23 November 2017

Newsletter Articles

Deputy Principals Comments

With the end of the school year approaching, I am certain students, tutors and parents are looking forward to the upcoming break in the next few weeks. My thanks to all for your diligence and hard work through the year; the outcomes for our students is a testimony to the commitment of the vast majority of parents.

As is the cycle of things, with another year closing, we pause to celebrate. Our annual Awards Day (30th November) is a time, not just to recognise the remarkable achievements of our students but also a time to recognise our entire school community for the amazing job that they do.

For those of you attending our end of year celebrations, please travel safely and we look forward to catching up with you back at school after the official ceremony. With storm clouds about early in the season, we hope it will not dampen the occasion, but at the same time, that you get rain if you need it and stay dry if you don’t.

Cameron Burke
Deputy Principal

Parent Liaison Officer

Lesley Griffin
Parent Liaison Officer

21st Century Skills

Preparing Students for a Changing World

Meningococcal

Due to an increase in Meningococcal W and Y disease across Australia in the last 3 years, Queensland Health made the decision to fund vaccinations for the 15-19 year olds for the period June 1 2017 to May 31 2018. It is important to note that since this decision there has been an outbreak of Meningococcal W in the Northern Territory.

All year 10 students in Queensland will be able to receive this funded vaccine through a state wide school program. If your child has missed this vaccine at school or is not in year 10 but is 15-19 years of age they are able to receive the vaccine free through their local vaccine provider [GP, Community Health Service or Council]

Meningococcal disease is a rare but severe infection that occurs when meningococcal bacteria invade the body from the throat or nose. Meningococcal bacteria are carried in the nose and throat of healthy individuals and are spread through close prolonged contact. The bacteria are more commonly found in teenagers and young adults. There are a number of different strains of meningococcal bacteria. Worldwide, the main strains that cause meningococcal disease are A, B, C, W and Y.

Most people with meningococcal infection fully recover, but some people who survive can develop long term health complications including limb deformity, skin scarring, deafness and possible loss of brain function. Meningococcal W disease has a higher death rate than meningococcal C and meningococcal B infections and may be fatal in about 1 in 10 cases.

IT Hints

Email Attachments:

When sending email attachments in Outlook 2016 from files that you have stored in the Cloud like OneDrive or Google Drive, Outlook will put in a link (or shortcut) to the file instead of the actual file.

Education Queensland computers are not able to access attachments stored on cloud drives like OneDrive or Google Drive so your teacher can’t access your attachment.

You will need to send the actual attachment file.

The good news is it is very easy to do, and this process can be used for any email that you want to attach a file to.

The process to include actual attachments instead of the link or shortcut is to attach the file via Drag & Drop from a File Explorer window.

1. Create and type your email as you’d normally do until you are ready to add an attachment.
2. Open a File Explorer window (keyboard shortcut: Windows key + E).
3. Browse to the file that you want to attach.
4. Click and hold down your mouse button on the file.
5. Drag your mouse cursor over the message body of the email that you are creating and release the mouse button.

The file will now be an actual attachment.

Norris Webb
IT

Library News

October Reading Rainforest Book fair – I think all of our Butterflies, snakes and crocodiles had fun!

We raised a whopping $621 worth of new books for the library with donations and commission.

Thank you to all who helped by making decorations or buying a book.

Call in and see our 12 Days of Aussie Christmas display in the library and sit for a picture with Santa.

Jenny Currin
Library

Prep

Sharing My Favourite Rhyming Book

To finish off the year in English our talented Prep students were asked to complete their- ‘Sharing my Favourite Rhyming Story’ task.

The task required the students to:

1. Select a favourite rhyming storybook and think about why they really enjoy it.
2. Write or draw about why they like this book.
3. Write or draw about what they don’t like about this book.
4. Identify and write some rhyming words from the rhyming story.
5. Think about other words they know that would rhyme with these words.
6. Share their thoughts, feelings and rhymes with others.

All the Preps created a poster to share with their audience.

Well done to all our preps on the incredible efforts you have put into this task and thank you for such entertaining presentations!

We wish you all the very best in Year 1 in 2018.

Prep Photos

Tom - One Mole Digging a Hole

Di Luxton and Leean Shepherd
Prep Teachers

Year 1

Mini School Round Up!

What an action packed week we had at Mini-School!

Throughout the week, the Year 1s were very busy learning about dinosaurs. We certainly have some keen palaeontologists amongst us. We discovered that some dinosaurs like to eat meat and they are carnivores. Some dinosaurs like to eat plants, they are herbivores and some dinosaurs eat both, they are omnivores. We learnt about different types of fossils and made some of our own.

We also found some dinosaur eggs, which we placed in a cup of water and eagerly awaited them hatching. We had to predict what we thought would be inside the egg. The next day, when we arrived at school our eggs had hatched. We were super impressed. Some of us had a baby T-Rex, Brachiosaurs, Triceratops and a Stegosaurus.

In Maths, we explored data. We asked our friends what their favourite dinosaur was and graphed it in our booklets. We learnt we could gather data in lots of ways; using graphs, ticks and cards with our names. We also measured how long a T-Rex’s foot was and compared it to our own feet. What a huge difference!

In English, we imagined what it would be like to have a pet dinosaur. We were very good at remembering to use our capital letters, full stops, finger spaces and editing skills. Check out some of fabulous writing below:

My Dinosaur Writings:

In Science, we learnt about volcanoes and the different parts of one. We created our own erupting mountains using vinegar, red food dye and bi carb soda. WOW!

We also explored procedures during our English lessons. As a culminating activity for all the great work we have been doing in lessons we created some “Gooey, Chewy, Dinosaur Stew”. First, we read a book about a cheeky T-Rex who wanted to eat a poor defenceless Triceratops. He was brewing an interesting stew, but the other dinosaurs had a plan…… Can you guess what happened?

After the story, we put on our thinking caps and pieced back together our jumbled up recipe. We did a wonderful job, identifying the steps and following the procedure to make our “Dinosaur Stew”. It was very tasty.

In Drama, Ms Geisel taught us about Shakespeare and we acted out a scene from “Much Ado about Nothing”. It was a funny story. We were all very brave performing in front of our friends.

On Wednesday afternoon, we went to the library and trekked through the deep, dark jungle. We discovered lots of colourful wildlife hidden amongst the books and displays. Our Library looked amazing! A huge thank you to Ms Cindy who face painted some amazing butterflies and snakes on our children during our borrowing time. I am sure there were some children who did not want to wash their faces that night.

On Thursday, the Fire Brigade visited and spoke to us about fire safety. We thoroughly enjoyed climbing through the Fire Truck and spraying the hose over the oval. It was a terrific way to cool down on a hot afternoon. We all know what it means to, STOP DROP and ROLL.

By the end of the week, we were certainly all exhausted! Thank you for an amazing week, Year 1!

Year 1 Photos

Zane & Charli making Dinosaur Stew

Tash Weston and Alanna Price
Year 1 Teachers

Year 4

Students Mini School Fun

Some of our year 4 students got to sleep over at school for a week this Term. This was a great opportunity for them to get to know their peers and teachers. During this time, the students participated in Math and Science challenges, created a pizza box biography, enjoyed two rugby-training sessions, decorated a ceramic mug, went swimming, created and modelled some amazing toilet paper fashions, played board games and attended a quiz night. It was a fun but tiring week!

Mini School Photos

Tiarna O’Brien and Sharon McLauchlan
Year 4 Teachers

Year 6

A Busy Year in Year 6

The 2017 Year 6 cohort has had a very busy year in their final year of being primary school students. Along with completing their studies and participating in lessons, the students have had the opportunity to participate in many activities throughout the year. Activities have ranged from Home Tutor School and Outreaches, to the ANZAC Day march, Country Music Parade, Collaborate Remembrance Day Service and even the opportunity to purchase a CTSDE Year 6 Shirt.

Term 4 allowed the opportunity for the students and teachers to come together to participate in the much anticipated Year 6 camp to Townsville. The camp included a week full of action packed activities. Activities included exploring the Museum of Tropical Queensland, games of Mini Golf, a technology lesson on the Strand where the student’s creative sides were put to the test, a fun run at Riverway followed by the biggest game of Marco Polo the pool has ever experienced, a trip to the RAAF base, practising our basketball skills with the ‘Townsville Fire’ and exploring the beautiful views of Castle Hill.

On the Tuesday of the camp, a day trip to Paluma was the scheduled event for the day. Waking to a bit of rain had the teachers a little worried as many students (including the teachers) didn’t have a rain jacket. But the sun played nice and decided to grace the day with its presence. It was pretty special to see a rainforest that is only approximately 80km north of Townsville. It was a peaceful day of adventuring in the forest and enjoying the natural beauty of what’s available not too far from our front doors. The children loved looking at Crystal Creek, on the way up and down of the mountain, and jumping from rock to rock, even if it did scare Mrs Langham. It was a good day even though there was a leach or 10!

The teachers had a fantastic week with the students and were amazed with their behaviour and willingness to help prepare meals, clean up and check to see if there was anything they could do to help out. The students had a wonderful week together enjoying spending time with each other. We are sure there were quite a few quiet car rides home on Friday afternoon! Thank you to Mr Fan Zeng who attended the camp as a supervising teacher.

As the end of the school year grows near, we wish the students all the best for their transition into Year 7.

Year 6 Photos

Basketball skills and drills session with the Townsville Fire

Mrs Langham and Mr Purdie
Year 6 Teachers

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