Striving for an engaged and motivated school community, fostering individual achievement, social responsibility and well being

Contact details PH: 4625 8555 Jane Street Dirranbandi QLD 4486 www.dirranbass.eq.edu.au Student absences line PH: 4625 8566 Absence SMS line 0418 164 912 Principal Mrs Andrea Killen Email the.principal@dirranbass.eq.edu.au

P&C Executive President: Amber Stewart Vice President: Jen Miller Secretary: Tanya Moore Junior Secretary: Jess Persse Treasurer: Tamara Burke dirranbandipandcsecretary@outlook.com

What’s Inside this issue: Pg 1 Snapshots of the week Pg 2 From the Principal Pg 3 Prep - Year 2 News SRC Fundraiser Pg 4 Secondary Snapshot Pg 5 Captain’s Report Prep Transition Evening From the HOC

Dirranbandi P-10 State School

Dazzler

“Success Follows Effort”

2018

Term 3

17 August

SNAPSHOTS OF THE WEEK

Year 5 soil testing

Students preparing their scripts for Opti-MINDS

Maths strategies for the Year 9/10’s

THRASS phonemes in Year 3/4

STAFF Teachers Liz Bromwich Kirsty Cookson Jessica Davis Keeley Glass Monica Hadenfeldt Kylie Hegarty Rogan Kinnear April McLaren Jen Miller Mollie Rodgers Secondary Coordinator Kylie Hegarty PH: 4625 8534

Student Services Coordinator

Monica Hadenfeldt PH: 4625 8500 Head of Curriculum Jen Miller PH: 4625 8501 Instrumental Music Luke Todd Business Manager Michelle Burke Teacher Aides Tamara Burke Sheldon Dawes Darcie Fenech Bronwyn Hopkins Angela Hourigan Kathleen Ruttley Shelley Smith Amber Stewart Cleaners Keith Blunden Katie Macmillan Leonarda Tramacchi Groundsman Boyd Hopkins

FROM THE PRINCIPAL Celebrating our amazing support staff during School Support Staff Recognition Week On Wednesday we held a special morning tea to say thank you to all of our wonderful Support Staff on behalf of our whole school community. School Support Staff includes our Administration Officers, our Teacher Aides, our Cleaners and our Grounds Officer. I would like to acknowledge and thank our School Support Staff for the wonderful work that they do each day and for their ongoing commitment to our school. School Opinion Survey Have you completed your Parent survey? All families and school staff are invited to complete the survey prior to the 24 August to ensure that your opinion is included in our School’s report. A blue letter was sent home early this term outlining the process and a unique code to access your Parent/Caregiver survey. If you cannot locate your letter, more letters are available from the office. The survey is designed to help schools identify what they do well and what they can improve. If you have any queries about the survey, or would like to complete the survey at school please contact the School Office. We understand that internet access can be challenging in our rural location, use of computers or iPads, along with a tea or coffee are available at the school to assist families in completing the survey. Your opinion counts! Academic Success Guarantee (ASG) We have reached the half way point of this terms ASG cycle. Mid-term reports will be sent home at the beginning of next week. The reports provided an update on how students are progressing with their current PLP reading and number goals. The report also provides an update on student attendance. Remember to be eligible for on-going inclusion in ASG, individual student attendance must be maintained at 90% or better, that is no more than 20 days absent for the year! Whole school attendance for term 3 is 90.3 %. Keep up the good work students, staff and parents! Important Dates… Wednesday 22 August Drone Workshop Year 5-10 Sunday 26 August Opti-MINDS St George Wednesday 29 & Thursday 30 August Beginner Band Camp St George Monday 3 to Friday 7 September Year 6 Faith Camp Wednesday 5 September P&C Meeting 5pm Thursday 13 September School Public Speaking Competition Friday 14 September Tractor Day Congratulations to... Last week’s attendance winners Year 7/8 with 96% attendance. Jessica Purvis and Jack Walter who have completed their certificate work. Jessica has

achieved a Cert 11 in Health Services and Jack achieved a Cert 1 in Agri-Foods. Darcy Persse who competed in the South West Team at the State Touch Trials in Bundaberg.

Well done Darcy! Best wishes to… Students selected to represent our school at the Balonne Athletics Carnival on the 17 August.

Go Dirranbandi! Thank you to… Our School Support Staff for the wonderful work that they do each day and for their ongoing

commitment to our school. All the parents, teachers and presenters who attended the Prep Transition Parent evening.

Welcome to… Practicum student Claire Armstrong who will be working with Miss Keeley Glass and the

5/6 class. We hope you enjoy you time at Dirranbandi. Remember… Our School Facebook page. You’ll find important messages about School events and

photographs of School happenings on our page. Have you ‘liked’ us recently? To complete School Opinion Surveys by the 24 August. Enjoy the weekend! Andrea Killen

School Improvement Priorities for 2018

In 2018 our school improvement priorities are to improve student outcomes in:

Reading

Attendance – Every Day

2018 Term 3 Week 6 Monday - 20 August Homework Centre Parade Tuesday - 21 August Sporting Schools-Athletics Little A’s Wednesday - 22 August Tuckshop Drone Workshop Year 5-10 Sporting Schools-Netball Thursday - 23 August Homework Centre Friday - 24 August Playgroup Sunday - 26 August Opti-Minds in St.George

Week 7 Monday - 27 August Homework Centre Parade Tuesday - 28 August Sporting Schools-Athletics Little A’s Wednesday - 29 August Tuckshop Sporting Schools-Netball Beginners Instrumental Camp Thursday - 30 August Homework Centre Hearing Screening Friday - 31 August Playgroup Beginners Instrumental Camp

PBL FOCUS’ I am responsible when I am …

An Active Learner Safe

Respectful

Keep hands, feet to self

Speak respectfully

**UNIFORM UPDATE** Uniforms will now be sold through the P&C executive until further notice. If you are looking at purchasing uniforms please contact Tanya Moore on 0411 954 893.

P&C TUCKSHOP NEWS

Week 6 tuckshop special is … Packets of chips - $2 Plain, Salt & Vinegar, Honey Soy Specials will be available by order only.

SRC TRACTOR DAY

Save the Date:

Friday 14th September

All families and community members are invited to attend

the carnival afternoon. The countdown is on!

Only 4 weeks to go until we are enjoying an afternoon of

Tractor themed fun! If you are able to assist in donating

prizes for the competitions and carnival stalls, please contact Jen Miller.

P-2 NEWS P-2 have been working extremely hard for the past 5 weeks. I would like to congratulate all students on their persistence shown towards achieving their individual goals. A special congratulations to Daraki Weatherall and Quin Fenech for improving significantly in their reading. Both of these boys have improved by 5 or more reading levels. Keep up the fantastic work P-2. I am very proud of you all. Mrs Cookson.

PREMIER’S READING CHALLENGE: Next Friday is the last day of the Reading Challenge. Students are reminded to complete their blue recording sheets and return to their class teacher or Mrs Hadenfeldt. We look forward to celebrating all of our fabulous readers with their Premier’s certificates! Mrs Hadenfeldt.

SECONDARY SNAPSHOT 9/10 Maths - Last week, the students were applying their knowledge as they calculated volume of water at the Pump House. Ronnie Cooke explained the process of the extraction of river water and bore water and the students measured up both sections. The cylindrical tower holds the river water and the rectangular tower holds the bore water (520C). In the storage shed there is liquid water floc and liquid chlorine. Heights, circumferences and lengths were measured. We thank the Council for allowing us to use our maths for real-life situations in our town. Please enjoy our photos.

Art: - Students are practising using negative space to create sculptures.

Year 10 Work Experience - Work experience placements assist students in their transition from school to work. It helps students with: better understanding of how classroom learning is applied in the workplace better understanding of the work environment and what employers expect of their workers an opportunity to explore possible career options increased maturity, confidence and self-reliance and increased motivation to continue study and/or undertake further training. We thank the employers for offering the opportunity as it is: making a positive contribution to the education and development of students contributing to the development of students’ workplace skills assisting young people in their career decision-making developing mutually beneficial partnerships with schools to support students to become work ready building industry/school partnerships that provide for local community needs and endeavours. Jessica Purvis has finished her Certificate 11 in Health Support – this will give her QCE points! This then leads her to work experience – she will be working at the Dirranbandi Hospital every Thursday. Thank you to the Hospital staff for giving Jess this opportunity to learn from your experience and knowledge. Jack Walter is currently at the Deshon’s farm. He has been busy with machinery and stock work. Jack has finished his Certificate 1 in Agrifoods and his work experience placement enhances this course. We thank the Deshon family and staff for allowing Jack to undertake this work placement.

SCHOOL CAPTAIN’S REPORT Already, it is the end of Week 5. Both students and staff have been very busy learning and working towards demonstrating their new understanding and skills in upcoming assessments. Highschool students are currently working on assessments and have exams commencing next week. It has been fantastic seeing that all students have been following school expectations and that all classes have come up with a stall for Tractor Day. Tractor Day is this term's school fundraiser to continue to raise money for our new playground. Thank you to all classes. Have a great weekend! Jessica Purvis

PREP TRANSITION PARENT EVENING On Monday we were fortunate enough to host Conversations about Transitions, a parent information session on transitioning students, families and educators for the upcoming Year of Prep in 2019. We would like to thank Melissa Kidd and Jacqui Moore from the Transitions, Partnerships and Innovations Team in Toowoomba, and Jess Bail, Early Years Coach based in St George, for taking the time to visit and provide valuable information to parents and educators. The session opened conversation between stakeholders around supporting each other in the transition to Prep. Thank you to the parents, and the Kindy and School staff that attended the evening. Thank you also to Miss B and Miss Davis who gave their time to babysit so the session could be such a success. If you have a child enrolling in Prep for 2019, were unable to make the session and would like further information, please contact the school. Enrolment packages will be sent home prior to the end of term and we invite families to attend an enrolment interview in Week 1 of Term 4.

FROM THE HOC

While a short week, focussed learning has continued right across the school. Last Thursday I was fortunate enough to take Year 5 students for their Design Technologies lesson while Miss Rogers was ill. There was critical discussion around an engaging TED talk from a boy who lives in Zambia, who used his initiative to design and test ways to keep predators away from his family’s livestock. Students were able to clearly see his processes around collecting information, designing, trialling, redesigning and re-trialling until he achieved something that worked. We then went to the garden where Mr Boyd had arranged a visit from Mrs Graham. Mrs Graham took us through soil testing and students were able to carry out the testing on several soil samples, from school, local properties and even St George. It is hoped this testing will assist in solving a problem we have with one of our garden beds. Across the school this week I popped into classes and saw: P-2 students were investigating area, in order to compare and order shapes and objects. Year 3/4 students worked independently and diligently on a range of spelling tasks Year 5/6 students completing and publishing a letter to a student in the future in order to evoke a sense of time and place. Year 7-9 students in their Numeracy session, engaged in activities ranging from a place value strategy game called 101 and

Out, developing their fluency with multi-digit subtraction involving borrowing, and solving word problems involving multiplication- selecting the most appropriate strategies.