Hello everyone! What an exciting Term we have ahead of us!

It has been wonderful to see our students engaged and involved in their class activities as I move across the school visiting classrooms and seeing the great curriculum work happening. Staff and students are working hard on their goals, using every opportunity to increase student learning outcomes. Increasing students’ communication continues to be a huge focus for us and we appreciate the support families are providing as we work together with private therapists to ensure we are all working towards the same goals for our students with complex communication challenges. Claire, our Education Queensland Speech Language Therapist, has been consulting in many of our classrooms to ensure staff are able to support our students proactively.

Calendar & Communication

Please check the Term 4 Calendar your child brought home at the end of last term to ensure you are aware of all that is happening this term at our school. If you didn’t receive one or have misplaced it, please give us a call and we will send another one home to you or email it out, if you prefer. We will have some additional things happening that are not on the Calendar as they are still being finalised so please watch out for updates as the term progresses. This year, due to COVID-19, the school term will end early on Wednesday 9^th December.

We are working hard to improve our communication with our families and make sure you receive information in a timely way. Please check our Facebook posts regularly as these are used frequently to inform you of what is happening or share information and photos of what has happened at our great school. In addition, we are continuing to update our Gympie Special School website https://gympiespecs.eq.edu.au/  to ensure all the information you need is available. Check it out if you have not been on there recently. 

BOOK WEEK Dress Up Day Wednesday

Next week, on Wednesday, we will all be dressing up for Book Week.  Our theme this year is “Curious Creatures, Wild minds” which fits beautifully into our English curriculum for this semester which is based on Animals. I am really looking forward to seeing the imaginative costumes our students and staff wear to our Book Week Parade next Wednesday 21 October at 9.15am in the Quad. Book vouchers will be presented to the best dressed student in each sector for use at our school Book Fair, held in the library next week. Parents are welcome to come to both our Book Week Parade and our Book Fair.

QUOTA

On Wednesday this week, we welcomed Joy and Nola, from our local Gympie Quota Club to our school. With our P&C president Juanita Sempowicz, we discussed both the financial support Quota has provided to Gympie Special over a long number of years and the trophies the Quota Club has donated for our end of year awards. Gympie Quota have very kindly agreed to continue supporting our school by donating an annual “Primary Most Improved” Trophy and a “Secondary Most Improved” Trophy.  We will also have a plaque in our office foyer with the names of recipients added annually. A huge thanks to Gympie Quota for their ongoing support as Friends of our school. We really appreciate it.

End of Year Awards Night

This year due to Covid-19 we have held off announcing our awards night. We will need to be very conscious of socially distancing and making sure we are being safe. We have tentatively identified 6pm Thursday 3^rd December for this evening, however it will be a modified evening. More information will be released closer to the time.

We will still be presenting awards and staff will very shortly start nominations for these. This year and from now on we will present awards for both a Primary and Secondary winner for all categories. Our Categories include: Communication, Literacy, Numeracy, School Pride, the Shannon Shield ‘All Rounder”  as well as our 2 Quota trophies for Most Improved.

Drop Off / Pick Up Zone

Thank you everyone for the patience you demonstrate to ensure the safety of our students in our Transport zone. It has been great to see students arriving on time for an 8.30am start to their lessons. It is much appreciated.

Unfortunately we cannot relay messages from the transport zone to classrooms or teachers. Staff on duty in the transport zone go straight to their own classrooms to support learning and do not get an opportunity to pass these messages on.

Instead, please

• write the message in the communication diary or
• ring our office on 07 5480 2333 or
• email your class teacher or email
• admin@gympiespecs.eq.edu.au

NDIS

Would you like help to understand/implement your NDIS plan? Not sure where to start? Does your NDIS plan cover your support needs? Would you like help preparing for a review? We have a parent available to assist you with these questions and any other questions you might have regarding your NDIS plan. Penelope is available on Thursdays from 11.15am to 1.15pm here at school to help parents/carers with their NDIS plans. Please ring our office to book a time with Penelope if you would like this support.

Best wishes to everyone for a wonderful weekend and a terrific Term 4!

Sarah 

Principal 

Hi everyone,

It was great to have all students back at school last Tuesday.  I hope all families had a refreshing and relaxing break.  Term 4 is always exciting, with lots of fun and rewarding activities planned for our students.  Our Year 6 and Year 12 students will be celebrating their graduation and we are also hosting a PBL (Positive Behaviour for Learning) Rewards day.  Keep encouraging your child to follow the school rules and earn those Ardy tickets!

Students earn Ardy tickets for following the school rules:

1. Be Safe
2. Be a Learner
3. Be respectful

2020 World Teachers’ Day  

Every day, our wonderful teachers here at Gympie Special School are making a positive difference.  They are continually creating opportunities for their students, empowering the minds of our young people. 

World Teachers’ Day is a wonderful opportunity to celebrate and thank Queensland teachers for the vital role they play inside our classrooms and out in the community.

We are celebrating on Friday 30^th October 2020!

Sunshine Coast Regional Disabilities Expo

The expo brings together under one roof, all businesses within the disability sector and is designed to connect services with families, carers and people with disabilities. RDE – Regional Disability Expo is a chance for a multitude of providers to showcase products and services.

Regional Disability Expo attracts a varied range of exhibitors, informative and interactive workshops and high profile personalities.

When: Thursday 29^th October

Time: 9:30- 4:00 pm

Cost: Attendance is free

For further information click the link below.

Endeavour Foundation excursion

On Wednesday our senior secondary students attended a ‘meet and greet’ session at the Endeavour Foundation on Glasgow Street.  The students had the opportunity to do some VR (virtual reality) gaming, learn how a 3D printer works, program robots using an iPad and use the sensory room.

The people at Endeavour were full of praise for our students, who represented their school with pride.  We were very proud of all of them, even the teenage boys who ate a few too many of the delicious sausages that were cooked up for them.  I believe one of our boys (who will remain unnamed) needed 6 of them to fill him up. 

We received a lovely email from the foundation stating how much they enjoyed having our students visit and how popular the VR, 3D printer and robots were. 

For more information on the services offered by the Endeavour Foundation in Gympie at the link below.

The massage chair in the sensory room was very popular with our students (and staff).  Of course, it was important for me to conduct a full safety check prior to it being used by our students.

Fundraiser for Quota

Kind regards,

Rachael

Have you heard that next week is Bookweek? It is my favourite week of the year!

Our library has been transformed into a wild and curious world and will be open on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday to families and friends to explore and make purchases from the extraordinary display of books on offer for our first ever Bookfair. Classess will explore Bookfair on Monday and Tuesday and will complete ‘wish lists’ of books they see and feel. Purchases can be made on site via Eftpos, Credit Card, cash or online payments. Each purchase made earns credits to purchase new books for our very own library.

Families and friends are invited to join us on Wednesday 21^st October at 9.15am we will hold our very first EVER whole-school Bookweek costume parade. $10 Bookfair vouchers will be awarded to one best dressed boy and girl from each sector. I can’t wait to see all of the wild and curious costumes!

Thursday we will announce our best dressed classroom door prizes to classes and I can’t wait to see how creative the classes have been. I am looking forward to dressing up and decorating my office door to share my love for books with you all.

Shellie

Our theme for Dance this term is called Wildlife Watch. Students will be expressing ideas about animals and the environment through dance. They are practicing technical skills using fundamental movements. One of the most important things to learn in the first weeks is performing dance safely. All students are encouraged to practice their Ardy rules.  For some students it is a huge learning experience to consider and practice spatial awareness when performing their dances. It is lovely to see the children expressing their creativity through dance and really enjoying the experience. The following photos are of students exploring how animals move.

Chris, (The Arts teacher)

HASS – Learning World

Welcome back for the final term of the year. This is a very busy time across all sectors, with the Senior Secondaries finishing off their studies on liveability of places. They will investigate the liveability reasons indigenous peoples choose to live on ‘Country or Place’. There is also a mapping element and data comparison studies within this unit of work.  Junior Secondary classes will investigate what makes a place special in the local community and how it can be cared for. Primary Years classes are focussing on caring for places within the school and also looking at how weather is a feature of places. The Early Years classes will spend their learning time reading and exploring stories about places which are special to people and how they are looked after.

Miss A

Both senior classes attended an Excursion to the Endeavour Foundation on Wednesday.  Students were able to interact with other community members and participated in a variety of activities.  The activities included a virtual reality game with other students able to watch what the participant could see on a big screen, printing blocks on a 3D printer and playing against a robot in a robotics game on the iPad.  All students and staff thoroughly enjoyed the sensory room which included a massage chair, fairy lights and a bubble tube.  The day ended with a sausage sizzle and many happy children on the bus trip home, we thank endeavour for this fantastic opportunity.

Warm regards

Trista, Sonia and Debbie

JS4 began the term with a bang. Everyone is working really hard and we are so proud of our students. Over the next 4 weeks we will be working on our science and mathematics tasks and working on or English presentations.

Our silkworms cocooned over the holiday period and this week they are beginning to hatch and lay eggs. We plan on storing the eggs until next year and then sharing them with other classes so they can experience the joy of watching the life cycle of a silk worm in real life.

As part of our science life cycles unit, we have planted seeds into the sides of clear containers. We will be recording the development of the plant from seed to plant.

Anne-Maree and Cann

JS3 enthusiastically started Term 4 by making a classroom poster calling themselves “The Sensational 6”. It was a truly collaborative effort with great results.

We have also been busy learning all about being healthy and safe while moving our bodies.  We have also been busy preparing for Book Week next week and we are excited about the curious creatures, wilds minds theme.

Until next time,

Sue, Grace & Darren

Welcome to Term 4!

This term we are continuing to learn about animals.  We have also been investigating curious creatures as we prepare for Book Week and are thrilled to find that so many of our Australian native animals have curious features indeed! Backwards facing pouches, egg-laying mammals, giant male birds with talons and horns guarding enormous green eggs – wow. In science, we are continuing to learn about life cycles.

Miss Emma has almost completed our biome windows and we enjoy deciding which habitat our Book of the Week animal characters would live in.

In mathematics, the students are focussed on consolidating and building their number knowledge, including counting using 1-1- matching and working forwards and backwards in a counting sequence.

As the weather warms up we will be keeping our water bottles on our desk, so please remember to send in fresh water each day. 

Until next time, Miss Jodie, Miss Emma, Miss Jordan and Miss Tanya

Term 4 and we are off! JS1 will have a busy term with Book Week to kick it off in Week 3. We have been reading ‘The bat and the crocodile’, an Aboriginal Dreaming story that explains why bats hide in caves. We created some texts about where we live using symbols similar to those used by the Gubbi Gubbi people. We have another text from the same series about an echidna for week 3. The Book Week theme is ‘Curious creatures, wild minds,’ so we thought echidnas are probably one of the most curious creatures on earth.

We have a new favourite game, Word Bingo. The students are identifying and saying the words throughout the game and we are a competitive lot!

At the end of Term 3, we had ‘Dress like a Pirate Day.’ Our learning revolved around a pirate theme with treasure map construction, a pirate text to read, numeracy with a pirate influence and a treasure hunt to finish the day. Each student was given a clue and had to work out where to go for the next student to find a clue. Lots of fun and a found treasure chest was the end result.

Maths is still a favourite. The students are becoming more independent in working through their maths tasks. We continue to play number games using physical movement, giant claws and throwing to reach particular numbers. The learners are very focussed during maths and strive to achieve their individual goals.

In Science we have been sequencing the lifecycles of animals. We have the most amazing animals in the world. We are also investigating the lifecycles of plants and what they require to survive. We have found many great YouTube clips that show lifecycles to help us to understand the progression. What did we do before Google?

Playtime continues to be an active session of structured play in the quad at first break with set games while second play gives the students opportunities to play tag, swing or maybe kick a footy. We have noticed new friendships springing up and new skills being demonstrated as they choose their playtime fun.

Kind regards,

Karen, Bree, Debbie, Dana and Deb. 

Welcome back to Term 4, it was fantastic to see the students back after the school holidays.

We have started well so far with the students working hard in their learning.

The school swimming program has started this week and the students really enjoyed their first session at the pool. This will continue every Tuesday until week 7. This week our students focused on safe entry and exit of the pool as well as different strokes and floating.

We have also started a drumming program with Chappie Naomi on Fridays and the students really enjoyed it last week. The students are given the choice of many percussion instruments to play during our time with her.

In science students have been learning about life cycles and have been keenly observing their own mealworms grow, carefully watching what they develop into. 

In English, students are identifying their favourite character and building their vocabulary to describe why these characters are their favourite. It has been interesting to see how some students may like the same characters but have different reasons.

Book week dress up is on next Wednesday the 21^st October and the library will be open for Book Fair all of next week for browsing, come along and have a look at some fantastic books.

That’s all for this week,

Dale, Ev, Dana.

WOW, week 2 already. Time flies when you are having fun. To add to the fun times we have in the primary sector, we have begun swimming on Tuesday afternoons. It has been the highlight of the term so far, so much so that it has been the stimulus for two of our budding authors. In preparation for swimming, P2 has discussed pool safety and we have created rules to follow while at the pool to help keep us safe. In science, our mealworm experiment will soon come to an end. We have witnessed and documented a mealworms full lifecycle from beginning to end. We will finalise our experiment over the coming weeks and release the mealworm (now black beetles) into the wilds of the school gardens.

From the class of P2

Who would have thought that we are now in the second week of Term 4 with summer nearly upon us? Luckily, we have swimming during middle session on Tuesdays! We are continuing our English with texts about pets. “Belinda” is about about a misbehaving milking cow and an old favourite and “Wombat Stew,” have been our Books of the Week so far. We are identifying descriptive vocabulary about a character in the texts along with our favourite parts. We are looking at where the stories take place and sequencing incidents at the beginning, middle or ending of texts. We are also describing what we like and dislike about our favourite characters.

In maths, we are working on our number and shape goals and we are learning to interpret data displays. This involves answering yes/no questions as part of information collecting e.g. “Do you like mealworms?” and then observing and/or being assisted to participate in the display of information collected. Speaking of mealworms, we now have very few left as they have turned into pupa or beetles (adults). We have all enjoyed looking after the mealworms and were surprised by the number of beetles after the holidays. We will soon be taking them home to share this experience with our families.

Sincerely,

Libby, Deb, Chrissie, Bree, Che, Jodi, Miss A, Chris, Andrew and the boys.

Early Years News

Welcome to term 4, it was great to see our students coming back eager to learn.

This term has been fantastic so far and our students have been really engaged in their learning activities, including making choices and requesting a continuation of an activity.

 Students have also been really engaged in our HPE gross motor movement lessons and have enjoyed a variety of musical activities too. Students have had the opportunity to communicate how movements effect their bodies and how to move safely during these lessons.

Chappy Naomi joined us for outdoor learning on Friday and provided our students with fun musical instruments to play, including drums.  Thanks Chappy Naomi!

Students are continuing to learn about animals this term and are developing an understanding of the differences between the mother and baby animals in science. Our maths unit of work is focussed on data collections and understanding which group of data contains more or less.  The students are also continuing to work with numbers, including counting.

During English the focus is on describing characters and students are beginning to communicate the various attributes of each character in our focused book. For example, physical appearance such as tall or short and personality traits such as friendly, happy or sad.

Our swimming program started this week and our first day of swimming was really enjoyed by all. This will continue each Tuesday until the 1^st of December. Our students will be focusing on digging hands and kicking feet in the water during the first few lessons.

It is book week dress up on Wednesday 21^st October.  The Book Fair is open in the library all of next week and you are welcome to come along and browse.

We are very proud of the progress that our students are making and are certainly noticing how far they have come, particularly in the area of communication.

Until next time.

Lynne, Megan, Liz, Tricia, Janet, Michelle, Kym, Katrina and Jasmin.