August 2018

Newsletter Articles

Principal’s Ponderings

Yes: Only three weeks and we are into holidays! Grab your cuppa and read on!

What has been your most exciting memory of your role in our school this term? I have a couple that I would like to share…

The student newsletter – how lovely to see the students work displayed and shared in this way. Congratulations to our school leaders Savannah and Renae for this initiative and entertaining production.

Returning from Long Service Leave – and realising how great it is to look forward to the good, the bad and the ugly of each day and accepting all of this as a challenge but also believing that we are here for a purpose and because we have strengths, skills, knowledge and care that make a difference for each student. And that I do appreciate all that you do, and am humbled that I’m not so important in the grand scheme of things because you are here. Sometimes it takes a break to see and be grateful.

P&C Qld’s Conference 7th and 8th September: I am looking forward to attending the P&C Qld’s Conference this year with three P&C members, Brie Boyle, Bec McKeering and Sue Hurford. I have chosen this conference because the focus is on Parents as Partners in Learning. As you can see in our AIP (attached) we have prioritised developing a framework with the school community that supports meaningful relationships and collaboration. The conference agenda explores this in the areas of:

1. What does good parent engagement look like?
2. Schools are people places – building trust is essential
3. Parent engagement in Rural and Remote schools
4. Others as per the agenda.

I am asking the parents who are attending to bring their findings back to be considered by the P&C and the management committee to help inform what our framework will look like.

Western Alliance: The Western Alliance has been active since 2011. It was was formed by the three schools, Mt Isa School of the Air, Longreach School of Distance Education and Charleville School of Distance Education to support secondary students by combining the teaching staff of the three schools to provide:

• More direct teaching of curriculum through increased on-air time
• Individualised support and tutorials
• Home groups
• A greater variety of elective subjects including vocational training
• Access to teachers with subject expertise and
• Engagement with peers through on-air lessons and face to face during field services.

Our student enrolment in Secondary has grown from 27 in 2011 to 79 in 2018. This changing demographic has influenced our committee and meeting structure. A Western Alliance representative from the parent body is now on our Management Meeting committee and once a term there is a support meeting of a WA parent representative from each of the three schools and the three Principals. The first one is to be held in early September.

Head of Departments visit Capricornia SDE and Brisbane SDE: Mandy and Leonie visited these schools last week to understand the strategies and practice that they use for their delivery of Literacy (all things, reading, writing, spelling, vocabulary and across all subject areas). This sharing across like schools is a rich source of ideas. I look forward to working with Mandy and Leonie and further developing our plans for 2019.

Support Staff Week: A special thank you to our support staff, Business Managers – Mitch and Tippy, Administration Officer - Ellen, Parent Liaison Officer – Helen and Technical Officer – Bill, for the commitment to the students in the school through the work that they do. We celebrated last week with certificates and treats.

Teacher Aide Day: Please thank our wonderful Teacher Aides for the work that they do with and for our students. Jenny J, Kerry, Natalie Batson (Thargomindah), Leah, Virginia, Erica and Kerry. On the 7th September we will officially celebrate.

NAPLAN REVIEW: Please see the information about the NAPLAN review in this newsletter and encourage your students (in years 3-10) to participate in the survey by clicking on the link.

Have a wonderful spring.

Yours in education,

Jenny

“The best teachers are those who show you where to look, but don’t tell you what to see.”

From the Deputy’s Desk

Sun. Surf. Sand. What a wonderful week we all had on the Primary Camp. There is a link in this newsletter to a photo gallery of a huge number of photographs that were taken during camp. The Sunshine Coast Recreation Centre was an excellent facility. I was a bit concerned that the children would be cold, as there were a few chilly nights. It turns out that there was a reverse cycle air conditioner in every cabin. Speaking of the cabins, ask your child what 1693# was. We only scratched the surface on the different types of activities that can be undertaken there. We were very close to the beach, so close, I overhead one child remark how they enjoyed hearing the waves when they were going off to sleep at night.

NAPLAN results are out and individual results will posted to families by the Department very shortly.

Minischool planning is currently being finalised. Thank you to families for handing in your forms and also to the many parent volunteers to help out in the kitchen. Quilpie may not be a full week as student numbers are low. We will let families know after the due date of the forms (Friday 7th September) if the Quilpie Minischool is a shortened event.

Western Alliance Camp is just around the corner. From Charleville we have 16 students attending the trip to the Gold Coast, accompanied by Jack Morris, Amelia Machray and Jenny Swadling. A timetable for an alternative program for students to participate in if they are not going on camp will be released very shortly by Mrs Mandy McDonald. Please negotiate with your student’s teachers if they are up to date with their required work return as to what your student will be doing this week. If your child is travelling on the bus, please return the bus pickup/drop off form to Mr McIntosh ASAP.

If you have any ideas for student activities during the KickStart Conference at the beginning of next year, I would be grateful if you can send them through to me before Friday 7th September.

PLO Prattle

End of Term 3 is in sight. From all accounts the Year 3 to Year 6 camp was a huge success and enjoyed by all.

Time to think about Term 4 with Minischools, Multischool, Speech & Awards, Yr 6 & Yr 10 Celebrations, Swim Muster and Report Cards. How are we going to fit in any school work? Remember to book your accommodation for these events.

I am going to rerun the item around getting a second phone line for your school rooms.

A MULTI-AGED CLASSROOM which requires two phone lines - Telstra have made a commitment to install a second phone line in a Distance Ed classroom for no extra cost, other than a connection fee, which you would pay for the original service.

Currently there is funding available for Drought Declared Families to access.

• Ergon Energy – the fee for pumps that are pumping water to water stock can be waivered.
• The Farm House Centrelink Allowance – Contact Rural Financial Counselling Services for them to assist you to fill out and submit the forms.
• CWA – there is funding of one off payments for each family – complete the forms on Daily notices.
• Lifeline – There is funding for the purchase of Education resources – this closes on the 29th September 2018.
• Rotary – They are supplying/sending out food and fuel voucher to families.
• Drought declared councils are also distributing vouchers to families.
• Telstra – I can access funding to have your telephone account paid.
• Banks – If you contact your bank to let them know about your situation some of the bigger banks are offering support to help until it rains.
• Charleville Neighbourhood Centre – They have access to funds to help pay Chemist and Produce stores accounts.

If you want further details around any of these organizations, they can be contacted directly, or I can help you with phone numbers, contact names or paperwork.

Hopefully the cold mornings are soon on the way out, as I don’t like the cool weather.

Cheers

Helen Cook – PLO

Curriculum Corner

Feedback, Reflection and Reading Groups

This has most certainly been a year of change for us in the Primary Years. We started the year by including a Flexible Friday to allow teachers the time to give students specific, detailed feedback as education researcher John Hattie identified this as an area of significant influence on students’ success. Each primary teacher has planned and presented this day to their students in unique and individual ways as they reflected on what was and wasn’t most effective for their class. This journey will continue until the end of the year with parents and Home Tutors being offered the opportunity to give their feedback at the upcoming Minischool Home Tutor sessions at the beginning of Term 4.

Another part of our teachers’ reflective process has been to identify the success of reading across our primary years of teaching to coincide with our 2018 Annual Improvement Plan’s focus on Reading. Our current method of once a week, mixed year level, Round Robin reading groups had limited impact on students. After completing training with the Reading Centre, identifying students’ needs according to the Literacy Continuum and observing the practice of other teachers in other schools our teachers took on the challenge of moving towards the Balanced Reading Approach. Teachers hold two lessons a week based around the same concept. In the first lesson teachers model the strategy and support students as they are exposed to new learning. In the second lessons students apply the knowledge and skills learnt from the first lesson while being guided by the teacher through questioning, discussion and feedback. As this has been a trial, parents and Home Tutor are encouraged to give their feedback at the Minischool Home Tutor sessions.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank our Home Tutors and students for willingly going on this journey of reflection and change. Although there have been moments of frustration and confusion we must continue to change our teaching to ensure our students have every opportunity to succeed.

Thanks

Leonie Herwig
Head of Department Primary – Teaching and Learning

Digital Discoveries

App of the Month: Book Creator

Book Creator is a simple app that allows you to make your own beautiful electronic books (eBooks) on your iPad. Your student can become an instant author and create their own picture books, comic books, photo books, journals and more. Document a science investigation or retell about an event – add text, handwriting, photos, cartoons and audio and videos.

Need to Change Your Password?

When accessing eLearn and other Education Queensland sites you may find your password needs to be changed (usually about every 90 days). It is advised that you use the Webmail website to change your password rather than eLearn or the Learning Place. Many users are finding that when they change their password on eLearn it doesn’t ‘stick’, whereas when changing at Webmail it works better and changes for all Education Queensland sites, including eLearn.

Webmail: https://outlook.office365.com

One Drive for Students Now Available

What is One Drive?

OneDrive is a part of Office 365 and provides students with a place to store up to 5 terabytes of work in the cloud. Watch an Introduction to OneDrive Video here.

What is it for?

Being able to upload documents to the cloud (a storage space on the Internet) allows students to share their work with their peers and teachers without the use of emails. This is particularly useful for when students create items (such as PowerPoints or videos) that are too big to email to the teacher as they can be shared via OneDrive instead.

Students Sharing Files

Students can only share files with people who have an @eq.edu.au email address. This includes staff and students. To share a file, students will need to type the user’s full @eq.edu.au email address.

With regards to file sharing, students should:

• only share files with people that they know;
• edit the sharing permissions to ‘Specific People’, so only people with whom the link is shared can access the file.
• check they have entered the email address accurately before sharing;
• only open files that have been shared with them by someone they know; and
• alert their teacher if they think someone has accidently shared a file with them, or someone has shared files that are not appropriate.

School vs Personal Files

Students should only use OneDrive for Business to share school related files.

School related files include those that are created for the purpose of completing a class activity or an assignment.

Students should ask themselves, ‘would I get in trouble or be embarrassed if my teacher saw this file?’ If the answer is ‘yes’, then it is likely that the file should not be stored in the student’s OneDrive.

Enrolment status

When a student’s enrolment status changes (e.g., following move to non-state school), they will no longer be able to access their @eq.edu.au email or OneDrive library. Students need to back up any files/emails they wish to keep prior to their enrolment status changing.

Accessing OneDrive

Go to Webmail (student email) at http://webmail.eq.edu.au and click on the ‘waffle’ (set of 9 squares) in the top left corner and select OneDrive.

The student’s OneDrive library is automatically configured the first time it is launched. This may take up to 10 minutes to finalise. Once configuration is complete, you will be presented with your empty OneDrive library.

Note: If configuration takes longer than 10 minutes, click on another Office 365 application (e.g., Outlook), then click on the OneDrive tile again.

Student Work

Check out the latest blog posts:

Prep – Year 3 Student Link:

Years 4 – 9 Student Link:

Year 10 Student Link:

From the Technician’s Table: Need More Help?

If you are having trouble with log on details, access problems, computer or headset issues or just want some advice we are here to help you. . .

School Technician – Bill Grant: wjgra0@eq.edu.au or 07 4656 8909

For all phone and headset issues and problems with computers.

Digital Learning Facilitator – Sam Owczarek: sowcz1@eq.edu.au or 07 4656 8915

For advice or help with using programs or tools on the Learning Place (including eLearn, Student Space and Blogging).

Give us a call or send an email.

P & C News

A huge thank you and congratulations to Bec McKeering our new President and Toni White our new Treasurer.

Phones/Headsets

We have had our special meeting and now the final decisions are underway. We look forward to having a suggestion bought to us at the next meeting on the 12th September.

Battery Drive

This is constantly ongoing. If you have any old batteries lying around at home, contact Anne-Marie and Greg - gfcolamba@gmail.com . A lot of money has been raised for the P and C through the battery drive.

Grants

Thanks to the our AMAZING grant writer – Christy Bredhauer

The P&C have very happy news to report…

FRRR has approved our travel subsidy grant, which is $15,000 to put towards families travel/accommodation costs to attend Speech & Awards and Swim Muster in November.

We are always looking out for ways to fund money to assist our students, families and the school. If you hear of any grants, please contact Christy Bredhauer - lambertstud@skymesh.com.au .

Fundraising

The children’s drawings have been sent away and we will receive back a final version ready for ordering. Keep an eye out for upcoming order forms in bluebags and on notices.

REMINDER…

Memberships

If you have not been receiving the documents for the meetings, your membership is not current for 2018. Membership is free. Please complete the form and send to the secretary.

NAPLAN REVIEW

The Queensland Government is undertaking a review of NAPLAN in the Queensland context, to better understand the impacts NAPLAN is having on learning and teaching within the state.

The first stage of the Review, conducted in June 2018, focused on consultation with parents.

The second stage is now underway, with consultation extending to students, teachers, principals and other key education stakeholders across Queensland.

Queensland students in years 3 to 10 are now invited to provide feedback on their experiences with NAPLAN, via an online survey. Students wishing to participate will require the consent of a parent or carer, who can assist with completing the survey at home.

The survey link is available at:

This project has received ethical clearance from both the Australian Catholic University and the Department of Education. Further information on the student survey and the Review are provided within the survey link.

Reading Nook Fun!

Instrumental Music

The recruitment process for instrumental music in 2019 has started.

If your child is in year 3 or above next year and interested in learning a musical instrumental, please fill in the application form and return to the office. If you have any question regarding our instrumental program, please contact Mr Kwan by email: cckwa0@eq.edu.au .

Student Newsletter

Please click on the following link to view the latest Student Newsletter

But wait… There’s more!