Principal’s Message – Semester 1 Reflection

With the beginning of Semester 2 on Tuesday the 24th of June, it’s nearing the end of our Year 7s first Semester of high school, my first Semester at BSC, and in contrast, our Year 12 students are about to enter their final, and, in many ways, most important semester of secondary schools. These milestones offer a great opportunity to pause and reflect.

Our Year 7s have transitioned from Primary school and have now settled into the hustle and bustle of a Secondary School, things that once felt difficult, opening their combination padlock, reading their timetable, finding their way around the school, ordering lunch at the canteen, remembering the names of their many teachers have now been normalised, routine and it’s hard to remember why they may have been overwhelming in the first place.

Our Year 12s have completed significant milestones during this semester, in particular, they’ve navigated rite of passage events like their School Formal and their recently completed GAT (General Assessment Task). It won’t be long before they’re signing each others shirts, celebrating their last day of school, and preparing for their exams and post-school destinations.

At a personal level, like our Year 7s, many tasks that were once challenging are now routine, which enables me to work more efficiently and take on greater responsibility. Most importantly though, I’ve become more familiar with our students, parents and carers, staff and other stakeholders. I have greater understanding of values and expectations of our school community.

I’m looking forward to the beginning of Semester 2, it’s an opportunity for our students to make a fresh start with some new subjects and perhaps, some new teachers, it’s an opportunity for students to apply their learnings and the feedback that they’ve been given to continue their growth and development.

Throughout Semester 2, our staff will be developing our knowledge and understanding of the Victorian Teaching and Learning Model 2.0 (VTLM 2.0), which is being rolled out by the Department of Education, with all Government Schools being expected to implement it fully by 2028.

The VTLM 2.0 is has 4 Elements of Learning:

Attention, focus and regulation
Knowledge and memory
Retention and recall
Mastery and application

It also has 4 Elements of Teaching:

Planning
Enabling learning
Explicit teaching
Supported application

The first steps in our roll out are to design an Instructional Model, which is an agreed approach to teaching that will be adopted by all teachers and our Positive Classroom Management Strategies which will see greater clarity and intentionality in lifting the expectations in all classrooms.

This work will be move slowly and intentionally so that the impact will be sustained and impactful, but when it comes time to reflect on our year at the end of Semester 2, there will be evidence of improved practice which will be sustained and built on in 2026.

Congratulations to all students on a wonderful Semester 1, enjoy a restful and well earned break when our holidays begin in a couple of weeks.

Peter Langham

Principal

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