Term 3 Week 2 Newsletter

Principal's Report

Dear Stafford Heights Families, 

Welcome back to Term 3!  It has been wonderful to see happy and excited students, ready to learn and looking forward to reconnecting with their classmates.  By this stage of the year students are really settled into routines and expectations and it is when so many young people accelerate in their learning.

NAIDOC WEEK 

This week at SHSS we celebrated NAIDOC Week whereas, the National NAIDOC Week celebrations are held across Australia in the first week of July each year (Sunday to Sunday), to celebrate and recognise the history, culture and achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.  NAIDOC Week is an opportunity for all Australians to learn about First Nations cultures and histories and participate in celebrations of the oldest, continuous living cultures on earth.

The 2025 theme, "The Next Generation: Strength, Vision & Legacy," celebrates not only the achievements of the past but the bright future ahead, empowered by the strength of our young leaders, the vision of our communities, and the legacy of our ancestors.

On Monday, all students got to enjoy participating in traditional first nations art activities and listen to stories about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.  On Thursday, we were lucky to have Gregg Dreise who is an accomplished author, artist and musician known for his engaging children’s books that celebrate Indigenous culture and storytelling present to all students.  I would like to say a special thank you to Kym Mayall and Jo Jardine who organised this event.   In addition, another big thank you to Kym who was successful in securing $1500 from Brisbane City Council Indigenous team. 

Attendance

National research shows that higher student attendance has a direct correlation with higher achievement, stronger peer relationships and future outcomes.  We really want to encourage all families to prioritise school and see if our Semester 2 attendance can exceed 90%.  To put this into context, for a student to attend above 95% this semester, they can be absent for 4-5 days (a whole school week).

School Opinion Survey 
The annual suite of School Opinion Surveys will be open from the mid-July to mid-August.  All families, school staff and students (Yrs 5 and 6) will be invited to participate. We encourage you to take this opportunity to have your say about what our school does well, and how we can improve.  For the survey information to have as much meaning as possible, we need to get the majority of parents/guardians, staff and students to engage.  It would be fantastic if you could take the time to complete!
An invitation to complete the Parent/Caregiver Survey will be emailed to one parent/caregiver per family in this week.  The invitation will be sent from the Department of Education, not the school, and it will have the subject line School Opinion Survey for parents/caregivers, 2025.  Check your junk email folders if you can’t find it.  The survey can be completed as soon as the invitation is received and will take approximately 5 minutes using a computer, tablet or smart phone. 

Head of Curriculum

Curriculum newsletters

Last week you would have received an email from your child’s class teacher which outlines what students will be learning for each learning area for this term.  Curriculum overviews are a way for parents to know and understand what students are learning.  It can also be a great way to start a conversation with your child by asking them what they are learning about at different times of the term to follow what learning has occurred. 

In English this term Prep to Year 6 students will be undertaking a speaking and listening task. The purpose of the task is for the lower years students to give an opinion on a topic and as the year levels progress students will be building a persuasive argument for a particular topic. 

Majella Cooper

Head of Curriculum

Head of Inclusion

Attached to the Newsletter this week is an explanation of the Nationally Consistent Collection of Data on School Students with Disability (NCCD). Every year, all schools in Australia participate in this data collection to provide information to the Australian Government about our students with disability. The information collected by the NCCD helps teachers, principals, education authorities and governments to better support students with disability at school. This term each school will reflect on the work already being undertaken to identify and support students with a disability who require reasonable adjustments due to functional impact of their disability to access and participate in education. The factsheet attached will provide further information. The HIVE welcome parents and carers to contact if they have any questions regarding the NCCD process.

Shelley Kemp

Head of Inclusion

Enrolments

What to Include in an Enrolment Application

• Proof of address and residency documents
• State School Consent and school permission forms
• original birth certificate for each child
• passport and visa for any children born overseas
• recent report card
• Any relevant medical information and health action plans.
• Any current court orders or custody details related to the enrolling child/ren
• Any other information that you consider important for us to know about your child/ren.
• For students with an international passport and an Australian visa the following are also required: 
• visa grant notice from the Department of Home Affairs. Please note, a VIVO check does not provide details necessary for school enrolment.
• passport photo page.
• An official, English translation of their birth certificate may be requested.
• An Authority to Enrol in a Queensland State School is required for all subclass TR500 visas and is arranged by contacting Education Queensland International External link External link.
• All temporary visa holders should refer to Education Queensland International  External link External link to determine if an Authority to Enrol is required for their visa subclass.

Once you have completed the necessary forms, please return them (along with the necessary documents) to admin@staffordheightsss.eq.edu.au or alternatively contact Sonia Yates our enrolments Officer directly.

Pre Prep News

PREP ENROLMENTS FOR 2026

Applications for Prep 2026 are now being accepted.

If you have a sibling that is due to start in 2026 please make sure you come and see us in the office to receive an enrolment pack.

Please visit our school website at: https://staffordheightsss.eq.edu.au/enrolments to download our enrolment forms or alternatively collect from administration.

Please note: Our school is now catchment managed therefore we require the following documents to be sent through with the enrolment forms and permission forms.

The right age for Prep 2026 is for all children born between 1 July 2020 and 30 June 2021. Our Prep program is planned and designed to cater for all children at all levels of development who are born in this 12 month period

Book Week - "Book an Adventure"

Jeans for Genes Day - Thursday 7th August

General School Information

Term 3 Calendar of Events

Office Reminders

• Office Hours – 8.15am-3.15pm

• No Hat No Play Outside

* Student Birthday’s

If your child is celebrating a birthday and would like to bring cake to school to celebrate with the class please make sure that you contact the teacher or the office to ask how many students are in the class. We ask that you bring in something that can be easily given out to students for eg: cupcakes, freddo frogs and zooper doopers. (Please note: no full sized cakes as classrooms do not have the facilities to cut up slices to hand out)

• Students with Long Hair - All students with long hair should tie their hair back with a blue hair tie while at school (as 
per the Stafford Heights SS Student Dress Code)

• Early Pick Up of Students - If you need to pick up your child early throughout the day please come up to the 
office and sign your child out on the IPad.

• Family Holiday’s during School Term – if your family is going on a holiday during the school term, please email the office to inform them of the dates so that we know why your child will be absent from school. If the time away from school 10 school days or more the office will require you to fill out a specific form.

• Students Late to School – if your child is late to school (arrive after 9am), please make sure you come to the office first to receive a late slip to hand to their teacher. 

• Animals on School Premises – Please note that no animals are to enter school grounds at all as per the signs on each of our school fences.

Medication at School

If your child requires medication at school, please bring the medication in the original 
packaging with a label from the chemist along with a letter from the Doctor stating the child’s name, medication, dosage and time to administer. You will then be required to fill out forms to give us permission to administer this medication during school hours.

Please note: where the dosage of a medication requires tables to be halved, we have to request that parents/carers supply a pill cutter, labelled with your child’s name.

If medication supply is running low, you will receive a phone call to bring more tablets to the office. Please DO NOT send tablets in a zip lock bag with your child to hand to the office, we require a parent/carer to come to the office to give the extra tablets.

Student Absences

Even though you may have notified your child's teacher we still require you to inform the office when your child is away from school. Please note: all Unexplained absences are noted in a child’s Report card.

1. Leave a message on 3621 2333 OR
2. SMS: 0426 305 697 OR
3. QParents App – Submit Absence OR
4. Email: admin@staffordheightsss.eq.edu.au

Even though absences may result in missed learning opportunities, the main reason we ask that you notify us when your child is away is so we are made aware that your child is SAFE.

2025 Premier's Reading Challenge

Parents/Carers please keep motivating your children to read. More forms can be collected from their teacher or the office. Once completed please return to the classroom teacher or to the office.

QParents

We’re streamlining our office processes by making the most of QParents and encourage all parents to create an account. It’s a user-friendly portal which provides secure online access to information about your child’s schooling including attendance, report cards, invoices and payment history. QParents also provides ease of viewing and updating your child’s details (including address and medical conditions) and helps both schools and parents through improved administration efficiencies and reduced printing and mail-outs. Please see the QParents Fact Sheet below for details about how to sign up.

PBL News - "Place belongings in the correct area"

Our PBL focus for this week is to Place belongings in the correct area which falls under Respect for Property and the Staffie Life Skill Perseverance.

This week’s focus is of double benefit for our students as putting their things in the correct place ensures we have a safe, tidy school however it will also help students keep track of their belongings and know where they are when they need them. This actually reduces students’ stress/cognitive load that can occur before the lesson has even started if they can’t find the equipment they know they need. We will run through where each class have assigned student belongings to be in their room and throughout the week support the class by running through some think alouds at challenging parts of the day e.g. first thing in the morning – “is my bag on the port rack and homework folder in the basket?” After break - “have I put my hat and lunchbox back in my bag?” Etc.

It goes without saying that this will need a fair amount of perseverance as keeping track of those hats, for example, can be very tricky for a number of our students so we will continue to remind them of the time-of-day checklists until it becomes a habitual, internal thought process.  

At home, you could also run through some strategies for finding their things in the morning to try and leave the house more easily or simply just keeping track of their things.

Health & Physical Education

Here we are at the beginning of another busy term.

Athletics

We have a large number of students who will be attending the North District Track and Field on August 7^th and 8^th at Nudgee College.

Forms and paperwork for this are now overdue and there are a number of students who have not yet returned them.  If you have not done so, please do so immediately.

Running training for those participating in running events is happening on Wednesday Mornings between 8.30am and 8.50am when Run Club is on and first break Fridays on the top ova.

Term 3 – Before School Activity.

We will continue with skipping on Monday Mornings at 8.30 and running on Wednesday Mornings at 8.30 this term weather permitting.   

Students are to wait in the blue area on both mornings to be collected by the relevant staff member.  Remember, you must have a hat and be wearing it to participate.

Volleyball Cup

Our year 5 & 6 Students have expressed interest in participating in the Annual Volleyball Cup at Craigslea State High School on Thursday 21^st August.  Permission forms will be home later this week for this event.  

Mrs Jardine

HPE Teacher.

Arts News (Dance, Drama, Music)

It has been a great start to the term in the Arts room with lots of new learning taking place.

Preps, Year 1s, 2s and 3s have all begun their drama units exploring the questions, what is drama? And, where and why we experience drama? They have enjoyed some drama games focusing on movement and as well as activities centred on imagination and pretending.

Year 4s, and 5/6s classes will spend term 3 focusing on music. Over the past fortnight they have echoed some rhythms and reviewed the elements of music. Year 5/6s have started learning to read some simple rhythms to play bucket drums.  Year 4s have begun learning some simple songs and playing their melodies on the glockenspiels.

Dance Troupe and Choir have kicked off their rehearsals for the term. We’ve had a huge number of new members turn up ready to join in the fun. It’s been great to witness all the enthusiasm and passion for the performing arts.

Term 3 Week 1 and 2

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Class News - Years 5/6B & 5/6C

The 5/6 classes have started an exciting unit in HASS in which we are looking at the geographical features of countries around the world. It has got us dreaming of hiking through the Rocky Mountains, or perhaps the Alps. Some would prefer to be taking in the sights of Paris, Toronto or New York City. Regardless of our dream holiday destination, we are loving seeing the world and learning about some of its most famous locations.

5/6B and 5/6C.

Holiday Photos

Student Council

Stafford Heights Shines – Student Council Springs into Action!

It’s been a busy and exciting start to Term 3 at Stafford Heights State School, and our amazing Student Council hit the ground running with their first meeting of the term!

With representatives from across the year levels in attendance, the meeting buzzed with energy, enthusiasm, and fresh ideas for improving our school grounds.
Mrs Duke welcomed everyone back and congratulated the students on returning to their leadership roles. It was inspiring to see how passionate they are about making our school the best it can be!

Student Suggestions – Voices Heard!
Here’s a snapshot of what our Student Council had to say:

• 4B kicked things off with a request for soccer goals, perfect for some lunchtime action and healthy competition!
• 4C boys suggested installing a mirror in the boys’ toilets – because everyone deserves to check they’re looking their best!
• 4A raised the important issue of improving toilet facilities and also suggested getting more sports equipment to keep active play alive during breaks.
• 5/6A chimed in with a similar request for upgraded toilets, showing a united front for better facilities.
• The 4C team also highlighted that there’s currently no way to dry hands in the bathrooms and proposed installing hand dryers or paper towels – a thoughtful suggestion that puts hygiene first!

The Student Council is off to a fantastic start, and their ideas will now be shared with school leadership and the P&C to see which improvements can be tackled first. With student voice at the heart of our school community, we’re confident that positive changes are on the way!

Thank You, Councillors!
A big thank you to all students who attended and brought their ideas to the table.

Let’s keep the conversation going – our students are building a better Stafford Heights one great idea at a time!

– Mrs Duke and the SHSS Student Council Team

Instrumental News

Beginner Band Blitz Workshop

Dear Parents/Carers of beginner Instrumental Students (first year of playing):

Your child is invited to attend the Northside Beginner Band Blitz Workshop 2025, a one-day workshop for band

students from schools in the Northside Cluster. Band students who started learning their instrument at the beginner

of this year, and who are in Year 4 or above, will attend the Band Blitz at Earnshaw State College on Monday, 1 September 2025 from 8:30am-2:30pm.

To register your child for this activity please use the Registration & Payment Link below.

REGISTRATION & PAYMENT LINK: https://www.ivvy.com.au/event/ZT1ZXP

If you require help to register online, please contact the school office admin admin@staffordheightsss.eq.edu.au , who will register your child on your behalf and invoice the payment directly to you.

Library News

Rules for Borrowing:

* You must always have a Library Bag with you to borrow a book from the library (no exceptions)

* You may borrow one (1) book for the week (prep to Year 3)

* Remember always keep your book safe by placing the book back into your Library bag when not reading it.

* Always bring your returning Library Book and bag back to school on borrowing day.

* If you misplace your library book, or the book has been damaged beyond repair, the school's policy requires replacement or reimbursement for that resource.

P&C

Community News

APPLY NOW for QACI Brilliant Futures  - a two-year selective-entry preparation program for student participation in Year 7 and Year 8. Current Year 6 students are welcome to APPLY NOW. QACI Brilliant Futures provides impactful, collaborative extra-curricular learning experiences aligned with the International Baccalaureate Learner Profile, including inquiry, critical thinking and reflection.