September/October 2023

News from the Principal

Welcome back for Term 4.  By the time the newsletter comes out, we will all be well and truly back into our daily routines focusing on maximising each school day.

The whole school had a great day celebrating our end of term 3 PBL rewards day.  We held our now annual Rosella Park School Show Day.  Each students received their own show bag and were able to visit 15 different activities / stalls to engage in a fun game.  At each stall they also were able to select a prize to add to their showbags.  To top it off all students also received a show staple – a bag of fairy floss.  It was so great seeing everyone join in and having a great time.

For Term 4 our PBL rewards day will be spent at the Town pool.  What a great way to celebrate great student behaviour and effort, and also a great way to cool down on a hot summer day.

Recently, I have been able to negotiate and agree on an official date for the opening of our L Block.  I am excited to share via our newsletter, that the official opening will be Friday 3^rd November at 1.00 pm.  I will be sending more correspondence out over the coming days and weeks leading up the event.  If you are free, you will be more than welcome to come along and join in and celebrate with us the amazing resource that L Block is.

Massive congratulations to some of our sporting stars that spent a few days down in Brisbane competing at the State Championships for Track and Field.  Well done to Kaleera, Jack B, Jack L, Tehmarni, Levi H, Tyler R, Jesse J, Joshua J and Holly-Ann on all of your hard work and determination.  Well done to Miss Harris for attending and providing support to our students and other students from the CQ region.  Finally, a massive personal thank you to the families of these young people.  The biggest reason they attended and represented the CQ Region and Rosella Park School so proudly is that you made it possible by getting them there and supporting them.  So to all involved congratulations and well done. 

Staff have begun processes to determine class groups for 2024.  As soon as the class groups are completed and confirmed, we will begin allocating staff to class groups.  Processed for 2023 should see families being notified earlier than normal regarding what the class groups and staffing look like in 2024.  Please keep an eye out in the coming weeks for updates.

Term 4 is notorious for being a super-fast period of time.  I am looking forward to what we can all achieve this term, and I am particularly looking forward to getting to read students progress during the report writing period in term 4. 

 As always, if you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact the school to arrange a time to meet.

Geoff Miller

Principal

News from Administration

Transition Camp

Our Transition 1 and 2 classes are heading off to Bundaberg on Monday 23/10/2023 and returning Friday 27/10/2023. Departure time will be from the school at 9:30 am and anticipate return time on Friday to be around 4:00 pm. Students will need to be picked up by a parent. An information package was sent home last term detailing the items your student will need on camp. If you need another copy, please contact either the school office 49768333 or Mrs Leeson jlees37@eq.edu.au or Mrs Brierley sbrie32@eq.edu.au.

Please note that payment of $370 (or $320 if deposit was paid) must be received in full prior to the camp departure date.

Please also ensure any medication needed for your student for camp is sent in to the school on Monday 23/10/2023.

Junior and Intermediate swimming

Swimming lessons continue each Tuesday and Thursday for our Junior and Intermediate classes. Please remember to send in swimmers, towel, cap, swimming nappy (if required), car seat (if required).

Outstanding Accounts

Please make sure that ALL outstanding accounts are settled with the school prior to the end of the school year. If you require another copy of your statement, please contact the school office.

Upcoming events for Term 4

• Junior and Intermediate swimming lessons Tuesday 10th October - Tuesday 14th November
• and Thursday 12th October to Thursday 16th November
• Prep vision screening 19th October
• School Fun Run 20th October
• Transition camp 23rd October
• Remembrance Day ceremony 10th November
• Year 12 Graduation 22nd November
• P&C Christmas Party 30th November
• Christmas Concert 1st December
• PBL Rewards Day at the Town Pool 6th December
• End of term 4 8th December

Colour Fun Run

Friday 20th October starting at 9:00 am is our school Colour Fun Run. Please make sure that you send your child to school in old clothes and shoes you do not mind getting wet or colour bombed. Also, please ensure your child has a set of school clothes to change into after the event. We will be having a visit from our local Rural Fire Service and also our local Fire Brigade which is always a lot of fun. The window for ordering your prizes is now open until Friday 20th October. If you need any assistance, please do not hesitate to call Dee at the school.

Junior 1 - Mrs Avis

Happy week 3 everyone and welcome back to a very busy term 4. All students in room one have settled back into our daily routines well and are already working hard! The students have particularly had a great time exploring patterns, our letters of the week and reading and writing over the last couple of weeks. Fun Fridays are proving to be a highlight of our week, especially as we explore and taste new foods and textures. Both staff and students have a fantastic time during these sessions!! This term, we began our swimming lessons and I am happy to report that our first lesson last Tuesday went very well. Can I please remind parents to send in a swim nappy on swimming days (if your child needs one) along with their swimmers and a towel. From all of us in room 1, we hope you all have a wonderful week.

Junior 2 - Mrs Williams

Hello families,

To finish off a fantastic term 3 of learning, students participated in our Carnival themed PBL rewards day. Everyone had a wonderful time and enjoyed exploring a range of interactive fun carnival games. Students all received a bag of fairy floss and a prize after participating in each activity which they thoroughly enjoyed. It was an extremely busy term and our main highlights were book week, the sports day gala and Naidoc week. Junior 2 also welcomed a new student to our room which was very exciting, we now have 3 boys and 3 girls. During term 4, we will be participating in the swimming program starting Tuesday 10th October from 1:15 pm to 2:00 pm which will be a lot of fun and a very valuable learning experience as water safety is an extremely important skill to develop. We are looking forward to a fun filled, engaging term of learning and will keep you all posted on our endeavours.

Thank you, the Junior 2 team.   

Junior 3

As you may be aware, Mrs Hayne is on long service leave up to week 8 of this term. We have had Mrs Withoos and Mrs Appleton filling in for her in Junior 3 for the first 2 weeks. We would like to welcome Sharon Sidle to the Rosella Park School Junior team as of Monday 16th October; Sharon is looking forward to meeting all parents of Junior 3. Term 3 ended with our PBL rewards day Carnival which all the students thoroughly enjoyed, especially the fairy floss and prize bag. Term 4 is shaping up to be a very busy term. We will be continuing with learning our letters and numbers and our reading and writing. With the weather warming up, Junior 3 have also enjoyed starting their swimming lessons. The Junior 3 class will be swimming every Tuesday from 12:30 pm to 1:15 pm with the students from Intermediate 5. Please remember to send in a swim nappy (if required), swimmers, towel, caps etc. for your student.

Intermediate 1 - Mrs Buckle

Welcome back to the last term of the year.  It will fly by; we always feel the closer we get to Christmas the faster time goes!!

Upcoming events are- Wet Fun Run (Friday 20th October), Swimming, Melbourne Cup Day, Remembrance Day, PBL Rewards Day and School Concert.  Busy times ahead.

Our class along with Intermediate 5 had a successful visit to Yandiah Farm.  Whilst it was a hot day the students made every effort to feed or pat the many animals.  We were so proud of their involvement. Please enjoy the attached photos.

Yandiah farm visit

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Intermediate 2 - Mrs Maguire

Welcome to the final term of the year. This year has gone really fast and it will be Christmas before we know it. Students have had an extremely exciting start to the Semester participating in cooking with the transition students. They are developing some great cooking and cleaning skills in the kitchen.

Term four has seen students continue to work hard towards goals in class with some enjoyable activities along the way such as swimming which has already started and will continue until week six of this term. Friday is our school fun run which the students really enjoy and I would just like to give a reminder for parents to ensure that students all have drink bottles as the weather begins to heat up again. 

Cooking

Intermediate 3 - Mrs Bowden

Welcome back to another term.  Intermediate 3 students have settled back into class well and we have had a very successful week of work and preparing for assessments.  We went to Trinity College for the production of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.  It was an amazing performance and the students absolutely  loved it.

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

Intermediate 4 - Mr Dennis

Intermediate 4 really enjoyed book week last term, and won the prize for the best classroom window display, using Jack and the Beanstalk as our story. Students from intermediate 4 came dressed in some great costumes on the Friday of Book Week. In class we have been reading many stories and putting pictures from the stories in the correct sequence. For Maths we have been learning more about adding and subtracting and gaining confidence with these skills.  This term we will continue to enjoy our cooking program on Fridays. We also look forward to the swimming program this term.

Intermediate 5 - Mrs Nash

Hi everyone and welcome to the last term of the year.

Term 4 is such a busy time of the year for everyone, with Christmas activities, concert, reporting and everyday classroom activities.  You child has nearly completed another year of schooling and are very tired as are we all 😊.

We have had a busy start with an excursion to Yandiah Farm in week 1.  Although it was a little overwhelming for some of the students they loved this experience.  I was extremely proud of just how hard each of them tried their best.  Please see attached some of the photos from the day.

We are also continuing our communication Fridays with intermediate 1.  Here we focus on the word of the week.  Last week we looked at the word ‘Need’.  We read the book “The Pigeon Needs a Bath”.  We looked in our communication devices for the word ‘need’.  We also made Nachos, where we had to say what we ‘needed’ next. 

Looking forward to another amazing term

Joan Nash

Yandia Farm

Senior 2 - Miss C

Senior 2 enjoyed their holidays and this is what we did.

“I went for a bike ride for one hour :~ 😊:-” Blair

“I played games.” Riley

“I like sleeping and when I’m awake I like eating.” Jayden

“Humphrey grass me.” Shontae – on Tobii

“I played a lot of game on the Xbox.” Kielin

“I uploaded Angry Kid videos on YouTube.” Dylan

“I played on my phone.” Ethan

“I crocheted lots, read two books and watched loads of Netflix.” Lin

“I swam in the ocean, read two books and ate too much holiday food with my best friends.” Miss Cindy

Senior 3 - Ms Harris

Welcome to term 4! This term will no doubt go by really fast, I am excited to see the great things we get up to as a class.

I am excited to tell you about school events coming up:

• 20^th Oct is our school Fun Run.
• 10^th November we will do our school Remembrance Day.
• 22^nd November our Year 12s graduate.
• 30^th November is the P&C Christmas Party.
• 1^st December is the school Christmas Concert.
• 6^th December is our PBL Rewards Day at the pool.
• 8^th December is the last school day for the year.

In our classroom we will have fun things to look forward to as well; we will do a cooking activity every Wednesday 1^st session. Later in the term (perhaps from week 3) I am hoping to start doing Wednesday excursions to local parks to expand students learning beyond the classroom. I will send permission notes home once it is organised.

We will have fun every week learning English, Mathematics, Science, Geography, History and Music/Drama.

As well as being the Senior 3 classroom teacher I am also our school PBL Chairperson – this means I am part of organising of Rewards Days, the Shazam Shop, and keeping track of positive and negative things happening across the school in terms of behaviour. Sometimes this takes me out of class to help organise activities or attend trainings.

I am also a proud member of our Student Council and support the organisation and running of school fundraisers.

The other part of my teaching is that I coach Athletics and have a passion for helping our students who are interested in physical achievements attend events and represent the school. This term we had one of our students from our very own class (Tehmarni) who attended the State Championships in Brisbane from the 11^th-15^th October. I also attended as a support person and was very proud of how all students represented the school.  

The biggest passion of mine though, by far, is ensuring the students in my class get access to the best education I can give them and achieve their curriculum goals. Whilst also engaging in social learning and feeling included as part of the class.

If you have any questions, please contact me on my email: charr512@eq.edu.au or via Class Dojo – or write me a note in the communication books.

As I am sure you all understand I get a bit busy – as such it can take a day or so for me to reply to some things. I do endeavour to be in touch whenever anything pressing is happening.

I am also happy to organise meeting with you before or after school if you would like to know more about anything that is happening in Senior 3.

Thanks so much!

Caroline Harris

Senior 4 - Mrs Dunstan

“On the school holidays I was on Facebook trying to find work, I found work. I found a lady that needed help moving so I messaged her to see if she still needed help and she said yes, so I went and helped her move and clean her property. We did it for free. We helped her unpack boxes. I also went walking with my friends”.  - Nic

“My holiday was extremely boring because I was in hospital for an emergency appendectomy. After they took my appendix out, I had to walk back and forth in the corridor everyday and rest in bed a lot. I was in hospital for 5 days. I feel much better now”.  - Rory

“On the holidays I went to Grandma’s house. I had a sleepover there. Mum took me to the shops. We brought pizza, bread, milk and salami. I spent some days at home with Mum. I watched Shaun the Sheep and Peppa Pig.” -  Zayd.

“On my holiday I went to the movies and I stayed at home and watched Netflix. That is all I have done.” Blake.

This term we have collapsed one of our Senior classes and students have been absorbed into the remaining 3 senior classes.

Transition 1 - Mr Pallett

Welcome to Term 4. As I write these words, it is 50 days to Graduation and 66 days to the end of term. And only 83 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 Wednesday 22^nd November and farewelling their friends in Year 12 as they complete their time at school and begin the next phase of their lives.

Transition 2 - Miss Sally

Welcome back to Term 4. Towards the end of last term we celebrated Joshua, Jesse and Allie’s birthdays. We also enjoyed a fun Sports Gala day with the mighty Dawson Tigers coming away with the win. Well done to our transition students Holly, Levi, Jesse and Joshua who represented their sports teams as Captains.

We have had a great start to the Term celebrating our Shazam achievements with Tyler cashing his points in to have lunch with Miss Sally. Joshua was also very excited to cash in all his shazams for the chance to dunk Miss Sally. Allie got some amazing prizes and everyone else has chosen to save up for Term 4 for even greater rewards!.

4 of our students took place in the Capricornia trials last term and then headed off to Brisbane for the State Championship. Well done to Holly, Tyler, Joshua and Jessy!

This term we are counting down until we head of on school camp in Week 4. Everyone is very excited for our week long adventure!

Recycling continues to track really well with a combined effort of $2000 between the two classes. We are seeing amazing displays of independence as students now start to access their businesses independently to complete their workplace tasks. It is an amazing progression to witness as they started out fully supported and have progressed to this stage. There are a lot of proud students when they start to reach this level of workplace independence….and teachers as well!!

In Maths, we are fortunate to be continuing our budgeting program run by Variety that will correlate and connect with our money and financial mathematics lessons. This is a very valuable, hands-on learning opportunity for our students.

We have started a cook off against Intermediate 2 with judges deciding who has the best dish of the week. We can proudly say that we have 2 wins in a row now with our chicken pies and Cob Loaf. We are confident we can make it three in a row next week! Good luck beating us Intermediate 2!

As always if you need to make contact with me please do not hesitate to contact the school, via Dojo or on email – sbrie32@eq.edu.au

Miss Sally 😊

Out and About

Transition 3 - Mrs Leeson

Welcome back from the holidays. I hope everyone had a lovely big rest as this term will be super busy and will fly by.

School Camp:

Not long now until we head off on camp. Please ensure that all notes are in as we need to finalise all the paperwork. I will be in contact with any student who takes medication as there is extra paperwork to fill in. So far everything is looking good for our trip to Bundaberg and we are all super excited. Please make sure payment for camp has been made prior to our departure.

Graduation:

By now you will have received two graduation notes, including your invitation to attend graduation this year on Wednesday 22nd November and a payment envelope. This year there is no limit on the number of people you can invite. I will need to know as soon as possible who will need the school to organise transport to the venue. The students will be involved in making most of the major decisions for the running of the evening and so far they have chosen to go with an alternative drop menu rather than a smorgasbord.

Endeavour Industries and Endeavour Learning and Lifestyle:

These programs will continue as normal this term. Monday’s for Endeavour Industries and Friday Lunches for Endeavour L&L. It has been a real pleasure to see our students mixing so well with the clients of each of these programs.

Salvation Army Volunteering:

Unfortunately, we have had to put this program on hold while the Family Thrift Store undergoes some much needed renovations. Hopefully they will be up and running in the near future and we can return to this valuable program. The students have done a great job following routines of work and giving their time to a valuable organisation. When the students finish school and are looking for a way to fill their time, finding somewhere to volunteer can give them a real sense of purpose and connection to their community.

Post School Connections:

In previous years we have spent some time in term 4, engaging with programs from Gladstone Community Linking Agency and Choice, Passion, Life in the form of two, 5-week blocks. At CPL we take part in their music program and look at the woodwork program. GCLA put together a sample of all their different programs for us to try. As GCLA’s programs usually involve making things and cooking, there will be a small fee to help cover the costs.

End of Year Celebration Concert:

To ensure our last term is as busy as can be, we have the added joy of preparing and presenting an item for the end of year concert. This year we are hoping to be the cohort who shines as we have several keen performers.

If anyone has any questions or concerns, please don’t hesitate to call me or send me an email or message via Class Dojo.

Athletics Club News

From the 9^th-11^th October Jack and Kiki competed as part of the 10-12 year age group Capricornia team at the State Finals for Track and Field. Both students did really well, being in the top 5 of Multi-Class students in their age group in the state is a huge achievement.

The 13-19 year age group started the week with photos being taken on Wednesday and they all looked great in their formal Capricornia sport uniform. There were 20 multi class athletes in amongst the 141 athletes on the Capricornia team which is a great achievement in itself. Seven of those students were from our very own Rosella Park School. Holly, Tehmarni, Jesse, Joshua, Tyler, Jack and Levi all did a great job at their events. Between track and field events we had 26 times that a Rosella student was competing in a state final. Of those we ended up with results that every single athlete should be proud of!

This was Levi’s last time competing in a school sports carnival and he made the most of it finishing with 5 medals! Well done Levi.

The highlight of the week was really seeing the team spirit coming through; they were so supportive of each other and cheering each other on loudly and proudly. A wonderful group of athletes who represented Rosella Park School proudly. It is an honour to be able to work with them.

State Championships