Greetings Gympie Special School Community,

Term 3 is rapidly progressing. One of my favourite things is hearing and seeing the terrific progress many of our students are making with their learning. At the end of last semester, we had many students move up a curriculum level. What a fantastic thing to celebrate!

We are really seeing some solid progress with communication and literacy skills across the school as students and teachers engage with our literacy program, working on phonics, word knowledge and decoding. In the very near future, we are expecting our new school PODDs to be delivered for use in every classroom.

This week, we celebrate Speech Pathology Week. This year’s theme is “Communicating for life.” Communication is a basic human right and Speech Pathology Week helps to raise awareness of communication disability and the role of speech pathologists. 

Improving the communication ability of all of our students continues to be a major focus of our school and we could not do this without the support of our Speech Language Pathologists, Claire and Simone. With our Communication Mentor, Cassie, they support our drive towards improving our practice and making a difference in the lives of our students by improving their communication skills.

We warmly welcomed Kate Cloete, our new Head of Department -Curriculum on Monday. Kate has joined our team having worked most recently at Nambour Special School. Kate met with our previous HOD-C Shellie, for a great handover day yesterday. Kate is excited by the teaching and learning happening here at our school – see her introduction later in this newsletter. 

This week from Wednesday to Friday, we have four staff members attending a major conference in Brisbane. The QASEL conference is an annual Special Education conference for Special Education Leaders. Our 4 Sector Leaders will be attending this year for the first time and we are excited to hear all about the great professional development they experience over these very full 3 days.

I am away on personal leave, for the next 5 days from Wednesday and will return to school on Wednesday next week. Phil Whatt, our Deputy Principal will be Acting Principal while I am away. 

As you would be aware from my correspondence over the past week, one of our Year 12 students Tom, sadly passed away last week. We thank you for your support during this difficult time and send our thoughts and well wishes to Tom’s family and friends.  

Lastly, just a reminder that on Friday 1^st of September, Gympie Special School is closed for the state wide Student Free Day.

Warm regards,

Sarah

I cannot believe we are now a third of the way through the term 3.

It was an honour to host my first book week parade at Gympie Special School and amazing to see the engagement and smiles all round. Our students and staff shone by dressing up as their favourite characters and sharing these with our parents, carers, staff and peers. I would like to thank you all for participating in book week and making it such a special and memorable occasion for our students. I would like to extend that thank you and highlight our amazing Library legends Jasmin and Janet.

Last Friday, our school lit up in orange to support the ‘National Day of Action Against Bullying and Violence. Our school has a zero-tolerance attitude towards bullying and violence and it was a great opportunity to share in the excellent social interactions our students have throughout the school day.

Coming up, we have Teacher-Aide Day on 31st August. This is the day we celebrate our wonderful teacher-aides and everything they do to support our students, teachers and school community. If you have any special messages for our Teacher-Aides, I invite you to send them in on this day whether it be a message in the communication book, a card or a personal message to communicate.

Looking towards next term, Gympie Special School will be hosting its inaugural Colour Fun Run as a major fundraiser for the year. This is an opportunity for our students to participate in an event that all children engage in throughout the school year. Keep an eye out for more information on this coming home with your child/ren.

Finally, we are still looking for a parent or community member to join us in our Positive Behaviour and Learning Committee at the school to ensure a parent or community voice in our processes and decision making. If this is something you may be interested in, please email at pwhat0@eq.edu.au.

Kind regards,

Phil Whatt

Deputy Principal

I am so excited to have joined Gympie Special School as the new Head of Curriculum.  I am looking forward to becoming a part of this vibrant community and getting to meet each one of you. I plan to collaborate closely to ensure the best outcomes for your children.  Shellie has done an incredible job at supporting staff, students and families and I am very fortunate to be working closely with her during this time.  My door is always open and please pop in to say hello if you are on site. Thank you for welcoming me into this wonderful school community. 

Thanks,

Kate Cloete

Early Years 1 have had a fun couple of weeks! We decorated our door in the theme of Spot the Dog which are favourite story books in our classroom. Our door is named ‘Where are Spot’s Friends’? Each students photo is hiding behind something on our story door. The students had fun painting the door decorations and pasting their faces behind each door/curtain etc. After it was completed, they enjoyed looking for themselves and finding their friends. We also enjoyed dressing up for Book Week and taking part in the parade. Harry won best dressed from Early Years and was dressed as Pig the Pug. Mason also dressed as Pig the Pug, Evie a fairy, Jack as Spider Man and Ollie as Gekko out of PJ Masks. Miss Kelsey was Green Eggs and Ham and Miss Cassie was Sad from Upside Down. The students also enjoyed exploring Book Fair, although initially they weren’t so interested in the books but more the props and library displays. They particularly enjoyed the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party display and all decided to have a tea party.

We also enjoyed the visit from the Rural Fire Brigade. The students each had a turn to use the hose. The firemen also put on the sirens for the students. They all covered their ears as it was very loud but they thought it was funny.

Early Years 1 Staff,

Cassie, Kelsey and Leanne

Over the last month we’ve been enjoying our music sessions using instruments, learning to listen to the beat and keep time. We’ve also used the parachute and continued doing movement to music. Learning about the forces push and pull in our science lessons has been fun too. We’ve used a scooter board, the little cars and lots of toys to push and pull.  

These children have received awards since the last newsletter. Ayden for recognising and saying the letters of his own name. Isaiah for responding to requests more consistently. Indiana for sitting and interacting with the group during learning sessions for longer periods.

Ayden also received a gold Ardy certificate this week for getting 75 marks on his Ardy tracker. Well- done to these children.

We had a fun time during Book Week. The library looked amazing and the dress-up day was enjoyed by all. We also enjoyed going around looking at the decorated doors.

Lynne, Kate, Ayden, Isaiah, Jade, Dominic and Indiana.

EY3 enjoyed making play doh as a cross curricular activity. Isaac read the ingredients and instructions and everyone followed the instructions which included counting and directional language. Communication about what we were doing, smelling and our thoughts and feelings flowed between students and adults it was great to see and hear. Next, we used push and pull, our science skills, to kneed and mix the play doh. If the amount of flour and play doh on the students’ clothes equals how much fun they had then making play doh was a huge success. 

We also used play activities to learn about push and pull in science this week. The students loved pushing the skittles over by pushing the ball with their hands and feet. Next, we played with toys and explained if we were pushing or pulling them to make them work.

We visited the library at the beginning of the week and have enjoyed reading the book we chose during reading time. Kruze liked talking about continents and water on his Proloquo2Go when reading the river book.

Gosh, we are over the halfway mark for Term 3 and are ever so busy learning, creating, writing and socialising.

During Numeracy, the students are familiarising themselves with positional language like; under, behind, near, above and manipulating numbers daily during a variety of practical and formal activities and listening to number songs.

These last few weeks we completed work on Imaginary and Informative text, learning more about fish, chickens and how wheat is milled. We even made biscuits with the milled flour.

In Science we are learning about different forces. We have looked at different ways people and animals move, then investigated ‘push and pull’ forces, playing with different toys, making them move by either pushing or pulling it.

GSS students all had fun dressing up for Book Week. P2 walked around the school to look at all the beautiful decorated doors, and a shout out to Miss Bree for decorating our door with The Lorax as our theme. We also had a visit from a local Rural fire brigade and the kids enjoyed holding the thick fire hose pipe.

Last Monday we had a farewell party for Miss Debbie in class. The students all gave her a big hug to say thank you for all she has done for them during the 1^st Semester.

Only 4 more weeks of school for Term 3…we have to hurry to get all of our learning done. Wish us luck parents!!

P3 have been working hard since coming back from holidays. We have all settled into our new room and routines really well and are enjoying class.

We love reading our books of the week, which have all been about animals. One week we read a narrative book, the next week, we read an information book about the animal. It’s been great to see our students being willing to read the books to the class.

In Maths we have been looking at numbers to 20 and directions. We love learning about our number of the day and playing our maths games. Go fish is fun! Especially when you are matching numbers!

Book week was so much fun. It was great seeing everyone dress up. Cody tied the primary dress up voucher with Jaspar from P2.

Over the past fortnight, primary 5 has really enjoyed looking at Rosie’s walk and Chickens in the back yard. It turns out that everyone has their own chickens in their backyard. We looked at the lifecycle of a chicken, looked at egg production and cooked choc chips cookies. In Rosie’s walk, she walks past a mill. We even ground our own oat flour using a hand mill.

Wow, what a busy term. In English, students have been working in pairs to identify imaginative and informative texts using ALD boards. We are also learning the structural features of the different texts. The learners also continue to use laptops for a range of writing purposes. They have become competent at sending emails during this time, as well as independent writing.

Book week went off with a bang with the addition of a visit by a fire truck. Most students tried their hand at using the fire hose, it was lots of fun. On Friday 18^th, we wore orange to support Bullying. No Way! and the National Day of Action against Bullying and Violence. We also made orange wrist bands that said, “Bullying, No Way!” During class, we discussed how we can help each other if we feel bullied and how to say no and walk away when someone is not being kind.

Declan is our first Gold Award recipient with other students creeping up close behind. Mason has achieved his Silver Award. Congrats to you both! All the students are counting how many boxes left to achieve Gold. (This seems to be every morning)

We have a change in our room. Kerri has swapped classrooms with Darren. We also have Amie who pops in to help our learners throughout the week. Mason is pretty chuffed with Darren’s guitar and enjoys a song or two during free time.

The term is going way too fast,

Tyson, Hayley, Evie, Declan, Shyanne, Ryan, Mason, Andrea, Darren, Amie and Deb.

S2 had a fantastic time during book week. We would like to thank Miss Anne-Maree for organising the Rural Fire Brigade to come to school. The siren was very loud and the hose was difficult to control. We now have a much greater appreciation for our fire fighters.

Also thank you to the students that voted for our door display “Walter the Farting Dog”. We won 2^nd prize and used the money to buy each student a shark with a rubber and a sharpener from the book fair.

Our sentence building skills are improving as each week we use the laptops to type sentences using the words from our ‘sound of the week’ list. We are becoming more computer literate and require little to no assistance to complete our laptop tasks. To make our maths number activities more exciting, we are using 100 number fidget popper squares. We are counting forwards from a set point, backwards from a set point as well as skip counting; all while using our new squares. They have been very motivating and make our maths lessons fun.

It was great to see Mr Tom again when Miss Cann was away at a PD. Mr Tom took us out into the playground to demonstrate concepts to us. We positioned ourselves under things, over things, in things, beside things and on things. Thank you, Mr Tom, it was good seeing you again.

We continue to explore circuits in science. We have been exploring things that are conductors or insulators. Humans are conductors and we can make a special circuit ball light up and buzz when we touch the terminals with our thumb and forefinger. Jacob went exploring the school ground with our potato clock to test for conductors and insulators in the garden area. He found that silver beet leaves are conductors but soil is not.

Over the last few weeks, we have celebrated Book Week, a fire truck visit and have been making electrical circuits in Science. We all had a fun time being creative to celebrate Book Week. S3 presented a door based on the theme “Hats Off to Reading Books… about Zones of Regulation.” We painted the background in the different zone colours and represented different emotions found in the Mr Men books, such as Mr Happy (Peter) and Miss Curious (Gorgia). Angelina produced a wonderful likeness of The Cat in the Hat, too! S4 made some great individualised hats to go with drawings of each student and attached them to their bag rack, with some of the interesting books they have read this term. Tommy made a Naval hat, Henry’s had the letter H on it and Tahlia’s showed how talented she is with design.

We were also lucky enough to experience what it is like to be a Rural Fire Fighter. Some of us wondered why the fire truck was yellow and not red?! We were able to hold the huge hose and point the nozzle, streaming water into the air. We listened to the high-pitched siren and sat in the driver’s seat, pretending to drive the truck to a fire. Most of us could independently use the steps up and into the cab and confidently back down again.

In science we have been experimenting with electrical circuits, using batteries as the power source, wires and loads. We have attached bulbs, fans, magnets and sirens to see them light up, move or make sounds.  It has been challenging and great fun to follow the instructions on how to complete increasingly more involved circuits to see if they work.  

We are doing lots of movement during our play breaks and looking forward to the Colour Fun Run, which will take place on Friday, 10^th November.

Warm regards,

Savannah, Tahlia, Angelina, Tommy, Zane, Ray, Jed, Peter, Henry, Braydan, Marcus, Gorgia, Tegan, Libby, Kerri, Jas, Amie, Kelly and Darren.

Throughout this semester, our Senior Students have been actively delving into various avenues of employment. Recently, we had the privilege of engaging with Carers Queensland to explore the ways in which they can provide support to both students, families and carers at Gympie Special School. Carers Queensland has partnered with the National Disability Insurance Scheme to implement community programs centred the NDIS journey including employment goals. In the near future, we will be organising a workshop specifically designed for families, aimed at delving into the realm of employment possibilities. This workshop will not only shed light on what employment can entail, but also provide valuable insights into the available support systems that can aid students in their journey towards readiness and success in finding employment. Additionally, we will be discussing future employment goals and aspirations. Rest assured, we will keep families informed about the dates and availability of this workshop.

In addition, we had Lenny from APM employment services come in and give our seniors and their parents/carers a talk about post school options. Lenny provided a lot of very useful information on how having an employment consultant can help gain employment for the future. Lenny would love to connect with families of year 11 and 12 students to get the process started. We all thoroughly enjoyed his visit and look forward to working with APM. 

In the realm of hospitality, our students are eagerly preparing to showcase their skills in crafting exquisite iced coffees for staff. Throughout this term, we have dedicated our attention to exploring the origins of various coffee beans, emphasising the importance of work health and safety, and honing our expertise in proper food handling practices. As we progress in the coming weeks, we are excited to offer our meticulously crafted beverages to staff members, allowing them to indulge in the delightful flavours we have perfected. Alongside this, we will be conducting taste tests to gather valuable feedback and further enhance our creations.

The students have been participating in sport in the community. From week 4 to 10 students are attending Aerial Dreaming in Gympie and learning a range of aerial acrobatics. The students are having a fantastic time learning on the silks, the aerial Hoop and the bar. They have achieved all tasks each week and have showed excellent skill. We are looking forward to watching them complete a full set of exercises by week 10!! We have been very fortunate to be able to access this amazing centre. 

Embarking on a fun excursion, both students and staff ventured to Maroochydore to witness the captivating play, 'Twits'. This enthralling storyline was brimming with mischievous antics and hilariously wicked pranks. As an adored classic by Roald Dahl, the play served as a gentle reminder to treat others with utmost love and care. Seeing the smiles on students faces was brilliant.

Students have been enjoying designing and building a different item each week that they can interact with.  Each item thus far uses a form of propulsion. We’ve used: air blown by mouth (straw-launched planes), compressed air (Stomp Rockets), elasticity (rubber band cars and catapults), lift caused by air pressure imbalances (Flying propellors), and mechanical advantage (trebuchets).

The students are shown how to make one of the toys/items and encouraged to deviate from the original design to see if they can improve it or make it unique somehow.  We’ve all had a lot of fun and it’s great to see students engaging with experiential learning through trying our some of their own ideas.  Moving forward students will be encouraged to design and build their own items or toys from scratch.

Andrew Stokes – Technology and Design technology Specialist.

Our communication team ran the twilight professional development session for all staff in week four and it was a huge success! The team took everyone through our school’s communication policy and procedure documents, so all staff understand their roles and responsibilities working at Gympie Special School. The session continued with a hands-on, practical activities. Staff used a variety of augmentative alternate communication (AAC) systems within different activities to demonstrate how to implement it into their classroom teaching and learning. Celebrity Heads was a hit! The feedback from staff was extremely positive. Many staff said it was one of the best professional developments they had attended. It was very practical, hands-on and they could see how to implement it into the classroom.

Speaking of which, our ‘Core Word of the Week’ is one way staff can model AAC in the classroom and we invite parents to do the same at home. The ‘Core Word of the Week’ for weeks 6-10 is below.  Parents and carers, you can use the core word when reading to your child, during dinner time chats or when playing with them.

Thanks from the Communication Team

PBL NEWS Week 6 Term 3

Last week on Tuesday, our teachers engaged in a PBL Professional development session based around priorities learned from the Effective Behaviour Survey. As a school we have identified and will focus to improve in the following areas: 

1 – Data-based decision making, 

2 – Clear behaviour definitions, and 

3 – Professional development and communication.

Our PD presented by Phil, focused on each of these areas to set SMART goals to target specific behaviour areas, sharing and developing new behaviour definitions and Providing focused PD to whole school staff. Teachers explored function of behaviour and ABC reporting focuses to assist with future data collection. 

This week our teacher Aides will be engaging in the same Professional Development.

Yours in PBL,

Phil

On the 27^th and 28^th of July Gympie Special School took 14 students to compete at the District Athletics Carnival. Mason and Ryan competed in the 10-12 years boys multi class events, Hayley competed in the 13-15 years girls multi class events, Charlie, Zane, Tyson and Thomas competed in the 13-15 years boys multi class events, Savannah, Jasmine, Aliera and Maddie competed in the 16-19 years girls multi class events and Geoffrey, Curtis and Deegan competed in the 16-19 years boys multi class events. All students tried their very best with some very pleasing results. Special Congratulations to our Age Champions; Ryan, Zane, Hayley, Geoffrey and Jasmine. From this carnival 4 students were selected to represent Gympie District at the Wide Bay Athletics Carnival to be held in Bundaberg from Monday 28^th of August to Wednesday the 30^th of August. Good luck to Ryan, Aliera, Zane and Charlie.

As I’ve talked about previously, much of my activity this term has focused on helping the school support the RSPCA. Last week we saw our efforts start to come to fruition. Vanessa Richardson (Manager, RSPCA Gympie Shelter), Jess Elson (Puppy Foster Carer), and her mum Elaine visited the Senior Secondary classes. Even more exciting, though, was that Jess brought along Kyle, her 2-month-old foster puppy. The staff and the kids all loved interacting with Kyle, and learning about the important work done by the RSPCA and their volunteers. Before they left, we gifted Vanessa, Jess, and Elaine with a hamper made up of the many things that were donated by the school community. The ladies greatly appreciated our generosity and assured us that the items would go to good use.

My role is to support the wellbeing of staff, students, parents, and others in our school community. If you ever need to have a chat or help with something, please contact me. I’m at school on Tuesday (8.30-11.35) and Thursday (9.30-2.35), and can also be contacted via email – rsdri0@eq.edu.au.