Tomorrow’s sports stars are playing in our school teams today.

I hope you had a wonderful weekend and enjoyed the amazing winter weather. It is the peak of sport seasons and like many families at this time of the year, I spent my Sunday as a sports parent, taking my daughter to compete at the Cornubia Netball Carnival. In addition to watching my own daughter play, I got the pleasure of watching and catching up with many of our current students, former students and families. It seemed as if every team I watched had students with a connection to Rochedale. Most importantly, our students were smiling, having fun and really enjoying their netball. With all this netball talent, it was not surprising that our recent interschool sport netball season was dominated by our future Firebirds.

On parade last Friday we had the opportunity to acknowledge our interschool sporting champions from Semester 1’s season of interschool sport. Throughout this 10-week season, our students played with much skill and enthusiasm competing for the title of District Premiers. I was extremely pleased to announce that four of our teams won their grand finals. Congratulations to our Girls Junior A Touch Football, Junior A Netball, Senior A Netball and Senior B Netball who all became the District Champions; an outstanding effort from our school. We are still awaiting the Football (Soccer) results and are hopeful we can announce the final result for this sport this week. From a very proud principal, I would like to congratulate all players who represented our school this season and offer my sincere thanks to the teachers and staff who coach our teams and make interschool sport possible. Interschool sport is just another program we offer at Rochedale to help our students showcase their talents.

End of semester reporting

The semester is quickly coming to an end and one of the main tasks for the next three weeks is finalising report cards. These reports will reflect your child’s progress and achievement over the first half of the year. Teachers are currently finalizing assessment and are moderating with their year level cohort to make the judgements about the Achievement and Effort grades attained by their students. Every parent would love to see their children receive an ‘A’ for achievement, however, on Queensland state school reports an achievement of ‘A’ means a student is performing considerably higher than their age expectancy, so 'A's for achievement are not common. The majority of children will receive a ‘C’ as this means they are performing to the expected developmental level. The Effort grading is a very important section of the report and perhaps, one could argue, even more important than the actual result. This is where you want to see the A’s or B’s because this means your child is putting in the greatest effort and is working to their potential to get the best result they possibly can. Always discuss the report card with your child, celebrate their achievements and work out a plan to improve the results next semester. Focus on the effort section and see if that area can be improved. Goals that are set with strategies to help achieve them, have the greatest chance of being fulfilled. Remember, on the front of the report card is an explanation of what the codes mean.

Semester One reports will be emailed home at the end of term on Friday 25 June for all year levels. Due to the logistics of writing and preparing 1020 odd report cards, it is impossible to email them out early. Please ensure your email address is up to date so that you can receive your report card(s) promptly this semester.

New Playground

A final meeting with the playground builder has been scheduled for this Wednesday. At this meeting the playground should be designated as complete and signed over to us. All things going to plan, the new junior playground will be open to students from this Thursday.  I know many students are waiting to have a go at the new slides and the climbing area in between; their wait is almost over.

School Council nomination of parent rep.

Nominations for our School Council parent rep position will close this Friday 11 June. The role of the parent rep is to provide a parent perspective to our School Council at our meetings which are held once a term in school time. Nomination forms are available from the office and nominations will be shared with the community via the school newsletter. If an election is required, the election will be held during Week 9. Please do not hesitate to contact me if you have any questions regarding School Council representation or the nomination/election process. Thank you.

Learner Profile: Attribute focus for the week – Balanced – Students should read a variety of authors and books to become balanced readers and share their week’s reading list with their teacher. Depending on age and reading ability of students this may be done as a whole class, small groups or individually. Check with your class teacher how it will be done in your particular room.

Have a fabulous week
Kind regards
Keith Graham
Principal

Extension and Enrichment through Differentiation in the Classroom

In classrooms at Rochedale, teachers differentiate: content, process, product and learning environment for all students to cater for individual student needs to support growth.  For students requiring extension and/or enrichment, teachers deliver the curriculum at a level, pace and degree of abstraction and complexity beyond learning expectations of their age peers.

Students requiring extension and/or enrichment are identified, through ongoing monitoring of progress and through school wide data collection- using data from a range of sources. 

What is Extension and Enrichment?

Extension deepens students’ knowledge, understanding and skills through problem-solving tasks, use of digital tools and resources and flexible grouping.

Enrichment broadens the curriculum. Students develop and apply their knowledge, thinking skills and attitudes on topics and concepts— at a complexity beyond the learning expectations for their age peers. Enrichment may also be provided through extra-curricular activities.

Differentiation in the classroom at Rochedale

For students requiring extension and/or enrichment, aligning with Education Queensland policy, teachers:

• Adjust tasks so they are required to process more complex and abstract information from a variety of sources. (content)
• Use a faster pace -this still means providing clear instruction and scaffolding- but with few repetitions. (process)
• Challenge and support students to set learning goals and develop higher-order thinking skills including problem-solving strategies, critical and creative thinking, and self-reflection. (process)
• Provide opportunities for students to demonstrate imaginative, innovative and rigorous responses that may involve extended outcomes. (product)
• Provide opportunities to undertake challenging work, which enables them to develop strategies for persevering with difficult problems. (product)
• Encourage students to pursue their interests in independent inquiries and negotiated tasks. (product)
• Provide flexible groupings to enable collaborative work with students of the same or higher ability; or with shared interests. (learning environment)

At Rochedale we have an inclusive learning environment where differentiation for both support and extension and enrichment occurs within the classroom.

Enrichment opportunities during lunchtime:

Rochedale teachers also provide opportunities across the year where some enrichment activities are offered during lunchtimes.  We have our coding club which runs in the library computer lab at lunchtimes 1:15-1:45pm on Tuesday for Years 5 & 6, year levels alternating fortnightly (Semester 1&2), Wednesday for Year 4 (Semester 1&2), and on Monday and Thursday for Year 3 (Semester 2).  We also have Opti-MINDS, which is 6-week Challenge process held in Term 3 each year during lunch times for Year 6 students. The selection process for Opti-MINDS has begun and teams will be announced soon.

At Rochedale, our teaching teams work collaboratively to provide all students with an educational program that suits their individual needs through differentiation and flexible groupings.  Supporting students who require extension and/or enrichment is a priority. 

Jessica Rigby
Deputy Principal Year 2 / Head of Diverse Learning and Enrichment

Dear Parents and Caregivers,

As the nights draw in and the mornings and evenings get colder (feels like Melbourne!), it’s a great opportunity to share some quiet time with the children. You might like to share a story, artefact or image as you try to beat back the cold.

An interesting way to share a story, image or artefact and to promote some discussion is to use a strategy called ‘I see, I think, I wonder’. It is a strategy that some of the children may recognise from school.

I see - together look at an image, artefact and just identify what you can see, hear or feel.

I think – together talk about what you think the image or artefact may be, what it may be used for and possibly what it may be made from.

I wonder – This is where a host of questioning comes in. Ask questions about when you think it may be used, who may be there and why are they there.

For example – the image of a birthday cake.

I see - I see coloured icing, candles and sprinkles. I see the birthday person getting ready to blow the candles out. I see their family getting ready to sing Happy Birthday. 

I think – I think it’s someone’s birthday. I think they have shared a meal with their family. I think they are …… years old. I think everyone is very happy.

I wonder – I wonder if it is a chocolate cake? I wonder if they had their favourite dinner?

This is a fun way to spark a conversation and interest and get them talking.

Have a great week
Paul Kelly
PYP Coordinator

This strategy comes from a higher thinking strategy book – Visible Thinking Routines by Ron Ritchard.

Welcome to Week 8 of Term 2!

Brain Teaser

Q. If you had 20 men build your house in two months, how long would it take 10 men to build the very same house?

A. No time at all, because the house was already built by the 20 men.

Congratulations to Elyse N in 3A for figuring this one out.

Captain Read It

Congratulations to our Captain Read It winners from week 7 of term 2

Prep B           Stella K
1M                 Lucy N
2D                 Beatrix S
3F                  Sohil K
4F                  Tyrese P
5J                  Hasith J
6C                 Mia C

Have a great week!
Jackie and Lorraine

School Photos have now been delivered and will be going home with students this week.  If you requested to collect the photos from the school office, they are now available for collection.

ABSENCE LINE 3340 8388 or

text 0427 890 693 (24 hours)

*******IT IS NOW A REQUIREMENT THAT ALL STUDENT ABSENCES BE REPORTED ON THE DAY OF THE ABSENCE TO THE SCHOOL OFFICE*******

To report a student absence, please call the absence line on 3340 8388 or text our SMS line on 0427 890 693.  These lines are both open 24 hours a day.

When recording an absence on either our phone line or SMS line, please state the following:

1. Your name
2. Student's name
3. Student's class
4. Reason for absence

Please speak clearly and slowly and help us with spelling of names when calling the phone line.