Hello, and welcome to the monthly Principal's blog. In this post, I reflect on the exciting end to 2022, discuss the first week of 2023 and provide an overview of what lies ahead for RGS in 2023.
Wrapping Up 2022
The end of 2022 was a wonderful time of celebration and excitement with our first ever end of year Celebration Assembly as well as a special school performance at the Upper Hunter Christmas Spectacular event.
Our inaugural Celebration Assembly took place at 9am on Friday December 9, where we were able to allocate a leadership role to all students in the school. This involved speaking as part of the formal assembly run sheet, involvement in a STEM presentation, assisting with the distribution of the awards and prizes, in addition to singing the National Anthem and School Song. All students did incredibly well.
Awards presented included one award per class for Music, STEM, Growth, and Effort, as well as an award for School Spirit, awarded to just one student at school.
Thank you to everyone who was able to attend our Celebration Assembly. Congratulations to our award recipients and to every student for their achievements throughout the year.
Images: 2022 RGS Celebration Assembly (Image Credit: Alyssa Bestmann)
Commencing 2023
This week we have welcomed our students back to school, with Year 1, 2, and 3 commencing on Monday, and Kindergarten on Wendesday. Kindergarten will have an earlier finish time for the first 2 weeks of school as they ease into their new learning environment.
Image: Day 1, Term 1, 2023 - Whole school singing with Mr English and Mrs Sherringham.
I would like to give another warm welcome to our two new fantastic full-time staff to RGS this year; Mrs Tara Stanford teaching Year 2/3, and Mrs Susanne Goodhew our Student Learning Support Officer (SLSO).
WelcomING our new Kindergarten Students
We are pleased to have 19 students enrolled in Kindergarten this year, almost double our enrolment of 10 Kindergarten students the year prior. On Wednesday, all 19 Kindergarten students arrived for their first day, with Miss Presland. Congratulations to all of our brave children and families for the important milestone of starting ‘big school’ and the first day of your educational journey at Richard Gill School. It is such an exciting and emotional time for everyone. We look forward to seeing the students grow and thrive throughout the year and beyond.
Image: 2023 RGS Kindergarten Class and Families
School Improvements
We are hopeful of making further improvements to the school this year, dependent on grant funding, including new playground equipment and improved bus accessibility. Stay tuned for more information about these as the year progresses.
Assemblies and sports carnivals are other new additions to our growing school in 2023, which we are excited to introduce to our RGS community.
Upcoming pROGRAMS AND events
Term 1 features lots of exciting events at RGS, including:
Commencing our Year 3 Cello program with Mrs Gillian Miles from the Upper Hunter Conservatorium of Music
Image: Year 3 Cello program with Mrs Gillian Miles from the UHCM
Clean up Australia Day – Friday March 3
Swimming Carnival – Friday March 10
Upper Hunter Show/Bullying No Way Day – Friday March 17
Enrolment
Enrolment is open to Year 1, Year 2, and Year 3 students in 2023, and a waitlist is in place for Kindergarten 2023. To enrol or join our waitlist, please contact the school.
Enrolments for Richard Gill School are always open. Our prospectus, enrolment form, parent info and fee information can be found here.
Media
Talk about Artificial Intelligence (AI) and particularly ChatGPT has been surging through education publications in January, and I began exploring the technology myself whilst on holiday early in the New Year. Please see below a link to the blog post I wrote about this exciting technology on January 11.
AI in Education - Christopher English, Educational Musings Blog
More research which supports the importance of music in education for improving results across all subject areas.
How to improve the school results: not extra maths but music, loads of it - Josh Halliday, The Guardian
Welcome back, and thank you for your ongoing support.
Yours in Music,
Chris English – Principal, Richard Gill School
Richard Gill School is a primary School with a musical focus, based in Muswellbrook, NSW. Find out more…