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Dear Parents and Carers,
With only 4 weeks left of term, things are speeding up as we head towards the Summer Holidays, and what a busy 4 weeks they will be!
Please keep an eye on Facebook posts and communication books as we approach the end of this year to make sure you are informed and up to date with all events.
Awards Presentation Ceremony Thursday 16th November – please be seated by 9.15am.
This Thursday, we will be holding our Annual Awards ceremony at 9.15am in our Performing Arts Room. We look forward to your company. Please be seated by 9.15am for a prompt start. Remember, Parking is sometimes difficult and you may need to come a little earlier to find parking.
Year 12 Graduation News
We are very excited to spend time with our Year 12 students this week as they prepare for their graduation. The Gympie Special School formal graduation dinner is Thursday night at the Gympie Senior Citizens Hall and this is a very special celebration for our students, families and staff.
If we have good weather students will be going to the Memorial Park for photographs before moving across to the Senior Citizens Hall. The students and staff have been working hard on organising the night and making decorations and ensuring the night will be a memorable success.
On Friday 17th November at 9am we will be holding a short Graduation Ceremony for our Year 12s and their families, followed by cutting the Graduation cake. We will then farewell our Year 12s as they leave us for the last time. This is always a bittersweet moment as we wish our Year 12s, who have been such a huge part of our school life, all the best for the future.
PBL Rewards Day Thursday 30th November - Inflatable Play Day!
In week 9, on Thursday 30th November, we are having our Whole School PBL Rewards Day! This is very exciting and the PBL team planned a great day of celebration to reward our students for their terrific behaviour. We have having an inflatable theme to celebrate the wonderful behaviour our students have demonstrated this year.
Report Cards Semester 2, 2022
Report cards will be emailed home at the end of the Term. With the report cards, we are aiming to be able to inform families of their child’s 2024 Class Teacher and Teacher Aide.
2024 BOOKLISTS/ Stationary Lists
Each student will be provided with a 2024 Booklist/ Stationary List (similar to those at other schools) at the end of this term, for families to purchase the necessary resources. This year, we have partnered with Nextra at Gympie Central Shopping Centre. You can drop your list into them and they will prepare your child’s stationary list for you.
The school office will be open from Monday 15th January 2024 for families to drop their student’s stationary box off prior to the start of school. Thank you for your cooperation in ensuring all items are purchased, named and ready for the first day of school. Have fun covering and decorating your child’s equipment and books – don’t forget to NAME everything.
Medication
At the end of each year, all medication and medical equipment is sent home. If your child takes medication during the school day, it must be collected from the school office on your child’s last day of attendance.
For 2024, please ensure your child’s medication is in a clearly labelled pharmacy box with correct dosage, time of administration and is in date. The office will be open from 8.30am to 2.30pm from Monday 15th January 2024 for you to drop off medication and sign forms.
2024 Health Plans
For any students on a Health Plan, Lisa our school nurse will be available next term to meet to discuss your child’s plan. If you are attending any medical appointments during the holiday period, could you please organise the following for your child?
- New midazolam orders (required yearly)
- Updated Asthma Plan (required yearly)
- Updated Anaphylaxis plan (required yearly)
- Dietician letter if your child requires Gastronomy tube feeds (required yearly)
- Copies of any current health management reports or summaries that may assist in the management of your child’s specialised health requirements at school
Keeping the school informed about any changes to the health and management of your child, ensures we can work in partnership with you to better support your child at school, and maximise their safety and attendance.
I look forward to seeing many of you over the next few weeks as you help us celebrate the success of our students!
Moving forward, learning together,
Ms. Sarah
Can you believe we are already into week 7 of term 4!!!
After busy times we are going to get even busier as the year comes into its conclusion. We are happy to share that we have completed all of our P.A.T.H plan meetings for our year 10 students transitioning into senior schooling. These meetings are my favourite throughout the year being able to discuss the personalised dreams, ambitions and goals of our amazing students and putting plans into place to best assist in making them a reality.
Our Inaugural ‘School Colour Fun Run’ was a major success with smiles seen everywhere both on students and staff faces. Our final fundraising figure was $5196.00 which will be much needed funds towards our new school bus in the future. I would like to recognise Baxter Bowers as the schools Gold champion fundraiser, raising $1550.00! Baxter was presented a special gold cape on Colour Fun Run day and photos can be seen on our Facebook page. I would further like to thank all families and staff that fundraised for our school, we are very grateful and look forward to using the funds to improve our student’s educational experiences. Please keep an eye out for your child coming home with their well-deserved prizes in the near future.
Over the next few weeks, we will be getting ready to ensure we build on a fantastic year by continuing to plan strategically to improve and provide the best educational experiences possible for our students.
I hope this newsletter finds you well as we reach the midpoint of the term. It's been a fantastic journey of learning and growth for our students.
From the youngest learners to our senior students, teaching and learning are in full swing, and we're delighted to see our students thrive academically and personally.
Ben from True, delivered an insightful presentation on Respectful Relationships to our Senior students. This important discussion provided our students with valuable insights and tools to navigate relationships, build healthy connections, and promote a culture of respect within our school community. We believe that fostering respect and understanding is crucial in creating a safe and inclusive environment for all.
With just four weeks left until the end of the term, we are excited about the opportunities to consolidate all the knowledge and skills our students have acquired so far. These weeks will provide a chance to review, reinforce, and apply what they've learned. Our teachers will continue to support and guide our students to ensure they finish the term with a strong foundation for future learning.
Well it’s the end of week 6 already! Only four weeks to go until the holidays and our students first year in Prep complete. We have had such a fun time together. The students have all formed good friendships and look after each other which is lovely to see.
EY1 had BLAST at Colour Run! We all got nice and wet in the splash pools and with the super soakers to start. Then we did the colour run several times and got nice and colourful! The students finished off with an icy pole and a movie afterwards as they were all exhausted from all the excitement and running around.
Swimming will re-commence next week and go until week 10. Horse riding will also continue until week 10.
Miss Cassie and Miss Kelsey
On Friday the school had the long-awaited Colour Run. The children had so much fun getting totally wet first in the little pools and from the water pistols and then having the powder squirted at them. The colours ran beautifully on their wet t-shirts. There was much laughing and fun.
We still have the PBL Inflatable Obstacle Course reward’s day to look forward to! Remember to send back the permission form. All the children are working hard towards receiving their Platinum Ardy award in the next few weeks and all definitely deserve the reward’s day.
Work goes on as well as fun and the children have enjoyed the books we’ve been reading about all sorts of animals, giving their opinions about the books and making sentences for Predictable chart writing.
We’ve also had lots of fun comparing heavy and light objects in maths. We particularly like throwing balloons in the air and calling out “light!”
All too quickly the weeks pass. We’re just making the most of the precious time left in 2023.
Lynne, Kate, Ayden, Jade, Isaiah, Dominic and Indiana.
Congratulations to Kruze for earning his platinum Ardy award.
EY3 are enjoying term 4, which combines a mix of learning and fun activities. There is a lot to fit in every week and students are starting to show signs of tiredness and being ready for the holidays! We are enjoying going horse riding and swimming, it is fun to be out in the community twice a week. It is lovely to see safe behaviour and following the rules on the bus and while we are out, the weekly PBL rules have definitely helped us learn how to be safe, respectful and learners.
Hopefully you will have heard all about the colour run that happened on Friday, I am sure there will be photos on face book.
Still be come this term, Student award presentation on Thursday the 16th November, week 7. All family members are welcome to come and watch the students’ successes being celebrated from 9:15am – 10:45am at the school. The inflatable PBL rewards day on Thursday the 30th November, week 9. Please return permission slips for this if you have not already done so, also come along and help your child through the course or cheer from the sidelines.
We are past the halfway mark for Term 4, where has the time gone too?!
Well, P2 is still learning and exploring the wonderful world of Science, Maths and English.
In English we just finished The very noisy Bear as imaginary text and for our informative text we read and looked at different musical instruments and how it is used in orchestras. The students handled and used a few wind and string instruments and Moni even composed a song for us while playing the ukulele. In Maths we are concentrating on number work after we have finished off our unit on capacity. The students enjoyed discovering which materials or objects magnets would attract.
P2 is still enjoying going to the pool for swimming on Fridays and we can see the progress some have made already. Today swimming was replaced by our School Fun Run which all of us enjoyed so much. The students had fun getting wet, wet each other and their teachers. We tried to get rid of most of the paint but we are sure you will discover a bit hiding somewhere. A very successful and fun day we had!!!
The final countdown is on. I can’t believe that we are past the halfway point.
In English we have explored a range of non fiction texts and chose an Australian animal that we encountered at the zoo to create a multimodal presentation. In Maths we had fun splashing around in the water play trough to compare the capacity of different sized containers, and in Science we made a toy car and fishing rod toy that uses magnets to help make it move.
We are all enjoying our swimming on Fridays; and it is great see new water skills and confidence being developed.
Well folks,
We are definitely on the home stretch at Gympie Special School. As we near the end of 2023, I have begun to reflect on the year that we have had.
We entered the classroom as a solid group of students and staff and have transitioned to a cohesive team of learners.
I am very excited to say that we have Declan who is very close to his ‘Platinum Award’ as he continues to demonstrate being a SAFE, RESPECTFUL LEARNER both I and out of the classroom. Hayley, Evie, Tyson and Ryan have all hot their ‘Gold Award’ and are racing toward the finish line.
Mason has thoroughly enjoyed having lunch with friends that he invites to the classroom most days and some even stay for a play afterword.
Science continues to be a favourite subject when the learners build circuits using a range of components. Fans take off, Happy Birthday rings out, and light bulbs light up. Such fun!
Mason helped to create a positional language book in Mathematics and took great delight showing his book to peers and admin staff.
Enjoy the last few weeks of school,
Tyson, Hayley, Evie, Declan, Shyanne, Ryan, Mason, Andrea, Darren, Amie and Deb.
S2 has been enjoying lots of hands-on activities with their Maths and Science programs.
In Maths we have looked at directions and placement concepts. We enjoyed using the Bee Bots to demonstrate directions that we drew from a hat. We also used the cardinal points of North, South, East and West to describe the pathway our Bee Bots were taking.
We continue to do experiments with circuits in Science. We are able to make circuits to produce a variety of sounds and movement. This week it was very frustrating as our batteries are losing strength. This helped us to discover the less components in a circuit, the less power it needs to produce a result.
We are currently finishing off our subject assessments. The students tell me they are “easy peasy lemon squeezy”. I hope this is reflected in our report cards.
We are all looking forward to the colour fun run this week. Everyone is planning on getting very, very colourful.
We are continuing to explore informative texts in English and our students are creating some amazing power points on famous people and places around the world. When reading and responding to these texts, they identify literal meaning, main ideas and supporting detail, describing the connection between images and meaning of accompanying words.
In publishing an informative text with a supporting digital image, the students make conscious choices of language features and vocabulary to add detail, build cohesion and inform the audience. They select and position images to extend reader understanding of the text.
Most students have successfully published several informative digital texts with diverse topics using appropriate titles, headings to organise the information, nouns, proper nouns, pronouns and verbs to link ideas. They used simple and/or compound sentences and connected ideas using conjunctions, topic-specific vocabulary and mostly, accurate spelling and punctuation. These topics included: The Great Barrier Reef, Dame Nellie Melba, The Sydney Opera House, Douglas Mawson, Mary Mackillop, The Eiffel Tower, Elephants and The Sahara, Marie Curie and Coco Chanel. With a range of topics to explore, most students enjoy these combined lessons with their peers.
Warm regards,
S3 and S4 Staff and Students.
The end of the year is almost upon us and we cannot believe how quick the year has flown by!! It is a very busy time in Seniors with camp and graduation. The year 12’s are looking forward to finishing up their schooling experience this week! The highlight of term 4 so far has been on the camp down to the Sunshine Coast Recreation Centre at Currumundi, where the students worked together to complete team building activities. We had so much fun building a raft and seeing if it floated in the ocean. There was a lot of wet participants!!
The Halloween disco was a fun time for all with lots of funny costumes. We had many brave students who stepped out of their comfort zone and challenged themselves on the giant swing. It was great three days spent together growing as a sector and a fabulous way to finish off the year.
The school celebrated AAC Awareness Month on last Thursday the 26th October. The theme was ‘Wear Your Words’ and staff not only ensured they wore their AAC devices but they got very creative with their outfits. Check out the photos! The team hope to make this event bigger and better each year!
The core words for weeks 6-10 are: the, next, about, pick/choose, read.
Thank you,
The Communication Team
Our amazing PBL team have been very busy over the last few weeks. We have continued to review and develop our new school behaviour Matrix as well as complete Regions Tier Fidelity Inventory. Regional PBL Coaches came into our school to survey students, staff and the PBL Committee members to score our schools implementation of PBL. We are very happy to share that we scored over the 80% benchmark for the first time in 3 years and are super excited with how well we can do next year with our action planning in place! I would like to thank Mrs Nicole Shannon for becoming our PBL community member providing a vital link between our positive behaviour and event decisions with a community voice.
We have our PBL rewards day coming up on Thursday 30th November so please return any consent forms before then to ensure whole-school engagement.
Finally, in order to be fair and clear with staff I have sent out an expression of interest to our whole staff to apply for the BL Mentor role at GSS next year. This role will come with specific professional development opportunities in behaviour intervention and strategies as well chairing our amazing PBL Committee. I am sure you will wish all of our applicant’s luck and I look forward to sharing the outcome next Newsletter!
Chappy’s Cost Cutting Tips:
Eating Well on a Tight Budget
One of our biggest living expenses is buying groceries. In fact, the average Australian family of four spends $207 per week on groceries, equalling $897 a month or $10 764 a year. With a bit of planning and savviness, however, this can be reduced.
Stock up on cheap, nutrient-dense food. While processed and junk foods seem cheaper and are more convenient, they are not great long term. In contrast, seasonal vegetables and legumes are low cost but highly nutritious. Coupled with starchy foods (e.g., whole grains) and cheap protein (e.g., eggs), you can make inexpensive, nutritious meals that will leave you feeling fuller for longer, meaning that you will eat less.
Plan your meals so you can make the most of cheap staples, reduce waste, and avoid going shopping each day. Brainstorm breakfasts, lunches, dinners, and snacks that include a variety of good starches (e.g., brown rice, wholemeal pasta, potatoes) and protein (e.g., eggs, beans, lentils, tofu, mince). Sample meals are:
- Breakfast: porridge or overnight oats with yoghurt and fruit; eggs or baked beans on wholemeal toast; wholemeal pancakes served with yoghurt and fruit.
- Lunch: leftovers; soup; sandwiches; wraps; noodles.
- Dinner: frittatas; omelettes; soups; casseroles; stir fries; curries; fritters; fried rice; burritos; baked potatoes with filling.
- Snacks: homemade popcorn; fruit; vegetables and dip; homemade baked goods.
Make weekly plans that use your meal ideas. You can also incorporate leftovers and plan times to make double batches into your plan. Thus, when you don’t have time to cook (or don’t feel like it!), you can avoid forking out money on take away. Then, write out your grocery list. Put asterisks next to optional items that you can put back on the shelf if you go over budget.
Build up and maintain a supply of pantry staples. By having certain foods on hand, you will always be able to prepare a variety of cheap meals. Building up your supply can be done slowly and over time by, for instance, buying a few items each week. While you may have a tighter budget for a few weeks as you stock up, you will save money in the long-run. Basic staples include:
- Rolled oats
- Rice
- Wholemeal flour
- Tinned fish
- Canned tomatoes
- Tinned/dry beans, lentils, chickpeas
- Pasta
- Sugar
- Spices
- Cooking oil
- Vinegar
- Baking powder
- Milk (fresh and/or dried)
- Salt and pepper
- Miso paste
- Butter
- Eggs
- Frozen vegetables
- Nuts and seeds
- Tinned/bottled tomatoes
Eat cheap protein. This could include cheese and other dairy, tinned fish, dried or tinned beans, lentils, tempeh, tofu, chicken wings or drumsticks, sausages, mince, and organ meat. You can save costs by eating less meat, stretching what meat you do eat, and buying economical cuts. For instance, you can mix vegetarian meals with meat meals across the week, or use meat as a condiment rather than the focus of a meal. Casseroles, soups, stews, pastas, bakes, and stir fries, for example, can be loaded up with veges, lentils or beans to make a little bit of meat go a long way. Also, while cheaper cuts of meat can be tougher, cooking them in a slow cooker will bring out their flavour. Further, getting dinner into the slow cooker at the start of a busy day means that you will have a meal ready to go when you are tired and not wanting to cook at night-time.
Freeze and preserve seasonal and cheap food. Several Gympie butchers often have cheap meat, so follow them on Facebook to keep up with their specials and buy bulk lots of cheap meat to freeze. Also, you can make jam with cheap fruit, and freeze seasonal fruit and vegetables to use later in the year. Finally, supermarkets often have marked-down meat, bakery and deli goods, and BBQ chickens that can be frozen for later use.
Buy home-brand and items on sale. A lot of staple items are the same as name-brands except in price. For instance, there’s little difference in quality between different brands of rice or pasta. Thus, you can save a lot of money on items like tinned foods and dried foods that will last for ages if you buy them when they are on sale, especially when they are half price.
Get help if you need it. These Gympie organisations provide assistance in the form of hampers, discounted/free food, and grocery vouchers:
- St Vincent de Paul Society (Vinnies): (07) 5482 7429, https://qld.vinnies.org.au/services/child-and-family/child-family-services?suburbid=?dioceseid=
- Community Action: (07) 5482 1147, https://communityactiongympie.com.au/emergency-relief/
- Gympie Salvation Army (Salvos): (07) 5482 1710, https://www.salvationarmy.org.au/gympie/
- Victory Care Services: (07) 5482 7248, victorychurch.com.au
Happy saving!
Chappy Rachel
[1] https://www.frugalandthriving.com.au/eat-healthy-tight-budget/
[2] https://www.canstarblue.com.au/groceries/average-grocery-bill/