October 2021

Principal's Message

Welcome back to term 4. I hope everyone had a relaxing and enjoyable break, and most importantly rested up to be fresh and ready to finish off the 2021 school year with a bang. 

Quota International of Gladstone Inc.

During term 3 I met with a representative Aileen Weeden form the Quota group.  She shared that they wanted to support our school via their next fundraising event.  Late term 3, the Quota group held a fundraising cent sale.  The proceeds from the cent sale were gifted to our school.  On the weekend I along with Miss Joan and Miss Tracey attended the Quota fashion parade where we were donated a cheque to the value of $3000.  On behalf of the school can I thank Quota for their generosity, hard work and support for our school.  The money donated will be used to upgrade outside play equipment.

Positive Behaviour for Learning (PBL)

Over the next few weeks staff are going on a bit of a Shazam blitz to identify, acknowledge and celebrate the great behaviour the students are displaying at eating and play times.  We all know our 3 rules:

• I am safe
• I am respectful
• I am positive

So join in with me and help find and celebrate all of our Safe Sally’s, Positive Pete’s and Respectful Ronald’s.

Strategic Planning

Rosella Park School's 4 key improvement strategies for 2021 are:

1. Provide professional development and feedback to support staff understanding and self-reflection.
2. Embed effective Literacy programs in classrooms.
3. Build capacity of staff to model all modes of AAC all day every day.
4. Build understanding of the Australian Curriculum and Guide for Individual Learning (GIL), and how an ICP/SET Plan aligns with an effective teaching and learning

If you would like to know more, please do not hesitate to contact me, I would be more than happy to share and discuss our school improvement journey.  As we near the end of the year the school leadership team in conjunction with the school community and staff will review our 2021 journey and collaboratively identify our 2 key priorities moving forward for 2022.

2022 Classroom planning

Over the coming weeks, the staff at Rosella Park will work together to begin the process of grouping students into class groups for the 2022 year.  Later in term 4 when class groups and staffing models for 2022 have been developed, reviewed and finalised, we will share with our school community.

Acting HOD Curriculum

Please join in with the school community celebrating the birth of Miss Dom’s little girl – Mum and bub are all doing well. While Miss Dom has her hands full at home, we have been fortunate to welcome Miss Tracey Davis back into our school community to act in Miss Dom’s place.  Miss Tracey supported Rosella Park as Acting HOD Curriculum for part of Term 2. Welcome back Miss Tracey, we are all looking forward to working with you.

New Building

How exciting to see the new building development well under way. Representatives from our school meet each fortnight with the project manager and the building team to discuss progress. To date the building project is well on track and on schedule. Watch this space as the building starts taking form over the next few months.

Cheers

Geoff Miller

Admin News

School Fun Run

This Friday is our School Fun Run! The event will kick off on Friday 22^nd October at 9:00 am on the school oval. We look forward to seeing all of our students get involved. Please make sure you send in extra clothing with your child as they will be getting wet from our visiting Firies. If you have collected any sponsorship money please return it and your sponsorship/prize form to the school by Friday 22nd October. Otherwise, please continue your online fundraising efforts. I will let you all know when you can order your prizes. All funds raised will allow the school to purchase valuable resources for our school students. Thankyou for all your efforts so far, there has been some awesome amounts raised by students.

Hollywood Trivia Night - Major School Fundraiser

A reminder about our major fundraiser for the year - Hollywood Trivia Night. The new date is Saturday 30th October. Tickets are $40.00 each and can be purchased from the school office.

A big thank you to those who have already purchased tickets and have waited patiently for the new date to be set by the organisers. The school really appreciates your support and are certain you will enjoy yourselves immensely on the night. The trivia night is being run by the same people who ran our previous fundraiser (Bogan Bingo) so it will certainly be a fun packed night.

Please consider buying a ticket, you do not have to have a table in order to book, however if you would like to get a group of friends together then that would be awesome.

If you are able to lend your support to our very small P&C Committee by nominating yourself to help out with setting up, packing up, making decorations, working in the kitchen on the night, being a waiter or any other way, please contact one of our committee members Michelle Grice, Kerryn Harris, Pam Wode or Jodie Jansen via our P&C Facebook page.

Day for Daniel - Friday 29th October

Our free dress day on Friday 29th October is in support of Day for Daniel. Please wear a red shirt if you have one. If not, wear red shorts or socks. Please bring a $2.00 gold coin donation.

Room 1 - Junior - Mrs Thomas

In Term 4 the Junior cohort is swimming every Tuesday and Thursday afternoons until the end of Week 5. It is exciting to see the students building their water confidence and begin to learn to swim. The students are busy with their learning goals of following pictures, photographs, gestures and objects to complete a task within English (with cooking), Science (with moving objects), Geography (mapping and location), History to create texts from a book or picture (families), English (to create texts from a book or picture, Mathematics: Numeracy, (Collections of objects and making quantities in numbers 1-5, 1-10) and Measurement, (using language for measurement e.g. long, short). This is a very jam-packed term with a lot to fit in.

Room 1 swimming fun

Room 1.5 - Junior - Mrs Coulston

Welcome back to school for term 4. I hope you all enjoyed your holidays and are ready for a fantastic, yet busy term. We kicked the term off with swimming and this will continue every Tuesday and Thursday until the end of week 5. I have no doubt by this time we will all be feeling rather water logged but pleased to be inside swimming rather than at school working. After swimming is finished Room 1.5 is planning to go on another excursion, possibly with some other junior classes. Keep an eye out for further information coming home soon.

Our school calendar has us running parade on Friday the 5^th of November in week 5. 

I have added some photos from our last day of term 3.  The students were given free choice and they all become very productive at their chosen activities.

Room 1.5

Room 2 - Junior - Mrs Williams/Mrs McKenzie

Hello and welcome to term 4. Room 2 has had an exciting start to the term as the junior cohort will be participating in swimming lesson’s weeks 1-5 on Tuesdays and Thursdays. The students have thoroughly enjoyed this new experience including travelling on the school bus to and from swimming. There has been a change in staffing in room 2. Mrs Wellsteed has taken on another role in Mackay for the term. We wish Miss Kate all the best in her new endeavour. This has provided Mrs Michelle Williams (Mon-Thur) and Mrs Ellie McKenzie (Friday’s) with the opportunity to team teach in room 2. Ms Michelle is contactable via the class dojo and/or the communication books. Students will continue on with the same subject areas and learning as last term and we are all looking forward to a fantastic term of learning together.

Room 3- Junior - Mrs Hayne

Welcome to Term 4. It is hard to believe that the end of the school  year is nearly upon us.

Room 3 has been busy with the students participation in the swimming program at the Gladstone Aquatic Centre. They have had fun learning to blow bubbles, floating, kicking, fetching toys in the water and playing water games.

In Science, the focus has  been on objects that roll. We have been joining our peers from other classes which has added to the fun.

In  Literacy, we have continued to sing alphabet songs and participate in lots of fun sensory letter activities.

Our Maths, has been fun with participation in location and direction activities around the classroom. For History, we have now focussed on new and old toys. The students made some interesting comments about a very old teddy (60  years) hard, bumpy, cold, old, and itchy. In Geography, the students are looking at bedrooms and designing their own room with LEGO and other materials.

Room 3

Room 5 - Intermediate - Mrs Nash

Hello from Room 4/5. We have hit the road running this term and are super busy achieving our goals for the semester. It is a very busy term so please ensure you check your child’s communication book and Class Dojo for any updates.

We say a big welcome to Mrs Thompson as she joins our class on Fridays this term. I will be taking on a special project to assist our school in moving forward. I will still be at school but off class. Mrs Thompson is well known to Room 4/5 and the students are very excited to have her join us. Mrs McGuire will continue to assist our class with the ARTS program. This will be on a Wednesday and a Thursday.

Our class has been trying very hard both in the classroom and at lunch breaks to earn stamps and shazams. They are doing very well and most of the students have chosen to save up their shazams so they may choose a bigger prize.

I look forward to our final term together. It has been a huge year so far 😊

Room 5

Room 6 - Senior - Mrs Buckle

My, how quickly this year is going. We are all working hard on our learning goals and will be completing assessments very soon.

On Fridays we write about the item we feel in the mystery box.  Last week it was two potato scallops, the students had to describe by touch alone.  When Mr Geoff is in our room, the boys make him have a go as well.

They built Lego plans of the features in their bedrooms.  We will be investigating the features of places around the school.  We are loving looking at the atlases and discussing other places.  Chilli has taken her piggy to investigate the areas of the school and made this into a lovely book.

Currently in Maths we are looking at the features of 2D shapes and sorting them into groups.  

The class has already started their concert rehearsal with Mrs Maguire.  Once their costume has been sorted our non contact teachers will let you know. 

We are discussing "Stranger Danger" as part of the Daniel Morcombe Day – Friday, 29 October. 
I encourage you to hunt down a red shirt/shorts or socks to help acknowledge this day and help raise child safety awareness. 

We are very proud of the number of Shazams our students have earned.  They are close to shopping for the item they have been saving up for.  Also, the in-class rewards certificates are going very well with the gift cards going home.  Thank you for your support regarding your child’s behaviour at school.

Cooking this term has swapped from biscuits to pizzas.  Exploring pizzas made on English muffins, puff pastry and pita bread.  The whole class love pizza on Wednesday and Thursdays. 

Thanks for reading our news. As usual feel free to book an appointment to discuss any concerns you may have.  From the Room 6 team- Mrs Buckle and Miss Deb

Room 6

Room 8 - Intermediate - Ms Schulz

Wow, where has the year gone.  It is hard to believe that the end of the year is nearly here. With only 8 weeks to go we have been focussed on preparing for our upcoming assessments on our learning areas.

English has been focussed on our word and sound knowledge. In shared reading, we are developing our comprehension skills discussing the characters and events that are in the story. In predictable chart writing, we are working on our sentence writing skills including details like when, where, what and who when we do our writing.

Maths is still focussed on the concept of time, exploring time duration through a range of tactile activities and experiments which this week includes timing making pizzas and then timing eating them to determine what takes longer.  We have also been exploring patterns with numbers and shapes, matching number words, numerals and quantities as well as measurement, learning key words such as small, short, tall, long, wide and thin. 

We start our History lessons with the Split Enz classic “History Never Repeats” and we have been exploring telling stories about events that have happened using pictures and favourite or special items such as toys and pillows.  Using our senses to provide details like how it smelt, felt and looks.  We have also discussed why it is special or our favourite and how long we have owned it. 

Geography has seen us exploring the differences between maps such as pictorial maps to show location and models.  We’ve created pictorial maps of a bedroom and will be learning about creating models of places to show location of features.

In Science, we have started exploring the types of movement such as rolling, bouncing and sliding.  Experimenting with familiar objects to learn how they move and how their size, shape and weight can affect how they move. Last week we used the water in the sensory garden to explore the concept of floating and sinking, making predictions about how objects would behave before we did our experiment.

Room 8

Room 9 - Intermediate - Mr Pallett

A warm welcome back for Term 4. I hope that everyone enjoyed their Spring holidays.

Room 9 have been working hard in all their subjects and have started work on their assessments for Semester 2.

All work and no play makes Mike a dull boy, so we have been putting together the Woolworths Lego kindly donated by members of the school. The class have thoroughly enjoyed the activity and we are very close to having our first full shop.

Room 10 - Senior - Mrs Bickle

Wow, where has the year gone. Room 10 is already on the count down to the number of days left at school. We have been working hard to hone our handwriting skills and write on red and blue lined paper. We have also been reading stories and discussing our connections to the text.  

In Geography, we have looked at maps of Australia and around the world and we have made models of our classroom with Lego. In History, we have been looking at how people commemorate special events, including Australian Aboriginal Dreamtime stories, birthday celebrations from around the world as well as Christmas celebrations around the world. We have had Miss Andrea tell us about her home land – New Zealand. Miss Rania also shared her Egyptian culture and customs.

In Science, we are investigating “how objects move” and conducting investigations to see how different objects move down a ramp. The students have enjoyed discussing their hypothesis as to which object they think will go the furthest and their reasons why, in relation to the object’s properties.  We have also investigated forces and looked at push and pull, gravity and friction.

We are still enjoying our morning game of dodgeball with Room 11 but it is proving much harder to get each of the students out as their skills and ability has grown. Our class shop is still in business and the students have been making green choices and receiving money to spend on rewards – where the favourites has been: soft play, Lego, water balloon fun, and lollies. This has helped with our maths money goal and all the students have enjoyed budgeting and counting their money from their money boxes to purchase rewards.

Room 10 is very excited and looking forward to our Dreamtime Centre excursion. There has also been discussions with Mrs McGuire during Art lessons regarding our rooms’ performance piece for the school Christmas concert. Make sure you keep the date free, so we can see you there. The Christmas Concert is on Friday 3^rd December. See you there.

Room 10 - Miss Donna and the gang

Room 11 and 12 - Senior - Mrs Dunstan

Dreamtime Adventure

As part of the Senior cohort the students in rooms 11, 12, 10 and 6 travelled to Rockhampton to visit the Dreamtime Cultural Centre as part of our History and Geography Curriculum.

The students heard stories from the past, as well as how Central Queensland was in the past. One of the stories, the overnight disappearance of all the water from Lake Nugga Nugga, was surprising as well as extremely interesting. Everyone was fascinated by the idea that all the water could disappear overnight and perplexed by where it had gone. Mr Wayne, the tour guide, explained the locations of some of the indigenous art and sacred places in Central Queensland. He played the didgeridoo and explained that it took him 10 years to learn how to play it.

We were shown how to throw a boomerang. Everyone had a go. It was so much fun. By the time we had lunch in the conference centre it was time to come home.

A special thanks to Mr Craig for getting the buses ready for us and Mr Geoff for coming with us and driving the big bus.

Dreamtime Cultural excursion

Room 13 - Transition - Mrs Oliver

We cant believe we are in term 4 already! This term we have been continuing to learn about Ancient Egypt. We have been listening to stories about the Gods and Goddesses especially about the story of Osiris, his wife, Isis and their son Horus.

In art, we have completed our Egyptian Death Masks and have described what process we used to make them.

In geography, the students have continued to explore a different country. Over the last few weeks we have taken a trip to China and have learnt that the Great Wall of China is a man made structure that can be seen from space.

In HPE, we have been investigating the effects that physical activity has on our bodies. During HPE we have been discussing the importance of personal hygiene especially as we enter in to the hotter months. We encourage our adolescents to shower and use deodorant daily, wear suitable clothes and bring a water bottle to school every day.

We have lots coming up in the next few weeks. Please make sure you look out for any updates especially around camp. The students are super excited!  

Room 14 -Transition - Ms Harris

This term our Grade 11 program times have changed slightly. The students will now cook on Monday during first session. The cooking program you paid for in term 3 covers this term as well so the cooking costs are already paid for. A few families still have some of the costs outstanding; check with Julie in the office if you are not sure. Week 2 we cooked a broccoli and bacon salad and it was delicious! We will focus on making healthy meals all this term.

Leisure preferences (the program where we have been navigating community places) will now be Tuesday first session. The students have all completed tasks well these first 2 weeks back and have proven their ability to identify community locations and recognise symbols on maps. They have been doing well at both following and giving directions using maps and symbols. The next step is communicating to members of the public, such as staff at shops, and we will work towards asking for directions to things independently.

For week 3 on Tuesday 19^th October, students are going to walk to the Coffee Club for leisure and we are practicing communicating with staff at the shop. For future weeks the Tuesday 1^st session we will go to places and ask directions and find information. The students will learn to go to information centres at shopping centres and the Gladstone community information centre.

In English, students are working on reading comprehension and writing. The writing task they are doing is a summary of a movie (Cool Runnings). The students are working really well at recalling information such as the characters, settings, main events, interesting words/activities and the conclusion. We are in the planning phase now but over the next couple of weeks they should complete their summary.

In Maths, Room 14 students are working more on money maths and linking it in to ideas like getting change and beginning to budget.

The Certificate 1 in Accessing Vocational Pathways students have finished the written assessment side of the Certificate for the year. They still have course work to do and practical activities such as completing a stocktake. I am very proud to tell you they have all passed the Certificate 1 written assessment component and are progressing well.

We are getting excited for school camp from the 8^th to 12^th November; coming up very soon! If you still need to pay for camp, please do so by Friday 5th November.

Room 14

Room 15 - Transition - Mrs Leeson

Another month has passed and our year is disappearing fast. Our year 12 students are counting down the days until their formal years of schooling is over. This week we began the formal organising of the graduation.  We have sent an email to Harvey Road Tavern for clarifying detail like the cost and the number of guests we can have. We have also begun working on the invitations. Hopefully we will have the details soon so we can send home the information. The year 12 students began their weekly visits to local agencies to trial programs on offer. We started with CPL. We joined their singing/music program. The students loved having a turn at choosing the song to be sung by the group. They will also have the opportunity to try the woodwork program too. Later in the term we will be heading to GCLA (HUB). They have put together some great experiences for us to try.

At the end of the month the students who attend the Endeavour Learning and Lifestyle program have been invited to the Halloween Party. There will be pizza and soft drink. We will need to get our costumes ready as there are prizes for the best dressed.

As part of Literacy the room 15 students read a book called “Treasures in the Garden.” As part of the story we made scones (the dragon’s recipe) and had a look around the school gardens for some treasure. The students especially enjoyed eating the scones and taking the leftover scones home for our families.

For those students who are going on camp, you should have received your invoice and paperwork by the time the newsletter comes out. If you don’t have your camp paperwork, please make sure you contact your class teacher. Payment for camp must be received by no later than Friday 5th November.

Room 15

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Community News

ABSTUDY helps Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians with the costs of studying or doing an Australian Apprenticeship.

You may get help with your child’s school fees, boarding, travel and other school items.

If you are a parent, guardian or carer and your child is younger than 16, you should apply on their behalf. If your child is 16 and over, or independent, they can apply themselves.

Claiming before December means it can be finalised in time for the start of school next year. This is very important if your child needs to move away from home to study.

If your child is starting uni or TAFE, they can apply for most of their payments online.

The other way to claim ABSTUDY is over the phone. You can do much of your claim at the one time.

You’ll only need to return a paper form if your information isn’t correct or you need to advise of changes. We’ll also let you know if you need to provide any additional supporting documents.

Claim ABSTUDY by calling us on Freecall™ 1800 132 317.

To see what you or your child can get, and learn how to claim, go to servicesaustralia.gov.au/abstudy

It is because of the tireless work of our local farmers and primary producers that our country manages to keep moving. All proceeds raised will go to supporting families in Central Queensland. Please support our rural communities and join us on Saturday 30th October at the Gladstone Events Centre (Yaralla).