Week 6, Term 2 2021 RSS Newsletter

From the Principal

Parent / Community Code of Conduct - Exert

We welcome parents and other members of our diverse community into schools across Queensland. Working together with their school community, school staff support the learning and wellbeing of every student, and are entitled to a safe work environment. Parents and other visitors to schools support safety by ensuring their communications and conduct at the school and school activities is respectful.

Below is a link to the Parent and Community Code of Conduct. 

Richmond Field Days

A selection of student work will be displayed at the Richmond Field Days on the 11th & 12th of June, we encourage parents to stop by to see their child/ren’s learning.

Richmond State School Staff, in conjunction with our RSS P&C, are running the Field Days Canteen on Friday and Saturday.  Money raised during the 2 days will go back to supporting our students and our school with resources, camps, facilities etc.  We have a number of 1 hour spots available on the roster and would appreciate your support.

Student Wellbeing

The wellbeing of our students at Richmond State School is of upmost importance to all members of staff.  We work hard to ensure engaging learning opportunities, provision of safe and supportive learning areas, explicit teaching of self-awareness and self-management in conjunction with providing a range of interesting activities during school hours to promote joy and success.   

To further this work and to ensure the voice of our students is heard, we will soon be facilitating a wellbeing survey with Year 4 to Year 9 students.  This will inform our Richmond State School ‘SLAWF’ – Student Learning and Wellbeing Framework. 

I also encourage parents to enact proactive and open communication with classroom teachers, particularly in the event that you may have a concern about your child. This includes (but is not limited to):

• Not wanting to come to school
• Increase in bed wetting
• Concerns raised at home about another student
• Changes in behaviour

We are here to partner with you to support your child/children.  This can only occur with open communication. 

Head of Department - Curriculum

Supporting your child’s reading in Prep

As the 2021 Premiers Reading Challenge is now in full swing, I thought it was timely to look at how we can all work together to support reading throughout the different grades. This newsletter we will begin with supporting your child’s reading in Prep.

Learning to read is a significant milestone in any child's life, and one that will bring many benefits over their lifetime. Parents, carers and other family members play an important role in modelling reading behaviours and supporting your child's reading efforts. You make a difference to how your child will discover the wonderful world of literacy and how they view themselves as readers.

In Prep, children will:

• increase their range of vocabulary
• explore a range of listening, speaking and writing opportunities
• ask questions about their knowledge of the topic of a story
• make connections between what they know and a story
• predict and draw an event in a story
• explore individual sounds in words
• alter sounds in spoken language
• know direction of written words
• explore features of picture books
• understand the relationship between printed letters and speech sounds
• match letters with sounds

What can you do to help your child become a reader and support your child's reading skills?

Model reading: Let your child see you reading, read to yourself and read to your child – often.

Make time for reading: Make regular time for reading, even if it is only ten minutes a day! All prep children will be bringing home library books and home reader books, make time to engage with these texts each day to support reading development.

Sing!: Singing nursery rhymes, jingles and fun chants helps your child have fun with language and to develop their phonological awareness. Even making up silly songs is great for literacy development – have fun with words (we would love to hear any that you come up with!).

Sounds like: Play talking games that require your child to hear the same beginning sounds, for example, ‘I spy’, ‘Let’s look for all the things in the fridge that begin with the mmmmm sound’, or ‘I can think of lots of words that start with ssssss, snake, Sammy, silly, can you think of more?’

Encourage and praise: Reading should be enjoyable for you and your child. Expose your child to a range of text types and topics. Always encourage their attempts and praise their efforts.

Participate in literacy related activities: Richmond State School will be holding two Book Fairs in 2021 in addition to Book Week and the 2021 Premier’s Reading Challenge. These activities promote a love of literacy and reading and encourage students to read through a number of different activities. Encourage and support your children (in all grades!) to participate in these activities throughout the year.

Our Improvement Agenda

Achievements & Awards

Around our school

We have had a very busy time at school during the past two weeks. We enjoyed Book Fair, Walk to School Day, a space reading by an astronaut on the International Space Station, Under 8's Day, Midweek Milkshakes, lunar eclipse gazing and cross country trials.

Mr Marshall, with the help of students, took the temperature of Richmond State School on Tuesday the 12th May and sent the data off to the International Space Station.

Camerata - Queensland Chamber Orchestra visited us and amazed us with their performance.

Under 8's Day was amazing!  There were lots of students and teachers wishing they were under 8 so they could join in.

The students of Richmond State School did an amazing job at "Walk to School Day" showing us that they have a great understanding of what it means to be safe on the roads. Many thanks to Senior Constable Harm and Sargent Rob for leading by example and showing us the correct way to walk safely.

Enjoy just a small snapshot into life around Richmond State School.

ALIS Experiment

Book Fair

Walk To School

Camerata Live

Under 8's Day

Basketball With Senior Constable Harm

Cross Country Trials

Year 6 Shirts

P & C Updates

Richmond State School

P & C ASSOCIATION

Hello Richmond State School community,

Welcome to week 6! We are officially over halfway through term 2, how quick has that flown by?!

We would like to thank everyone who has generously volunteered their time to help out with the canteen for Field Days. However, we are still needing a few more volunteers to fill in some time slots. If you could donate 1 hour of your time please contact one of the executive committee members to register your interest. Time slots needing volunteers:

The P&C has been successful in receiving vouchers through the FRRR grant for each child to use at the Richmond Newsagency to put towards school needs! Low on homework essentials? Have your children burned through their pencils? Here is your chance to top up on us! Please keep an eye out for your vouchers. They will be in with your child’s report card at the end of Term 2.

Next meeting: Monday 7th of June

Time: 2:30pm

Place: School Library

Sincerely,

Charlie Jones

Community Information