Dear mums, dads, carers and colleagues

We are now just past the half way point to the school term and the final four weeks  are looking very busy.  Parent-teacher interviews are being held next Monday and Tuesday, and the Disco, a Free dress day, our Year 6 camp and more will fill the final month leading up to Easter vacation.  Please make sure that you are able to keep up with what is happening.     

Free dress day (19 March)

Bullying No Way

Our entire school community is invited to participate in the National day of action against bullying and violence.  Coomera Rivers is holding a free dress day (and asking for a gold coin donation) and encouraging parents to join in as well by also wearing their best orange outfits that day.  Our learning focus will see students involved in activities in class during the week as well.  

Kindness quote of the week

I have challenged classes to research and select their favourite quote about kindness.  I am turning these quotes into posters and these will be placed around the school.  Please keep an eye out for them.   This week's quote is from 3JN.  

Kindness in action

The importance of practicing kindness is impacting across our school too.  This week, Emily was caught being kind by using her Rivers Rewards to buy a stamp at the school rewards shop for someone who wanted one but didn’t have enough Rivers Rewards themselves.  Very thoughtful indeed.

Survey emails are coming your way

We are needing your feedback and permissions regarding some important aspects of our school.  

1. Homework  (We need a big response)
2. Behaviour and bullying contract (We need a response for EVERY student)
3. 3rd Party IT use by students (We need a response for EVERY student).

The homework survey link has already been sent out.  This survey is year level specific.  This is designed to help us understand the different opinions across the range of year levels.  

The other 2 surveys will follow in the coming weeks.

Some things do not belong at school

Please keep the following things at home as they cause problems at school.

• Pets
• Toys
• Scooters, skateboards and skates
• Valuable items
• Dangerous items

These restrictions apply to children and adults too.  

There are some occassions where pets and toys can be brought along to school but these need special permission and organisation.

Kind regards

Vic

Congratulation's to the Coomera Rivers Esports Just Dance Team, for participating in The Fuse Cup this week hosted by Emmanuel College.  The students danced their hearts outs in fierce competition with students from Ormeau State School, Hillcrest Christian College and Emmanuel College.

We are very excited that one of our teams was awarded the overall school champions and will participate in the Queensland State Finals later this year.  Congratulations to Olivia who was also runner up for best overall dancer.

"They were so pumped and appreciative. Great kids who absolutely deserved to win amongst tough competition today. Amazing display of sportsmanship, encouragement and teamwork by all." Dan Martinez (Founder The Fuse Cup)

Esports is a great opportunity for our students to develop strength of character and resilience needed to be Good at Learning, Good at Life.

Thank you to our families that partnered with us, to transport their children to the event and thank you to Miss Wolbers for her supervision and support on the day.

Monday 22 February saw us finally hold our first senior assemblies for 2021 after needing to postpone because of the heavy rain the previous week. Postponing the event was most frustrating because it meant having to hold off on our announcement of our 2021 badged leadership positions ~ it felt like a lifetime of waiting for some! Students in Year 3 to 5 are given an opportunity to nominate themselves to represent their class either as a student council representative or an Environmental Warrior. Each student is to present a 1 minute speech to their class on why they would make a good class representative and then their peers and teachers take a vote. There were some pretty amazing speeches!

Student council representatives are responsible for taking their class's ideas to Student Council meetings which are scheduled at play breaks. They are also responsible for feeding back discussion topics to their class and a junior buddy class e.g. Free dress day information. It's our class student council representatives that also ensure Guest Teachers and special guests are looked after.

The Environmental Warrior position is a new position for students in this year level and it will be their role to support their class become more environmentally aware of their eco-footprint. They will work closely with the three Year 6 Environmental Warriors - Reduce, Reuse & Recycle - to form a team of environmental activists and advocates for a greener way to live.

Our Year 6 leadership application process began late last year and finished with 64 students delivering a 1-minute campaign speech to all Year 4 to 6 students. Submitting an application takes great courage. Putting yourself out there to be 'judged' on your skills and abilities can be quite daunting for the fear of failure or rejection can be quite real. Our Leadership assembly provided an opportunity to recognize all 64 students who took this courageous step in delivering a speech, especially given public speaking is one of the greatest fears known. It was also refreshing to see so many more boys step-up and see themselves as leaders because it's become a growing trend for girls to dominate this space.

A massive congratulations to all students who earned a 2021 badged position however our message to all students was clear, you don't need a badge to lead. We can all be leaders.

Well done to this week's Excellence Award winners.

Prep and Year 1

Year 2

Year 3 and 4

Year 5 and 6

Year 4 Identity Day

Year 4 students have been learning about factors which shape a person’s identity and sense of belonging. They identified groups they belong to (such as sporting, school, family, and cultural groups) and described the character traits the groups taught them and how the groups have influenced their identity. The learning culminated in an Identity Day, where students shared their presentations across the cohort. We all learnt a little more about each other, and this experience further strengthened our relationships with each other and sense of belonging at school.

Writing buddies

5C and 3GN shared some writing time to work on our Narratives. In particular, our focus this week in 3GN has been Tightening Tension. The Year 5 students offered ideas, feedback and support to assist their buddy with identifying strengths and areas to improve. Our time with 5C is valuable and also gives both classes a sense of purpose and an authentic audience for writing!

KidFit leaders desperate to start

While leadership training was held this week, quite a few of the leaders couldn't wait for the roster to start next week and have already volunteered their time in the Prep playground.   Well done Year 6 leaders!

We are here for learning

Prep O have been learning up a storm this week.  Great work everyone! 

Writing in the spotlight this week

There has been some wonderful writing work this past week - right across the school.

Mathletics champions this week

The students have been very hard at work this past week as they earn their Mathletics points.  The school record has been established at over 15 000 in a single week.  WOW!

Right-angled fish help learners with maths

Some very clever work with angles this week in 3JN.  Check out the fish in each of these photos as the students learn about right angles.

Congratulations to Leo and Alycia who received awards for their work in the Solid Pathway programs that they particiapted in at the end of 2020. Solid Pathways is an online program STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) program for indigenous senior students to help develop their creativity and problem solving skills with authentic, real world challenges. Selected students from years 4-6 have commenced new courses this term, so we look forward to handing out more medallions in the near future.

WAKAKIRRI IS BACK!

Hopefully you have had your children coming home buzzing with excitement about joining our Wakakirri Team for 2021.  If you have not been involved with Wakakirri before, it is an Australia-wide competition where schools tell a story through dance and drama. Coomera Rivers has previously competed in both 2018 and 2019.  Please see the links below for some snippets of our previous entries.

2019

2018

This week in your child's Music or Drama lesson, they have watched the winning 2019 Wakakirri story and discussed whether they'd like to become involved for this year. Interested students then came to Mrs Blyth's room on Friday to collect some paperwork containing more information.  If your child would like to be involved but missed the meeting, please email Mrs Blyth .

Info at a glance:

• Students from year 1-6 can participate
• Team size is maximum 120 students including backstage crew
• Our performance will be either Monday 23rd August or Tuesday 24th August at The Logan Entertainment Centre.
• Rehearsal Time- Thursdays 2:30pm-4pm beginning term 2
• Cost- Approx $60.

This year's Wakakirri participation fee has been increased to $35 per person, this fee is paid directly to Wakakirri. It has increased in 2021 to cover the COVID safe plan Click HERE for more information.   There will be no concert (previously ticket cost was $36 per person) instead will be a live streaming and we will receive a digital download of the performance (so there is money saved in that area). The rest of the $60 fee will be used to cover bus and t-shirt costs.

Try outs will begin next week once signed permission forms are returned. The try out dance is the beginning of last year's Flash Mob routine. It has been posted in student's Seesaw tab 'The Arts'.

Busking at the cafe

We would love to share with you our Music groups' progress so far this year. As we have only just begun rehearsing, our performances won't be polished but we are desperate to get our performing again! It would be wonderful if you could attend.

Year 4 Music

Students in Year 4 have had a great start to the year.  After just three lessons on the recorder, they are sounding very professional, playing with expressions and feeling, alongside the Tasmanian Symphonic Orchestra backing ensemble. They are also enjoying the games Chicken In A Fencepost as well as Staff Wars (this is a great app that can be purchased for an iPad for a minimal cost or downloaded onto a laptop for free).

Representative Touch

Congratulations to Scarlett and Noah who were selected in the Gold Coast Touch representative teams.  Scarlett made the U10s Girls A team and Noah made the U12s Boys A team.  Well done.

Kokoda Challenge

Our Kokoda students met at Coomera Rivers at 5:15am on Saturday to make the drive to Purling Brook Falls to start our first training session. The rain made the track slippery and slimy, and the waterfalls were pumping, which made for some great scenery. There were heaps of slips and falls, which is common when we do our training sessions, but all of the students, parents and teachers smashed it with smiles on their faces.

Running Club

Well done to all of our runners who came out this week. Well done to Amity and Andrew who claim Runners of the Week.

Running Club will be awarding medallions to students who cumulatively run 50km, 100km over the duration of the year. (1 Lap = 300m)

Broadwater trials for boys Rugby league

Boys born in 2010-2011 (Monday) or 2009 (Tuesday) who would like to trial for the Broadwater District Rugby League team are encouraged to come to the oval at 1-1.30pm on Tuesday. This is not the school team trial, it is a representative level team.

Congratulations to:

Cooper on his selection in the Gold Coast Regional team to compete at the state swimming titles on March 23.  He will be swimming in the 50m Butterfly event.  Good luck Cooper!  We will let you know how he goes!      

Remmy who has been selected to represent the U12s Girls Broadwater District AFL team. Well done, Rem.

If you have any questions, please email the P&C.

During the early mornings, active play and late afternoons we have been travelling to the playground. The kids have been absolutely loving being outdoors, climbing and sliding on the playground every day. The flying fox is a popular attraction with a line-up that goes off the platform onto the bark!  OSHC educators have found that when we are at the playground, we are seeing children that may not usually play together having fun with each other, making up new games to play, sitting and chatting away on the roped spider web and even helping each other if someone gets stuck halfway on the flying fox.

The sandpit has also been super fun with the children using it for long jump practice and too also dig deep holes to sit in. It seems as though the playground and sandpit are the places to be if you want to create new friendships and have an incredibly fun time!

Tickets on sale now

Come along in your best fluro gear and leg warmers and join us at our 80’s Disco to be held on Thursday 29 April.

Whilst there might be the occasional moon walk, the majority of the music will still be that hip, cool and rad stuff the kids think is AWESOME!

Junior hipsters (Prep to Year 2) starts at 4.00pm and goes to 5.30pm with the Senior groovers (Year 3 to Year 6) starting at 6.00pm and finishing at 7.30pm.

Ticket sales now open on Flexischools and the footloose deadline to purchase your 80’s Disco tickets is Thursday April 22 at 4:00pm.

If, for any reason at all, you would like to attend the 80's Disco but can NOT meet the payment deadline, please email the P&C BEFORE the deadline and we will be able to assist. Unfortunately, once the deadline has passed no further tickets will be available.

PLEASE NOTE - Please take special notice of the information, on the flyer, around senior students NOT to be at junior disco and junior students NOT to be at the senior disco as well as the requirements for signing in and collecting students, as refusal on the night of the disco may offend.

Hot Cross Buns

Bakers Delight are offering our school families to purchase delicious Hot Cross Buns delievered to school for collection.

Not only will you receive mouth watering Easter Buns, but you will also be raising funds for our school with a percentage from every packet ordered being donated to our P&C.

Available to purchase is your choice of:

• Traditional
  
• Choc chip
  
• Apple and cinnamon
  

The price for a half dozen packet is $8.00.

Orders are open now on Flexischools and will close at 4pm Wednesday 24 March.

Orders will be delivered on Wednesday 31 March.

Please remember, if your child has changed class, to update your child's class on Flexischools.

This ensures all orders, including Cafe orders, are delivered on time to the correct classroom.

The Annual General Meeting of the Coomera Rivers State School P&C will be held on Tuesday 16 March at 6:00pm in Corporate Services.

A general meeting of the Association will be held directly after the AGM.