Issue 2 Friday 4 March 2022

Principal's Report, Sonya Wilson

Dear parents and carers

Thank you to all our families for your flexible and supportive manner in navigating this past week with us. We appreciate many families will have experienced flooding first hand and we extend to you our thoughts at this time. We know that the ever-evolving situation and the changes that resulted from this will have caused disruptions to families and we thank you for your flexibility and support. The safety of our school community is what drives our decision making.

Despite these challenges, our focus on teaching and learning remains. Below I will share with you the School Improvement Agenda for Carbrook State School for 2022.

All state schools are required to document priority areas for improvement as part of a four-year strategic plan and a more specific annual improvement plan. Carbrook State School’s Annual Improvement Plan is based on the four-year strategic plan and feedback from the School Opinion Survey conducted in 2021. This survey gathers feedback from parents, students and staff. Collating and reflecting on this feedback and the strong academic performance results over an extended period of time has informed the three priority areas for improvement, as captured in the Annual Implementation Plan below. While the plan identifies three specific areas for improvement each priority area relies on foundation principles – the continuing engagement with the Australian Curriculum and teaching and learning expectations, the commitment to Positive Behaviour for Learning designed to teach students social and learning behaviours and continuing to value and invest in parent and community partnerships.

This plan has been discussed with and endorsed by our school’s P and C and will inform teacher professional learning and improvement for the remainder of this year. We at Carbrook State School believe that we are all life-long learners and will continue to demonstrate this to our students.  This is how we ensure that we are growing the capacity of staff and students in skills and knowledge.

Sonya Wilson

Carbrook State School AIP

Deputy Principal, Kerry-Ann Reese

Parent Teacher Interim Reporting/Interviews

Although this term has been a sporadic learning journey for our children, we would like the opportunity to share with parents, how your children are engaging and achieving against the year level achievement standards as per Australian Curriculum. 

This term we are implementing a new booking system to schedule parent teacher interviews.

We will be using the SOBS (school online booking system).

You child’s teacher will have timeslots available for you to book in a time.

We will notify you in the upcoming weeks when the booking system will be live to book in a parent teacher interview.

We look forward to meeting with you soon.

NAPLAN

NAPLAN is a national literacy and numeracy assessment that students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 sit in May each year. It is the only national assessment all Australian students undertake.

As students progress through their school years, it’s important to check how well they are learning the essential skills of reading, writing and numeracy.

NAPLAN assesses the literacy and numeracy skills that students are learning through the school curriculum and allows parents/carers to see how their child is progressing against national standards and over time.

NAPLAN is just one aspect of a school’s assessment and reporting process. It doesn’t replace ongoing assessments made by teachers about student performance, but it can provide teachers with additional information about students’ progress.

NAPLAN also provides schools, education authorities and governments with information about how education programs are working and whether young Australians are achieving important educational outcomes in literacy and numeracy.

NAPLAN Online

Your child will do the NAPLAN tests online.  All Year 3 students will continue to complete the writing assessment on paper.

Online NAPLAN tests provide more precise results and are more engaging for students. One of the main benefits is tailored (or adaptive) testing, where the test presents questions which may be more or less difficult depending on a student’s responses. Tailored testing allows a wider range of student abilities to be assessed and measures student achievement more precisely. A student’s overall NAPLAN result is based on both the number and complexity of questions they answer correctly. Your child should not be concerned if they find questions challenging; they may be taking a more complex test pathway.

What does NAPLAN assess?

NAPLAN assesses literacy and numeracy skills that students are learning through their regular school curriculum. Students sit assessments in writing, reading, conventions of language (spelling, grammar and punctuation) and numeracy. Questions assess content linked to the Australian Curriculum: English and Mathematics. All government and non-government education authorities have contributed to the development of NAPLAN test materials. To find out more about NAPLAN, visit nap.edu.au

NAPLAN timetable

The NAPLAN online test window for Carbrook State School is five days. The NAPLAN online test window starts on Tuesday 10 May and finishes on Monday 16 May 2022. Online NAPLAN test scheduling requirements are detailed in the table below:

Parents of students in Years 3 and 5 will be provided with further information next term regarding Naplan Online.

Kerry-Ann Reese

Pick Up Arrangments from Monday, 7 March 2022

COVID Restrictions

As you would be aware, the Premier has announced the easing of COVID-19 restrictions in Queensland

• Face masks - From 6pm on Friday 4 March, face masks will no longer be required in most settings including schools.
• Excursions, assemblies, camps and visitors to schools - schools will be permitted to conduct assemblies, excursions and school camps, while restrictions on parents and visitors to schools are also lifting.

Administration Building

We are excited to announce; the Administration Building will be open and operational from 9 March. From 9 March, parents can access the administration building from the main entrance, closest to the Beenleigh Redland Bay Road. There is a large sign placed on the right of the building, directing visitors to the administration entrance. We look forward to welcoming families to the new administration building.

Pick up for Prep students

Next week, prep students will commence a full school day of learning and be required to be collected at 3pm.

Prep parents, we ask that you to wait in the undercover area for the bell to ring and then walk directly up to the classroom to collect your prep child. Parents waiting outside the classrooms, distracts the children from learning and the teachers from teaching. Your support with this is greatly appreciated.

After school care providers will collect prep students from the classrooms. Older siblings can collect prep students if this prearranged by parents.

Students that are not collected at 3pm will be escorted to the main pick up zone (Zone 3) where they will be supervised by Carbrook Staff.

Changes to carpark pick up collection points  

With the administration building now complete, and all temporary fencing removed, the pickup zones in our carpark can now be accessed. At present, students are entering and exiting the school from the one gate.

From Monday 7^th March, we would welcome families to start utilising the other gates to exit the school in the afternoon.

At 3pm teachers will escort classes to the undercover area and dismiss children to allow them to walk to the appropriate pick up zones as outlined below.

Parents, you will need to nominate a pick-up zone and discuss this pick-up point with your child/ren so they are aware of where they will be collected in the afternoons.  Parents of younger children in the school might like to park and collect their children from zone 3 in front of the administration building to begin with and then walk with them and discuss possible future collection points with them.  As you can appreciate, staff will not be responsible for knowing collection points for children.  This will be something that as a family you will have to discuss, negotiate and become familiar in.

Students need to be responsible for looking out for parents and/or the vehicle they are being collected in. When students are waiting in the pickup zones, students will not be permitted to play games, participate in drawing or reading activities or eat food. Students are to ensure they are keeping an eye on parents coming to collect them. This will ensure for a prompt collection and less congestion in the pickup zones.

Pick up / (kiss and go) zones

• These zones are designed for parents to collect and go immediately after children are dismissed at 3pm. It is a 2 min loading zone only. Parents are to remain in their cars and children need to enter the car independently from the left-hand side of the car from the footpath. Cars are expected to move up in the queue when a car leaves the queue. If you are not able to collect your child immediately after the 3pm bell, please direct your children to wait for you at Zone 3.
• This zone is not suitable for children requiring assistance to get into a car or who need to put bags or equipment in the boot of the car. No child or parent is to be on the road in these zones. This is for safety reasons. If your children require assistance to enter the car and place baggage in the back of the car, please ensure that you park, collect children and escort your children to the car.

Park and collect

• Children are not be permitted to walk from any pickup zone to a parked car in the carparks. If you are parking in either of the carparks, you will be required to collect your children from the nominated zones as indicated below and walk them to the car.

Zone 1:  

• This is a zone where students will be not permitted to wait in, however a staff member will be rostered on this zone to supervise students exiting from gates 3 and 2 and walking to cars queued in the kiss and go pick up zones.

Zone 2:

• This pickup point is for students being collected in the new carpark extension.
• Students will exit gate 3 as indicated on the map and wait with the supervisor at that zone.
• This zone is a 2 min loading zone. Parents are to remain in their vehicles and children will be required to enter the car from the left-hand side of the car and will not be permitted to walk around the back of the car to enter the other side of the car or to place bags or equipment in the boot. This is for safety reasons.
• If your child is not there within 2 mins of students being dismissed, you will be required to either park and collect or do a lap and return back to this zone. This is to help the flow of traffic.
• This pickup point would be suitable for parents wanting to exit the school turning left onto Beenleigh Redland Bay Road.
• Students will be permitted to walk along the footpath to the end of the pickup. There will be a staff member on duty to supervise students walking safely to their cars (this staff member will be located in zone 1 on the map)

Zone 3:

• This pickup point is for students being collected from the main carpark drive through pick up (kiss and go zone)
• Students being collected in the kiss and go pick up zone will be permitted to exit the school from gate 1 and 2 and walk along the footpath to enter the car for collection.
• Children will wait with the supervisor in this zone which is the grassed area in front of the administration building and the sandstone garden at the hall
• This zone is the pickup point for those parents parking in the main carpark as well. Students will not be permitted to walk to cars parked in the carpark. Parents must greet their student at the pickup point and walk them to the car.

Zone 4: 

• This zone is the pickup point for students catching buses from Beenleigh Redland Bay Road.
• As there is no parking along the Beenleigh Redland Bay Road, only children using public transport are to wait at this zone for collection.

Wet weather

It is advised to have a wet weather plan for your children, in the event that it rains at 3pm. Students will be escorted to the main undercover area of the school for collection or students that are equipped with an umbrella or a raincoat will be permitted to wait in the pickup zones with supervising staff for collection. Staff will not be in the position to escort children to their cars under an umbrella. Parents will be permitted to collect students in the undercover area.

I appreciate that these new pickup arrangements will take time to adjust to. Please note that the school supervisors at these pickup zones are there to ensure that the traffic flows freely and to ensure the safety of the children. If you are directed to move your car along in the queue please be obliging and respectful to these directions. Please respect our staff and respect our school community, be patient with each other while we adjust to these changes. Your co-operation with these changes is appreciated.

Please look at this map with your children and discuss your pick up plan with them.

APT, Leonie Barnham

Academic Performance Team

After quite a different start to 2022, the Academic Performance Team is now working in classrooms, assisting teachers with their response to intervention and enrichment. 

The APT is assisting with both Literacy and Numeracy across the school, working with teachers in delivering Maths Consolidation Sprints as well as their Reteach, Maintain and Extend programmes. 

Prep and Year One Literacy is a focus this year, where Phonemic Awareness, Reading and Comprehension are priorities. 

Phonemic awareness is the ability to understand that spoken words are made up of individual sounds called phonemes, and it’s one of the best early predictors for reading success.

The APT are working in Prep classrooms, developing students’ Phonological awareness and Phonemic awareness.  Phonological awareness is a critical early literacy skill that helps students recognise and work with the sounds of spoken language.

Phonological awareness is made up of a group of skills including the ability to identify words that rhyme, counting the number of syllables in a name, recognising alliteration, segmenting a sentence into words, and identifying the syllables in a word. The most sophisticated — and last to develop — is called phonemic awareness.

Phonemic awareness is the ability to notice, think about, and work with the individual sounds (phonemes) in spoken words. Manipulating the sounds in words includes blending, stretching, or otherwise changing words.

Reading and reading comprehension are essential skills that require explicit teaching, together with regular reading practice.  Reading enables us to discover and understand the world in which we live.  It enhances imagination and creativity.  Reading improves vocabulary and communication skills as well as stimulating curiosity and improving focus. 

Comprehension is the understanding and interpretation of what is read. To be able to accurately understand written material, children need to be able to (1) decode what they read; (2) make connections between what they read and what they already know; and (3) think deeply about what they have read.

Reading with your child is crucial in the development of reading and comprehension skills. 

As teachers, it is our goal to motivate children to want to read so they will practise reading independently, and thus become fluent readers. We understand this happens when children enjoy reading. Parents can assist to build a love of reading by regularly reading to their children.  Providing them with access to quality texts by way of libraries, bookstores, swop and sell book sales etc. immerses them in a reading rich environment.

Having access to information through the printed word is an absolute necessity. Through books we can enrich our minds; we can also relax and enjoy some precious leisure moments on our own and with others.

With your help, your children can begin a lifelong relationship with the printed word, so they develop into adults who read easily and frequently, and who possess a broad understanding of the world in which they live. 

Happy reading!

HPE, Brett Reese

Cross Country

As this stage, weather permitting the Year 4 – 6 cross country will be scheduled for Tuesday 15 March 2022. 

As you can appreciate, the school grounds are extremely soggy which has affected the usual cross country course. More information will be communicated as soon as we can.

SEP, News Fiona Broquesa

SEP staff for 2023 include:

Prep, Year 1, Year 5 – Mandy Wayman aeway0@eq.edu.au

Year 2 – Fiona Broquesa fbroq1@eq.edu.au

Year 3 and Year 4 – Sandie Howe – showe74@eq.edu.au

Year 6 – Karin Geiger kgeig1@eq.edu.au

These dedicated teachers continue to provide support to both verified and non-verified students across our school working with class teachers to ensure ‘Every student is succeeding’. If you have any questions regarding your child, please feel free to contact one of the above staff members.

SLP programs are also up and running. If your child qualified to access one of these programs, you would have been sent a letter via email. Please return the consent forms as soon as possible to ensure your child gets the most out of this offered opportunity. There are several SLP groups currently being offered for different age groups. These include:

Tell It Again – designed to support narrative comprehension and retell skills

Renfrew – designed to support students finding information from a picture stimulus and answering grammatically correct sentences to blanks questions asked. 

Visualising & Verbalising – designed to strengthen student’s ability to form imagery and verbalise a sentence or story from a picture, word or sentence. This program also assists in comprehension, higher order thinking and oral language skills

Literacy – Drill and skill in phonics, sight words and decodable reading

STEM, Sheri Walls

This term has seen lots of creative thinking happening in STEM. The preps have started learning the different parts of the iPad and are learning how to take care of the devices in the classroom. Year 1 have been looking at the difference between hardware and software. They then used Lego to create their own piece of hardware. Year 2 have been learning about the importance of password safety and what makes a safe password. Year 3 have been investigating the difference between input and output devices. They were then given the challenge of creating their own input or output device using Lego. Year 4 have been learning all about their new laptops. This week they will finish creating their PowerPoint explaining the rules for using their laptops.

Positive Behaviour Learning

This fortnight has been exciting as the Carbrook State School Positive Behaviour Learning Coach role has kicked off with several induction courses. These have been  great opportunities to connect with our regional network of coaches and Principal Advisors.

As we start to focus on the year ahead the PBL Team is busily engaged in reviewing Carbrook State School Tier II processes. Several staff members attended a regional webinar on March 1, which provided good insights into the PBL structure and requirements for establishing supports for Tier II and Tier III students.

At Carbrook State School we are mindful of the fidelity required to provide support with student wellbeing, academic performance and behaviour. Our team approach ensures students in our care feel happy and safe 😊

Regards 

Charlotte Minty

Student Council, Tegan Simone

Student Council News

The student council has been busy behind the scenes establishing a new way of working. Student Council members have elected to work in one of four committees. These committees will have different focuses within the school year that reflect different aspects of our Carbrook Community.

The committees are;

• Academic Committee
• Cultural Committee
• Community Committee
• Physical Committee

Please keep and eye out for updates on what each committee is promoting.

Academic Committee

The academic committee are working on holding a variety of competitions throughout the year based on maths, spelling and writing. We want to showcase our amazing students and their capabilities in these subjects. More information to come soon. 

Cultural Committee

We are holding a school wide poster competition to enter the Logan City Council’s annual World Environment Day calendar event. Each student from Prep to Year 6 are able to enter a poster that follows this year’s theme ‘Our Green City’, be A4 or A3 in size and have a landscape orientation. Students will need to submit posters to their class teacher for the Student Council to collect by Thursday the 24^th of March. Please check with your child’s class teacher if they are completing the poster in class or as a home task.

The entered posters will be displayed in the school where students will vote for their favourites. The five winning posters from each grade will be submitted to the Logan Council competition as well as receiving recognition on parade. Students who are submitted to the Logan City Council competition have a chance to be one of thirteen winners selected to be in next year’s council calendar. All students who enter a poster will receive a prize on behalf of the Logan City council. We look forward to seeing all the entries.

Community Committee

The National Day Against Bullying Violence will be recognised at Carbrook on the 18^th of March. On this day students are asked to wear orange to symbolise that we are united to stop bullying. The theme for 2022 is Kindness Culture. By building a Kindness Culture together, we can promote inclusion, respect and community belonging for all students in schools across Australia.

Physical Committee

Cross Country will be held this term for our wonderful school. Due to the recent extreme weather event, the date is still being determined. Don’t worry though, we will still be preparing to cheer our loudest by practising our war cries.

Braveheart's Ditto Show

On Thursday 17 March, your child will have the opportunity to experience a Personal Safety Education Program “The Ditto Show”. Bravehearts are extremely proud of this program and believe that by providing children with the basic principles of personal safety, we are providing them with the tools to stay safe.

Topics covered throughout the show include:

• Yes & No Feelings
• The Body Warning Signs
• Private Parts
• Secrets
• Actions to Take When Feeling Unsafe

The Ditto show is a live performance delivered in a fun, interactive and engaging matter. Ditto’s Keep Safe Adventure Program and resources are not sex education. Private parts are simply explained as the mouth (as we do not just go around kissing anyone), the chest, between the legs and our bottoms. The main aim of the program is to enhance children’s emotional literacy. The performance will be held over two sessions, running for 35 minutes each. 

Parents are able to attend the sessions. Please advise your child’s teacher of your intention.

Religion

Religious Instruction

Queensland state schools embrace a multitude of cultural, religious and non-religious beliefs and encourage students to grow and develop as a whole person, in particular, in beliefs, values and attitudes. Under the Education (General Provisions) Act 2006, schools are required to provide regular Religious Instruction if approached by a faith group and students of that faith attend the school. 

Participation in religious instruction is not compulsory. Any student (except Prep students) may participate in religious instruction if a parent has given consent and indicated a religion on the Application for Student Enrolment From or in other written advice to the Principal.

At Carbrook State School the Christian Religious Instruction Cooperative currently offer instruction, fortnightly for thirty-minute lessons. Any student not participating in the official Religious Instruction program will be supervised and in their year level. Instructors use the authorized program Connect, including Beginning with God and Big Questions.

The National Day Against Bullying and Violence

On March 18th, Carbrook State School will be participating in the National Day Against Bullying and Violence. This is a day where students and staff participate in class activities, to focus on and discuss the impact of bullying and violence in our world. At Carbrook State School, we believe that a shared definition and understanding of bullying and violence is critical to finding positive and lasting solutions for everyone involved.

Bullying is an ongoing and deliberate misuse of power in relationships through repeated verbal, physical and/or social behaviour that intends to cause physical, social and/or psychological harm. It can involve an individual or a group misusing their power, or perceived power, over one or more persons who feel unable to stop it from happening. Bullying can happen in person or online, via various digital platforms and devices and it can be obvious (overt) or hidden (covert). Bullying behaviour is repeated, or has the potential to be repeated, over time (for example, through sharing of digital records). Bullying of any form or for any reason can have immediate, medium, and long-term effects on those involved, including bystanders.

At Carbrook State School we believe in a pro-active approach to bullying and violence and work tirelessly to provide a positive school climate which embeds anti-bullying responses and prevention within a whole-school approach.

Our Positive Behaviour for Learning (PBL) is a whole-school framework that promotes positive behaviour across our school and helps develop safe and supportive learning environments for our students. Schools which implement the PBL framework make sure all students are explicitly taught the expected behaviours and establish clear and consistent boundaries. The explicit teaching of positive school values to students through our PBL, creates a positive school climate, which in turn is related to lower levels of bullying.

Our day of wearing orange and completing task specific activities, ensures Carbrook State School students realise that the school culture and climate have a significant impact on their interactions.

A day of Action Against Bullying, assists our students to understand that bullying occurs within a multi-layered context — the layers being individual, peer and whole-school, and therefore successful school-based reflections and actions need to take a multi-level approach, and involve students and staff and parents and carers.

At Carbrook State School, our staff are fully aware of the role they play in presenting a world without bullying. Our staff are always role models to their students, however on March 18th, we are all able to take the extra time with our classes to create, participate and engage in conversations and activities that ensure the importance of our actions are in the forefront of our day.

1B, Alana Cutler

Term 1 sees 1B exploring animals. We will be writing an animal report and looking at the different animal classifications in science. As part of year 1’s collaborative learning approach this term, we have enjoyed welcoming our own class pets.

Introducing Snowy and Spike… our class Hermit Crabs! With pure joy and excitement, we brainstormed what our crabs would need to survive. We looked at what they will need in their habitat and how we could create this to ensure  our crabs were very happy creature.

Students recognised that Crabs need water, a place to hide, and they also need food. As a class we created our own crab habitat before introducing our crabs to it .

The students have loved having the responsibility of cleaning, feeding and giving the crabs their water.

Students also love to sit in a big circle and watch the crabs scurry along the carpet.

1B Gallery

1/2, Shu Fen Lo

JELLY BRAIN!!!

In Health, we are learning about our Brains, including how our brains work and how we can learn to use certain strategies to help us in a variety of situations.  We took a closer look at a Jelly Brain!  There was lots of discussion about how it looks, how it feels and the size of our brains.

After the lesson, students asked if they could eat the jelly brain. Ms Lo didn’t recommend it, because it was touched by lots of hands and fingers. The students asked Ms Lo ‘please don’t throw it away’, so that they could play with it as a sensory tool. They were amazed and excited as well as having a lot of fun!!!

1/2 Gallery

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2A, Amanda Kennedy

Wednesday March 2nd was National Be Kind Day 2022!  

To help celebrate 2A and 2B made Kindness Clouds as part of our fine motor activities and discussed the importance of being kind to everyone.  We shared how it makes us feel when others are kind to us and also how it makes us feel when we do kind things for others.  We identified significant words that reflected being kind and added them as a rainbow to our Kindness Clouds to display in our rooms as a reminder of the importance to always treat others as we would like to be treated.  Remember - think kind, act kind, be kind!  

2A and 2B

During week 5 2A and 2B celebrated Two’s Day – Tuesday 22^nd February 2022! 

It was a special day that year 2 investigated can only happen once every 100 years. Year 2 worked on number palindromes and activities around the number 2 and being in Year 2! 

Heart of Carbrook

1A Heart of Carbrook

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We make our story about kindness to THE PEOPLE AROUND US.

We show kindness. We respect others. We smile and pass it on… Happy Heart of Carbrook’s Day!!!

1/2 Heart of Carbrook

New Playground

Ninja Playground

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The day had finally arrive last Monday when the Year 5-6 Ninja Warrior Course playground was open. Each class had the opportunity to visit the playground, talk about using it safely and of course to have a play. The screams of excitement rung out as the students climbed, jumped and ran on the new equipment. A big thank you needs to go out to the P&C for organising and installing the play space for the upper school students.

Scholastic Book Club

P&C

Hot Cross Buns Fundraising