Barkly Highway State School - Term 3 Week 6
Principal's Welcome
What a fortnight we have all experienced! Along with the focused learning in each classroom, the 2024 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXXIII Olympiad, Paris 2024, the international multi-sport event and our local Mount Isa Rodeo Week were the motivation for so many of our additional activities.
It was truly a wonderful sight to see the whole school rotating through games on our Green and Gold Day, a culmination of the lunchtime sports which students from identified age groups were able to self-nominate. Thank you to our Head of Department: Curriculum Year 3-6, Cameron Alley, for his co-ordination of these events and every teacher who ran or assisted in any way to provide these events for our students. Certificates to the 5 students who won a prize for an Olympic Value on this week’s parade will be presented with their certificate on our next weekly parade, Monday Week 7.
Did you see the foyer display over the last few weeks or our walking float in the Isa Street Parade? With the theme “100 years of Mount Isa Mines” our school foyer was transformed into a mining site and the Wednesday evening our walking Mine Rescue themed float won second prize. We love giving our students the opportunity to participate and become participants in these community events. This is only possible because our staff are amazing!
Last week, I attended the culminating evening for the Spinifex State College’s Year 6 Gifted and Talented Program. During the evening, the supervising teacher of each area - Creative Writing, Science, Health and Physical Education and Gastronomy gave a summary of each 10-week program and then students received their certificates. Congratulations to all of our students who participated this year and thank you to Spinifex State College for continuing to provide the opportunity for our students.
Kind regards,
Fiona Kropp
K-2 Deputy Principal News
AAP shines at Barkly Highway
Here at Barkly Highway State School, we pride ourselves on the exciting and engaging learning environments and activities our teachers provide to their students through the use of Age-Appropriate Pedagogies (AAP). Our teachers take the time to get to know each of their students, what interests them and how they learn and then use this information to plan and provide learning activities, environments and experiences that cater to each individual student in their class. This week, we again hosted visiting teachers, this time from Doomadgee, who came and spent time in our classrooms learning from our amazing teachers. I once again thank our teachers for being so open in sharing their knowledge with our visitors and acknowledge all of the time and effort they put into their work. We are so lucky here at Barkly Highway!
Pre-Prep Playgroup
Pre-Prep Playgroup continues to be a huge success each week. It’s on every Wednesday afternoon from 1:30-2:30 and it is a great opportunity for our teachers and staff to get to know our future prep students and their families. We have some regular attenders who are becoming so confident in a new and unfamiliar environment and it is truly setting them up for a successful start to Prep in 2025. If you have a Kindy aged child, please bring them along to a playgroup session this term. It’s a lot of fun!
Mrs Roberts Report
What is Moderation?
A whole school approach to moderation processes involves teachers in a series of activities including professional conversations and sharing expectations about student learning and achievement. This process supports teachers to
- align curriculum, pedagogy, assessment and reporting;
- Ensure accuracy of reporting;
- Ensure consistency of teacher judgements
The Moderation processes ideally occur:
- before assessment takes place at the planning stage, and at appropriate times throughout teaching and learning (involves Head of Department:Curriculum and classroom teachers)
- after assessment takes place, but before it is graded (with cohort)
- after assessment is graded (with other Primary school teachers, teaching the same year level)
- at the end of the reporting period using assessment folios (with cohort)
Australian Red Cross – Pillowcase Workshop
On Monday our Years 3 and 4 students participated in a one hour free workshop, delivered by Australian Red Cross volunteers. The workshop encourages children to be active participants in their own emergency preparedness and involved engaging discussions and interactive activities to help students:
- Understand and discuss the importance of being prepared
- Prepare their mind for the thoughts and feelings that may arise before, during and after an emergency
- know what to pack in an emergency kit
Each student is then given a pillowcase to decorate and take home, to start their own personal emergency kit.
Pillowcase was originally inspired by events during Hurricane Katrina in the US. While evacuating campus, students of a local University used pillowcases to carry their cherished and basic possessions. After hearing this, American Red Cross staff developed the concept of using a pillowcase as an emergency kit. The program quickly grew into a global preparedness education program that has since become known as Pillowcase.
Library News
Book Club Issue #6 have been handed out and orders will be due this Friday, 16 August by 2:30. As usual options are to pay online via LOOP or orders can be returned to office.
Book Week & Book Week Parade
What is Book Week?
Each year, schools and public libraries across Australia spend a week celebrating books and in particular Australian authors and illustrators. Classroom teachers, teacher librarians and public librarians develop activities, offer competitions and tell stories relating to a theme to highlight the importance of reading. This year’s theme is “Reading is Magic”.
Book Week Parade
On Friday 23 August 2024, students have the opportunity to come to school dressed as their favourite book character. All staff and students will gather in the Undercover Area at 8:30 for our Book Week parade. The best dressed student from each class will win a prize. Over the years students made and displayed wonderful and resourceful costumes of an amazing variety of Book Characters. We can’t wait to see all of the fantastic costumes and the students of Barkly Highway State School transform into their favourite book characters.
As always, please don’t hesitate to contact us with any queries you may have.
Kind regards,
Svenja Spitzner-Lewis
Events & Flyers
Want to know what's happening within the school? Check out our School Calendar to keep up to date.
https://barklyhighwayss.schoolzineplus.com/calendar/1
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