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Welcome Back
Welcome back to week 2 and a brand-new year. I hope families all had a wonderful rest and lots of quality family time over the Christmas break. Welcome to all our new and existing families this year. Teachers have been actively engaged in professional learning leading up to the start of school. This is an important time to share the key messages from our region and commence the learnings around the strategic focus for 2023.
It was great to see many new faces in our teaching team and we are looking forward to sharing the profiles of our new staff shortly. This year our number one priority is Differentiation for all diverse learners in English. This aligns well to the new State School Roadmap launched last week to all schools. The three key focus areas within this document are Educational Achievement, Wellbeing and Engagement, Culture and Inclusion. This important document will support our school and where we sit in part of the larger system. We are looking forward this year to refining our key work and how this reflects back to the new road map.
New staff
Due to our significant growth in student numbers (of around 70 students) we have recruited heavily over the Christmas Holiday period and welcome some new staff to Bowen State. Last week we acknowledged the new staff on parade and look forward to their time here at our school and in the community. As we are in the week of Day 8 we will be tracking the numbers carefully looking for the right place to make changes to classes. Families will be notified early next week of this required adjustment. We envision all students will be in new classes by Wednesday.
Curriculum focus
One of our key areas for action as per the 2022 full school review was around tightening our curriculum delivery and knowledge. This year we are embarking on external moderation with Queens Beach State School and are looking for to this opportunity to ensure the consistent judgement of marking of student work right across the community. Later in the year teachers will have the opportunity to partake in moderation sessions with their cluster colleagues. In closing looking forward to a productive year ensuring that all students at Bowen State School reach their full potential.
Looking forward to sharing more great stories around the teaching and learning this term. Until next fortnight have a great couple of weeks.
Christien Payne
Principal
I believe in: Hard Work Honesty Transparency
Welcome to 2023. It has been a busy start with a large number of new students enrolling. We are excited for them to be joining our Bowen State School family. All staff are working hard to ensure students and families have a smooth transition.
With the increase in traffic at pick up time and parking becoming quite challenging please adhere to the road signs outside our school.
Loading Zones- Passenger vehicles are allowed to stand in loading zones (but not park) for no more than 2 minutes when picking up or dropping off passengers.
Supervised Road Crossings- (Kennedy St and Herbert St) Must be used to cross the road if parked in the middle park.
Drop Off before school- For safety reasons, students should not be arriving before 8am. We do not have staff supervision prior to 8am.
Thank you for keeping our students safe during the busy drop off and pick up times.
Welcome to 2023! I would like to take this opportunity to introduce myself. My name is Jessica Boucher and I am the Acting Head of Department – Curriculum for Term 1. I have really enjoyed working productively with all of our wonderful teachers at Bowen State School over the past couple of weeks unpacking our units of work and getting curriculum clarity across our school ready to deliver quality learning opportunities for all our students.
We have had a very exciting start to Term 1 at BSS with a visit from our very own Children’s Author - Dave Lowe. Dave has recently written four plays, an adaptation of Andy Griffiths’ classic ‘The Day My Bum Went Psycho’; two plays based on his own books ‘My Hamster is a Genius’ and ‘My Hamster is a Pirate’; and an original play called ‘Goldie – The Untold Story of Goldilocks’. He has also co-written ‘Café’, an episode of the TV show ‘Bluey’.
All of the students at our school have had the opportunity over the past week to take part in an Enrichment Creative Writer’s Workshop with Dave Lowe. During these sessions the students worked together with our resident author to inspire each other and learn how to develop their creative writing skills.
In addition to these class sessions with Dave Lowe, 10 students from grade 2 – 6 have been lucky enough to be chosen to attend a Writer’s Extension Group next week at Queens Beach State School. Students across our School Cluster from Bowen State School, Queens Beach State School and Merinda State School will work collaboratively with Dave to further enhance their creative writing skills.
Welcome back! As we enter week 2 many of us have adjusted to life back at school however, some of us are still adjusting. Creating a routine for the school morning will be extremely helpful to ensure a calmer state for the whole family. It reduces an emotional response and shows what is not negotiable. This will eventually become a habit again. Visual routines are extremely helpful for young children, it allows them to know what comes next, it helps them with an awareness of time and increases their feeling of safety and security having a predictable set of expectations.
If you need support creating a morning routine don't hesitate to contact a member of the Student Support Team (SST) Chappy Sandy, CEC Mrs Williams or GO Mrs Upkett.
Positive Behaviour for Learning (PBL)
Over the past two weeks we have been establishing expectations with positive and negative consequences. At Bowen State School on task behaviours of being safe, respectful, responsible and a learner are celebrated via a gotcha blue ticket or a do jo interactive class point. Gotchas and Do Jos can later be traded for fun rewards such as icing biscuits, play in any area, disco's as part of our 'Pop up' and end of term celebrations. Each weekly gotchas/dojos are traded for tickets into the weekly parade draw as an extra bonus.
See our school PBL matrix below.
Healthy lunchbox week is next week! (5-11 Feb)
It’s all about inspiring families to create healthy and enjoyable lunchboxes ? Nutrition Australia have some amazing free factsheets, recipes and videos online. The assembly of a healthy lunchbox should not be stressful, too time consuming and costly but an enjoyable and even salivating experience (especially if you are hungry!). Just a reminder to please keep it simple! A vegemite/cheese sandwich is totally fine however if you want to provide that extra nutrient and energy boost slapping on some avo works an absolute treat.
A sandwich aka sammie is a lunchbox stable! So I thought I’d provide some basic steps to creating the ultimate delish sammie:
- Choose your base - sliced bread, wraps or rolls – choose whole grain, wholemeal or high fibre varieties. Ps. If you have a picky eater try using one slice white and one slice wholemeal bread or use a high fibre white bread.
- Favourite flavour – use a spread like vegemite, hummus, nut butter or avocado to add a pop of flavour, colour and nutrients.
- Veg out - use a handful of salad leaves or any other raw or cooked vegetables you have at home. Ps. Leftovers are the best so don’t look past last night’s leftover roast pumpkin or zucchini ect. – extra flavour too!
- Protein power - cheese, tuna, boiled egg, crushed beans or leftover roast meat ect.
Endless combos to be sampled by your lil’ ones! You just never know what veg/fruit they might like now ?
Here is a lil’ taste of the amazing content available - Chicken and avo wrap recipe:
Important POTC regional update
Sadly my contract is concluding next week here at BSS... ☹ I have loved every moment of working with students, teachers/principals, guardians/parents, and other key community members involved across Bowen and the Burdekin regions but a special thank you to BSS as my host organisation for all their support and guidance! Together we have achieved great things, big and small and are on our way to seeing ‘fruitful’ healthier eating habits in our lil’ ones, if you haven’t seen the shift already ? I will always been known as the ‘science lady’ by BSS students and going away with this additional title is just the best! It is not all bad news for the program however as it is expanding to more schools in Northern Queensland and soon a new regional coordinator will be based in Townsville and will still support BSS and the surrounding participating schools across the regions.
Instrumental Music
Lessons are now every Wednesday in 2023. Please help your student remember to bring their instrument and music every Wednesday. Band rehearsal will start at first break in Week 3 for continuing students. Beginners will be invited to join the band as soon as they are ready (hopefully later this term).
P D
Prep D has had a great start to the school year. We have been learning and practising daily routines and are getting pretty good at lining up! We have made some class rules that will help us to be happy learners while we are at school. The Prep D students have been working on being amazing ‘whole body listeners’ and have been having lots of fun getting to know their new classmates!
In 3A, students have been learning about place value and ordering number patterns with three-digit numbers.
Students have enjoyed making a human number line, grouping, and regrouping paddle pop sticks in the place value houses, completing missing numbers on 100 boards, using magnetic numbers and number expanders.
Hands on activities with concrete materials play an important role in developing and consolidating number sense.
Welcome to Year 5M for 2023
Dear Parents and Carers,
Welcome to year 5. I hope that you had a relaxing and enjoyable holiday. I am looking forward to working with your child throughout the year and watching them grow. This term is going to be busy with many exciting learning opportunities.
Music –Tuesday
Technology- Thursday
HPE -Thursday
I believe it is important that we work together as a team to help your child grow throughout the year.
CLASSROOM PROCEDURES
When the students arrive in the morning, they are expected to prepare for the day by putting lunches in the fridge and preparing their learning materials. If you have any questions or concerns throughout the year, feel free to ring the office and if I am unavailable I will get back to you as soon as I can.
BRAIN BREAK
During our morning session, we stop for a quick brain break known as ‘munch and crunch’ where students are encouraged to have a drink of water and eat a piece of healthy food. This can include fruit, cheese, vegetables, seeds, etc. Please pack something into their lunch boxes for this purpose. Throughout the day we also do brain breaks which consist of body movement and breathing exercise. This allows students to refocus during the day.
HOMEWORK
Students have minimal homework. They are also encouraged to read for at least 20 minutes a day. It is up to the parents to decide whether they want their children to complete this. The EQ Homework Policy for our school states that homework will be available to all students however is to be completed at family discretion. Homework is due on Friday.
ARRIVAL IN THE MORNING BEFORE 8:30am
All parents/students when arriving at school in the morning need to wait under C block until instructed by the teacher on duty.
BEHAVIOUR EXPECTATIONS
Each student is expected to follow the School Code of Conduct. This means being a RESPONSIBLE, RESPECTFUL, SAFE, LEARNER.
TEXT BOOKS/RESOURCES
Year level class book lists were distributed. Please ensure your child has everything on the list. Should you require another copy please contact the office.
EXPECTATIONS
I have high expectations of all my students and will do all I can to help your child achieve their full potential. I believe it is also important that each student feels safe and cared for in our classroom. In class I expect all students to complete their work to the best of their ability.
I am looking forward to working with you and your child this year.
Thank you,
Mr Scott Mitchell.
Students went on a Scavenger Hunt for interesting facts on why and how Australia Day is celebrated in Australia. The students had fun documenting their learning on Recording Sheets.
