system works, as well as teaching their traditional dance and culture. 

We look forward to sharing with you all the experiences shared.

Northern Lights Sky have been settling into our new classroom and getting to know each other. We have been focusing on social skills and building relationships through purposeful play. 

We have also been working on letter sound recognition, we have been doing this through sensory play tasks. This week we used the playdough to roll out all the letters in our names. This also assisted with our fine motor skills.  

Northern Lights Blue have continued with hands on and project based learning throughout Term 4. From creating paper mache buckets to reaping the rewards in our vegetable garden with fresh lettuce and strawberries. Students have engaged in cooking lessons which link to mathematics, science, and English with our most recent recipe being scones. Goulburn North Public School is also fortunate enough to have teachers visiting us from Indonesia next week and Northern Lights Blue will be making and sharing some 'Aussie foods' with them such as fairy bread, vegemite toast, and ice cream spiders.

Our meetings have now changed to Weeks 4 and Week 8 each term. This will mean that our next meeting will be held on:

Monday 27 November in the Staff Room at 6pm.

We hope that you can come along and join in with the team.

The P&C is also excited to announce the purchase of a 12 month subscription for Mathletics for every student at our school, as well as a 12 month subscription for Reading Eggs for all infant students. This was a wonderful request from our staff and we are happy to support them and the students of our school. The P&C storage shed is now fully complete and equipped with lighting ready for Fireworks Night 2024 preparations! It’s that time of year when we are putting together a new Fireworks Committee to begin organising the 2024 event. We are sad to see some of our long standing members leave us this year as they move on to high school next year with their children and grandchildren. We wish them the best of luck and thank them for their generous ongoing support and efforts over the years. But with every sad goodbye we are very excited to welcome new faces to join us and help out in any way they can big or small. More info on how you can get involved will be sent home soon. 

The P&C meet at 6.30pm on Monday’s of week 4 and 8 each term in the school staffroom. We welcome new and casual members and would love to see you there!

• Updated Student Details
• Stage 3 Camp forms and payments
• Year 6 Big Day Out forms and payment.