Newsletter No 3 21 February 2024
From the Principal
Hi everyone
I have been informed of works at Narbethong Special School impacting the entry to the school from Salisbury St, commencing in early March. The entry to Narbethong Special School and driveway in Salisbury St will receive important upgrade works.
There will be no entry through the pedestrian gate and drive way until early May. Entry to Buranda SS will be via the gate in Churchill St. We will meet with the Narbethong team to ensure student safety in the coming fortnight.
Please be aware that the Budgie Cup events this year will incur an increased cost. The closure of Buranda Train Station will see our students requiring a charter Bus, to and from school to attend Budgie Cup events in 2024.
Away for the Day Students with phones/smart watches should have the devices checked in at the office daily.
Our Before and After school care service will move to the school hall early next month. This move will allow for important works to be carried out in A block, so that we can accommodate learning spaces for use during the Martin St Development.
Please keep your eye out for updates from Helping Hands regarding transition arrangements if your children use the OSHC service. Please note the school use of the hall will not be impacted through this change.
Future prep playground works will commence early next month. The old cricket nets will be removed to make way for a new early years playground. Fencing for this project will be installed in the next fortnight so that works can commence. The project will take a couple months to complete. I will provide an overview of current works plans at the coming P&C meeting.
Student cards will be sent home shortly to all Yr 1-6 families. These are in an envelope addressed to parents. The card contains details we have on file for you and your child/ren. Please take the time to look over this form and update any details necessary. All forms are to be returned to the office, regardless of any changes made.
Thank you for your cooperation with the drop off and pick up of students last Friday. Thankfully, flooding to Gladys St and our school oval was minor.
Last but not least - I am very proud to inform you that former Buranda SS student, Gwen G (pictured middle) is a School Captain at Holland Park State High School in 2024. Congratulations Gwen from the entire Buranda SS community.
Have a great week.
Simon Vaseo - Principal
From the HOD-C
NAPLAN
The National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) is a literacy and numeracy assessment that students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 sit each year. The Information for Parents and Carers factsheet offers parents information about why students do NAPLAN, what it assesses, how it is administered and when it is administered. A simplified NAPLAN factsheet is also available.
Beyond these fact sheets the NAPLAN website for parents and carers also provides a number of translations of the factsheet.
Students are not expected to study for NAPLAN. You can support your child by reassuring them that NAPLAN is a part of their school program and reminding them to simply do their best. Some explanation of NAPLAN is useful to help students understand and be comfortable with the format of the tests; however, it is not necessary for parents/carers to do this. Teachers will ensure students are familiar with the types of questions in the tests and will provide appropriate support and guidance.
At Buranda we will do the NAPLAN tests online and we encourage students in Years 3 and 5 to have a go and do their best with NAPLAN, as we do with all curriculum and assessment activities. All preparation for NAPLAN is done at school, through the practice test environment. The Australian Curriculum Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) also does not recommend excessive preparation for NAPLAN or the use of services by coaching providers.
Swimathon
You will read further in the newsletter about our upcoming Swimathon. At Buranda we are very fortunate to have the pool as a teaching resource and a fabulous swimming teacher in Mrs Wain. We want to thank Mrs Wain for organising the swimathon and helping our school community support our P&C every year.
Learning to swim is essential in Queensland with the summer heat and the beautiful beaches, waterways and pools that tempt us to cool down. Swimming has many health benefits and as a former swimming teacher I would impress upon parents the importance of ensuring children have water safety skills and become competent swimmers who know and can assess their limits in a variety of water environments.
If you have preschool-aged children, don’t wait until they come to school to learn water safety and swimming. Coming to school with the basics of pool and water safety and swimming assists children to be safe, learn, make progress and enjoy school swimming lessons.
Dr Rosie Scholl - HOD-C
From the Resource Centre
The library management system has been updated in the last week with parents’ names and email addresses. Parents who receive invoices will also receive reminders of their child/rens’ overdue books.
Reminder emails will be sent every Friday when library books are 14, 30 and 90 days overdue. The email will include details of the book/s that need to be returned to the library.
Invoices may be sent to parents when books are 90 days overdue to recover the cost of replacing the lost book.
From the Sports/Technology
Physical Education – Swimming and Ball Skills
This term in Physical Education all our classes, except for Preps, are having swimming lessons. Our Preps are currently taking part in a Balls Skills unit learning the basic throws and catches and doing small, organised games utilising their newly acquired skills.
If your child is in Year 1-6 and new to swimming it can be very scary taking part in a lesson with 24 other children in a 25m pool. Our lessons have currently been cut down to once a week which is not enough for beginner swimmers. If your child is a non-swimmer, please consider getting them enrolled in swim school outside of school hours. They will get to be part of a class with a ratio of 1:4 allowing them to feel more secure and to acquire basic skills at a much faster rate.
The following students represented the school at district swimming, Fletcher T, Eleanor HB, Annabelle L, Annika P, and Ben C. Eleanor, Annabelle and Annika then qualified for the Mt Gravatt District swim team and will swim for them next week.
Sifti K recently won 2 medals at Regionals. She placed 2nd in Shot Put and 3rd in Discus, she will go onto compete at the State titles in March.
Well done and congratulations to all our athletes.
Swimathon
Our Annual Swimathon will occur next week during PE swim lessons. You would have received your letter outlining all the details last week. This is one of our biggest fundraisers for the year and all proceeds are to be deposited directly into the P&C Qkr App.
Our P&C support our school with functions and resources throughout the year and I strongly encourage families to support this event. The children will have their PE lesson to swim as many widths or lengths as possible. There is no pressure to swim continuously and they can stop, rest, use a kickboard and change strokes as often as they need.
Most children love the event and challenge themselves to improve upon last year’s results.
Digital/Design Technologies
Our Technologies classes are well underway, and I really look forward to seeing the children each week for new and exciting lessons. Last week our Year 4/5 classes took part in a Masterchef Challenge trying to name 28 different herbs, spices and vegetables. Cumin stumped almost all of them.
- Prep/1 classes are learning how to code Beebots.
- Year 1/2 classes are learning about hardware, software, peripheral devices and will learn how to make a table to collate data using Word.
- Year 3/4 classes are learning about data (quantitative & qualitative) and will begin learning Excel to collate data, create graphs and make statements.
- Year 4/5 classes are doing Design Technologies and learning how to design a garden to grow edible pizza ingredients. We are working in conjunction with Mr De Kramer (Groundsman) and Mr Bryant (Environmental Teacher) to plan and hopefully build the new garden in between the pool and the school building. We will conclude with a pizza cook up in the school garden.
- Year 6’s are also doing Design and learning Photoshop. They will ultimately produce a yearbook which will be printed for our Resource Centre. It will also be available for parents to order their own copy.
P&C Support
This week our P&C very kindly gave me funds to purchase a new Canon Powershot Camera to use for Technology classes and other school events. We regularly take photos at camp, sports days, cross country, assemblies and during class time. Our new camera will also be available for the P&C to use during Winter Solstice events, school discos and fetes.
Julie Wain - Physical Education and Technologies Teacher
Year 4/5 Masterchef Challenge
Philosophy Corner
From the P & C
P&C AGM
The P&C Annual General Meeting (AGM) will be held on Wednesday 6 March 2024, in the school library, starting at 6.15pm.
We welcome nominations for the executive roles (President, Vice President, Treasurer and Secretary) before or at the meeting. By joining the executive you can help make the school a great place for all our kids to learn and grow.
We also welcome help in non-executive roles such as a volunteer to update our website and Facebook page with news and new events.
If you can't make the meeting in person, please join us via this Microsoft Teams link.
Tuckshop
Tuckshop this Friday, 23 February, has chicken or vegetarian fried rice and lots of other yummy options.
Orders close at 8pm tonight.
We need volunteers to make the tuckshop run. If you can spare a couple of hours on a Friday please sign up at this link.
New Camera and Music Instruments
The P&C is donating $800 to the school for a new camera, which is intended to be used to take photographs of things like excursions, carnivals, leadership ceremonies, graduations and camps.
We are also donating $1,483 of new music instruments for the school:
- 8 x Djembes (to create a class set of 28) - $590
- 20 X Glockenspiels (to create a class set of 28) - $893
These are the sorts of things we are proud to do to help the school with the money raised through fundraising, in addition to the $15,000 a year the P&C donates to the school, principally to fund Mr Bryant’s work in the school garden and Environment Program.
Easter Raffle 2024
We are still looking for chocolates and small items to be donated to add to our amazing prizes which will create a fabulous Easter hamper. A box for donations is situated in the school office.
Raffle tickets will come on sale via a QR code in the following weeks.
Any questions please contact Ludivine on 0432 257 248
Warm regards
Chris McGrath
P&C President
E: president@burandasspandc.org.au
M: 0432899097
P&C website: https://www.burandasspandc.org.au/
P&C on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BurandaPandC