September

Newsletter Articles

Principal's Ponderings

Again another wonderful month full of fun and laughter and lovely people.

Thank you to Bianca and Leannda for their most elegant afternoon tea! A hard act to follow at Swim Muster ladies (and gentlemen?). These activities bring us together for fun and sharing of experience and builds on relationships.

Staffing:

We welcome Angie Walton as Teacher Aide for SWD students. Angie commenced on Tuesday 23rd August.

Kate Lofthouse is now on Long Service Leave, Alison Simmons is acting Deputy Principal and Caroline Daunis is teaching Alison's classes.

School opinion survey:

We had an exceptional number of responses from families when the email issue was sorted and families could respond. Thank you and we look forward to your feedback when the information is collated and shared with the school community. A message for the organisers is that our families with more than 3 students would use excessive internet and could we request that slips are not sent to all students in the family.

Management Meeting:

Topics discussed at the Management meeting prior to Sports Muster were:

Attendance – a reminder that the Education Act –states that attendance at an SDE is based on work return.

Calendar: A draft 2017 calendar was presented. The P&C meeting dates will be confirmed at a later date.

Curriculum: The 2017 introduction of ETeach (other subjects such as Arts, HPE) units will not all be delivered next year. History, science and geography to remain the same. Arts and HPE have been trialled and feedback on these is that they are good. The present CLC unit links are breaking thus these units need to be replaced. Digital and design technologies will be rolled out – introduction to years 1-3 in 2017 and then roll out to year 4 and beyond in the following years.

QCAA has conducted a curriculum review and Zoe and class teachers are working on identifying the appropriate units to cover based on the report. Discussion was held about the importance of history and geography as separate subjects. Schools are to make the decision about what will be covered and may be done across bands (years 3/4/ 5/6).

Not all units are able to be aligned for multi-age classes. Year 1 – 2 work well together and 3 – 6 work well together. Across years 1/2 and 3/6 doesn't work as well due to unit length.

Prep – Micarla and Zoe met with other prep teachers/HODs in Brisbane to address the Prep curriculum delivery. The materials were written when prep was not compulsory and it was play based. Transition for prep to year 1 was discussed.

SDEs will backwards map the prep program to identify areas that are going to be covered again and the aim is to reduce the load in the prep curriculum.

PLO Report: There is a Home tutor site on SDE websites. This gives HTs access to professional development e.g.: videos/vignettes, power points and will be of use to both new home tutors and existing HTs.

KSC is well under way for 2017. Requests from Home Tutors has led us to engage Michael White from Aus Identities. His session will enable Home Tutors to understand their learner, understand how they work with their learner and is based on personality identification.

Also continuing is the session for parents with employed Home Tutors.

Cluster Muster: Enquiries as to why Cluster Musters occurred with the small numbers attending some clusters? Attached is the school policy for Field events that explains the guide for us to deliver the best combination of field events for the students.

Strategic Plan: The committee reviewed the recommendations and the highlights in the growth in the school.

We are considering the information and data that we have and will decide upon our one focus for 2017.

NAPLAN is one source of data for us. Use of this data may be one area to focus on. Staff members are attending professional development to understand the use of data.

While the recommendations are concerned with teaching expertise and this is a Darling Downs South West priority, at all times we put the lens of a home tutor across the proposed strategies and what it would mean for our common concern: the students.

Suggestions of areas to focus on from the committee are communication, social/emotional, open communication, mutual respect, consistency, acknowledgement, community.

Wishing you all a well-deserved September break.

Jenny

Curriculum Corner

New Readers

I would like to say a very big thank you to the P&C for donating $5000 towards new readers for the library. This money went towards purchasing early year's readers that are decodable as well as readers for those levels who might not have enough in them. These have now been ordered and will be making their way to the shelves as soon as they have been barcoded and covered.

Similarly, the school spent another $5000 to purchase readers for older students who might still be reading at a lower level. These texts will be engaging in content for the students' age, while still meeting their reading level.

Jenny Juniper did a clean out of old readers earlier this year. These readers were available at Sports Muster for families to take. As we still have many left over, these will also be available at Speech and Awards so keep an eye out for Jenny J and help yourself to what is there.

Digital Readers

We are still reviewing our digital reader subscriptions and developing a plan for 2017.

Prep is now compulsory

In case you missed it… Prep year now compulsory in Queensland

State Parliament today passed legislation ensuring all Queensland children benefit from a full-time Prep year before starting Year 1.

Premier Anastacia Palaszczuk and Education Minister Kate Jones said compulsory prep was among a range of education reforms passed in the Education and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2016.

"My Government wants all Queensland students to benefit from a fulltime Prep year before starting Year 1," Ms Palaszczuk said.

"We want to build on the Government's provision of 15 hours each week of kindergarten for all our four-year-olds."

Ms Jones said participation in Prep improves a child's educational outcomes and was a critical foundation year for schooling.

"Importantly, this does not lower the compulsory school age. Parents will continue to have flexibility in terms of the age at which they may enrol their child in Prep, provided the child is enrolled and attending school from the age of compulsory schooling of 6 years and 6 months."

(Source: Media release 3719 7530 – Queensland Government)

Thanks
Zoe Farrer
Head of Department – Teaching and Learning

PLO Prattle

What a fantastic time that we all had at Sports Muster and the Jubilee Celebrations. It was wonderful to catch up with so many past and present staff, families and students.

If you know of a family in your area who is interested in joining our school next year can you ask them to contact me for an enrolment interview and application forms as soon as possible.

A few more parenting tips from Michael Grose, on how to get children to do chores etc without arguments or nagging.

Getting cooperation from kids can be simple

In a conversation with a mum after a recent parenting seminar I was reminded how important it is to get the little things right if we want to get cooperation from kids….and avoid yelling, nagging and fighting with them.

She told me how she uses 'when…then' language when her children ask her to do something, particularly when she doesn't think their timing is right.

Child: 'Mum, can I watch TV?'

Parent: 'When you've done your homework/done your jobs/helped your brother then you can watch TV.'

Grandma's principle

I call 'When…then' language Grandma's principle. My grandma was smart. She insisted that children do the boring and difficult things before they did the easy, fun activities.

Want to go out and play? Sure, but you need to get your homework out of the way first.

Grandma's principle is all about getting the order right – get the boring but important stuff out of the way then you can relax and have fun.

Grandma's principle has other applications as well.

You can use it to promote responsible behaviour as well.

"When you've helped your brother with his homework then you can play a game on the iPad."

We can also use Grandma's principle to give kids more freedom.

"When you've shown you can catch the bus to the shops safely on your own then you'll be able to catch a bus into the city on your own."

'When…then' opens up possibilities for kids.

Rather than saying "No you can't have ice cream/use my phone/go out" you can grant kids their wishes contingent on doing the important things first.

"When…then" is a useful strategy to add to your parenting repertoire.

I hope you all have a wonderful break and get rested up for a busy fourth term. Minischools/Multischool starts in week 2. Don't forget to book your accommodation for Swim Muster, Graduation and Speech and Awards.

The program for Kick Start Conference 2017 is well under way with lots of exciting things happening. You may also wish to book your accommodation for KSC, the dates are Tuesday 31st January 2017 to Friday 3rd February 2017.

Enjoy your holiday.

Cheers

Helen Cook
Parent Liaison Officer

Digital Discoveries

New Web Conferencing Delayed

The new Blackboard Collaborate is now on hold awaiting a final sign off after investigations into issues accessing from some locations. Home Tutors are still able to test the system until we officially launch. All eLearn courses have a session available for testing called 'Help Desk'. Please note that while students can use Web Conferencing on an iPad the App has limited tools available and won't give full interaction like the online version does.

New Robotics Kits

The school has recently purchased some new robotics equipment so that teachers can teach the students how to code. But first - they need to learn it! Pictured below is a group of teachers learning to use the Edison Robot. It reads barcodes but can also be programmed with algorithms. Teachers programmed it to not run into anything, to sumo wrestle and to do a fancy performance.

Below is a photo of our teachers learning to program the Ozobots, mini robots that follow colour commands that students draw.

The Edison Robot and Ozobots join our collection of BeeBots and Probot which will be used at Minischools, Multischools and KickStart Conference in the future.

iPad App of the Month: BeeBot

If you have seen our BeeBot robots in action at Minischool, then you will love the BeeBot app. The app makes use of Bee-Bot's keypad functionality and enables children to improve their skills in directional language and programming through sequences of forwards, backwards, left and right 90 degree turns.

For more information and a link to download from go to:

Student Work Celebrations:

Year 8 students have been learning about Game Design as part of their ICT elective subject. Check out one of their games they made using GameStar Mechanic at

Check out the latest blog posts:

Audacity: Recording Student Voice

There are often times when teachers ask students to record a speech, some reading or poem as a record of their abilities. One tool that is available to use to do this is a program called Audacity. This is a free program that you can download onto your computer that allows you to record a person talking. It then saves the recording so you can send it to the teacher.

For advanced users, you can also experiment with the effects and make your voice sound different. Try 'Change Pitch' to sound like a chipmunk or Darth Vader, use the Gverb effect to sound like you are in a concert hall or try the duplicate effect to sound like an alien or ghost.

Remember, when saving your finished product to 'Export as mp3' so that the teacher can listen to your recording. If you send the Audacity project file, the teacher will not be able to open it.

From the Technician's Table: Back Up Your Data

We all know we are supposed to back up our data. Yet many people do not do it, even after losing an important document, irreplaceable photo or set of financial records. Perhaps it's because backing up takes some effort and time. However, it is an important step, is becoming easier for people to carry out and is time well spent. Backing up can be as simple as copying a file from one spot to another, say from your hard drive to a removable USB drive. However there are other options.

• Windows has its own Backup and restore feature within the Control Panel.
• Cloud Storage such as Dropbox, OneDrive and Google Drive allow you to save online in case your computer crashes. Most of these sites generally give about 2GB free storage before asking you to sign up and pay a fee for additional storage.
• Full Disk Image creates a replica of all your data – every file and folder, including program and systems files. It is a good option if backing up a brand new computer as it will allow you to restore back to that point if something goes wrong. You will generally need software to conduct an image. Options include Drive Image and Clonezilla.

Girl Guides

Did you know that Charleville School of Distance Education has its own Girl Guide Unit? The 2nd Charleville (Lone) Guides is an official part of Girl Guides Queensland. In 2016 we will continue Girl Guide sessions on Tuesday afternoons at 3:00pm.

Our weekly sessions (subject to leader availablility during field events) are run as an on-air session using Web Conferencing. The girls learn about the World of Guides, they strive for badges, help out in their community, have fun and fellowship, and meet during Field Events if possible.

Email Mrs Sam O on sowcz1@eq.edu.au if you would like to join and application forms and information will be forwarded to you.

Annual Promise Ceremony

Eight of the 2nd Charleville Lone Guides joined the 1st Charleville Guides for the District's annual Promise Ceremony. It has become tradition that the two units get together once a year allowing all the Guides to either renew their Promise or make their Promise for the first time showing their commitment to Girl Guides.

The Promise Ceremony had a bilby theme, so Guides had to act like bilbies – bounding to the front of parade and crawling through the burrow. Here is Savannah who, as one of our older 'bilbies' only just fitted – thanks for being a great sport and having some fun on our special night Savannah!!

Lone Guide, Alice (Guiding name: 'Quail') was inducted as a Junior Leader on the night of the Promise Ceremony. It made for a special occasion as her mother and home tutor, Tracy (Guiding name: 'Brolga'), was also inducted as a fully qualified leader for 1st Charleville Guides on the same night!

Western Alliance

How many triangles?

Year 7A Maths students were presented with this challenge in a recent warm up activity. Many students worked on this for hours and even days! Pictured below is Darcy who went to extreme lengths to try and get to the correct answer.

Alliance Iron-on Logos

Charleville SDE now has more iron-on Western Alliance Logos for secondary students to add to their blue Charleville SDE or Thargomindah Campus uniform shirts. This allows students to show off their dual identity of being part of our school as well as the Western Alliance.

Contact Mrs O if you would like logos sent to you to iron on ready for Multischool. Logos go on the opposite side of Charleville SDE logo.

Teaching and Learning Library

Something to smile about….

I'm going to give you a minute to contemplate this picture…

Can you relate?

I don't think it matters what school you enter, Term 3 is always a doozy. I'm never really sure why. The end is near but far away? Sheer exhaustion is kicking in? Or everyone is just ready for a holiday?

And when I say that… I'm not just talking about the adults. I'm sure there is a picture representation of how the students feel too…

So what do we do when exhaustion is taking over? How do we ensure this has minimal impact in the classroom? Well… we SMILE.

Smiling is arguably the most important and impactful nonverbal expression humans can use in social situations. So, let's take a crash course in what smiling is and why it's so important…

The Purpose of Smiling

Primates expose their teeth as a defence mechanism —flashing teeth at foes. Perhaps this is where curmudgeonly teachers get their poor advice about not smiling. Good thing we are beyond our baboon beginnings.

For those of us who ascribe ourselves as "human," smiling is an expression of social safety. It signifies that we are not a threat, that we are approachable, and that we wish to share positive emotion. If any of these ideas—safety, approachability, positive emotion—do not belong in the classroom, then, by all means, don't smile.

The Effects of Smiling

There is ample research on the positive effects, internally and externally, of smiling often. Ron Gutman provides an engaging and informative summary of smiling benefits for those who love a good TED talk.

Let's explore the benefits from an educational standpoint:

Smiling prevents perceived threat

Imagine you are scanning the brain of an adult as he or she sees a picture of a neutral facial expression. The part of the brain you would see light up would be the frontal lobe—our rational thought centre. We are, in a sense, logically analysing if this face is happy, sad, angry, etc.

Compare this to the brain scan of a teenager looking at the same photo. Which areas of the brain light up? The limbic system—in particular the amygdala which is processes emotion and perceives threat. In other words, teenagers are more likely to read neutral expressions or tones as threatening. Worse yet is that when one is sleep deprived, this effect is strengthened. Read: You think you're being normal and neutral. Sleepy teen thinks you're being a jerk-hole.

The simplest solution: Smile more.

Facial Feedback Response

Theorized by good ol' Charles Darwin, FFR suggests that cueing a certain facial expression can activate the feeling of that emotion. Some studies have shown legitimacy in the idea: Suppression or expression of facial cues affects how we feel and respond. We can fake it until we make it—or better yet, fake it until we become it as Amy Cuddy suggests about nonverbal influence.

Think about the power of this small idea. We can intentionally counteract sourness syndrome. Smiling, then, can not only affect our students; it can create a better experience for us as teachers. Joyful teachers = joyful teaching = joyful learning.

Smiling can be contagious

It is difficult to suppress smiling when seeing someone else smile. For example, try not to smile looking at this kid:

Some link this idea to the concept of mirroring—the process by which humans build rapport and mimic one another's nonverbal cues. By smiling, we make it more challenging for our students to be a bunch of angsty grumps. (Now, this doesn't mean jumping around with exaggerated grins—doing so will just tick your kids off even more. A simple smile will do, please).

Smiling can increase ratings of competence, sincerity, and sociability

Do we want students to see us as knowledgeable and competent? Yes. Do we want students to trust us and see that we are sincere in our intentions to educate them? Yes. Do we want to build rapport and have strong social trust in the classroom? Yes. All of these are beneficial for learning and management, and all of them can be increased by smiling.

A joyful default can make management easier.

The idea that smiling helps classroom management runs counter to the horrid advice to "not smile until Christmas." However, picture yourself as a student. You have a teacher who smiles often (even if Ms. Grins is faking it). Then, after you and your classmates get a little unruly, that smile ceases immediately. Before the teacher even says a word, your brain has been cued to recognize the behaviour as socially unacceptable. Your developing brain is improving its ability to read emotional responses. Compare this to a classroom in which the teacher normally scowls. You're having to constantly worry about whether this pseudo-schizophrenic teacher is going to snap.

Creating a smiling default makes it more clear to students what behaviour is socially acceptable in our classroom and what behaviour is not. In my experience, after developing a smiling default, my students know quickly when they've disrupted a social expectation. I've had many a moment in which my students knew as soon as they walked in whether the sub report was good or bad.

For those who think, "I don't smile. It's not natural for me. I'm not going to be someone I'm not," consider this. You were actually born joyful. It was who you were as a person – joyful, smiley, full of laughter. By smiling, you are cultivating who you used to be. So, cheese it up and bring a smile back to your life, your teaching, and your students' learning.

So, what have you got to smile about today?

Thanks
Zoe Farrer
Head of Department – Teaching and Learning

A Stellar Performace by CSDE at the Performing Arts Festival

Congratulations to Ciara Freeman, Emily Goddard, Tully Allen, Cooper Clover, Bodhi Allen and Christian Clover for winning a silver medal in the Year 4-6 Verse Speaking Contest at the Charleville Performing Arts Festival. Our group of just 6 students impressed the audience and judges with their volume, gesture and expression while performing "I tried to take a selfie" by Ken Nesbit. It was a huge competition this year with each class from St Mary's and the Charleville State School entering the category. I couldn't be more proud of our students who practised together in person for the first time just an hour before the performance. A huge thank you to Mums and Dads and Home Tutors for assisting with rehearsals and driving in the pouring rain to get their stars to the performance. Although we are divided by distance we truly were united by voice with our performance at the festival.

Mrs Katie Allen

Choir of No Commitment

On Tuesday 6th September we were lucky to have a visit from Alisen McLeod who joined our teachers for a rhythmical music session. Alisen also shared a web conferencing session with our students where we joined in on lots of rhythm and beat and lyrical songs. What fun we had!

Thank you to all the students who joined in! I hope it did't use too much of your data!

Alison Simmons

Camerata Visit

On Wednesday 31st August we had the pleasure of a visit from Camerata of St John's Queensland Chamber Orchestra. These fun loving string musicians perform regularly in festivals, collaborations and tours. We were lucky enough to have them live, here, in our studio, in web conference with students across our school. What a great opportunity to connect with students! Now we know a little more about music texture – how it can be thick or thin, lovely, creamy and buttery. Don't forget melody! This is the most recognisable part of the music. Thanks to Mrs Lofthouse for organising this event. Watch this space for more shared on-airs! Ms Simmons.

Jubilee Celebrations

What a fantastic weekend of catching up and reminiscing!

Thank you to the committee who tirelessly pulled together a full program of entertainment and official activities. Thank you to the P&C for their support with the book launch and managing the finances. And a special thank you to all staff who gave of their time and expertise in last minute setting up and support for the committee. This effort on the back end of Sports Muster is very much appreciated and made for a very smooth and successful weekend.

Our sponsors of the book production have helped to ensure that we have a photographic history of the first 50 Years of this wonderful school. There are more books and souvenirs for sale and jerseys avilable for ordering should you want a memento.

The photos tell the story of the Meet and Greet, book launch and formal activities. Enjoy!

Snow Camp

Charleville School of Distance Education have just returned from a week long school camp to Dubbo, Canberra and Smiggin Holes Ski slopes in New South Wales. Forty six students from years 4 to 10 and 14 adults travelled by bus to Dubbo where they spent a morning visiting the zoo. Amongst our group were students from Western Alliance – Longreach School of Distance Education and Mount Isa School of the Air. After a stopover at the Parkes Observatory they then travelled to the country's capital where they visited the old and new Parliament Houses, the War Memorial and the Telstra Tower. Students participated in a mock vote whilst visiting the Electoral Education Centre. They also learnt about the Senate and House of Representatives. The following day was spent visiting the Australian Institute of Sport where the students watched athletes training and tested their own skills with some apparatus, the CSIRO and Questacon Science Centres.

It was then time to hit the slopes! We travelled to Berridale where we stayed for three nights and travelled daily to ski and snowboarding lessons at Smiggin Holes. Wow! The amazing white stuff provided a great playground for our students from outback Queensland! Perseverance was the name of the game and by the end of three days everyone could move in many ways across the snow!

Our thanks goes to all the many people who have helped with financing this camp and supporting our families with payments. Thank you to the Charleville SDE P&C who contributed a generous amount per student attending camp as well as sponsoring our 2 parent helpers, and to the SDE Student Council for their contribution. Added to this we received a grant through the Parliament and Civics Education Rebate (PACER). The students have faced many new experiences in their travels from busing overnight to sharing rooms and dealing with being away from known situations. They worked together to have a fun filled week.

Alison Simmons
Acting Deputy Principal, Charleville School of Distance Education

Congratulations

Dharlia pedals to the medals

Western Alliance Yr 9 Student, Dharlia Haines competed at the Australian cycling Championships in Bendigo last week.

Dharlia is the new Australian Champion in the Criterium event!!

(The Criterium is a bike race consisting of several laps around a closed circuit)

She also placed 2nd in the 32km Road Race and 14th in the Time Trial with a new personal best time!

Congratulations Dharlia.