TERM 4 2022

Jingeri families

Welcome back to our final term of 2022! Our families, staff and students have been faced with numerous challenges this year, which our community continues to overcome and thrive! Term 4 is full of celebrations and preparations  We look back at all we have achieved, while also looking forward to prepare our transition to what comes next. It is a term filled with a buzz of positive energy- and it often flies by!

This week I had the privilege of attending the State Schools Principal’s Conference, where all principals from across our state come together face to face to learn about the vision and aspirations of the Department of Education for your children. I spent some time with colleagues working in the Torres Strait, two of whom can only access their little island school by helicopter! 

We spent the two days focused on providing feedback to the department and sharing celebrations of our own schools, while making new connections that can mutually benefit our learners. 

One clear and strong message that we will hear more about over time, is the importance if “equity” and “excellence” in our schooling system. Equity refers to every child receiving the supports they need to ensure they can live a life of choice, not a life of chance. Equity is different to equality; while equality is about giving everyone the same resources (for example), equity is about giving everyone the same opportunities and requires tailored supports and resources for each individual to succeed. We will spend more time unpacking this idea as a community in the coming weeks  Encouragingly, excellence aligns very closely to the conversations our community have already been sharing - empowering every student to reach their personal best. 

Wishing everyone a fantastic term ahead!

Stacey Wood
Principal

Welcome to Term 4 students, families and staff! 

Wildlife on Site at Rochedale South

Spring is in the air! Not only can we see the budding of flowers and renewal of life around the flora of our campus, but also with our local fauna.  Captured only two weeks ago we see Cal-ewina the Koala and her offspring travelling around campus.  

As the weather warms, we have also had an unprecedented amount of reptilian activity around campus.  Snakes are not to be approached if you come across them.  Please inform the closest staff member or administration directly if you come into contact with a snake onsite.  

With all Australian native animals, snakes are protected under the Nature Conservation Act 1992 (Qld) and cannot lawfully be killed or taken from the wild and held in captivity. Most snake bites occur when people are attempting to catch or kill a snake.

All staff, students and the school community are reminded not to attempt to move, catch or kill a snake. A licensed “snake catcher” (holder of a Damage Mitigation Permit) is required to relocate snakes. At Rocehdale South we:

• remind you not to attempt to catch, kill or move a snake
• report to the office so we can contact a qualified “snake catcher”
• Yesterday 30+ staff engaged in their senior first aid, and we remind our community that the office has access to a first aid kit, in the event of a snake bite.

If you woud like more information on common snakes that live in the South east corridor please visit.

https://environment.des.qld.gov.au/wildlife/animals/living-with/snakes/near-you/south-east-qld 

Life at school

The first two weeks of school have been a hive of activity.  Students have been engaging in a range of activities from; Cyber safety talks with Senior Constable Lyons, feeding our Pick of the Crop garden with chappy, or engaging in a range of lunch time clubs across campus. 

Alongside our programs students focus this past fortnight and in the coming have been about identifying feelings, or more specifically named introspection;

One approach for tackling these sorts of feelings is the RULER strategy from the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence:

1. Recognise you’re not feeling yourself. You could be feeling worse, or better, but for whatever reason there’s something slightly or very different about your mood right now.
2. Understand why you’re feeling different. What set of circumstances, events or emotional headspace led you to feeling different now?
3. Label that emotion. Delve into and practise using a wider emotional vocabulary.
4. Express that emotion appropriately. Ideally this would be in the form of an explanation, rather than “letting it all out”. Practicing this self-expression of emotion over time, as habit, is more useful than withholding it. Being able to express how you’re feeling to others is fundamental to being a human that other humans want to be around.
5. Regulate what you do with that emotion. This is where knowing what works for you, what goes in your “toolkit”, can be really helpful.

An insightful article on the development of our emotional language. https://www.abc.net.au/education/teens-need-a-wide-emotional-vocabulary-to-express-their-feelings/14038450 

This fortnight we shift our focus more specifically to the skill of self control.  We invite you to help our students across all contexts P-Year 6 to improve their understanding of self and their cognitive ability to control ones own actions. 

“When children lack the ability to facilitate self-control, it can make them more prone to poor emotional outcomes and affect their long-term happiness (Augimeri, Walsh, Donato, Blackman, & Piquero, 2018). 

Yours in Education,

Craig Charles
Deputy Principal

Prep Transition Day

I had the enormous privilege to host our Prep Transition day last week for our upcoming 2023 Prep cohort. This event was held in the PAC and it was an incredibly positive experience to be a part of. It was the first transition day without a COVID caveat. Therefore, we had more than one person able to attend for each child. In some situations we had grandparents, carers and older sisters attend. This is a testament to all the important people involved in supporting the education of our students.

Our aim in these events is to establish positive relationships between the children, parents and educators. Families need to feel connected to the school including the teacher, principal and support staff. Building specific connections between schools and other prior-to-school educators and community members and organisations as part of a transition program, helps build open communication and trust between the school and their community. Please be aware that at any stage this year before the end of term, you are welcome to provide important information about your child starting next year.

If you still have a child/sibling starting next year, can you please ring the office to organise an enrolment interview as soon as possible.

Year 1 Ngutana-Lui Excursion

I would like to say a huge “Well done” to our Year 1 students who ventured off to the incredible Ngutana-Lui centre last week. Did you know Ngutana-Lui  means “To Teach”? Our students immersed themselves in the richness and diversity of Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures. Feedback from teachers and staff who worked at the centre, reported back that our students were incredibly well behaved and demonstrated curiosity. This lines up with our school’s vision “creative, curious learners empowered to excel.” I am very proud of our wonderful Year One cohort. I learnt a lot from their recounts on how to throw a boomerang. Lilith in 1P provided me with an incredibly detailed step by step procedure on how to throw one. Well done!

Visual Arts

I would like to take the opportunity to highlight the incredible art work from our upper year’s students. These 3D animal portraits were created by Year 5 and 6 students, they had a lot of fun creating an outfit and then to paint their chosen animal. These will be on display at our upcoming Musical night. Mrs Walsh shared these fabulous pieces of art work with me. Thank you for sharing Mrs. Walsh.

 

Every Day Counts

Every day counts is a state wide initiative that aims to assist in improving student attendance at school through a shared commitment by students, parents, caregivers, schools and the community.

To do this, every day counts promotes four key messages:

• all children should be enrolled at school and attend on every school day
• schools should monitor, communicate and implement strategies to improve regular school attendance
• truanting can place a student in unsafe situations and impact on their future employability and life choices
• attendance at school is the responsibility of everyone in the community.

I would like to invite any P-2 parents who have concerns about their child’s attendance, to please make a time to come and have a chat with me. And for 3-6 to speak with Craig Charles. I would like to talk to you about how we can implement support strategies so that your child is attending school every day. Building resilience can often be a way to overcome students who are feeling reluctant to want to come to school at times. Resilient children are often good at solving problems and learning new skills. This is because they’re more willing to try again even if things don’t go the way they want the first time.

 

Alice Harvey
Deputy Principal Prep-2 

CHAPPY CHAT

Next up regarding RESILIENCE...gleaned from the work of Maggie Dent in her booklet Building Children's Reslience - One building block at a time, is the absence of stress.

 So many grown-ups can't manage stress well.  Becasue no-one helped them enough with stress and distress in childhood, they never set up effective stress regulating systems in their brains.  Margo Sunderland, The Science of Parenting (2007)

 There are particular ways of responding to children that help them to establish pathways in their brains that enable them to manage emotions well.

 Main sources of stress and anxiety in childhood can include: being overscheduled, temperament/personality, pressure to perform, absence of healthy love and attachment, poor sleep and diet, too much stimulation from devices, and threats of abuse and violence.

 Here are some tips from Maggie Dent to calm your home:

• remove clutter and mess as it can add to a child's perception of chaos
• play soothing music - nature sounds or classical music
• take children into the fresh air as much as possible
• use a quiet, calm voice when talking with your child
• practise small acts of kindness and generosity
• really listen to your children - without interrupting
• practise safe touch - hugs, foot massages, sitting close together

Children depend on parents and other significant carers to help them develop healthy stress-regulating systems so they can manage stress and anxiety.  the more love and affection, calm surroundings, safe nurturing touch and predictable routines the better chance children have a growing the neural wiring to help them be happy and psychologically strong.

 THANK YOU

Our fundraising efforts for the year have come to a close.  Thank you to everyone who supported our Subway lunch today (almost 250 orders!!) and the family portraits last weekend.  We appreciate your support of our chaplaincy service!

 Coming up...

FAMILY CONNECT is on Saturday November 19th from 3-5pm.  This is our final family event for the year and we look forward to some Christmas themed activities.  CONNECT is a cost free afternoon of family fun, and includes a simple meal for dinner.  The program is supported by Chappy volunteers from local churches who fund and run the afternoon.  Registration will be out soon.

Blessings

Cassie Love
School Chaplain: cassie.love@suchaplaincy.org.au  

0434 789 465 (direct work line)

SU Australia humbly expresses our gratitude for First Australian peoples, knowledge systems and connection to land, waters and community. We pay respect to Elders past, present and emerging, and declare our commitment to reconciliation and seeking wholeness for all who call this country home.

SPORTS REPRESENTATIVES 

​A big congratulations to Paea Taipaleti who over the September Holidays represented the Metropolitan East Region in Girls Rugby League at the QLD State Titles. Paea represented Met East last year and this year was part of a Met East team that won the State Championship! Well done Paea on this incredible achievement, we are extremely proud of you. 

Well done also to students who represented our District in sport last term. Quinn Davidson and Riley Cook represented Logan District in Cricket at the Regional trials for the second year in a row. Also, Hendrix Seipel, Bella Saylor and Paea Taipaleti represented Logan District in Athletics. Well done to these students on achieving these representative honours. 

Marcus Stilianos
HPE Teacher 

Dear Parents

Welcome back to Term 4.  We have some exciting events happening towards the end of the year. Information will be sent home to families closer to the date. We are looking for volunteers to help with these events.

If you are interested, please concert Alina Orams sorams@optusnet.com.au.

Alina Orams on behalf of
P & C 

UNIFORM SHOP 

Uniform Shop hours:  8:30 - 9:00am Monday & Tuesday - Term 4

2023 Back to School Uniform Shop hours will be advertised before the end of term.  Orders can be placed through Flexischool and will be delivered to student's classes when orders have been filled.  Please note this process may take 2-3 business days.  

TUCKSHOP

Trading Hours 8.40am-2.30pm

Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday & Friday (Closed MONDAY)

New menus were sent home last week with students, listing new menu items available this term and current prices.

Another meal day will be occuring  Term 4. Notes will be sent home with students shortly.

Melissa Treacy
Tuckshop and Uniform Convenor

2022 Enrolments are now available online.

Would you like to enrol or have a tour please contact us.              E: ars@ymcabrisbane.org

M: 0437 332 970        P: 3841 6613                      

Important messages from your Coordinator

Lost Property

Are your kids missing water bottles, hats and jumpers? Chances are we have it. Our lost property treasure chest is bursting at the seams!

Enrolments & Bookings

The enrolment process is now exclusively online via QKEnrol, and bookings can be made via the My Family Lounge App. If you need to make or cancel a booking with us and the app is not working for you, please send us a text or email and we can make changes to your bookings on your behalf. Below you can find some details that will help with the new online process.

New parents or anyone who needs to register for use of QK Enrol or My Family Lounge can access registration through this website below:

https://www.ymcachildcare.com.au/rochedale-south.html

Existing parents can log onto this website below:

https://www.qkenhanced.com.au/webui/Account/Logon

SWINGING BACK INTO THE SWING OF THINGS

The spring holidays were exciting, fun and colourful here at YMCA and it was great to see the kids build, maintain and make new friendships with some unfamiliar faces on the scene.  While everyone was busy having fun, all of a sudden it was time to wave farewell to our holiday cheer and bring back the daily school routine. First days can be a little daunting but when you have friends by your side, it’s much easier to get by.

The YMCA Rochedale South OSHC Team