Term 2, Week 8 12 June 2026

From the Principal

Hi Everyone,

Firstly, our Chamber Strings are through to the next round of FANFARE!!!! Congratulations!!! How amazing!!!!!!! Well done to our other Strings groups and Band, they are so impressive and have come so far too. Chamber Strings have their next Fanfare Round on Wednesday the 24th of June.

Thank you to everybody who came to our P&C AGM this week. Congratulations and massive thank you to our new President, Mr Mitchell Page and our new OSHC Vice President Ms Kirstin Isaccs.

We are thrilled that these volunteers have stepped forward and our P&C can keep functioning for now but to continue long-term, we need a SECRETARY and TREASURER - PLEASE CONSIDER STEPPING UP!!

Thank you so much to our outgoing P&C Executive Mrs Phoebe Anderson, Mr Michael Archbold and Mr Matt Chung. Below is the list of things that have been achieved under their leadership in 2025 and the first half of 2026. We are so grateful for everything they've done. Thank you also to all the people who regularly attend meetings or volunteer to help when needed.

Events:

Family Picnic
Swim Club (Term 1 + Term 4)
Election Day BBQ
Mother's Day Stall
⁠Father's Day Movie Night
International Breakfast

Donations:

$5000 Prep Playground Equipment
$10000 Mulch
⁠$50000 Writers Toolbox
$25000 Teachers Wellness Program
$1000 For disadvantaged children
$2500 World Teachers Day
$2000 Graduation party
⁠$150 Ice blocks for end of term 1 and 3
$300 Father's Day BBQ food items
$25000 Water refill stations
⁠$40000 Shade sails
$30000 Shaded seating areas

Other Achievements:

Business review and knowledge base and handover structures created.

Being Considered:

Historic Signs
Covered walkways
- between hall and prep
- between hall and m-block
Beautification project (murals, artwork, painting)
Bike racks
Prep natural playground
Fence upgrade to enable renting of tennis courts

The Senior Athletics Carnival was just fantastic! I was so worried about the weather, but we pulled through. The spirit was alive and well on the day and I think the House Spirit Day that the Student Council put on the week before really helped but also, our House Captains are just wonderful leaders! We got to witness some amazing athletic feats on the day, and it was great to see so much participation. Thank you so much to Mr Nathan Reardon and for organising this important event and to all our staff who helped. We don’t know who the winning house was yet - watch this space! We have the Junior Athletics Carnival coming up next week on Thursday and I'm sure it is going to be another great day.

Our Ironside State School Chess Team did so well at their competition this week. Thank you so much to Mr Tim Shepard and Mr Neil Malcolm for coaching them.

Congratulations to all our 4-6 Merit Award recipients on assembly this week, we are so proud of you.

The performance by the Senior Strings at assembly was so impressive. Thank you so much to them as well as Mrs Trudy Weekes. Next week is our STAR Assembly and we will get to hear our Year 3&4 and Year 5&6 Choirs which is very exciting. We will be able to hear a lot more where that came from when our instrumental music students, as well as our choirs, perform for us at the Soiree's on Tuesday night. I look forward to this enormously.

We also were able to congratulate a dedicated group of students who were awarded their Life Member Badges for completing Level 3 of the Library Monitors Program, what incredible, dedicated volunteers!! Thank you to these children.

I thought I would pop back in the Celebration of Learning Timetable which is coming up in Week 10 on Tuesday for Year 3 and Thursday for the rest of the school. If you look below, you will see exactly what time your child's year level is holding their celebration.

Tuesday
Year 3 (all specialists on Thursday)	2:30pm - 3pm

Thursday
Prep	8:30am - 9am
Year 6	10am - 10:30am
Year 4	11:30 - 12pm
Year 5	12:30pm - 1pm
Year 2	2pm - 2:30pm
Year 1	2:30pm - 3pm

By now you should have received the NAIDIOC letter, if you haven’t, please let us know. The cost is $7 and you only need to let us know if you don't want your child to attend. I know that the performance and NAIDOC in general will be amazing.

I thought I would pop back in our Containers for Change number as well. We only received such a small amount of money from donations last time through the scheme to inside that I thought a reminder might get people pushing their donation towards our school.

I mentioned in earlier newsletters that I would pop the occasional podcast for you to listen to and I've done so again in our parent section of this newsletter. This podcast is about mathematics and various components of it. I think you'll find it interesting. We are focusing on the implementation of the Australian Curriculum Version 9 mathematics this year. One of the things I want parents to become all cognisant of is the need to have all our children know their number facts automatically. They should be able to recite them using the click test. That is the aim, that you can ask them an addition or subtraction fact or a multiplication or division fact and they can recall it immediately. Of course, this is scope and sequenced and age-appropriate, children must only learn a certain amount of them each year. What is important is that they're practising this skill. I know that over the decades there has been some suggestion that knowing these things is not important, due to advances like calculators and the Internet etc. That is simply not true. It is vital that children have these building blocks to become not just outstanding mathematicians but also people who can use maths in their everyday life successfully, which everyone needs to be able to do. Please encourage your children to practise their addition and subtraction facts and multiplication tables and division turnarounds.

I will end by welcoming a staff member Ms Oktolita Elsanadia. Ms Elsa is finalising the set-up and running of our Resource Room which is incredibly important because resourcing in schools is fundamental in assisting children to learn successfully and to assist teachers to teach effectively. Very big welcome to her!

I cannot believe we've only got 2 weeks left of this term.

Have a wonderful week.

Servabo Fidem

Keep the Faith

Angie Kelly

HPE News