Rosella Park School eNewsletter

News from the Principal

Welcome to the last semester of the 2022 academic year. I am incredibly proud of each and every one of our pupils for the incredible effort they have made over the past three terms. Our outstanding team of teachers and teacher aides at Rosella Park School has provided them with excellent support.

I'm also grateful for the assistance our parents and caregivers have provided to school personnel. Your cooperation and encouragement have undoubtedly made it easier for staff to guarantee each student's achievement on a daily basis. As a school community, I have faith that we can all pull together to successfully end the academic year.

I'm happy to report that Dominique Colucci has returned from maternity leave. She joins us part-time for the remainder of term 4 as she juggles working and being a new parent. We are eager to see Miss Dom around the school and are thrilled to have her expertise and experience back on board as she serves as one of our HODs of Curriculum alongside Miss Tracey Davis. If you meet Miss Dom throughout the school, please join me in wishing her a warm welcome.

Historically, term 4 has been a very hectic and brief 10-week term. Staff members worked with the Leadership Team last week to create a draft class list for 2023, and they will do so again this week. The recommended class lists will be widely distributed to the school community as soon as we are finished with this procedure. Along with creating class groups, staff members will also go through a process to decide on staffing choices for 2023. By starting this process early in term 4, we will give our entire school community—staff, students, and parents—more time to adjust to the changes for the 2023 academic year.

Our new 12-classroom building is still being constructed. A revised handover date of roughly the fifth week of term 4 was provided to us late in the previous term. The most recent contact suggests that things are still on track at this point. We intend to transition classes into the new building gradually given the limited time left in term 4. As the transfer date approaches, the leadership team will continue to develop this plan and share it with the school community. Please keep an eye on any correspondence from the school for updates.

I urge families and the larger community to think about contributing to the forthcoming Rosella Park School P&C fundraising benefit, "Rosella Rhythm & Vibes @ Moonbar Moments." The event takes place on Saturday, November 5th. Live music and snacks are included in the $40 ticket price. Our P&C event wouldn't be the same without raffles and door prizes, so come along and try your luck. Please get in touch with our P&C or ask at the school if you are interested; I'm sure we can send you in the right direction.

Take care until our next newsletter. In the upcoming weeks, I'm looking forward to seeing you around the school. If you have any questions or need assistance with anything, don't hesitate to get in touch with me.

Cheers

Geoff Miller

News from the HOD

Australia will celebrate the teaching profession on World Teachers’ Day on Friday 28th October 2022.

Our teachers have shown great resilience during challenging times, all so they can give Australian students the best future possible. Hats off to teachers this World Teachers’ Day!

Share your “hats off” selfie to celebrate teachers and tell us what they mean to you.

We are encouraging students, their families and the community to celebrate teachers. What do teachers mean to you?

On Friday 28 October, you can show your appreciation to teachers by posting a “hats off” selfie on social media, either on your own or with family or friends. Use these tags: #WTD2022 @aitsl

Room 1 - Junior - Mrs Dobbie

During Science lessons the students in Room 1 have been learning about how plants grow. We planted seeds into a pot, watered them and left the pot in the school plant nursery in the sun. We have thoroughly enjoyed hosing them each week and watching the plants grow. The students are learning that plants are a living thing and they need soil, water and sun to grow.

Room 1 gardening program

Room 1.5 - Junior - Mrs Coulston

Well, here we are in the last term of the year. Since our last newsletter we have had many special events, quite a busy time really. We were involved in our sports day gala, book week activities and PBL celebration day. Check out the photos!

Our sports day gala was not your typical sports day, it was way more fun! We did a march past and our "war" cries, all dressed up in our house colours. We participated in a great range of ‘sporting events’ throughout the rest of the day. Some of our favourite events were ‘paper, scissors, rock’ competition and the ‘horse races’.

This term we will be involved in swimming lessons; which we are looking forward to. Our class will be going on Thursdays with room 2. We will also be continuing our cooking program with a lot of delicious items on the menu. The students will be chopping, peeling, measuring and mixing up a storm and they may bring some of it home. (if you're lucky 😊)

Cheers from room 1.5

Room 1.5 shenanigans

Hello and welcome to term 4,

We have had a fantastic start to the term and are extremely impressed with everyone’s level of participation and willingness to explore new activities. During week 1 we had a great time exploring the word of the week ‘Put’. We read the book ‘Don’t Put Your Finger in the Jelly, Nelly’, we made jelly and students then explored with the jelly. Everyone enjoyed participating in these activities and experiencing different ways we can use the word "put". We put our shoes and socks on to go outside, we put the books in the tub when reading time is finished. This term our class will be participating in the swimming program on Thursday afternoon’s which will be extremely beneficial and a lot of fun. Stay tuned for updates and photos.

Thanks Michelle and Laureen

Room 3 - Junior - Mrs Hayne

Welcome to Term 4 and the start of a busy term. We have begun our term with the Juniors heading to the Gladstone Aquatic centre for weekly swim lessons. The students have lots of fun floating, kicking and learning new skills as well as participating in games and water safety activities.

In English we are continuing to explore characters and re-tells of the book of the week. In Maths there is an emphasis on whole and part with fractions incorporating some cooking lessons. Room 3 are engaging in activities of different situations where they can use money. The students visit the breakfast club on a regular basis to make a choice of food and then pay for their items with their money This term in History the celebration of family events that are important is the focus. Every Geography lesson sees the students visit special places around the school to then make maps of that area. In Science, after looking at what plants need to grow, the students are comparing these needs to animals.

In the following weeks we will be participating in the Fun Run and beginning practice for the annual Christmas concert. Lots of fun times ahead.

Room 3 goings on

Room 4 - Intermediate - Ms Atkins

It has been a busy month in room 4 as the school year begins to wind down. For many of our subjects we have begun to complete final assessments. In geography students have started work on their dioramas of their ‘special place’. They are coming along nicely and we can’t wait to add final touches and label them. In English, students have completed Comprehensive literacy assessments which has showed gains for all students in different areas such as reading, writing, phonics and letter recognition. We are so proud to see students hard work paying off.

We had 4 of our 6 students attend intermediate camp on the 12^th to the 14^th of October. For many of our students it was their first camp. It was an amazing 3 days and I feel so grateful that we got to enjoy this activity together.

Room 4

Rooms 4, 5, 8 and 13 - Intermediate Camp

Last week, 17 Intermediate students attended school camp along with 7 staff members. We stayed at Coolwaters resort in Yeppoon. On the way to Yeppoon we had morning tea at the Rockhampton Botanic Gardens and then visited the Zoo. A highlight at the zoo was definitely the Meerkats. After the zoo we had a picnic lunch in the gardens and then travelled onto Yeppoon.

At the resort we participated in lots of fun activities such as the pool, playground, jumping pillow and movie nights. We also visited the Yeppoon lagoon and Kinka Beach. A delicious fish and chip lunch after the beach followed by a yummy ice-cream from Mr Mojo.

Everyone had a wonderful time and though exhausted by the end enjoyed their camp experience. Thank you to all who came along and participated. Students have already been asking when we can go again 😊.

Students were asked "What was your favourite part of camp"?

Laithe: All of it…..except getting sand in my eye at the beach.

Sylas: The jumping pillow

Oscar: Swimming

Norman: The fish and chips

Jaxson: Swimming in the pool.

Lachlan : Jumping on the jumping pillow.

Vincent: I like the trampoline at the park.

Annabelle: Building sandcastles

Bella: Did not like bushwalking.

Mckenzie: jumping on the jumping pillow

Levi: Swimming at the lagoon

Isaiah: The ice-cream.

Tyriq: The Lagoon

Blair: Cleaning up on our bushwalk

Ethan M: Going to the beach.

Intermediate Camp - Rockhampton and Yeppoon

Room 6 studetns along with three of the other senior classes enjoyed three (3) excursions to Tondoon Gardens and Tannum sands to explore plant and animal habitats for Science. The students were on their best behaviour and really used their senses to tune into the environments. The visits also helped us with our Geography goals as well. The mangroves at Tannum Sands showed us lots of crab and shell life. The students were respectful of the animals returning them to their homes after examining them through a container.

Our new members have settled nicely into room 6, likewise our former students have been very accommodating.

Please enjoy our photos.

Room 6 excursion activities

All students have had a busy and exciting start to the term as we work hard to finalise assessment pieces and the preparation and execution of our camp experience. The intermediate students that didn’t go away on camp participated in a number of fun activities over the three days they were away.

Room 8 happenings

Room 10 - Senior - Mrs Bickle

No article submitted :(

Room 11 - Senior - Ms Harris

Welcome back to Term 4. Isn’t it crazy that there are less than 45 days to go of school this year. This term we have welcomed Jayden into our classroom. He is fitting in really well. We are continuing our shopping and cooking program. Shopping is going really well. We all like going to the shops. Jessy enjoys eating the food we make, he eats it in a variety of locations and he gets to share the food with others across the school. Allie especially likes giving food to the adults in the office.

For writing this term we are going to write a report about deforestation. We have been watching The Lorax to learn more about the value of trees. We have also done some writing about feelings as part of learning about Mental Health week.

We have changed up our Shazam Display in Room 11 ready for the final term of Shazams. Most of the students in Room 11 are saving up for a 90 prize. Jayden, Jessy, Joshua, Holly and Tyler are saving for lunch with a staff member. They will choose a preferred staff member to get to have a take away lunch with. Allie spent her Shazams in week one on scrunchies. They are all getting lots of Shazams when they make good choices.

8 students from Rosella competed at the Queensland State Athletics Championships at the Queensland State Athletics Centre in Brisbane. The 10 - 12 year old group competed from the 10^th-12^th and the 13 - 19 year old age group from the 13^th-16^th.

We also have our School Fun Run coming up on Friday 28^th October, if students raise money for the fundraiser they can claim some amazing prizes. The same day is also World Teachers Day, so we will celebrate Miss Harris being an amazing teacher.

This term is also when SET plans and PATH plans happen with the year 10 students, so they will all get to have a meeting to plan their end of schooling. This includes choosing subjects and activities they will do in Grade 11 and 12. They will be fantastic meetings for setting up a good plan for the next 2 years.

Room 12 - Senior - Mrs Ward

This semester in maths we collected, sorted, graphed and analysed data on the Harry Potter Magical Builders from Coles. When we finished we found we had enough for each of us to take home the complete set. Best maths activity ever 😊 Thank you to everyone who collected the builders for us.

Room 12 Maths activity

Room 13 - Intermediate - Mrs Dunstan

Hello

I’m Miss Susan. I have been working with year 7 – 10 students at Rosella Park since 2020. I was happy to learn the I would be working with the students from Room 9 in Term 4 in place of Mrs Thomas who left us at the end of term 3.

We have spent the first 3 weeks getting to know each other.

The students were asked "What I like about moving to Room 13 and working with Miss Susan". Their responses were:

T says “I liked learning to play UNO doubles. It is easy for me now and I have fun”.

B says “I like playing handball when we have a brain break and I like doing Maths at my own speed so I cqn work ahead.”

E says “I like being in Room 13 because Miss Susan is nice and the room is bigger and newer.”

N says “ I liked learning to play UNO and having fun with my class, Miss Susan and Miss Kirsty. I also like the Minecraft figures and the Squishies.”

Overall everyone is settling well and both staff and students are enjoying Room 13 and looking forward to our time together in Term 4.

Room 14 -Transition - Mr Pallett

Welcome to Term 4. As I write these words, it is 43 days to Graduation and 64 days to the end of term. And only 80 days until Christmas.

During our first English lesson of the term, we made a list of all the things that we are going to be doing before the end of the year. It was a very long list indeed! The students are looking forward to some Halloween fun at the end of this month and all the Christmas activities to mark the end of the school year and the beginning of the Summer holidays.

In particular, the students are looking forward to the Graduation dinner on Friday 18th November and farewelling their friends in Year 12 as they complete their time at school and begin the next phase of their lives.

Room 15 - Transition - Mrs Leeson

What a crazy busy term this one is shaping up to be. We have our camp commencing on the 24^th October. If you have not already sent in your camp forms can you please do so as soon as possible. We have been reviewing the camp arrangements and are in the process of deciding if we will take the inland roads via Gayndah to avoid the large amount of road works. We will let you know on any changes to the itinerary as soon as possible. The year 12 graduation is coming along nicely. It is looking pretty spectacular thanks to Ms Sally, the year 12 students and their merry bunch of helpers. All subjects are as busy as always. In Community Agencies we are starting to piece together ideas and activities we have investigated over the last semester and will pull all the information into potential activity timetables based on our personal interests and preferences. The Salvation Army program continues to be a huge success with the students practicing valuable work skills. Our weekly lunch outings on a Friday with Endeavour Learning and Lifestyle continue as does the Endeavour Industries program on a Monday. Leisure preference continues and may involve some swimming related activities if the students are keen. Overall, this term is not slowing down in any way. If you have any questions about any of the end of term arrangements, don’t hesitate to get into contact. Please remember to get your tickets for graduation as soon as possible. If you have any questions, please contact the school on 49768333.