Dr Carmel McGrath

Autism Friendly School

Our 4 strategic pillars are:

INCLUSION, CURRICULUM, INNOVATION and WELL-BEING. 

As part of our school’s Strategic Plan Inclusion Pillar we are embracing the opportunity to become an Autism Friendly School. This is an initiative of the Metropolitan Region. This week our Inclusion Coach, Judy Loudon and I attended the second regional day of this initiative. This focussed on responding to student’s needs in self-regulation, a proactive approach to planning for safety and wellbeing, using data to inform a targeted approach to building staff capability, and highly effective individualised planning tools.

Friday 6 March was Wear Blue for Autism Day. The Community and Charity Student Committee organised the day with many staff and students taking the opportunity to wear blue for the day. We raised $499.45 for the AEIOU Foundation. Further information regarding autism friendly approaches can be found at the Autism Hub www.ahrc.eq.edu.au .  We are very proud of our work in ‘ensuring that students benefit academically and socially from high quality inclusive education.’

Effective hand hygiene is vital

As the coronavirus (COVID-19) continues to evolve, it is important to remember that effective hand and sneeze/cough hygiene is the best defence against viruses and can help prevent the spread of illness.

Lead by example and encourage your children to:

• wash their hands regularly with soap and water, before and after eating, and after going to the toilet
• use alcohol-based hand sanitiser if soap is not available
• cover coughs and sneezes with a tissue or the inside of their elbow
• dispose of tissues in the bin immediately
• if they’re unwell, stay at home and avoid contact with others such as touching, kissing or hugging.

Check out the 20 second routine video for effective handwashing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NpmB80pWUsk&feature=youtu.be

Traffic Around Our School

Arriving: Thank you for your cooperation in the morning drop offs.  Just a reminder that drivers should remain in the car and students should get out of the car by themselves and then go straight into the school.  Staff are on duty to monitor and assist in the transition process. 

Leaving: While for the most part, the pick up area is working quite well, there is certainly still room for improvement.  Students should enter the car from the curbside only as entering from the driver’s side has caused a great deal of concern for student safety. Unfortunately, we still have some drivers encouraging this unsafe behaviour. 

In some instances, drivers have parked and left the vehicle to go and collect children from the school.  This is incredibly frustrating for other drivers delayed by further interruptions to ‘traffic flow’.  Your child will be directed to your car when you reach the top of the cul-de-sac area so please wait in line.  If you need or wish to go in to collect your child, that is absolutely fine but you should find a park elsewhere and not use the Hawthorne Street area at this time.

With everyone’s cooperation, the drop off and pick up procedures are very smooth and safe for all.  Thanking you.

At pick up and drop off, please remember:

• Drivers and other passengers remain in your car
• Display your family name on the car dash for staff to see (Lookout Program)
• Be Patient and stay in the flow of traffic
• Follow the instruction of the staff member

What not to do:

• Do not park and leave your vehicle
• Do not direct your child to the driver’s side door
• Do not encourage or instruct your child to walk across the road to your vehicle

Parent Involvement

Our school has an outstanding culture of parent and community involvement and we are very appreciative of the support given.  Our P&C is our key parent body, which supports the work of the school by aligning with the school’s strategic and operational priorities for both its 4 year Strategic Plan and its Annual Improvement Plan.  This year our P&C will be developing its own Strategic Plan and this will both align with the School’s Strategic Direction and provide continuity to parents as the executive and P&C members change from year to year.  I sincerely thank our current P&C executive David, Janelle, Sheroo and Belinda for their incredible volunteer work and for their support and guidance during the 2019 year. 

The P&C Annual General Meeting is on Tuesday 17 March at 6pm in the school library.  This is a forum for joining the P&C and electing the 2020 Executive members.  The P&C is a great way to learn more about the school and to get involved in the planning and consultation, which occurs throughout the year.  I welcome all newcomers to this year’s AGM.  Following the AGM, a general meeting is held and the newly elected Executive will lead the meeting.

Thank you so much to all parents who have volunteered to be this year’s class parent representatives.  The role of the class reps is to provide additional information sharing at the class level and support both teachers and parents to keep abreast of school activities and events.  The official school channels of communication remain the school website and schoolzine (newsletter, excursions). Further details about the protocols of the role will be sent directly to the parent reps and again I thank all these parents for assisting in this voluntary capacity. 

Wanted – we are still encouraging any parent interested in either Curriculum, Well-Being or Innovation (Science Tech Engineering Arts Math - STEAM) to email and let me know as we are very keen to ensure we have parents involved every step of the way on our learning.  Please email admin@newfarmss.eq.edu.au – address attention COMMITTEE INTEREST

Kay Bradley

Parent/Teacher Interviews Date Claimer

Due to a clash of dates which will affect a number of our staff, our Parent Teacher interviews will now be held in the week 2 of term 2 – 29^th  of April between 3.15 p.m. – 4.30 p.m. and on the 30^th of April between 2 p.m. – 8 p.m. Apologies for any inconvenience this change of date has caused.

N.B. No interviews can be booked at present.

Harmony Day

On Friday the 20^th of March at 9.15 a.m. we will be holding our first Harmony Day Parade.

Children who identify with a particular culture/country will be invited to wear traditional dress or suitable clothes to represent their group. These children will be walking with flags to represent their culture/country. If your child does not identify with a particular culture or group, they are be invited to wear orange as an alternative.

Your child is encouraged to arrive dressed and ready for the assembly and remain in their costume for the day – or have school uniform ready to change into. The school day starts as usual at 8.45am.

P.B.L. FOCUS OF THE WEEK

I would like to introduce myself as the new Uniform Shop Manager. My name is Annalisa Toole, and you may know me as a swimming teacher and also soccer coach at New Farm United. I’ve recently taken over from Vanessa and now running the shop each week:

8-9am & 3-4pm Wednesdays in Term 1

We are cleaning house, and have some bargains right now, for the next few weeks.

All second hand is $1 each! We are getting donations every week so come have a look.

Microfibre pants size 8-14 are only $5 each, brand new! Come have a look. 

Next week we will feature new sales, so check the newsletter to see what’s new.

Thanks!

Annalisa Toole

Uniform Shop Manager, NFSS

Treat yourself (by not having to make lunch) and your kids (to a delicious & healthy lunch)!

For more detailed information regarding our school’s Tuckshop please refer to the Tuckshop News & Information in last week’s (March 3^rd) newsletter.  This will provide you with details on how to register with Flexischools along with many other FAQs and answers.

Tuckshop Volunteering

This year, up until now, we have been lucky enough to have parents, etc. approach us to volunteer their time to help us out in the tuckshop – to them we say a very big THANK YOU, you have been amazing and we couldn’t have done it without you! 

Now that the individual Class Parent Representatives have now been decided, I will email each of them this week to discuss and arrange a class by class volunteering system.

Your Class Parent Rep will be in contact soon to provide you with further information as to how you too can help, whether it be volunteering your time or providing homebakes.

Volunteers we’ve had in the past have told us how much they enjoyed helping us out in the tuckshop and how much of a thrill their children get from seeing their mum, dad, grandparents, carers, working there.

We looking forward to meeting and working with you too!

Thank you and bon appetit

Michelle G, Rachael, Michelle L & Vannesa

Convenor:  Michelle Gerrard email hello@nfsspandc.com.au I’m happy to assist with any queries you may have.

We pride ourselves in providing the students with a variety of fresh, tasty and nutritional meals, most of them made in-house by Rachael!    Along with our regular menu, we also offer the following special meals:

• Monday

Fried Rice – pork or vegetarian (made in-house with the freshest ingredients, delicious!)

Sushi & Bento Boxes – chicken, avocado or tuna

(Please note sushi needs to be pre-ordered by 8am on the Friday prior, see pre-order tab on Flexischools website once logged in, or order over the counter by 9am on the Friday prior)

• Wednesday

Pizza – Cheese or Ham & Cheese on a 7” base (very popular with many repeat customers!)

Pasta – Bolognaise or Napoli (made in-house - gluten free pasta option also)

• Friday

Sausage Sizzle (a crowd favourite!! High quality beef sausage from The Standard Market James St served on a wholemeal torpedo bun)

Chili Beef or Chili Veg on Rice (made in-house with a hint of spice & chili, perfect for young taste buds!)

Don’t forget….Friday at second break, we sell a variety of icy poles, ice creams and frozen yoghurts ranging in price from 50c to $2.00.  The students come up to the counter during second break with their money to purchase icy poles themselves, happy days!

It’s been great welcoming our new Preps to and all other students back to the Music room this year. I’ve included some information to show the focus for each year level in term 1.

This term in Prep, we will be on keeping the beat while learning songs and playing games. This is a fun activity to do in the car when you are playing music.

For year 1, the focus will be learning rhythms through games and songs and beginning to notate music. 

Year 2 students, will continue to develop their voices and basic music notation.

In year 3, we will be practising singing, starting to play the xylophone and learning treble clef notes. 

For year 4, the focus will be on beginning to play the recorder and developing music reading skills.

In year 5, we will be developing their recorder skills and starting to play the Djembe (African hand drum).

For our senior students in year 6, we will be beginning to play the keyboard, while further developing musical knowledge.

Senior choir (yr4-6) has started meeting on Tuesday mornings at 8.10 a.m. Students are welcome to join the choir and commit for one performance at a time. We are currently working to put together a show for assembly in week 9. Students are welcome to join or leave the senior choir after any performance. Those students staying in the choir for longer periods will be offered leadership singing roles to help others and new students.

Year 4 student Giselle  is competing in the QLD Little Athletics State Championships this upcoming weekend,  in the 400m and Shotput and we wish her luck.

Giselle’s team came 3rd in the U9 girls 200m relay in QLD Little Athletics State Relay Championships 

We would like to thank our sponsors for their continuing support for 2020.