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Parent & Community Engagement
Parent and community engagement is the interaction between schools, families and the wider community and the degree to which they are involved in the educational lives of the children (Constantino, 2006).
You and your family are vital to our school and the support you provide to our students ensures they continue to progress. A big thankyou to the Bowen State School Staff and Families for supporting Harmony Day, what an amazing showcase of our students and our diverse family backgrounds (not to mention delicious treats!).
Each Term we have numerous opportunities for you to be an active member of our school community. We encourage you to take part in any or all of the below events.
Term 1 Date Claimers
Badge Parade – 29th March @ 8:50am.
Cross Country / Splash & Dash –4th April from 9:00am.
Easter Bonnet Parade – 5th April @ 8:50am
Term 2 Date Claimers
Athletics Carnival – 26th April @ Sporting Complex from 8:50am
2019 P & C Fete – Saturday 15th June
Communities of Practice
In 2018, our school was selected to work with representatives from both regional and central office around successful transitions from Kindy through to Year 2. We were selected due to the strength of our current practice within the school and throughout the Bowen Cluster. We are continuing this work throughout 2019 with a specific focus on strengthening students Oral Language skills.
We are providing students with a range of activities to engage in within the classroom, in small groups and one on one. Below are some photos of some of our Prep students practicing their oral language skills. Keep up the great work Prep Students!
Facilities
We have been very excited for the completion of our Parade Ground, some finishing touches are planned to occur throughout the Easter Holidays. We also have a lift being built near the office and have recently secured funding for a refurbishment of our music room. Thank you for your patience during the completion of these works.
Have a great Week 9!
Kind regards,
Jemille Malouf
PBL News
We have had an amazing start to the year with our PBL Team who have been very productive busy continuing on our work from 2018.
Our Team has:
- Created a Bowen State School PBL Handbook for our staff which outlines how we implement PBL throughout the school
- Purchased a range of new GOTCHA rewards for 2019 including: pencils, rulers, handballs and water bottles
- Drafted our 2019 PBL Action Plan
- Engaged in PBL Training
- Hosted 2 rewards session
- Planned our End of Term Rewards Session
If you are interested in being a Parent Representative on our PBL Team, please contact me on 4786 9555.
Attendance
We have had a wonderful start to the year with our attendance. It is so exciting to have students here at school each and every day to see their development in both their learning and in their social development.
We currently have 50% of our school population attending school between 95% - 100% which is a brilliant start to 2019. I hope we can continue to increase the number of students attending at this rate in Term 2.
Unfortunately, we currently have 18% of our school population who have an attendance rate of less than 85%. This equates to missing 11 or more days in Term 1. We have also noticed a number of students who are arriving late at school, some days giving out more than 15 lates slips per morning. This can also impact on your child’s attendance.
I will be speaking with individual parents over coming weeks and into Term 2 to discuss how we can support increased attendance throughout the remainder of 2019.
1A
2A
Our class has just completed writing a narrative. We read the book Lucy Goosey by Margaret Wild and then wrote our own stories about Lucy Goosey. Students needed to include expanded noun groups, evaluative language such as feelings and compound sentences in their stories. We have now started looking at writing alternate character descriptions based on fairy tale characters. Early next term we will present a character description to the class.
3A
3A have been working tirelessly on extending our vocabulary to make our narratives engaging to the reader. We are becoming experts on language features such as, noun groups and verb types. We also use our scientific language word bank to explain how night and day occur. In Maths, we can correctly order notes and coins based on their value.
4A
This term, Year 4 students have been learning about erosion in Science. The unit is called “Here Today, Gone Tomorrow” and is about the importance of preventing erosion. Mr Cookson, who is an agronomist, made a special visit to share an experiment with the Year 4 students and talk to them about the importance of our land, soil and reef and how we can look after them. Ileana who is in the photo, helped her father make the experiment and grow the grass. The experiment highlighted the difference between rain on soil with ground cover, compared to rain on soil without any cover. The students discussed the outcomes of the experiment and enjoyed leanring about Mr Cookson’s career path to becoming a scientist.
5A
In HASS students are learning to represent places and selected characteristics on a map. Also describing the relative location of Mexico and Sweden.
6A
Students in 6A have been working on some early algebra problems. To encourage them to show their working, they are given the correct answer and must show/explain how the answer is found. Using this method often forces students to try a range of strategies in order to come to the correct response. It also generates valuable discussion. The answer to this problem is ten. See if you can figure out how it works. HINT: Look closely at the number of choc chips, the number of bananas, and the hands on the clocks. Oh, and don't forget your order of operations rules!
| Week 7 | |
| PA | Franzelle Barano |
| PB | Kovy Boers |
| Prep/1C | Aiden Halloran |
| 1A | Karissa Wills |
| 1/2B | Tobias Watego |
| 2A | Matilda Royal |
| 2C | Keyan Burley |
| 3A | Reuben Jorgensen |
| 3B | Michael Teale |
| 3C | Ryker Boers |
| 4A | Kelly Medhurst |
| 4B | Alexander McDonald |
| 4/5C | Mia Sanderson |
| 5A | Ryder Hatelie |
| 5B | Gigi Wallis-Hage |
| 5/6C | William Otto |
| 6A | Maureen San Pedro |
| Week 8 | |
| PA | Kaylee Symonds |
| Prep/1C | Javarne Hamilton |
| 1A | Logan Pollard |
| 1/2B | Isaac Crook |
| 2A | Callum Weicks |
| 2C | Murphy Aitken |
| 3A | Reygan Anthony |
| 3B | Mia Saxelby |
| 4A | Callum Peebles |
| 4/5C | Malachi Ashlin |
| 5A | Erin Romeo |
| 5/6C | Hannah Sherwood |
| 6A | Hannah Racz |
| 6B | Flynn Sawdy |
We will be hosting our Inter-house Cross Country trials on Thursday April 4th at Bowen State School. The event will kick off at 9:15 am on the Gregory street oval and run for the morning session. Details and times will be sent home closer to the date.
Cross Country will be followed by our first annual Colour Splash & Dash event during the middle session. Students will need a light coloured shirt and a change of shorts to change into prior to the event.
We are fundraising to provide all play areas with sporting equipment (below) for students during lunch time.
Families and friends are more than welcome and encouraged to come out and support all participants throughout the day.
Sub-District Trails
Congratulations to students who represented Bowen Sub District at the Whitsunday Touch Football Trials last week; Shanae Murdock, Emma Samuels, Dakota Richards, Rashawn Watego and Denan Lavaring.
Special mention to Shanae, who was successful in making the Whitsunday Touch Football Team. Good luck at the North Queensland Trials at the end of March!
Mark your calendars
Bowen State School Sports Carnival will be held on Friday April 26th 2019 (Term 2 Week 1) at the Sporting Complex. Information and permission forms will be sent out closer to the date.
We had a very successful Book Fair. We have just over $800 worth of new books, as well as many posters and stationary items for Reading Hub prizes. Scholastic are very generous with commission rates and are very easy to work with in organizing our Book Fairs. Thank you to our student helpers, families who purchased and Scholastic.
Library Borrowing
We expect all students to be borrowing from our library. Reading is so important and students need a large selection so they can find books that interest them and maintain their willingness to read. They are able to ask me where to find books on topics that are of interest. Classes have a library borrowing time during the week. They can usually borrow at first break (Monday to Thursday) unless I need to be somewhere else.
Students are expected to look after these books and return them within the 2 week loan period. If books are lost or damaged, families are requested to pay for the replacement of the book.
Library Bags
Students in Prep to Year 3 must have a library bag so they can borrow. Students from Year 4 are strongly encouraged to also use their bag from last year.
New bags
Sometimes, students forget their library bag. I would like to have a supply of bags that can be lent out and returned later (similar to the Boomerang Bags project in many communities). I feel it is important for children to be able to borrow as often as possible. For this to work, I will need volunteers who could sew them (parents, grandparents, other community members) and donations of material.
Beth Harrison
(Library Co-ordinator)
Thanks to all the students and parents who have put all their forms in. The band is rehearsing each Thursday on 1st break and our first performance for the year will be on Harmony Day. A few of our groups will be playing on parades over the next few weeks and showing what they have learned.
Beginners – about this time of year students start to find some difficulties learning or practicing. This is known as ‘the wall’ which is where the students have a difficulty they need to overcome - most students will hit it. If they keep working at their instrument they will be able to overcome the problems, it just takes a little bit of patience.
Reading music – reading music is one of the things students find hardest at first. Don’t worry too much if your child has difficulty with this – I couldn’t read music up until year 8 due to a hyperactivity problem (along with a few others issues). Be patient with reading music – it will improve little by little with time, experience and practice.
Yours in Music,
Jason Osman
Instrumental Music Program students are provided an initial supply of instrument consumables at the start of every school year.
Replacement instrumental consumables are available for purchase from the administration office. Please refer to the price list below.
Clarinet Reeds = $3.50
Saxaphone Reeds = $4.50
Valve Oil = $10.00
Bowen State School celebrated National Day of Action Against Bullying again this year with our trademark orange hands, orange face paint to symbolise our stand against bullying and violence.
Our captains lead the school community in the pledge:
* I pledge to stand up to violence and bullying by saying “STOP, I don’t like it!” in a strong voice.
* Then walking away and ignoring. If it continues I will TALK to a staff member straight away.
* I will not watch others be bullied and will use this strategy to support them if needed.
* Bullying and violence. NO WAY!
At Bowen State we are respectful, responsible, safe and learners.
At Bowen State School we are committed to take action against bullying.
From the Student Support Team (SST)
Chappy Adam, Mr Power, Mrs Upkett.
This week at ALIVE we had Beau Brooker attend the session to share a bit about his life and his passion for dance. Beau then shared with the boys how he found dance amongst his struggles and how it helped him put all his anger and frustration into something constructive. We then went to the hall and were all taught some break dancing moves. The boys were super engaged in the activities and all gave it ago. At the end of the afternoon Beau showed the boys a little bit more of what he could do, they loved the spins, twists and were super impressed with the backflip! Overall we had a fantastic afternoon.
BOYS AND GIRLS SOCCER TRIALS
Following is some relevant information for the forth-coming Bowen District Soccer Trials.
Date of Trials: Wednesday 24 April
Times: 3:30pm – 5:00pm
Venue: Bowen Sporting Complex
Team: No players turning 13yrs this year are permitted to play.
All players should be available to play in the Whitsunday Trials on Friday 9 May
Selections: From this trial a team of 13 will be chosen to represent Bowen at the Whitsunday Trials.
ALL CHILDREN MUST WEAR SHIN PADS.
ALL CHILDREN MUST WEAR MOUTH GUARDS UNLESS EXEMPT.
PLEASE ONLY SEND PLAYERS WITH AN ABILITY TO PLAY SOCCER. REMEMBER IT IS A TRIALS NOT AN EVENT JUST FOR PARTICIPATION. WE UNDERSTAND SCHOOLS MAY NOT HAVE HAD A CHANCE TO CHECK PLAYERS ABILITY SO IF NEED BE SEND ANY STUDENTS YOU THINK AND WE WILL WORK IT FROM THERE