28 October 2020

Newsletter Articles

Principal’s Report

Yours in education,

Leanne Odorico
Principal

Student of the Week

Top Kurwongbah Kids

Congratulations to the following students who have recently received Top Kurwongbah Kids Awards by showing our School Values:

TERM 4 WEEK 2

Top Kurwongbah Kid – Term 4 Week 2

Date Claimers

Due Dates for Payments

Day for Daniel

Friday 30 October is 'Day for Daniel' 2020. We encourage students to wear an item of clothing (socks, shirt, shorts, hair band etc) to recognise this day. We are not doing a gold coin donation for this event in 2020. During the week all classes will watch a Child Safety video developed by the Daniel Morcombe Foundation.

Children Leaving Kurwongbah

Please ensure you advise the office if your child/ren will be leaving Kurwongbah at the end of the school year (other than year 6 students). We are starting the process of forming classes for 2021.

2021 Prep Enrolment

We still have some places available in prep for 2021. Children who were born between 1 July 2015 and 30 June 2016 are eligible to commence prep in 2021. If you know of anyone wanting to enrol their child at Kurwongbah, please ask them to contact the school office (ph: 3481 4333).

World Teachers’ Day

This Friday, 30 October, is World Teachers’ Day which is a great opportunity for students and parents to show their appreciation for all the hard work teachers do with their students. Kurwongbah teachers are extremely dedicated and have a strong commitment to their role as educators. Thank you for the appreciation you show to our terrific teachers.

2021 Student Leadership

Yesterday 43 year 5 students presented their speeches to an audience of year 5 students and staff. All nominees are to be congratulated on their preparation on delivery of their speeches.

The 2021 Student Leaders Council will be announced at parade this week.

Absences

Absence notification process

The preferred method for reporting absences is via our SMS service on 0429 919 560. Your other means of letting us know is via our absence line (3481 4366), by QParents or by the main phone line. Please be sure you indicate the following when reporting the absence:

• Name of child (especially if there is more than one child in your family)
• Absence reason – Please indicate if your child is sick or at an appointment etc. Indicating that your child is not coming to school, does not give a true reason for the absence
• Late Arrival – If your child will be late due to an appointment, please indicate an approximate time of arrival
• Dates of absences, if longer than 1 day

When using our absence line (3481 4366), please speak very clearly. It is a requirement of the Department of Education for all absences to be explained.

Collecting Students for Appointments

Please be aware these are the lunch break times for your children:

• 1st Break : 10.50am – 11.30am
• 2nd Break: 1.30pm - 2.10pm

If you need to collect your child for an appointment, please inform either the office or your teacher as to your approximate arrival time and if necessary we will attempt to have your children waiting for you at the office. We do not have a system where we can contact children or teachers during break times.

New student free days added to Term 4!

A reminder that the last two days of the school year, Thursday 10 and Friday 11 December, have been declared student free days. Our school will be closed on these days.

View the updated school calendar below.

Caleb’s Winning ‘Telling Stories’ Entry

Congratulations to Caleb, who won the Year 5 section of the ‘Telling Stories’ competition hosted by Mooloolaba Rotary together with University of the Sunshine Coast and Voices on the Coast. This was open to Year 4-9 students. Well done Caleb!

The wizards mistake! (457 words)

The tiny, wiry wizard added some acids, a lizard tongue from the Land of Despair and a head of a Yeti from the Land of Ice. The odour of his concoction nearly made him faint. The wizard had piercing, moon like eyes that penetrated the very soul of anyone that looked into his eyes. His face was round and unattractive. The concoction he was brewing smelled worse than the stench of a giant’s disgusting breath. He knew it was nearly ready.

The liquid bubbled and spat as if it were full of life. All those years of gathering his supplies and studying the ‘The Art of Invincibility’, had finally paid off. This was his life’s work. The wizard laughed long and maliciously, so that even his house seemed to shiver. The creatures living around his home, the few brave enough to live nearby, scampered away with blinding speed at the sound of his laugh. The concoction was ready.

He walked outside carrying his precious potion. Foolishly, he didn’t read all the instructions of its use. For, under the light of a full moon would the potion only be effective. The potion needed to be poured onto the ground and magically a tree would form with fruit that, when eaten, caused the eater to become invincible. However, in his excitement, the wizard neglected to notice the crescent moon hanging in the sky.

The wizard glanced up, startled. Suddenly, with no warning, disaster struck. Colossal, dark grey rocks fell like rain. The ugly wizard shuddered with fright. From out of the sky a creature loomed over him. A malevolent, spiteful beast at least twenty metres tall was looking down on him. The wizard recognised him; it was Drago - a creature he thought was merely the stuff of legends. Worst of all, Drago looked hungry.

As Drago approached the wizard, the wizard noticed his teeth were like swords, they would cut through him like the swords of a thousand armies. During the chaos, the clouds turned black and roared with insane fury. Lightning bolts fell like hammers. Drago’s footsteps shook the ground. The wizard suddenly realised his error. By not following the instructions thoroughly, he had woken Drago Black-Streak from his millennial long sleep. The wizard leapt under the cover of a near-by rock to hide from the horrible creature. The inscription now made sense. Written in small print at the very end of the mystical book, was the phrase “The creator of The Art of Invincibility is not to be blamed for severe injury or excruciatingly painful death/s due to not correctly following the instructions contained in this manual”.

“I should have been more careful” he moaned from underneath the boulder.

By Caleb

First Aid News

You are reminded that children who are unwell must not attend school. In accordance with Queensland Health Directions, parents or carers of any child showing signs of illness will be asked to collect them immediately from the school.

First Aid Room
firstaid@kurwongbahss.eq.edu.au

Music News

Instrumental Music

The instrumental teachers are in the process of recruiting students for 2021. If your child is interested in participating in the instrumental program, he/she should have received a note by now. The String Program is offered to students going into year 3 next year while the Band and Percussion Programs are offered to students going into year 4. Please have the forms returned by this week to avoid disappoint of your child missing out as numbers for beginner students are limited for each group. This is a lengthy process which will take a few weeks. Students will be notified once the entire process is finalised. We thank you for your patience in this process.

Junior And Senior Singers

Students are able to perform on parade for their peers this term. The following are the planned performances for each group:

STEM & Enrichment Education News

Kurwongbah’s Makerspace Lunchtime Timetable – Term 4

Robotics Sumo Wrestling Competition

Students in Year 3-6 are preparing their robots for the Kurwongbah Sumo Robotics Wrestling Competition. Come to the library and join a team where you will learn how to program and design a robot to compete in the upcoming round robin competition. See you in the Makerspace at second break Tuesday – Thursday.

Botley the Coding Robot

Junior students are enjoying learning how to code with the new Botley robots in the Makerspace. Students are creating programs to make Botley follow a line and score goals as it moves the ball through the course to score. Join in the fun at the Makerspace this week!

STEM - Year 2 Day in the Life of a 7yr Old

Year 2 classes are participating in the STEM program of, ‘A day in the life of a 7 year old,’ every fortnight in Term 4. This program is to promote curiosity in STEM knowledge and skills as well as including collaboration, innovation and entrepreneurship.

Students will engage in a culminating group challenge to build the tallest tower that can balance a marshmallow using only spaghetti, string and sticky tape. They will use their collaborating skills and follow the design technology process in Engineering, as well as apply knowledge of 2D and 3D shapes and their knowledge of forces from science to compete the task.

YMCA OSHC

We would like to extend a warm welcome to our new families – welcome to OSHC, we are happy to have you as part of our OSHC community!

These past couple of weeks at OSHC have been exciting. We have been following the children’s interests with sensory play – our wonderful educators have set up experiences with slime, playdoh, cloud dough and kinetic sand. There have been many conversations around craft, especially with Halloween fast approaching. We have created masks, ghosts, spider webs, decorations and have done lots of drawing.

Cricket, handball and tennis are still our main favourite sports games, as well as various forms of tag. We are so grateful the weather has been on our side and we have been able to enjoy the sandpit, swings, bush gully, oval, tennis courts and the prep playground.

On Friday 30th October we will be participating in Day for Daniel alongside the school community. Our students have been hard at work on some fantastic posters to remind us all to “Recognise. React. Report.” We have also been engaging in discussions around safety, including identifying safe people for each child. We hope to see you all in red on the day as we bring awareness to safeguarding children.

We hope you have a great fortnight!

The YMCA Kurwongbah Team
Phone: 0448 244 060
Email: akb@ymcabrisbane.org

P&C News

Recently the P&C have been working hard and having discussions about the best way to utilise the building fund to benefit the school, students and the wider community. As many of you would be aware, the QLD government has begun the roll out of the ‘cooler schools’ project, thus money raised to contribute to the various stages of air conditioning is no longer needed for that purpose. As a group we have narrowed it down to two projects that we are investigating.

The first project involves installing air circulation and ventilation to the school hall. This would provide a cooler environment for school parades, performances, special events and, of course, the various community groups that utilise the hall for activities.

The other project that we are investigating, and working alongside the school to secure additional funding for, is the construction of a cover over the multipurpose courts. This is quite a major project and would likely be delivered in multiple stages. Upon completion it would provide another undercover area for the school and community to utilise for the entirety of the year.

As always, we invite and encourage community support and participation in the school P&C. The next P&C meeting will be held on Wednesday the 11th November at 6:30pm. This will be the final meeting of the year as the next scheduled date falls on the last day of school.

Fundraising News

Return It/Containers For Change

Next Monday, November 9th, we are holding a bottle drive! Bring along your bottles from home to donate to the school! We will have volunteers there to collect and put them in the purple container near the oval off Frenchs Road. We encourage all donations- from the loose bottles in your car to the huge collections you have at home! Fill a bucket or a box and bring it along for a quick and easy drop off and help raise funds for our school!

Tuckshop News

Reminder, Pizza is available on Wednesdays - including Margarita $5, ham and pineapple $5, mega meat $5.50. Pikelets are available on a Thursday. A red food day is coming on Friday 13th November.

Ice Block Reminder

With the weather warming up and more children wanting ice blocks please remember these items need to be ordered either online or before school via the bag cash system and must be collected from the tuckshop in play time. We do not hand out ice blocks in eating time or put these items in the junior school esky system.

Ordering

The preferred method of ordering is Online at QuickCliq.com.au or over the phone, as all details of in stock items are available.

Cash

The tuckshop is accepting cash in bag system before school only. This is a COVID safe plan to ensure no cash is handled while food is been served.

Correct cash must be placed into a bag with child’s name class and order, this includes ice blocks. We do not accept cash during breaks.

Thank you to Kylie Mynett (Wednesday), Bruce Spencer (Thursday) and Liz Greer (Friday) for volunteering your time to assist in counting and removing the tuckshop takings.

Phone Orders

Parents can place a phone order, by phoning the tuckshop directly on 3481 4337 and paying by credit card. Cut off for phone orders is 9:00am.

Online Ordering

Parents can order via our online ordering system (www.quickcliq.com.au). Cut off for online ordering is 8:00am. Please ensure you have your child’s correct class, so your child’s meal is prepared and ready in the correct collection place. Please use the instruction box to pass on any information regarding your child’s order.

Allergies

We currently cater for many students with allergies. If you have any concerns, please feel free to contact our team and we will be able to give you up to date information regarding our products.

Tuckshop Hours

Monday – Tuesday CLOSED
Wednesday - Friday 8:15 - 2:10 pm

Sandra and Carol
Tuckshop Convenors
tuckshop@ksspca.qld.edu.au

Uniform Shop

The Uniform Shop is currently accepting phone orders or email orders.

Phone orders can be made Monday – Thursday from 9am – 12pm

If you are unsure of the sizing, we can have your child come to the office on either a Monday or Thursday morning. We will organise this with their Teacher.

Deliveries will occur on Monday and Thursday’s.

You can send your emails through any time and they will be processed on these days. We can send 2nd hand items home for you to accept but if you do not want them, they must be returned next day with your child.

Second-hand Uniforms

We have a good range of second-hand items available. If you want us to select for you, we can send the item home and if you do not think it suitable it can be returned for credit with your child the next day.

Ordering Through Uniform Shop

The following options are available:

1. Email your order through to uniformshop@ksspca.qld.edu.au. This will be processed next time the Uniform Shop is open.
2. You can phone the Uniform Shop during open hours and pay by Credit Card.

We are currently not accepting cash. We can do Direct Debit payments, payment by Credit Card over the phone, or by downloading our order form and filling in all of your details and emailing to for to us our email address is below.

Uniform Shop Hours

Thank you
Kay Mitchell
uniformshop@ksspca.qld.edu.au

Containers for Change