NAIDOC Week- we will acknowledge NAIDOC Week between 9-13 August

Facility Upgrades- over the holidays we had a number of works completed in our school.

Sporting Equipment at School- we have school equipment for students to use at breaks-please don’t send personal sporting equipment.

Extra-Curricular Offerings- a range of lunch time activities are taking place

Attendance- Every day counts! Students need to be at school everyday unless they are sick or there is a significant reason.

School Opinion Survey- don’t forget to complete your survey by 30 July.

2022 Enrolment- information about 2022 enrolments.

Parent and Community Code of Conduct

We will be adopting the Parent Code of Conduct as set out by the Department of Education. The Parent and Community Code of Conduct (the Code) aims to support schools to clearly communicate the conduct expected of parents, carers and visitors while they’re on state school grounds, at school activities, and interacting with others in the school community.

Please refer to the link below.

NAIDOC Community Meeting – Tuesday 8am 3 August 2021

This year’s NAIDOC Week theme, ‘Heal Country!’, is rich with opportunities for us to explore a multitude of topics, perspectives and experiences with students of all ages. This year, students will participate in activities across the week of 9-13 August. We invite parents from our school community who would like to assist with the planning of NAIDOC celebrations, to attend a meeting in the Administration Building on Tuesday 3  August 2021 at 8am.

Facilities

We are happy to report that a number of facility enhancements have recently been completed in our school.

• External painting of C Block (Year 2).
• Installation of wooden fencing to surrounding properties in the junior playground- working to keep our school grounds secured.
• Installation of solar panels (B Block and hall) 270 panels- 99.99kw system. Panels now in place, final connections and testing to occur.
• All rooms/buildings throughout the school are now air-conditioned!

Sporting Equipment at School

For all of our oval play spaces we have purchased school balls and equipment for students to use in their lunchbreaks. To support the management of play during breaks, we ask that students DO NOT bring their own sporting equipment to school. Each oval will have a bag of equipment (footballs, soccer balls, bounce balls) for students to use. This not only provides more access to students but will also reduce disagreements around game participation and if an item is lost or damaged.

Extra Curricular Offerings

• Years 2-6 choirs will be starting this term. Permission notes have been sent home.
• Dance Teams for Years 4-6 commenced in Term 2.
• Tech Team- sessions in the library during lunch breaks.
• Gardening Club for Years 2-6 during lunch breaks. See Mrs Arora to participate.

Attendance

At Wondall Heights State School we know students need to attend school regularly in order to participate fully and gain maximum benefit from schooling. Regular attendance enables children to access a full education and assists them to reach their full potential. School staff set an example for students by encouraging attendance and punctuality. Our current attendance data can be seen in the table, below.

High levels of full day or partial absenteeism can add up to substantial amounts of missed learning time per year for our students, please see table below.

School staff are here to support families in ensuring students are at school and engaged in learning. Please contact your child’s classroom teacher if you are experiencing difficulty in getting your child to school.  Alternatively, your child’s classroom teacher will be in contact to discuss ways in which we can support and encourage your child to attend.

School Opinion Survey

The annual suite of School Opinion Surveys will be conducted in Term 3 and will close on 30 July 2021. All families, school staff and students in targeted year levels (5 & 6) will be invited to participate. We encourage you to take this opportunity to have your say about what our school does well, and how we can continue to improve.

An invitation to complete the Parent/Caregiver Survey will be emailed to one parent/caregiver per family in the week beginning 5 July.  The invitation will be sent from the Department of Education, not the school, and it will have the subject line School Opinion Survey for parents and caregivers, 2021.  Check your junk email folders if you can’t find it.  The survey can be completed as soon as the invitation is received and will take approximately 5 minutes using a computer, tablet or smart phone. 

Parents/caregivers who do not have access to the internet at home are welcome to complete their survey online at the school. School computers/tablets will be available.

Prep 2022

Notice of Intention to Attend Wondall Heights State School in 2022

We are currently looking at Wondall Heights State School’s planning needs for the 2022 school year. Part of this planning is considering the number of students we will have enrolled in the school. If your child is of Prep age for the 2022 school year and you are considering enrolling your child at Wondall Heights State School, can you please let us know by contacting our school office. This expression of interest is not binding, school catchment area and enrolment requirements still apply. Expressions of interest to enrol at Wondall assist us with forward planning to make 2022 as successful as possible for all our students.  

Enrolment Process

In catchment students can currently enrol at the office during office opening hours.

Out-of-catchment students can join the waiting list, please contact the office.

Prep Enrolment Sessions will consist of a group interview where parents will be presented with information and asked to fill in questionnaires whilst their children interact with our teachers, in a group setting. The new format is designed to create a sense of community and for children and families to meet and establish connections in preparation for 2022. This format will also allow our staff to spend more time getting to know your children and to observe their interactions with other children. More information about this process will be provided to families next term when booking an interview.

Please share this information with family and friends living in the catchment area!

Year 6 Camp

Our Year 6 students have gone to Tallebudgera camp for the week to participate in “A Hero’s Journey”. We would like to thank our valuable teaching staff who have given up their family time this week to support our students at camp. The photos coming through show that they are not missing us much!

This semester we have introduced a new initiative in our school. We have developed a flow chart of universal processes for corrective actions. All teachers will be following the clearly defined steps to encourage students to apply self-corrective strategies. Each classroom has a dedicated calming space which is available to all students who may require time to refocus or reset themselves to be ready for learning. Students have been explicitly taught the processes around the corrective actions and calming spaces and some have already benefitted from the availability of these processes.

 In the next fortnight, our behaviour focus will be ‘Expectations V Rules’. We will be discussing the difference between our Wondall expectations; ‘Wondall Learners are Safe, Respectful and Responsible’ and our Wondall rules; e.g ‘Wondall Learners RESPECT others and their belongings by keeping hands and feet to self.’ On our PBL journey, it is important that our students know and value the difference between our overall behavioural expectations and the everyday rules we should all follow to ensure Wondall Learners are Safe, Respestful and Responsible at all times.

There are only a few more weeks left for the Premier’s Reading Challenge, and record sheets have started coming in. Thirteen of our avid readers have already completed the challenge!

Completed record sheets with student’s full name and class on them need to be dropped into the Office by Friday 27 August.

For a student to successfully complete the Premier's Reading Challenge they are required to read or experience the number of books indicated below:

• Prep to Year 2—read or experience 20 books.
• Years 3 to 4—read 20 books.
• Years 5 to 9—read 15 books.