There is no such thing as 'winding down' for the term at Ben Venue. In this past fortnight, our Kinder gymnastics program concluded, ASC Acting Principal, Sarah Travis visited our Stage 3 classes to answer questions our students had about high school, our Stage 3 students also visited ASC to view the dress rehearsal of High School Musical, our debaters took on ACPS and Guyra CS, our athletics carnival events were completed, and our staff completed CPR and anaphylaxis response training for the safety of our students.

This week, we mark NAIDOC week, with a range of activities both in and out of the classroom across all stages, our girl and boy basketballers will compete at a gala day, our netball team will take on Nemingah PS, and our next group of Year 6 leaders will participate in community service, visiting a local aged care home.

NAIDOC Awards

Congratulations to Patrick Gordon, Olive Russell and Charlee Page, who were recognised for their achievements in either sport or academics at last week's AECG NAIDOC awards.

NAIDOC activities

Today marked the start of our NAIDOC celebrations and activities. Below is an outline of activities occurring throughout the week, in addition to classroom-based learning on the theme, Keep the Burning! Blak, Loud and Proud.

All week

Library lessons - Dreaming stories

ICT lessons - Digital artworks based on Dreaming stories

PE lessons - Aboriginal games

Monday 1 July

10:30 - Opening ceremony

Stage 1 classes making Johnny Cakes

Stage 2 classes (S2B & S2C) making Johnny Cakes

Stage 3 Aboriginal students participating in ‘Mad Proppa Deadly’ workshop

Tuesday 2 July

Cultural workshops with Dave Widders (Kindergarten, S1F, S1L, S1B)

Weaving workshops (S1F, S1S, S1L, S1B, S2S, S2Y)

Stage 3 Aboriginal students participating in ‘Mad Proppa Deadly’ workshop

Wednesday 3 July

Cultural workshop with Dave Widders (Stage 2, 3, S1M, S1S & S1C)

Weaving workshops (S2L, S2B, S2C, S2E, S3O, S3C, S3F & S3H)

Thursday 4 July

Kindergarten and Stage 2 classes making Johnny Cakes

Weaving workshops (S1C, S1M, S3W & S3P)

Friday 5 July

12:00 – Closing Ceremony with guest speakers Will and Hayley Green, followed by a free community BBQ – Families invited

Click here for a link to NAIDOC activities in the community these holidays.

Academic Reports

Semester 1 academic reports will be released to parents/carers this Thursday. They will be accessible in the School Bytes parent portal via the 'resources' tile. Copies will also be provided by email.

School Stream is out - School Bytes is in

School Stream will no longer be used by Ben Venue. Please ensure you now have access to School Bytes.

Click here for a guide on how to set up your parent account and link your children

To download the app, search for ‘School Bytes’ in your app store, or use these direct links for Apple or Android phones.

Illness and staff shortages

Everyone will be aware that the past weeks have been characterised by multiple waves of illness from a range of maladies (see our Health and Wellbeing Updates section). Our student and staff absence rate has been higher than normal and this has impacted teaching and learning programs in most stages. At Ben Venue, we consistently prioritise student learning and wellbeing, and make daily decisions relating to how best to allocate staff to minimise disruption to learning. When casual teachers are unavailable, we do this by drawing upon teachers in our learning support team and executive, cancelling collaboration and planning meetings, postponing teacher release and splitting classes when absolutely necessary.

With a number of our teachers suffering serious illnesses in recent weeks, the frequency of instances requiring classes to be split has increased. I thank our staff for their flexibility and willingness to forgo release and planning time, as well as accommodating students from other classes. I also thank families for the understanding that has been shown in challenging circumstances.

Nationally Consistent Collection of Data on school students with disability (NCCD)

Every year, all schools in Australia participate in the NCCD process, requiring schools to identify information about supports provided to students with disability. Information provided about students to the Australian Government for the NCCD includes:

year of schooling
category of disability: physical, cognitive, sensory or social/emotional
level of adjustment provided: support provided within quality differentiated teaching practice, supplementary, substantial or extensive.

Students are not individually identified. Our school will collect and submit this data early in Term 3. To find out more about the NCCD, view the fact sheet and/or letter linked below.

School Holidays

I wish all of our students an enjoyable winter break and hope that the two weeks provides respite from the recent spate of illness that has plagued many of our families.

We look forward to welcoming students back to school on Tuesday 23 July.

Cam Pryce

Principal

Kindergarten

A message from Early Stage 1