25 May 2022
Newsletter Articles
Welcome to Week 6 of Term 2
Leadership Update
I have been offered the opportunity to be the Acting Principal at Charleville State High School for the remainder of term 3 and after much consideration have decided to accept this position.
I am enjoying the role as Principal and can appreciate the amount of work the great staff at Charleville State High School do to support each other and the dedication they have to facilitate that students have every opportunity to reach quality learning outcomes.
Anna Batstone will take on my position as Deputy Principal for weeks 5 and 6. Anna has done a fantastic job undertaking this role in week 5 and has my full support in terms of capacity and determination to work for the best interests of our school community. For the remainder of the term Anna and Stefanie Andriolo will share the role of Deputy along with fulfilling their respective Head of Department duties. This is a huge undertaking by both ladies, which endorses how wonderful and professional our staff are to ensure minimal changes for our students.
Attendance
It has been truly fantastic to have the students back at school for a full week of school after 4 weeks of long weekends. The majority of students are actively learning and participating in a wide range of learning experiences. Students are at the heart of school operations, adding great energy and purpose to our learning community. We are looking forward to utilising this energy as best we can to achieve quality learning outcomes.
Thanks to a large number of our students who have made an excellent start to the year for their attendance. It is very important that students are at school every day (unless they are unwell). The goal is for students in the school to attend 92% of the time, with a minimum expectation that they are at school 85% of the time.
Students who are consistently absent without a suitable reason will struggle to engage in their school work and will struggle to catch up on work missed. This will impact their ability to achieve satisfactory results which may impact their ability to achieve a QCE.
Remember, every day counts and students should be aiming to attend school every day. This includes the end of term as students in senior will begin their next unit of work prior to the holidays. Missing days in the final week of term will impact their results in the following term.
Bell times
One significant change for the start of 2022 has been the bell times. After extensive consultation last year, the decision was made to move to a two-breaks per day system in 2022. I am very pleased to report that the students have responded well to this adjustment. The first break for students is at 11:25am. Students are appreciating the need for a healthy breakfast to begin each day.
Students are managing their time appropriately during the five minutes after form and almost all are moving to Period 2 independently and on time. As stated last year the intent is to maximise quality learning time in the morning and then provide breaks between Periods 3 and 4 to maintain concentration levels.
Use of Technology at Charleville State High School
Students in years 10, 11 and 12 along with year 9 students in MESH have the opportunity to hire their own laptops to use exclusively for their education. Students and families are reminded that this technology, along with access to the school WIFI is to enhance the education of the student. The majority of students show a commendable amount of integrity and follow all instructions and policies. However, at times they need to be reminded that between the hours of 8:45 and 2:55pm, the technology is for the exclusive use of education. This week during parade students will be reminded of the policies regarding the use of technology at Charleville State High School.
P&C Membership and Meetings
One of the most important and valuable groups in supporting our school is the P&C. We have a dedicated group who work to provide vital aspects such as parental voice, promoting the school and conducting essential support services like the school tuckshop and uniform shop.
Fanfare
On Monday 23 May students from Charleville State High along with Augathella SS, Charleville SS and St Mary’s school travelled to Roma to compete in the biannual Fanfare Festival. Our students received a silver award in the high school division. The students from our feeder schools achieved gold. Well done to all involved including our Teacher Aide, Rose Russell, Rebecca Little from CSS and Strings Teacher Mr Harry Mulhall.
With the current change in the Leadership team we are all working hard to ensure the students remain our priority and learning is occurring in every lesson.
Narelle Webb
Principal
DEPUTY PRINCIPAL SENIOR SCHOOLING
Year 10 Work Experience
Year 10’s should at this stage have confirmed their placement for Work Experience in week 10 (June 20 – June 24). While some students have elected instead to go to Deadly Recruits or to the Shearing Camp, all year 10 students should be involved in one of these transitional activities so that they are starting to think about their life after school.
For students who have not yet found a placement please ensure you are seeing the Industry Liaison Officer urgently to finalise a placement (make appointment at the office).
Work experience is an invaluable opportunity for students to try a profession or job that they may not have had the chance to experience through part-time work and to see what it is like to go to work every day. Hopefully the week will give students some ideas about where they want to be when they finish school and will help motivate them in their final years of formal education.
Year 10 SET Planning
Parents will be contacted to organise a meeting to discuss their year 10 students’ Senior Education and Training Plan. These meetings need to be attended by a parent/carer and the student as well as a staff member of the school and are aimed at putting a plan in place for students to ensure that they are on the right pathway at school (university, vocational education including school-based traineeships, etc).
It is important to note that students do change pathways throughout senior school so the SET Plan does not lock them in. If students begin senior schooling and realise their pathway isn’t working for them, there are opportunities to sit down again and adjust the plan to suit.
Staff look forward to contacting parents and conducting these valuable meetings with students.
Fundraising – Trivia Night
After a break due to COVID the school and P&C are running the Trivia Night on June 4. Get together a team of 8 and send in a nomination form (available at the office or on the school website here). Money raised will be shared between a range of extra-curricular activities including sporting trips, the senior formal and future camps.
The doors will open at 5:30 for a 6pm start. There are 5 question rounds as well as a blockbuster page to complete with some games in-between. There will be food and drink available for purchase but tables will need to bring their own nibbles.
We look forward to seeing you there. And I would like to thank the businesses and groups in Charleville who have generously donated prizes for the evening and for the multi-draw raffle. Without this generous support events like this could not be successful.
Also, if you are available to assist on the night please contact the school office. As you can imagine it is a big night and volunteers are needed to ensure that it runs smoothly.
Cassandra Kohli
Deputy Principal
DEPUTY PRINCIPAL JUNIOR SCHOOLING
WELCOME TO WEEK 6
JUNIOR SCHOOL NEWS
Hello, I’m back in the Deputy chair for weeks 5 and 6 this term. We have had a busy couple of weeks with NAPLAN and our IMPACT writing classes coming to an end. We are heading into the assessment end of the term. It is important for students to be aware of when they have assessment and I encourage you to have a look at the assessment calendar with your student and discuss how they will manage their time during the next few weeks. Assessment time can be stressful for students. To help support the students they have access to homework club every Thursday afternoon. Homework club is a great opportunity for students to receive extra help from their teachers. The students merely need to ask their teacher the day before if they would help them at Homework Club. If the classroom teacher cannot be available then there is always another staff member only too willing to assist.
IMPACT WRITING
Our year 7 and 9 students have completed the 11-week program. Through the program they focused on improving their writing skills by engaging in online lessons with a qualified teacher from the IMPACT centre in Brisbane. Our students have thoroughly enjoyed the course and students believe they have improved their writing skill. This was evident through NAPLAN writing where students were engaged in the test and quoted after the test that IMPACT writing helped them through NAPLAN.
POSITIVE BEHAVIOUR FOR LEARNING (PBL)
Our positive behaviour focus for this week is:
“Be a learner – Actively participate in classroom activities”
Please encourage your student to participate in class at all times. If they need support our teachers are always available at lunch times or at home work club for extra help.
COMMUNITY PARTNERSHIP MEETING
Meeting Notice:
Community Partnership Meeting
Thursday 2nd June 2022 at time to be confirmed at Charleville State High School
We encourage our parents and carers to come along to this meeting to have voice and support the learning of our students.
An agenda will be available shortly and if you have anything to add please let us know.
If you would like any further information please contact the school office on 4656 8888
Enjoy your week,
Anna Batstone
A/Deputy Principal
Literacy Links
There is no doubt that being literate is important, not just in school, but in real life as well. We continue to focus on the importance of reading and reading comprehension in 2022.
Writing sensibly, accurately and with increasing complexity is still a major focus in term 2.
TERM 2 WEEKS 6 & 7
All classroom teachers continue to be engaged in using Directed Reading and Thinking (DRTA) strategies to improve student stamina and comprehension of the written word. They are now moving away from a writing focus on sentences, and moving into using these essential building blocks to focus on the construction of effective paragraphs. This will be occurring across all subjects in order to increase writing skills and stamina.
How can parents support their child’s literacy?
- Liaise with your child’s teachers to find out term 2 topics, assessment requirements, weekly homework;
- Provide a quiet area, away from distractions, for your child to complete reading and writing homework activities;
- Monitor reading/writing homework; encourage your child to give his/her best effort;
- Ensure that your child completes homework, or revision of class notes, every day of the week;
- Read with and to your child (listening to them read out loud is fantastic);
- Talk about what your child is reading (What is happening? When is it happening? Where is it happening? Who is involved? How do you feel about the events or people involved? Why is the reading important?)
- Support your child to complete homework neatly, accurately and using complete sentences to create interesting and effective paragraphs.
Creating literate children is a team effort; be part of the Charleville team.
ResQ Program
Over the past term, a group indigenous of students have been attending ResQ each Friday to take part in a program to make didgeridoos. Under the supervision of Graham, John and Nick the boys travelled out of town to identify and collect the right timber for their instruments, learning how to identify the correct trunks and limbs by examining the ground and how much activity there has been from white ants.
After bringing them back the real work began, stripping back the bark and excess wood, then sanding them back to the point that they were ready to paint. When choosing how to decorate their didge students used vibrant colours and patterns using their own personal totems. The final step was to add the bees wax to form a mouth piece.
All students who took part walked away with a valuable example of what they can achieve when they are able to work towards a goal. Thanks to Graham, John and Nick from ResQ and we look forward to starting a new group of students next Friday.
Didgeridoo Making
Young Endeavour
Applications now open for youth development voyages scheduled from July-December 2022.
This Youth development program builds self-awareness, develops leadership and communication skills and fosters a sense of community responsibility. This program is delivered by the Royal Australian Navy.
Apply now for the best chance of being selected for a voyage.
CLEANER – CASUAL
If you are interested in casual cleaning at Charleville SHS please contact Jillian Bussell on 4656 8888. You must have a current Suitability Card from Working with Children (Queensland’s Blue Card system).
We have casual hours that will be available in 2022 with possibility of permanent hours in 2023.
KEY DUTIES: Contribute to the efficient and effective operation and environment of the school by providing a high level of cleaning support.
Forgotten Warrior
