6 October 2016

From the Principal

Zoe Smith

Welcome to Term 4! We have 10 very busy weeks ahead!

As the year comes to an end we are keen to seek feedback from all members of our school community about our progress so far in Curiosity and Powerful Learning. As you know, we have ‘played’ with Inquiry this year and in doing so have made a commitment as a staff to create and embrace an Inquiry approach to learning. This will take us a number of years to learn and embed.

We have established a partnership with Kath Murdoch from Melbourne University to help us in our learning journey and act as a critical friend for the school for the 2017 and 2018 school years. The other focus area we have been working on is the Theory of Action, Learning Intentions, Success Criteria and Checking for Understanding. Our staff are very interested to see how far we have come and have agreed to take part in a review process. This is for our school purposes only and is not required of us by DET. I am so grateful to our wonderful teachers for agreeing to take part in the review. We really do have a great bunch of teachers who are dedicated to the school and improving student learning!

As part of the review process, our staff will take part in a Self-Assessment process and we have also invited back the external reviewers from 2016 to give us an external perspective of our progress. We will also be seeking feedback from our students and a small group of parents to see what they know and understand of our progress so far. We are seeking approximately 8 parents who are available and keen to take part in a focus consultation group on Thursday 13th of October from 9-10am. It is short notice but if you are interested please email zsmit24@eq.edu.au. Once we have completed the review, we will start planning for 2017!

Many parents are interested in the outcome of the Resilience Survey that was completed by Years 3–6 students in the last week of Term 3. We will have the results very soon as well as an analysis of the outcomes and what it means for future school planning. I will share the outcomes in the weeks to come.

The next P&C meeting is Wednesday 12th of October at 7.30pm. I will be sharing an audit of our current IT hardware as part of a broader conversation with P&C about how we, as a school community, fund and move forward in this area. Please come along if you are interested in the discussion.

Don’t forget the P-3 sports carnival is next Monday (10th of October) so please come along and support the children as they enjoy themselves participating in athletics!

Finally, a few important messages for the next few weeks:

• Nomination forms for Enhancement classes are due Friday 7th of October by 3.30pm. No late nominations will be accepted.
• Nomination forms for School Leadership positions are due Friday 14th of October by 3.30pm. No late nominations will be accepted.
• School leader, Sport and Music photos are 25th of October.
• School Disco will be 26th of October.

Have a great week.

Newsletter Articles

From the Deputy Principal

Maree Hass

I hope you all enjoyed a relaxing break!

Hopefully the sun will shine on us for the Prep-3 Sports Day on Monday October 10, please join us to support the students enthusiastically participating.

Prep 2017 – please enrol your child now!

Please see the office if you would like to book a meeting with me. If you are a school family and are happy without a meeting please ensure that you bring into the office your child’s Prep Profile as this contains important information that I use in putting the prep classes together for next year.

Date Claimer: Prep Orientation visit – Tuesday November 15th

A letter will come home in the next few weeks with exact times and information for this visit to school and prep with your child.

Please visit the following link which details our school enrolment management plan and also provides a link to the catchment area for Graceville State School for more information about the process for placing your child’s name on our waiting list if you reside outside of our catchment area:

Below is the calendar for Term 4 Junior assemblies – every second Tuesday commencing at 2.15pm.

From the Deputy Principal

Lisa McKeaten

Reminder – Sports & Music photos are on 25th October in the hall. Students are asked to come along with their musical instruments for the photos.

Swimming for Term 4

This term we will have our swimming program. Years 3-6 will have their swimming lessons with Mr Daunt, as part of the school program. All swimming lessons start in Week 2. Please ensure that your children have swimming togs, a rashi swim shirt, bathing cap and goggles.

Prep to Year 2 will be doing swimming with Peter Geraghty and his coaches as part of a paid, intensive swimming program. Peter is employed by the school to provide this service to us. In the past we have found it very intensive for our younger students, as the lessons are organised with several coaches working with small groups of students.

The Prep students will swim every Monday from next week, Week 2 to Week 9 – 7 weeks in total because of the 17th October Pupil Free Day. The cost will be $56 ($8 per week). For Years 1 & 2 students the cost will be $64 for 8 weeks of lessons – Weeks 2-9.

Money Matters

Roberta Harycki

Welcome to Term 4 of excursions. Your child’s permission proforma and family statement will be distributed this week. Please return your forms and payments at your earliest convenience.

Payments for Prep, Year 1 and Year 2 Swimming are now outstanding as lessons will start next week.

Helpful hints for payment - BPoint instructions are attached; Also note, Permissions and Payments by the “Last day of Payment” is a must for your child’s inclusion.

Credit in Account: (eg -$10) - Please let office staff know how you wish to use your credit and to nominate which excursions are to be paid.

Our financial system does not automatically match to other payments.

Request for Refund form for an excursion paid and not attended is available from the front office. Prepaid ticketing excursions, curriculum programs and prepaid competition entries are non-refundable.

Payment of account days:

8am - 3pm - Monday to Wednesday
8am - 12pm - Thursday and Friday

BPoint is the preferred method of payment.

Eftpos, Debit Cards: Visa/Mastercard, cheque or cash payments are accepted.

BPOINT User Information

For payment of multiple items on your statement/invoice, you will need to do a separate entry for each item, entering the invoice number and the corresponding payment amount for that item only e.g.

Separate Entries for each line must be done to ensure the payment is allocated to the correct Excursion/Resource Fee.

BPOINT payments must be processed in time to clear (usually 2-3 business days) before the Due Date for payment.

Music News

Naomi Lindh

Welcome to term 4! All instrumental lessons/rehearsals and choir rehearsals have resumed this week and we are looking forward to the performances ahead, listed below. Additional performances may be added to this schedule.

We started the recruitment process for current Year 2 and 3 students towards the end of last term. Instrumental teachers will be meeting with the interested students in the next 2-3 weeks to assess suitability prior to any instrumental offers being made. Please ensure your child has returned the slip which was emailed to parents last term via classroom teachers and a hard copy was given to students. Students in Years 3 and 4 next year are eligible to join the instrumental program but offers will depend on suitability (including a music aptitude test, suitability assessment with the instrumental teacher and information from classroom and music teacher/s). Please note places are limited due to the amount of time instrumental instruction time allocated to our school.

Upcoming performances:

16th of November – Evening Concert 6pm - all choir and instrumental students will be performing
23rd of November – Grandparent’s Concert 10am - all choir students and the Senior Strings

We hope you have a great first week back at school!

Chappy’s Chat

John Erichsen

Welcome to Term 4 and I hope the holiday break was a wonderful time for you and yours. I have heard many recounts of exciting holiday adventures, exotic discoveries and amazing encounters with wildlife. On Tuesday morning, I noticed lots of smiling faces as the new school term commenced. It is true that many of those smiles were from mums, who now may be able to steal a moment or two to breathe, but many students seem pleased to be back also. If coffee shops have some extra business this week from deserving mums who are rewarding themselves with a quiet chat and a coffee, we understand why.

This term will be another busy one and carries with it the excitement of the approaching end of year, Year 5 Camp, Book Fair, Remembrance Day, Year 6 Graduation and swimming carnivals. Of course, we also have the rescheduled junior sports day next Monday, which promises to be an amazing spectacle, well supported by parents and care-givers. Fingers crossed the weather works with us. The forecast for next week is promising so that is a good start.

This term sees our students back in the pool for swimming lessons, which is so beneficial given our proximately to some of world’s finest beaches and the abundance of swimming pools in our part of the world. For classes without available parents to help with supervision of swim lessons, I make myself available to be the extra required adult. This allows teaching staff to make better use of that time and also allows me to identify any weak swimmers to be watchful of, later in the year at Year 5 camp, swim carnivals, class breakups or water park trips. I would like to extend my thanks to those parents who are able to volunteer their time to help at swimming lessons. It makes a huge difference to how consistently the school can deliver swimming instructions to the students, giving them skills and strategies to keep them safe in the water.

There is also the Parent’s disco later this term and I am sure it will be loads of fun. Keep your eyes out for more information regarding this event.

Have a great week!

Uniform & Stationery

Opening Hours: Monday, Tuesday and Friday 8.15am to 9.00am.

Get ready for swimming this term with most of your swimming gear available from the uniform store. Attached is a form to order long sleeve rashies, swim caps, bags and quick dry towels in your house colours. Rashies are not kept in stock and can only be ordered through this form.

I am placing an order for Graceville gold polo shirts in long sleeve for those that need a little extra sun protection. They will be made only based on what orders I receive. They will be about $5 more for each shirt. Please contact the Uniform store ASAP if you wish to order.

Friday sport shirts are in stock.

All sizes in Polar Fleece jumpers are in stock, as are tracksuit pants and bootleg leggings. Lots of second hand stock on hand.

Donations of 2nd hand uniforms are always appreciated. Good stock is available for sale now, including lots of dresses, culottes, jumpers and good shorts. Come in and grab a bargain.

Order forms are available on the School website. If you email the order, the items will be sent to the classroom.

Email address for school uniform store is: uniformstore@gracevilss.eq.edu.au

Tuckshop News

Anne, Amanda and Ally

Welcome back to Term 4. Volunteers for next week, commencing 10/10 are:

This term you will see a few menu changes on School24 as we move towards the State Government Healthy Food Choices menu guidelines for 2017. New items will be added and some lines will be deleted.

If you have any queries please come and see us, call the school or email: tuckshop.gss@gmail.com.au

P&C News

SCHOOL BANKING

We urgently need some help with our school banking. Please call in to the school hall canteen after drop off on MONDAY mornings to see if our school banking co-ordinator Julie needs a hand. Banking takes about an hour (depending on number of helpers). Any help would be greatly appreciated.

TECHNOLOGY CRISIS

At the last P&C meeting we again discussed the state of technology in our school. It is important that the school community understand the position we currently find ourselves in and to have an open discussion about how to address this situation. Any feedback, comments and ideas are very welcome via email, in person, and at our next meeting.

The situation at GSS is over half of our computers in the school are out of their warranty - ie PCs over 5 years old. As you probably understand older computers need more maintenance. Unfortunately we do not have a full time IT support person and so these older computers do not get repaired immediately. The P&C contributed $18,000 to technology this year, which is a considerable sum, but unfortunately does not stem the flow of the bulk of our machines falling out of warranty. The trouble is that the problem compounds year on year.

Many other schools find themselves in similar situations. Some schools in the area have addressed this by a Technology Levy paid at the start of the year. Other schools have put the responsibility back on the parents and have adopted a BYOD (bring your own device) policy for technology in their schools.

Please feel free to join the discussion. We are working on the premise that we want our children to have ready access to appropriate technology for their learning.

PARENTS DISCO

The last P&C event of the year is set to be a cracker! An Old School disco break up party. Adults only! This is just a few weeks before the end of school, so please save the date - Saturday 19 November. (See attached flyer)

BUILDING FUND

The P&C, like most other P&Cs, offers parents an opportunity to take part in a Tax Deductible Voluntary Contribution Scheme. If you wish to contribute to the P&C building work projects for the school, please contact the P&C Executive at the email below and we will send you the details. The building fund is going towards climate controlling the school, continuing to air condition the class rooms and the major project of fixing the ventilation of the hall.

NEXT MEETING

The next meeting is Wednesday 12 October (2nd week back after holidays) at 7.30pm in the Waratah Room (which is beside the staff room in the main reception block). Everyone is very welcome.

Please feel free to contact the P&C executive via email: pandc@gracevilss.eq.edu.au

School Banking News

Just a reminder that due to the pupil free day and a meeting of school banking co-ordinators, there will be no school banking on Mondays for Term 4, Weeks 1-3.

School banking will resume in Week 4 - Monday 24th of October.

Fete News

Fete 2016 Slide Show

Please join us at the first full school assembly for term 4 on Thursday, 13th of October at 2pm to view the fabulous photos from the fete. Relive your happy fete memories and watch the kids yell and laugh at theirs.

And, Mums and Dads if you're wondering why we were so exhausted after fete day, it's because we all worked SOOO hard that we raised over $76,000!!!

Well done and thank you to everyone.

The Fete Committee

Swimming News

Bookings are now being taken for swimming lessons which start this Saturday, October 8th. Group lessons are on offer before and after school on weekdays. To enter group lessons students must be in Year one or older and able to swim 25 meters freestyle non-stop.

All other students may book a private one on one lesson after school on Fridays or Saturday mornings. Students in after school care may also join the program as staff can take the children to the pool and pick them up after their lesson.

Please direct all inquiries to Pete Geraghty via email: petegeraghty@hotmail.com or phone 0432407442

Contact Club

Contact Club meets next Wednesday, 12th of October, straight after drop-off or reading groups.

There are so many books to be covered so please come along and lend your support to this worthy group. Your children reap the rewards of our work; every book or reading resource needs to be covered before it can go into the library collection. Every little bit of help counts and the contact used is super easy. Tea and coffee is supplied; come along for a friendly chat while you do something which makes a difference.

If you would like further information, please email Amanda: thecarps.home@gmail.com or drop into the library to ask how you can help.

School Plus

Community Notices

Staverton Kindergarten

Staverton Kindergarten has places available for age appropriate children for 2017 (children born 1/7/12 to 30/6/13). Please call 3379 1511 or visit our website for further information.

Queensland Academies Creative Industries

A selective entry senior state high school for highly capable students.

61 Musk Avenue, Kelvin Grove Urban Village

Open Day 1pm - 3pm, Saturday 8th of October.

Catholic Sacramental Program

We are pleased to advise that expressions of interest are now open for those parents who are considering enrolling their children in the local Catholic Sacramental Program (Confirmation, First Eucharist and Penance).

An information night will be held on Thursday, October 27th, for parents who would like to find out more about our new Sacramental program and the process for enrolling their children in the same.

The 2017-19 program, run by the Catholic Parish of Corinda Graceville, is for all children who are baptised and have turned 8 years of age by January 1, 2017 (usually Year 3 children and above), regardless of which school they attend.

The parent information night will be held from 7.30pm at Christ the King Church, Churchill Street, Graceville on Thursday, October 27th. To express your interest in attending the information night simply email the Sacramental Program Coordinator: sc.corindagraceville@bne.catholic.edu.au

Your correspondence will be acknowledged with a confirmation and a copy of the agenda for the evening. Enrolments for the Sacramental program will officially open following the October information session.