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Welcome to 2019 School Year!
Welcome back to a very wet and rainy start to the 2019 school year. We have had a wonderful start to our school year. When walking around the school and visiting classrooms over the past two weeks it has been evident that our students have a very clear understanding of our four values; being respectful, being responsible, being a learner and being safe, and the expectations from our school matrix that align with these values. Our classrooms have been productive, with students calm and engaged in learning. It is great to see how happy all our students are being back at school. I would to commend our students on their behaviour over the past two weeks. With all the wet weather, our students have done a magnificent job of staying calm during all the inside lunch and play times. I would like to take this opportunity to welcome back families who are returning to Bowen State School and to welcome all our new students and families. Thank you to all our parents and caregivers for your exceptional organisation in ensuring your child is at school every day and fully prepared with all the resources required for learning, we understand what a huge job this is in the lead up to the start of the school year.
Joining the Bowen State School staff this year
We would like to welcome Miss Awhina Ross (Year 5/6C) and Mr Ben Seago (Year 5B) to our teaching team this year. We are also extremely lucky to have Mrs Emma Daley (Year 2A) returning to our teaching staff after taking maternity leave over the past few years. Miss Kelly Gorham has taken over as our Head of Inclusion in 2019 and Mr Trevor Flaherty (Learning Engagement Teacher) has returned to our school in a new role after supporting Merinda State School in Term 4 of 2018. As a school community, we are extremely fortunate to welcome these staff to our school.
2019 School Priorities
Our improvement agenda is set out in our endorsed 2019 – 2022 Strategic Plan. In 2019 our school improvement priorities will be documented in our Annual Implementation Plan (AIP). The AIP will be presented and discussed at our first P&C meeting for any interested parents, caregivers or community
members. This year our priorities are:
- Quality Teaching in English and Maths – This remains a focus so we can continue to see the amazing growth and improvements achieved. As a school, we continue to have a clear focus on the teaching of reading, writing and mathematics and the pedagogical practices that we use throughout our teaching to ensure that all students achieve to the best of their ability.
- Student and Community Engagement– We will continue to prioritise work as a school community through our work with:
- Student wellbeing – providing students with support through the teaching of Social and Emotional Learning, programming (Rock and Water, lunch activities, check-in’s, breakfast club, boys group, ALIVE), our full time CEC, Rainer Power and Chaplain, Adam Goode
- Attendance – As a school we will continue to strive for 93% attendance. We want to ensure that our students are at school every day. We will continue to promote attendance every week through our school parades, classroom tracking charts, five weekly attendance awards, yearly attendance awards and class attendance awards.
- PBL (Positive Behaviour for Learning) – Teachers will continue to teach PBL lessons weekly with a focus on the four values of our school; being respectful, responsible, safe and learners, which will continue to be shared during our Friday morning parade. Our students will continue to engage in reward activities each term and will be awarded GOTCHA’s for following the four values of the school.
- Community Engagement – The school looks to continue to build on our work in how we communicate effectively with our school community. We will continue our strong relationship with the P & C, and look forward to seeing many new faces at our first meeting next week on Monday the 11th of February at 6pm in the school library.
- Implementation of the Australian Curriculum – As a school we will be continuing our work of aligning our school curriculum and documents with version 8 of the Australian curriculum, to ensure a clear vision for full implementation by 2020.
Uniforms
Thank you to everyone for having our children so well prepared for the start of the school year. Children need to be correctly dressed for school every day. As a reminder:
- Formal Uniform - is expected to be worn on Friday for parades, for any whole of school event and when children leave the school for excursions. The Bowen State School Uniform is the blue BSS shirt, black shorts/shorts/skirt, closed in shoes (trainers), BSS hat
- Sports uniform – can be worn Monday – Thursday. The Bowen State School sports uniform is our Denison/Leichardt/Sinclair shirt (can be purchased from the tuckshop), black shorts/shorts/skirt, closed in shoes (trainers), BSS hat
- Instrumental uniform – for students participating in our instrumental program, the instrumental shirt is to be worn on Thursday.
Wearing our uniform shows pride in our school readably identifies our students and helps with overall safety of children at school and on the way to and from home.
I look forward to another brilliant year at Bowen State School.
Jemille Malouf
Principal
From the Deputy
Welcome to 2019!
It is with great excitement that I, Ms Malouf and the Staff at Bowen State School welcome you and your family to our brilliant Bowen State School Community. We feel privileged to have you join (and for some, re-join) our school. We look forward to an amazing year of learning and achievements.
Term 1 Student Free Days (22nd – 25th January)
During the Student Free Days of 2019, our teaching staff engaged in a range of professional development. We focussed 2 of our 4 days on our yearly mandatory training, school processes and procedures and goal setting for the 2019 school year. We then spent the following 2 days with colleagues at Bowen High School learning about the Visible Teaching, Visible Learning and the current research regarding the highest impact teaching strategies.
P & C - 11th February (1st Meeting)
We invite all parents and family members of our Bowen State School community to share their voice and opinion as a member of our P&C. The P&C is a group of hardworking parents who volunteer their time to enhance the educational and extra-curricula opportunities for all children at Bowen State School. Participation in our P&C is a great way to be more involved in your child’s education and our great school.
We hope to see you at our first meeting.
Stay up to date
Ensuring you are up to date with our school information and events is very important to us as we value your role in our Bowen State School Community.
Facebook: Bowen State School Facebook page is updated regularly. Please Like & Follow our page to ensure you receive the most up to date information.
Newsletter: Our newsletter is published fortnightly with key information, a calendar of events and photos of our students learning. Newsletters are emailed, published on our Facebook page and uploaded to our school website. Contact the office to be added to the email list.
Website: Our website contains current policy documents and information regarding our school.
1A
In this photo, one of our groups is sorting different objects according to the material they are made of. Can your child give you a definition for object, material and property?
2A
This term students are examining the properties of several materials. They will be conducting tests to determine their properties and how best to use them in different situations. At the end, they will create a lunch box by combining different materials. Each child will need a couple of different sized recycled boxes for this activity. (Please don’t send these in yet.)
In this photo, one of our groups is sorting different objects according to the material they are made of. Can your child give you a definition for object, material and property?
3A
3A have had the best start to the school year! We have set our classroom expectations and enjoyed getting know each other through fun games. We wrote recount of our holidays and spent time doing some yarning circles and school routines and transitions.6A
The student support team: Chaplain Adam Goode, Community Education Counsellor (CEC) Rainer Power and Guidance Officer Danielle Upkett welcome you all to 2019!
Our office has moved location. You can now find us in G10, straight opposite the office at the other end of the parade ground with the new hard top cover that is in progress.
We would like to start with a shout out to everyone for their patience with the rain! How amazing have our students coped with the new school year and ‘wet weather play’ …. It is extremely challenging going from the freedom of the holidays to a very contained environment indoors thanks to mother nature. Our staff have coped with this confinement with patience and calmness also! If you are looking for some movement activities for your child at home check out these ‘animal walks’ below to burn some energy and meet the sensory needs of our kids.
The student support has much exciting news to share regarding our plans for 2019.
- Boys group: fostering resilience and leadership in boys will continue for senior students on Wednesday after school, letters will be out soon.
- Rock and Water will be continuing with the year 6’s in our new Social Emotional Learning (SEL) time on Mondays
- Rock and Water will also be introduced to the junior sport rotation on a Monday afternoon
- Cultural Awareness lunch time group will kick off Wednesday lunch times next week where students can connect through stories, dance, song, yarning.
- A new group: Alternate Learning in Various Environments ALIVE has been created by Chappy Adam and will kick off this term for a targeted group
- Social Skills in Sport (SSS) will continue on Friday afternoons for our senior students that need extra skills
- PCYC Re-Engagement Program will kick off a target group of year 5 boys.
- Rewards, check-ins, mentoring and counselling will resume as our core business.
- Continued membership of the Bowen Youth Network Group (BYNG)
- Staff Wellbeing is another focus for our whole school community now and in the future.
Please stop and say hi or don’t hesitate to contact the school if we can support you in anyway.
Have a fabulous weekend!
Mrs Upkett, Chappy Adam and Mr Power
We welcome Mr Jason Osman, our Instrumental Teacher for 2019, to Bowen State School. He is very keen to get the program up and running. Instrumental students- please ensure all paperwork is returned and invoices are paid promptly. We hope to have a great year with plenty of performance opportunities for you all.
Our school choir practice is going to be held on Wednesday’s at first lunch break. Singing in a choir has many benefits. Check out this article to find out what they are. http://theconversation.com/choir-singing-improves-health-happiness-and-is-the-perfect-icebreaker-47619
Please encourage students who love to sing to become a choir member.
The sporting calendar has been set and is looking very promising this year.
To get the ball rolling, students who are 10 (or turning 10), 11 or 12 will be able to sign up for Netball, Rugby League, and Touch Football at the start of next week.
School trials will begin during lunch times with dates to be announced (weather pending). Successful students will then head onto the Bowen Sub-District Trials. If your child is selected to attend trials more information will be provided in terms of times and venues.
Upcoming Bowen Sub-District trials are as follows:
Netball-Wednesday February 27th 2019
Rugby League-Wednesday February 27th 2019
Touch Football- Wednesday February 20th 2019
If your child is interested in taking part any of these sporting events please have them visit Miss. Horvath for training times and/or permission forms.
During 2019, Bowen State School will implement the ACARA Technologies Curriculum in all year levels.
The Australian Curriculum: Technologies, describes two distinct but related subjects:
* Design and Technologies, and
* Digital Technologies
Through exploration, design and problem-solving, students will learn how digital and other technologies work, and how to create solutions with technologies.
Design and Technologies
Students will:
* design and safely make a product, for example, create a musical instrument or toy using recycled materials.
* use materials or technologies when designing, producing and evaluating solutions, for example, a plan for a new kitchen garden.
Digital Technologies
Students will:
* represent data as pictures, symbols and diagrams
* break down a problem into parts and sequence the steps in finding a solution, for example, controlling a toy with digital technologies
* identify and learn how to follow safety rules when working online
* create a range of digital solutions, such as coding simple interactive games.
Our school has introduced the use of payment boxes for the deposit of payment envelopes. There are 2 payment boxes located in the Administration Office. One for school payment envelopes and one for P&C payment envelopes. All students, parents and staff are encouraged to utilise these boxes to assist in keeping all money coming into the school safe.
For easy online ordering just register at the link below or contact flexischools on 1300 361 769.
Alternatively, you can collect further information from the ladies at the tuckshop.