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Dear Parents/Carers,
What a brilliant start we have had to Term 2. It was wonderful to return to school in Week 2 and see how engaged our students are in their learning. This busy term is a 10 week term, which offers many learning opportunities for our students in the classroom, whole school events and sporting activities.
Explicit Improvement Agenda 2019
In 2019 we are focusing on three key priorities as part of the schools explicit improvement agenda. As a staff we regularly review our goals and have put into place strategies in order for us to achieve these. Our school priorities focus on whole school, classroom and individual students. Our key priorities for 2019 are:
Priority 1 – Quality teaching in English and Maths
Priority 2 - Enhance student and community engagement
Priority 3 – Effective implementation of the Australian Curriculum
As a school we are making significant progress towards our school priorities. Our staff and families should be commended on all their hard work in Term 1 and I look forward to what we will achieve in Term 2.
ANZAC Day
Thank you to everyone who supported our school ANZAC Day event and marched with the school last Thursday. Our students were very well behaved and very respectful during these ceremonies. It’s great to see that the significance of our involvement in these hardships are remembered and passed on to our young people.
NAPLAN testing
On Tuesday 14th, Wednesday 15th and Thursday 16th May, students in Years 3 and 5 will take part in the National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy, or NAPLAN, as it is commonly known.
Skills that will be tested include: reading, writing, spelling, grammar and punctuation, and numeracy.
These tests are done here at school and are considered just another part of the curriculum. It is important for you and your child to know that NAPLAN is not a pass/fail test. It simply looks at what level students are achieving in literacy and numeracy against National Standards and compared with student peers throughout Australia. NAPLAN cannot be studied for and students are not expected to do so. The best way you can help your child prepare for NAPLAN is to let them know that it is just a routine part of their school program, and to urge them to do the best they can on the day.
Please ensure that if you have a child in Years 3 or 5 that they are in attendance during that week in May. Please avoid booking holidays or appointments during those days. If you can’t avoid those days e.g. specialist appointment, please try to make it in the afternoon. All testing will be completed by 12.45 on those days. Later in the year we will send you an individual student NAPLAN report that you can use to view and monitor how your child is progressing.
Have a great week 3!
Communities of Practice
Our Prep Teachers, along with myself, Mrs Weekes and Ms Malouf have been working together to enhance the oral language skills of our Prep students through a project named “Communities of Practice”. We began this work at the end of 2018 and are excited with our progress to date.
We are currently utilising a range of activities to support the development of oral language including, Barrier Games, explicitly teaching vocabulary and enhancing the delivery of phonics and phonemic awareness. We will continue to review the teaching and learning to further support our students.
Attendance
I am most excited to be handing out an impressive number of attendance bands for students who achieved 100% attendance between Week 5 and Week 10 of Term 1. This fills me with pride.
As a school we are continuing to focus on achieving amazing attendance and celebrating our success together. Our current whole school attendance data is 91.2% percent with our Indigenous attendance data currently sitting at 88%. Our CEC, Mr Rainer Power and I have been working closely to support an increase in both of these sets of data to ensure our students are at school learning whenever possible. Look out for exciting news about some new attendance initiatives in coming weeks.
PBL - Positive Behaviour for Learning
As part of our ongoing improvement journey, we regularly gather data to determine the quality, effectiveness and impact of our whole school Positive Behaviour for Learning program. In coming weeks we will be welcoming a PBL representative to the school for a day to gather data which will be fed back to our PBL team. The data collection involves brief and informal interview with parents, students and staff regarding our 4 values, our focus of the week and our school behaviour processes.
We look forward to reviewing this data as a school whilst ensuring we are supporting positive behaviour across our school.
Kind Regards,
Mrs Elizabeth Mayo
Prep A
In English this term, the children will be selecting a favourite story to retell to their classmates. To prepare the children for this task we will be practising to retell a range of stories. The children are becoming aware that stories have a beginning, a middle and an end. During the term they will be drawing events from various stories, in sequence, and writing simple sentences. At this stage of the term, children are experimenting with writing words as part of their daily writing task.
1A
Students from year 1 had a GREAT time at Sports Day last Friday. Some of their favourite activities included Tunnel Ball and Sack Races. Look at how much fun we had.
2A
This term in maths, 2A has begun to look at number sequences. They have been practicing to count in 2’s, 3’s, 5’s and 10’s forwards and backwards. The class has also been working hard on describing number patterns in words and continuing patterns by drawing the next numbers in the sequence. The next topic in maths will be time. The class will revise o’clock and half past and learn how to read quarter past and quarter to on analogue and digital clocks.
3A
4A
Students in 4A have been captivated with learning about factors that shape a person’s identity and sense of belonging. After reading narrratives, “May Tang” about a girl who moves from Shanghai in 1989 to start a new life in Sydney, “The Little Refugee” and snippets from the “Happiest Refugee” about Anh Do whose family fled Vietnam when Anh was just two years old, they have become familiar with cultural influences. They then constructed a profile of what shapes a person’s identity.
5A
In Science students are exploring how light can travel in a straight line through cards.
6A
Last week we commemorated ANZAC day. 6A viewed a short film explaining the Gallipoli campaign and discussed aspects of life as an ANZAC, including the iconic ANZAC biscuit, which we all enjoyed sampling. Students rehearsed and performed a moving poem, which is available for viewing by 6A parents/carers on the class blog. To finish the day, students all posed for a picture with our slouch hat. They showed great respect through all our ANZAC activities. Great job Year 6!
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Week 2 |
|
|
PA |
Anna Whitfeld |
|
PB |
Raiden Finau |
|
Prep/1C |
Amber Altmann |
|
1A |
Mila Southern |
|
1/2B |
Maggie Jackson |
|
2A |
Max Fellows |
|
2C |
Blacke Koopmans |
|
3A |
Isaiah Howell & Matiu Mone |
|
3B |
Hayley Hickey |
|
3C |
Jacob Parter |
|
4A |
Ellah-Paige Hollingworth |
|
4B |
Shaun Khaleb Pitogo |
|
4/5C |
Franki Waston |
|
5B |
Whitney Otto |
|
5/6C |
Lincon Smith |
|
6A |
Savannah Ball |
|
6B |
Nicola Barnard |
Hi all,
I wanted to update you all on the Fun Run Colour Splash and Dash. There have been a few questions regarding prizes. Online prize order closed April 30, we are currently seeing students, selecting prizes and manually entering prizes, this will be completed early next week. Miss H has been researching play equipment for each area and we will take the proposal to the next P and C. We thank the P and C for supporting this fabulous whole school event and fundraising project. It wouldn't be possible without them.
As the Student Support Team (SST) we know too well that emotions are a sign of communication. Next time your child experiences some big emotions, have a think about what it is they might be trying to tell you then go from there.
Sports Carnival
On Friday, many students attended our annual Sports Carnival. I would like to congratulate all students who showed great sportsmanship and participation throughout the day. Also, thank you to our house captains for being great leaders and captains. Everyone did an amazing job and created a very positive atmosphere. You should be very proud of your efforts!
A huge shout out to all parents, teachers/aides, administration, tuckshop staff, the P&C and the community for getting involved and making it such a successful day.
Special thanks to Bowen Transit, Craig Power (the food van), Bowen coffee cruiser and the Athletics Club/Sporting Complex for being so accommodating with this event.
End of Term 1-Celebration of Learning
Thanks to all of the parents who visited classrooms during the last week of Term 1. The students love being able to share their amazing work with you.
At Bowen State School we place a strong emphasis on both staff and student wellbeing. Teachers have consulted with the Queensland Teachers Union, which has resulted in the below changes to our before school morning routine. Please find below information regarding our school operating hours starting in Term 2, 2019.
- If students arrive at school prior to 8:15am they must be seated under C block
- Reading Hub – Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday: 8:15am-8:40am – School Library
- Students who arrive at school between 8:15-8:45am will have access to activities under the parade ground and the seating area under C Block
- 8:45am students will be seated in their class line on the parade ground
- 8:50am students will be collected by their classroom teacher and will be transitioned to their classroom to begin learning.
Thank you in advance for your support with this change in our morning routine.
Hi there,
I’m Frankie Fresh, Healthy Harold’s new fruit and veggie buddy! I’m visiting your kids’ school next Wednesday 8th of May, and I really want your thoughts on why kids aren’t eating more fruit and vegetables and how we might get them eating more of the rainbow every day.
I know you are busy but I’d love to hear what you have to say.
This survey will only take about 10 minutes to complete, and your feedback will help us to create a new program of fun, simple and cheap ways to get kids munching on more fruit and veg, plus help you take the challenge out of meal times.
Complete this survey and help Frankie Fresh kids eating more fruit and veg
Visit by Registered Nurse for Free Prep Vision Screening
Good vision is important for a child’s educational, physical and social development. Vision screening is therefore vital in early childhood, particularly for conditions such as ‘lazy eye’, which if not detected early can lead to blindness.
A Registered Nurse will be visiting the school in 2019 to commence vision screening for all Prep Year children. If you wish to have your child participate in this free vision screening program, please complete and sign the consent form sent home with your child and return this to your child’s class teacher as soon as possible. You will be advised in writing of the outcome of your child’s screening.
Please note that if your child has had a vision assessment in the past 12 months it is not necessary for him/her to participate in this screening program. If this is the case, please complete the consent form and indicate that you do not wish for your child to participate, and ensure that you follow the schedule of reviews recommended by your eye health professional.
Primary School Nurse Health Readiness Program
Child and Youth Community Health Services
Children’s Health Queensland Hospital and Health Service
