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Whole school focus
Last week on parade I shared with the whole community the direction that Bowen State School is heading in 2021. I spoke about our sharp and narrow commitment to the teaching of reading and writing here at Bowen State School and the goals to improve the pedagogy around this. I explained to families and students that “pedagogy” means “How we teach” This year we have committed school funds towards professional development around “pedagogy” in our classrooms. Staff are engaged in weekly data conversations for the next steps in learning and the leadership team are actively involved as instructional leaders in this space.
Highly effective research based methods are being used, such as: students receiving regular feedback on reading and writing, use of the learning walls in classrooms, opportunities for staff to watch each other teach in the classrooms, weekly time off class to discuss the data and regular professional development. A culmination of all this intervention will be to measure our impact at the end of each term. We have set a target that 90% of our students will meet the required level for reading by the end of the year and that 90% of all our students reach at least a “C” standard in English and Mathematics by the end of 2021.
Governor of Queensland visit
Next Friday (week 7 March 12) our school will host a visit from the Governor of Queensland. His Excellency Paul De Jersey will be attending our school during the Friday afternoon session. To celebrate this momentous occasion we will be hosting a special parade on Friday afternoon at 2:00pm ( No Morning Parade) This opportunity will enable all our community to come together to meet the Governor and hear about his role and what he does. The school leaders will be attending a gala event on the Friday evening to personally meet the Governor. What a wonderful opportunity to showcase what makes Bowen State great!
ARD visit
On Tuesday we hosted our first ARD visit for the year. Graham Foster the Assistant Regional Director and the leadership team visited many classrooms to view writing, the use of feedback and the classroom learning walls. We saw output of students writing and talked to them about the next steps for their improvement. We were looking for consistency across the classrooms and lots of evidence of writing output. The leadership team enjoyed sharing the work around the table in key projects happening in 2021.
Professional development
This week the leadership team attended workshops in Townsville at the Middle leaders and Principal Professional Development days. The opportunity enabled collaboration across the North Queensland schools and a consistent message of the key work schools need to focus on. A wonderful professional development opportunity to continue to build capacity and strengthen our understanding to be the best leaders we can be for our staff and students.
Looking forward to sharing more great stories around the teaching and learning this term. Until next fortnight have a great couple of weeks.
100% Attendance Club
At this Friday’s parade we will award those students who have had a 100% attendance rate for the first 5 weeks of school. I am very pleased to say 165 students will receive this award this time around which is 39% of the school. Well done!
Missing a day a week matters!
At this very moment there are currently 79 students who have an attendance rate of less than 85%. On average, that is missing a day or more a week every single week. A student who has missed on average a day a week of school for their entire schooling life equates to that student missing more than a years’ worth of education. Imagine how hard it would be in Year 12 for your child if they have had missed more than a year of school.
Please call us at the school if you require assistance in getting your children to school every day. We are lucky here at Bowen State School to have so many staff members on board to help in whatever shape or form.
Jeremy Callaghan
Deputy Principal
Prep L
Prep L have been hard at work learning the different Casey the Caterpillar shapes so that we can start learning how to write and form letters correctly. We started off by practising the shapes on the cement and then to chalk boards. With lots of practise we were ready to start forming and writing the different satpin soud pics. Check out some of our writing.
1/2
In 1/2I we have been measuring the length of different objects. We need to make sure there are no gaps and no overlaps when we measure length.
We will also be measuring the capacity of objects where we need to make sure there are no spills or overfills when we measure.
Year Twos will also be measuring the area of objects.
3/4S
3/4s have been studying the Roald Dahl book, Fantastic Mr Fox and have written an amazing selection of extra chapters for the book! The students have been practicing using dialogue, prepositions, conjunctions, adverbs and time connectives in their writing.
5B
It has been a great start to the term. Our class achieved 100% attendance in week five, which was fantastic, to see. I hope that we can keep this up despite the rainy weather. In English, we have been practicing writing first chapters of fantasy stories. Students have been learning how to write stories that include noun groups, prepositions, similes, metaphors and personification.
6R
At the beginning of the year, we created portraits of ourselves to hang proudly in our class. We used oil pastels and coloured pencils to colour our features. They look fantastic!
PBL's Achiever's
Congratulations to our PBL Achiever's
Student Support Team (SST)
Team members:
- Guidance Officer – Mrs Danielle Upkett
- Chaplain – Beau Brooker
- Community Education Counsellor (CEC) – Ms Karenne Williams
We are located in G10 in between lower Prep classrooms. We are here to increase engagement and successful outcomes for kids. We do this by: Creating strong relationships with students, staff, parents and wider community. More to come on our roles in future newsletters.
Ultimately we support parents, staff and students to have happy, healthy learners
Term One 2020 is well underway with all students engaging in their learning both inside and outside the classroom. Swimming has been a big hit with many of our students with some super star swimmers in the making.
Please keep an eye out for a expressions of interest for the 2021 Challenge Games, please return this note asap so we can gauge an interest and start planning out trip, Challenge Game Committe have indicated that it will be held the second week of term 3 2021, exact dates will be released soon.
We have the exciting news that Alliance Community will be in Bowen on Friday 5th March and are meeting with some key stake holders at our school to help in the space of NDIS. There service will be valuable to many of the current Bowen Families. Please see their brochure.
Implementation of Pick of the Crop has begun and students apart of the Enviro Club have been putting in a tremendous amount of effort maintaining the school vegetable gardens.
Enviro Leaders Emma and Bridie along with Enviro Club members have been meeting weekly with Mrs Groves to keep the gardens maintained and weed free in preparation for planting.
Currently, the vegetable garden is having the watering system installed to ensure the plants are well watered over the school holiday periods.
Once completed, the soil donated from Hillery Group will be transferred into the raised garden beds.
Year 6 student and Enviro Leader Emma said, “I am looking forward to seeing the tuckshop use the vegetables grown in student’s lunches”.
The Bowen State School vegetable garden space is looking fantastic, so make sure you come and visit.
Instrumental Music Update
Students have had several lessons now and should be practicing 15 minutes each day or second day so that they can progress through our learning. Each week, students are set exercises or a page of work to go through. They are not expected to do every piece of music each day – just pick a couple each day. New students need to be patient as it does take a little while for them to learn these new skills – there will be squeaks and squawks for a while yet.
Swimming: - Occasionally we may have to reschedule some lessons due to swimming. The IM teacher and class teachers will liaise and swap groups where necessary.
Concert Band (years 5-6) has its rehearsals on Thursday morning at 8am or as soon as a student gets to school. This has been set at this time so students don’t miss lessons or lunches.
We have a few parade performances set up for late this term and next term. The band may combine with the high school band for some performances in term 2, especially the ‘Mid Year’ Concert – depending on Covid19 rules etc.
Reeds and Cork Grease: Reeds and cork grease for saxophones and clarinets can be purchased at the shops listed on the sheet handed out with the acknowledgement last year. We have a couple at the school but not enough to supply all students. They are $3.00 each from the school.
Beginner students will begin to perform on parade in groups in the next few weeks.
