16 November 2018

Newsletter Articles

DATE CLAIMER

PRINCIPAL’S REPORT

Dear Parents and Caregivers,

The end of year is always a busy time. We are in the process of bulk enrolments, forming classes for 2019 and of course celebrating our school year with students and staff.

Staffing Changes

As the year draws to a close we also farewell staff who transfer from our school to other departmental sites and positions. I would like to thank the following staff for their service to our school over many years. These staff have transferred to other schools for 2019:

• Debbie McCoy – Gold Coast
• Elisha Sorbello – Mundingburra SS
• Carla Drake – Mundingburra SS
• Wendy Fayers – Currajong SS
• Gene Graham – Ipswich
• Kyle Sanim – Cranbrook SS
• Tracey McClintock – Currajong SS

I would also like to thank Mrs Paula Prideaux (Master Teacher). Mrs Prideaux has worked in the Master Teacher role at The Willows for the past 4 years. The Master Teacher role for all state schools finishes at the end of 2018. Mrs Prideaux has made valuable contributions to the literacy and numeracy projects at our school. Mrs Prideaux will be taking some very well deserved leave to start 2019.

I would also like to welcome new and/or returning staff to The Willows SS for 2019:

• Katherine Marano from East Ayr SS
• Emma Slatter from Regional Office Curriculum Team
• Amanda Scuderi from Home Hill SS
• Aaron Davies appointed to The Willows
• Renee McDowall appointed to The Willows
• Kacey McCarthur from Bohlevale SS
• Ann-Maree Rowe returning from leave

I would like to congratulate the following staff members who will continue in their roles in 2019:

Kym Clay – Head of Curriculum Teaching and Learning
Kayla Hawkins – Head of Curriculum Teaching and Learning
Kate Haines – Head of Curriculum Student Services

Staffing a school of our size means that many changes can occur. For this reason, we release class teacher information at the beginning of a school year. All staffing decisions are pre-day 8 as staffing allocations are determined by total enrolment numbers of students.

2018 Achievements

At The Willows I am continually proud of the achievement of our students, staff and P and C Group. The year has been tremendously fast and I share with you a snapshot of our achievements at The Willows State School.

Attendance average for Students at The Willows – 92.5% Total Year. Well done to all of parents and students for your continued support of “Everyday Counts”.

School Opinion Survey Highlights

Our Students say:

My school encourages me to be a good community member. 100.0
My school celebrates student achievements. 98.5
My teachers encourage me to do my best. 98.4

Our Parents say:

This school is well maintained. 98.6
I understand how my child is assessed at this school. 97.1
Teachers at this school expect my child to do his or her best. 95.7

Our Staff say:

Students are encouraged to do their best at this school. 96.5
This school is well maintained. 95.3
My school provides useful information online. 95.2
I feel confident using student assessment data to improve student achievement at my school. 98.4
I feel confident in my ability to work autonomously. 98.4
I feel confident in my knowledge of the Australian and Queensland curriculums. 96.8

Our students consistently perform highly in academic subjects. As a school we have made significant progress towards adopting and adapting the Australian Curriculum and its’ requirements by the 2020. Our students are receiving full suite Australian Curriculum through the use of the Curriculum to Classroom Resources which is a Queensland State School resource.

The staff of The Willows have worked exceptionally hard in this area installing new subjects and areas within the last 2 years to ensure that The Willows Students have the best possible education and setting them up for future success in the secondary context. We have an exceptional lift in students achieving A-C across the subjects and have seen a lift in the number of students performing to a very high standard (B-A) in core subjects such as English, Maths and Science. One of the noticeable changes is the enjoyment of learning – installing the more fun subjects back into our school – Arts and Technologies has been a great investment in our professional learning and practice. Our students absolutely enjoy the creative subjects and are performing to high standards in these areas. Congratulations to all of our students and staff!

Over the next weeks of school much happens at our school to celebrate the success of our students across the term, year and their primary schooling years. I would like to take this opportunity to provide you with an update around our Year 6 Awards which all students at The Willows can aspire to. In consultation with our full staff and with our Parents and Citizens Association we have aligned our Academic Awards to capture the high achieving performance of our students. The Awards are outlined below:

Community is an important part of our school. We have a diverse community and our standards are high. Our school reputation is very important and we continue to enact our Enrolment Agreements and Enrolment Management Plan. It is unfortunate that I remind Parents/Carers of our school that when students are at school they are entrusted into our care and that the authority to make decisions rests on school staff. While you may not agree with all decisions, it is expected that you will be respectful to staff at all times. At no time is it acceptable for members of our parent group or their family members to approach staff, other students or other parents using abusive language or intimidatory actions. When reported, these members receive formal warnings and under Section 337 of the Education (General Provisions) Act 2006 (the Act) will be issued with formal directions by Principal and Deputy Principals. This section outlines parent bans from school sites and activities in the event that parent behaviour is unacceptable. We ask that parents communicate concerns to their relevant class teacher in the first instance and if unresolved, speak with their child’s Deputy Principal or line manager. Thankyou to the vast majority of parents who always do the right thing at our school, the staff of The Willows appreciate your support.

Positive Behaviour Learning has been a significant focus at our school for the past 36 months. The Responsible Behaviour Plan has been updated continually in response to our Departmental guidelines and incorporates the Student Wellbeing Framework and updates to policies and procedures relevant to all state schools. The consultation processes that occur at a school level are significant and the plan is endorsed by our Parents and Citizens Association who represent all parents at our school. As part of the systems in place at The Willows we have also placed significant support into the Behaviour and Engagement at our school including the following human resources:

1 Head of Curriculum: Student Services (Mrs Kate Haines)
2 Behaviour Support Teachers (Mr Bill Armit, Mrs Samantha Carter)
1 Full Time Guidance Officer (Mrs Narelle Thomas)
1 Chaplain (Chappy Adam)
4 Support Aides (Cathy Hughes, Mandy Berghoef, Aaron Davies and Correna Wheeler)

I commend our team for the fantastic work that has gone into Positive Behaviour Learning and aligning all of our resources to best support our total school population, small groups and where required individual students for short amounts of time.

As a celebration for the 94% of Willows Learners who do the right thing at our school, the Gold Awards (End of Year Celebration) is in sight. Please see below the arrangements for this special celebration for those students who have consistently demonstrated The Willows Way – Be Safe, Be Respectful, Be Responsible.

GOLD Star Rewards 2018

If you have any questions please contact Mrs Haines, Mrs Carter or Mr Armit.

Well done The Willows, we are heading to a fantastic part of our school year and we thankyou for being part of our school improvement journey.

Kind regards
Helen McCullough
Principal

BEFORE SCHOOL PROCEDURES

All students are seated and supervised in the Main CPA from 8am.

At 8:15 am

Yr 3 – 6 students move to TCBC
Prep – Yr 2 students move to Junior CPA

Please remember your hat every day.

Students will have a quiet activity and the opportunity to have some outside movement time prior to learning.

At 8:45 am All students move to classrooms to commence learning.

To help our students we ask that parents and family members model the following behaviours at our school

• Sit quietly
• Listen to the speakers
• Follow instructions
• Keep noise to a minimum

We appreciate you being a part of our Respectful community and modelling our expectations.

The Outside School Hours Care facility is an option for families to book/use and parents/carers who have early starts and late finishing times are encouraged to access this facility.

ATTENDANCE

Every student in our school is important to us and we are committed to providing personalised education suited to their needs. The very first step in that is maximising learning time and we believe that if students attend every day and every learning minute of the day we are improving their opportunities for academic success.

Students can come to school from 8am. If they arrive at 8am they go to the Main CPA. At 8.15am year 3, 4, 5, and 6 students are escorted by at teacher to TCBC. Students are expected to be at school in the classroom ready to start work at 8.50am. Students who are late to school are encouraged to complete any work missed in their own time. Please note that lateness and early departure have an impact on student learning.

THE WILLOWS WAY IS 100% ATTENDANCE.

Just a little bit late doesn’t seem much but did you know…….

Arriving late and leaving early can take up a lot of learning time

Reminder that students arriving after 9am need to come through the office.

YEAR LEVEL PARADES

This year our students will have year level parades weekly and full school parades as scheduled on our school calendar.

Note the time and place for all year levels.

Prep – Monday 8.45 am in Junior CPA
Year 1 – Monday 12.50pm in Junior CPA
Year 2 – Tuesday 8.50am in Junior CPA
Year 3 – Monday 2pm in TCBC Conference Room
Year 4 – Tuesday 2.30pm in TCBC Conference Room
Year 5 – Mondays 11.40am in TCBC Conference Room.
Year 6 – Mondays 2.30pm in TCBC Conference Room.

Parents/Guardians are most welcome to attend.

STUDENT LEADERS FOR 2019

Congratulations to our year 5 students who have nominated for leadership positions and have completed interviews and speeches to peers. They have done an excellent job showing our school community that they are passionate about our school and student services. Students will be finalising their application processes this week and positions will be announced at our whole school assembly on the 7th of December.

APPOINTMENTS WITH STAFF

Throughout the course of any day and week, the administrative and teaching staff of The Willows have significant commitments to the Teaching and Learning of our students. If you are needing to see one of the staff, please help us by arranging an appointment time at a mutually beneficial time. This can be done by contacting our office, email or by talking with us.

What’s coming up at The Willows State School

YEAR 6 END OF YEAR EVENTS

Information regarding end of year events with Year 6 has been sent out. Keep these dates and times handy.

Year 6 Graduation Ceremony – Wednesday the 12th of December 9.00 to 11.30am
Year 6 Graduation Dance – Wednesday the 12th of December 5.30 to 8pm
Year 6 Fun Day – Thursday the 13th of December 8.45 to 3.00pm.

PE News

Coles Sports for Schools

Earlier in the year you will remember we were all madly collecting Coles Vouchers to earn points to ‘buy’ sports equipment for our school. Have a look at our flyer for the resources that we were able to purchase through this valuable program.

P & C News

TWSS Logo Water Bottles

Available now from the tuckshop for $5 each in house colours.

Keep the kids hydrated for the upcoming warmer days. Don’t forget to write your child’s name on the space provided!

Upcoming Projects

We are excited to share a few of our upcoming projects with you all:

Playgrounds – we are looking to refresh our school playgrounds with some major changes! This will be an expensive project, but will benefit our kids for years to come.

Tuckshop – we are planning a major refurbishment of our aging Tuckshop. Exciting times ahead!

OSHC Play Area – our Outside School Hours Care outside play area is to be landscaped to continue the great work done on the first part of this project. This will provide a full synthetic grassed area outside for our children to play on.

Fun Fair – our Fun Fair will be back, bigger than ever in 2019. Our Fundraising Sub Committee have kicked off initial planning for this. Let us know if you want to be involved!

Kookaburra Student Packs

Once again, the P&C have partnered with Kookaburra to supply our 2019 booklist needs and online ordering is open now!

So easy to order all your booklist needs, order from the comfort of your own home and no running around finding everything! Fantastic prices on quality brands. And you will be supporting your P&C.

2019 Prep families can order too!

Go to www.kookaburra.com.au
Select "Order a Student Pack"

Username: thewi003
Password: Student9 (is case sensitive)

You can either select a complete Student Pack which will contain all the items from our booklist, or you can customise and select items individually (the suggested quantities are the quantities from the school booklists). You can order extras for home if you like! There are also some optional items available for your convenience, such as contact paper, book covers and left handed scissors.

Ordering and Delivery Dates:

SCHOOL DELIVERY (FREE)
Order Cut-Off Date: order by 7th December 2018 for school pick up from our OSHC building. Please note dates and times below. If you can't collect personally, send a friend, relative or neighbour!

School Pick Up Times (from our school's OSHC building):
Saturday 12th January 2019 02:00 pm – 04:00 pm.
Sunday 13th January 2019 10:00 am – 12:00 pm (midday).

.

HOME DELIVERY (Courier fee applies – about $11)
Order Cut-Off Date: order by 14th December 2018 for delivery to home by 18th January 2019. Home delivery will still be available after this date but may not arrive before school starts.

Note: Tissues/A4 Paper/Laminating sheets are bulk delivered to the school and these will be distributed to classrooms on your behalf.

The School Locker

The Willow State School have partnered with The School Locker and a rebate will be made to the school on absolutely every purchase made in store!

The School Locker offer parents the convenience of shopping at a local store (Domain Central) for all your school needs, including music and sports equipment, shoe fittings, stationery and technology. They are open 7 days, including late night trade with ample parking. Soon they will be stocking The Willows State School uniform and new style hats with toggle! (from January 2019)

If you don’t want to order your bookpacks online through Kookaburra, The School Locker can help you pick your book pack from their supply of stationery items (they have all of our booklists ready to go).

The Athletes Foot

Purchase a pair of shoes for any family member and just mention you are with The Willows State School, and The Athletes Foot will donate $5 back to our school. The Athletes Foot offers quality well-fitting shoes that will last the distance.

Contact Us!

Like us on Facebook to keep up to date with school and P&C events. (Search for The Willows State School P&C.) You can contact us sending a pm to the page. Alternatively, you can contact us via email at willowspandc@gmail.com.

P&C Meeting

Our next P&C meeting will recommence in the new year, the second Tuesday in February. Our annual AGM will be held in March 2019.

See you round!

Volunteers Afternoon Tea

All volunteers are invited to come and join us for afternoon tea as we say “Thanks for your time!” Friday 23rd November from 2-4pm. See attached flyer for more details.

Defence News

Hello Defence Families.

A BIG THANK YOU to all students involved in our Remembrance Day ceremony last Friday. I am very proud of all our speakers at the ceremony. It was awesome to see so many parents and people form our wider school community present. I appreciate LACW Cate Doll speaking on the day. On Sunday some of our students and staff attended the very moving ceremony at the Riverway Cenotaph in the morning. It was great to see so many families there. Please join me in welcoming a new addition to our school last week, Nurse Bear O’Meara. She has had a busy week with photos with the Principal and the family who donated her last week, attending the Remembrance Day ceremony at school and at Riverway. This week she is attending Year 6 classes. We appreciate the kind donation by Mikayla, Jeff and Marley. Nurse Bear will spend each day with a class where they will discuss her duties during the Great War and keep a diary of her daily travels around the school. All students are very excited to have her in class. We have completed making our 100 poppies and they have been placed in the garden at the main entrance for all to see. If you are walking by make sure you stop and have a look, as they are pretty awesome. Thanks heaps to all the students and Bunnings who were part of the school project.

Over the next few weeks I will be delivering Farewell packs to students posted at the end of the year, holding Farewell Parties and Christmas Morning Tea for parents. Busy times ahead.

This Wednesday is the last session for the Kidsmart Relocation program here at school. Thanks to all families for participating. The students attending have had a great time discussing issues and how to deal with moving. If you missed out make sure to contact your DSM at your relocating school.

Lots of activities are on in November and December in Townsville so check website for more details.

Most of the postings are out, so if you are moving please contact me and the office ASAP. Information regarding your student/s last day of school and where you will be moving to is important to the school. This information is much appreciated by myself so I have time to visit and talk about the transition to another school and also give a Farewell Pack to your student. If your children have the defence passport please bring them in to me to be stamped before you leave. Look forward to hearing from you. A must website to have a look at if you are moving is in the link below. It is full of awesome stuff about your new location.

IMPORTANT FOR STUDENTS; EDUCATION ASSISTANCE SCHEME - all defence families can access financial assistance for education costs incurred as a result of postings. Students may be entitled to up to 14 weeks of tutoring in any subject that has been identified by the school as representing a gap in learning. We may reimburse fees for tutoring required to fill any gaps in understanding or curriculum caused by changing schools. You have 18 months from starting at a new school to access and complete the tutoring. This scheme is very beneficial for students. Please see me if you would like assistance to complete the form. Or you can ring the Helpline for updates 1800 624 608.

Are you a member of the FREE ADF Family Health Program? If you said No you should be. Just read the fact sheet below and register now to access the FREE health benefits available to all defence families.

If you want to know about upcoming DCO programs, events, and activities or information about events and services in the wider North Queensland community you need to be on the mailing list. You can e-mail DCO office in Townsville dco.townsville@defence.gov.au and leave details such as member name, address, email, mobile/home number, children’s names or collect a form from me. I have attached a copy of the form below.

If you are finding life’s challenges overwhelming my door is always open. Don’t forget you are Welcome to come to L pod for a chat/cuppa, any day from 8:00am until 3:00pm. The office can phone ahead to make sure I am in my room or you can email me to arrange a time. Talking with others can help to put things in perspective. See you soon.

Deployments are a part of the Defence Force family lifestyle. PLEASE LET THE SCHOOL KNOW IF A LOVED ONE IS GOING AWAY. The impact of a parent’s absence due to a deployment can have a huge impact on the whole family, especially children. Sometimes, children lack the language to communicate or understand their feelings and can often express themselves with behaviour that is inappropriate or out of character. At TWSS we aim to support students during parental absence due to a deployment by; engaging the children in a variety of activities that allow them to identify the emotions they may feel during a parental absence; share their experiences with other defence children who may also have a parent away; read books especially written to help children cope with deployments; and create craft items at Kids Club to help the child communicate with the absent parent. Make sure you let your child’s teacher and DSTA know if you or a partner will be away for an extended period of time. Having this knowledge will go towards supporting the student at school.

Are you on the DCO mailing List?

Join DCO Townsville mailing LIST NOW if you want to receive updates from DCO. Contact them directly at dco.townsville@defence.gov.au or phone 07 4753 6539.

Townsville Gone Troppo Newsletter

DCO Townsville's Gone Troppo Newsletter is available to view on the DCO website and click on the latest edition to download

DATES AND ACTIVITIES TO REMEMBER OR NOVEMBER AND DECEMBER

21st November - Free career support Webinar for ADF partners

24th & 25th November - Renegade Handmade Mega Markets – Calvary Christian College

24TH NOVEMBER - GECKOS CHRISTMAS PARTY AND CAROLS $10-CHILD, $5-ADULT INCLUDES FOOD, DRINKS AND ACTIVITIES. BOOKINGS ARE ESSENTIAL.

1st December - Christmas in the City For information go to the link below.

6th December - Coffee Connection Where: Millie J & Co, North Shore, When: Thursday 6th December from 10.30am – 12.00pm

Saturday 8th & 15th December 8.30 – 11am - Come & Try Dragon Boat racing, Where: Rossiter Park pontoon

Christmas Card Competition from Member for Herbert

A reminder that this competition is now open, with final entries to be sent in by Wednesday 21st November, 2018.

The winner of the competition will have their design as the cover of my Christmas Card which will be printed and sent out to Members and Senators of Parliament House, Business Leaders and Community Organisations in Townsville. The winning entry will also receive a prize voucher valued at $100 and the runner up entry will receive a prize voucher valued at $50. I will personally select, notify and hopefully meet the lucky winners.

All entries should be returned either via email to cathy.otoole.mp@aph.gov.au or dropped into my office at the Nathan Business Centre, 340 Ross River Road, Cranbrook or mailed to:

Cathy O’Toole MP
PO Box 226
Aitkenvale QLD 4814

Please remember to send both sides of the entry.

All submissions must be received by the Wednesday 21st November, 2018, in order to allow time for a winner to be established and printing and delivery timings met. If you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact my office on 07 4725 2066 or get in contact with my Community Organiser Jonathan McCarthy at jonathan.mccarthy@aph.gov.au.

Last year I received so many phenomenal entries and I very much look forward to seeing the creativity and artistry of all the designs again this year.

Please download the attached form to submit your entry.