This week we welcomed our visitors from Natural Fertility Services in Cairns who were here to undertake and conduct the Wonders of Living Program (including Year 5 & 6 Puberty talks). We had several parents attend the movie sessions on Wednesday evening and then our students viewed the relevant movies for their year levels on Thursday.

This program is values-based and family-orientated and has the full support of Bishop James Foley.  The presenters are accredited Family Life Educators. Parents are a child’s primary source of formation and this program seeks to assist parents in this area. 

This week we also recognised National Reconciliation Week whereby we invited all of our teachers and students to participate in the nation’s reconciliation journey through prayer to say sorry and to reconcile.

What is National Reconciliation Week?

Each year National Reconciliation Week (NRW) celebrates and builds on the respectful relationships shared by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and other Australians. The dates that bookend the week are significant milestones in the reconciliation journey.

May 27—Marks the anniversary of Australia’s most successful referendum and a defining event in our nation’s history. The 1967 referendum saw over 90 per cent of Australians vote to give the Commonwealth the power to make laws for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and recognise them in the national census.

3 June - Commemorates the High Court of Australia’s landmark Mabo decision in 1992, which legally recognised that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples have a special relationship to the land—a relationship that existed prior to colonisation and still exists today. This recognition paved the way for land rights or Native Title.

Reconciliation must live in the hearts, minds and actions of us all as we move forward, creating a nation strengthened by respectful relationships between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and non-Indigenous peoples.

Thank you and blessings for a wonderful weekend,

Amanda                                  

A prayer for Reconciliation week:

God of all creation,

as we journey together in this Great Southern Land,

we pray for healing forgiveness and unity,

creating a path of good will, with justice and compassion.

Jesus through the power of your love,

You have given us the courage, wisdom and strength

to share our gifts and talents in humility.

In peace and understanding we share with each other.

Creator Spirit, we come together in prayer and thanksgiving

for the many blessings we have received.

Allow your Spirit to wash over us and give us strength,

to walk together, as one.

Two weeks ago, our newsletter contained information regarding the Nationally Consistent Collection of Data on School Students with Disability (NCCD). The NCCD is an ongoing process, not an isolated event and is implemented as part of the continuing process of teaching and learning.

Under the Disability Discrimination Act and the Disability Standards for education 2005, the NCCD gives schools, parents, guardians and carers, education authorities and the community information about the number of students with disability in schools and the adjustments they receive.  The below flow chart provides a very clear and simplified snapshot of the NCCD process. (see image below)

Australian students with disability must be able to access and participate in education on the same basis as their peers. To ensure this, students with disability may receive adjustments to access education, based on the professional judgement of teachers, in consultation with the student and/or their parents, guardians or carers.

If you are wanting further information on the NCCD, visit the following website:

https://www.nccd.edu.au/resources-and-tools/roles/parents-guardians-and-carers-14

Mrs Emma Dixon

Dear Parents / Caregivers

Welcome to week 6 of Term 2. The Prep students all did a wonderful job at the Athletics Carnival.

English:

Students are participating in reading simple text using the sounding out strategy for decoding unfamiliar words. The second tricky list has been introduced to the students which included the words: “a, I, the, is, my, that, they, was, you, he, she, we, be, me and said,”. The story for the week is Mr McGee Goes to sea. Where students identify their favourite part, get introduced to new vocabulary and express their opinions about the text. Students are also starting to write down their own words using the sounding out strategy, demonstrating beginning writing behaviors such as writing left to right, finger spaces between words and ending a sentence in a full stop.

During guided reading students are asked comprehension questions such as: What do you think the story is going to be about? What are the characters feeling? Why do they feel like that? Where is the story taking place?   

Library books and Home readers:

Inside the folder will be a Reading Log sheet or your Reading Log book.

Please sign the sheet/ book every time that you read with your child. For example if you read the same book 3 times please indicate it on the sheet.

Please find below some reading strategies that you could use at home and a tricky word poster.

Mathematics:

Students will continue to connect number names, quantities and numerals. We will start partitioning the number 5, 10 and then beyond. The students are introduced to measurement, where they are completing informal measuring to identify which container’s capacity is more or less.  Students are starting to make connections between the days of the week to familiar events and actions.

Miss Knight

This week we celebrated National Reconciliation Week.  The students created some beautiful artwork and made purposeful choices for their colour selections.  

We are very proud of our attendance - all but three students have attended school 95% of the time, well done.  

In English we will be learning the phonograms “ir”, “ur” and “er”, the tricky words “house”, “because” and “why”, and the grammar rules that apply when changing verbs to plurals.  We will continue to write character descriptions, using adjectives to make our writing more interesting for our readers. A reminder to fill in the Reading Diary each night. I will be looking at these each Tuesday.  I am also keeping a diary at school each time I read with each student.

In Maths, we are learning about chance; how to identify outcomes of events and describe them using language such as “will happen”, “might happen”, or “won’t happen”.  We are consolidating our addition and subtraction strategies such as counting on, rearranging parts and partitioning.

In Social and Emotional Learning (SEL), we are building Resilience by learning that it takes great strength to be sensible.  We are focussing on: listening to the teacher, asking questions when I’m not sure, not being distracted by others, and resisting the temptation to give up.

Homework:

Tricky words, reading and Maths game.

Mrs Bienvenu

The students have been busy learning about the world around them and how they are connected to it. Through our Design Technologies and Geography study we have been learning about places and their features, particularly farms, the food and fibre they produce. We have been making connections with the things we use in daily life, where they are produced within Australia and the world. This also ties in the skills needed to read maps and to locate places.  Lots of new vocabulary has been learnt in Geography including continent, equator and scale. While in Design Technologies new vocabulary words introduced are harvest, factory, dairy, produce and sustainability.

We have been focusing on our role in reducing, reusing and recycling. We particularly focussed on how to use resources such as food and water, sustainably.

Thank you to everyone who returned their Science mixtures homework and Design Technologies products from around the world. All the wonderful things discovered at home has inspired our classroom learning.

Sight words will be tested each afternoon again instead of only on Fridays. Please have your child bring their folder in and place it in the tub whenever they are ready for a test. We can test about 3 or 4 students per day. If we don’t get to you the first day, we will the following.

Just a reminder about fruit snack being a quick and easy snack to be placed on each child’s desk ready for the day.

There are currently ten students from Year 2 hitting our target of 95% or higher attendance.  Have a great weekend!

Miss Holly

What a fortnight for resilience. The students showed true sportsmanship during two days of sports last week. Each and every student gave the events a ‘red hot go’ with some of them coming out with ribbons to take home.

Our writing lessons are still revolving around persuasive texts. This week they have given the topic ‘Country or City?’ with students deciding whether they would much prefer to live in the country or the city. Many great arguments for why they chose their location were developed and discussed.

Our reading sessions have been productive with the students gaining more and more knowledge about the words they are reading. A broad understanding of the English language is vital to be a successful reader.

During Maths lessons we have been investigating length and perimeter. The students are grasping the concept of using formal and informal ways of measuring objects. Hand spans and arm lengths can come in handy when we don’t have a formal ruler at our disposal.

The Sacrament of Penance is our focus this week during our Religion lessons. We understand that we need to seek forgiveness and live out our lives like God wants us to. Making time to talk to God allows us to reset and restart on the path for a great life.

In our History lessons this past week we had the opportunity to look at what Gallipoli looks like now and what it looked like during World War 1. This helped us to make the connections to what happened to our brave soldiers.

Our attendance for those attending 95% or more is down this week with so many of our students getting sick with this terrible flu. Please keep well and take time to rest while the flu season has started.

Miss Edmonds

The grade four students have once again shown us how well they can adapt to changing timetables. I was impressed how well the students participated in the sports events last week and were then able to slip right back into their school work. Their ability to be flexible and to step up to complete tasks is wonderful to see.

This week I have been on the lookout for students to nominate to move from silver level to the golden certificate level.This for students who can move from usually to consistently showing  the 4Rs: Responsibility, Resilience, Respect and Ready to learn.To reinforce these ideals at home you could discuss the four R’s and ways your child and ways that they demonstrate them.

As we get towards the end of the term it’s a great opportunity to focus on being resilient and focus on the positives even when we are tired. It is also vital that your child is at school every day to make sure they don’t miss out on the learning that will be assessed on. Not all work can be sent home to catch up on, skills have to taught before they can be practised independently. Currently our attendance is that 47% of students are attending 95% or more of school days. Hopefully we can work together to improve those statistics before the end of the term.

This week in maths we have been working on fractions and how two fractions can have the same value even if they are not split into the same amount of parts. We have been learning that we wouldn’t trade one half of pizza for a sixth of a pizza because it will be a smaller piece. There has been lots of comparisons made to pizza and chocolate to help the students visualise the problem so they may come home a little hungry!

The reading program this week has been changed to better meet the needs of the students. We are fortunate at St Joseph’s to have so many school officers and during reading time we have access to two school officers and myself to support their learning. The small group rotations mean that your student is working at a level that can be challenging but allows for them to succeed in their learning. The rotations are made up of different activities including teaching explicit reading behaviours, vocabulary and comprehension tasks. The students have also been engaging in silent reading after lunch. This is not only a great way to reset after a busy lunchtime but an opportunity to build on the habit of reading. During this time, I also read my own book so that the students can see first hand how much I value reading.

Miss Briody

Our focus this week has been completing our Persuasive writing piece.  We have used high modality words, language devices such as repetition, emotive words, alliteration and strong sizzling sentence starters.  

Next week, students will type up palm cards and after practising in front of a peer, they will present their speech to a small group. All the topics have been about Weipa and I am very impressed with the reasons students have come up with to support their argument.  Some examples are “Why the skate park should be bigger.” “Why should Weipa have a bigger shopping centre?” “We should be able to wear our own clothes to school.” “WTA should put a trampoline park in Weipa.”

In Religion we have been exploring about how the Holy Spirit is part of our lives. We are learning about Confirmation, the Fruits of the Holy Spirit and finding passages in the bible that make reference to the Holy spirit.  

In Science, we are looking at the different properties of liquids, solids and gases and conducting fair tests to assess our predictions. Next week the students will start designing a poster to demonstrate their understanding of Bushfires and what we can do in Weipa to prepare for a bushfire.  We are in assessment time also, so many tasks this and next week will be for assessment.

We have finally come to the exciting end of Deltora Quest Series One.  In the last book the students have connected all the characters together, solved the puzzles and it has been great to see many of the students make predictions about what is going to happen next.

Miss Libby

This has been a fun and busy fortnight in Year 6. Everyone participated in the Athletics carnival, with some great results for individuals and also team events.

The year 6 students showed great responsibility throughout both days, by encouraging younger students and each other, and by showing real leadership in their houses. Many of them also assisted the teachers and parents with setting up and other tasks during the day.

Keeping with the sport theme, we have participated in AFL and NRL, and a big highlight was the Cowboys visit on Monday afternoon.

In class we have mostly been working on assessment tasks in Maths, English and Religion.

We have been experimenting with reading and writing different forms of Poetry, and continuing to learn about countries of the world in Geography.

Mr Mitchell

School Banking is collected from the office on Wednesday mornings. If you wish to set up an account with QCCU please phone 40 697 555