and Early Learning Centre

Email: office@burdekincc.com

2-12 Melbourne St, Ayr QLD 4807

Phone (07) 4783 5552 Fax (07) 47835926

Our new website is up and running!

www.bccollege.net.au

Wisdom &

Discipline for

Tomorrow’s Leaders

C

A

R

E

Courtesy

Attitude

Resilience

Excellence

Term 3 finishes

Friday 21st September

at 11am

Term 4

commences

Tuesday 9th October

Newsletter 12 — Thursday 30th August 2012

2013

College

enrolments now due!

From the Principal’s Desk

Andrew Evetts, Principal

The Blameshift Game Unfortunately it is part of human nature to try not to take responsibility for the nega-

tive things we do, and to ‘blameshift’ as quickly as possible when the

spotlight finds us out.

This reaction began in the Garden of Eden when God asked Adam why he had diso-

beyed God’s instruction. Adam blamed Eve (and even hinted it was God’s fault by mentioning that God had given

the woman to him!) and Eve blamed the serpent for tempting her.

Sadly neither took responsibility for the choices they had made, and their actions then led to their expulsion from

the Garden and cut the close relationship they had enjoyed with their Heavenly Father.

Over the years, I have experienced several instances where students and parents have failed to take responsibility

for their actions, and have attempted to absolve themselves of responsibility by blaming others—and the school has

been included in the blame game. If parents referred to the degree of influence a school has over a child’s life,

choices and actions, they would discover that it is less than 7%.

Of far greater influence to a child are their parent’s behaviours (they are a child’s first and most important role

models and greatly influence a child’s moral standards), their friends, and the amount and type of

televisions, gaming and dvd selections a child watches. These areas of input are of far greater significance than a

child’s input from a school.

Teachers are placed in a very difficult position where they are duty bound to report their observations of a child to

their parents. Our goal and hope is that parents will listen to our observations and act upon them in their own

home to assist their child to grow and develop into a mature, self-responsible adult.

However, without the support of parents, a teacher can do little to influence a child’s attitudes and

behaviours, other than set firm boundaries while in the classroom environment.

We hear much about school’s failing to stop bullying—the truth is that we cannot shadow and control every child

every moment of the day. When a child disobeys the school expectations, we can issue consequences and hope

that this may help train them to have a different response next time—but we can offer no

guarantees, because we do not control another's actions and choices.

We appreciate all those parents who have partnered with us to challenge, train and grow precious children into re-

sponsible adults. One vital part of that training includes teaching a child how to say sorry, to own their own behav-

iours and to challenge themselves to behave differently next time, especially when their behaviours have hurt an-

other. It is a slow process over many ears, and committed parents know that consistent boundaries and love are

the keys. May God bless you an strengthen you in the VERY IMPORTANT role of parenting.

Yours in Christ

The ELC corn is growing taller and taller! Come and check it out!

The ELC have new uniforms! Here is Ms Orchard, Mrs Wilson and

Ms Smallman in their new purple shirts.

MiniLit Program

Some of the students in grade one and two at BCC are involved in a program called MiniLit.

MiniLit stands for Meeting Initial Needs in Literacy. The MiniLit Early Literacy program has

been developed to provide a carefully sequenced and structured program of instruction for

small groups of children who may need a little extra support in the mechanics of learning to

read.

MiniLit incorporates the key elements of early reading programs including phonemic

awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary development and text comprehension. Mastery of

phonemic awareness and letter-sound correspondences equips students with the skills they

need to ‘crack the code’ of the English language and build up the repertoire of words that

they can read by sight. Research shows that fluency improves when students can read a large

number of words without the need to decode each word they encounter.

The MiniLit program adopts a sound-by-sound ‘synthetic’ approach to teaching beginning

reading skills. Students are taught to convert a letter or string of letters into sounds and then

to synthesise or blend these letter-sounds into words. In Level 1 the focus is on the key

phonemic awareness skills of blending and segmenting and the most common letter-sound

correspondences for all letters of the alphabet, as well as several commonly used digraphs.

These skills enable students to decode words with three phonemes. In Level 2 the students’

knowledge of phonic word attack skills is extended by introducing words with consonant

digraphs, beginning and final consonant blends, vowel and r-controlled digraphs and words

that contain the cvc+e rule. Students move from completing simple oral blending and

segmentation exercises to manipulating and transforming letters in words to make new

words. Formal sight word instruction and reading tasks continue through both levels.

MiniLit sessions are frequent, four times a week and involve 30 minutes of intensive

instruction in groups of four. Assessment procedures and tools are used to identify students

and monitor progress.

MiniLit embraces an approach known as Positive Teaching that employs applied behavioural

reinforcement theory to “catch students being good”. Positive teaching has been shown to be

extremely successful in achieving high rates of on-task behaviour during instructional periods.

BCC has introduced the MiniLit program this year and the students involved are progressing

well and enjoy these lessons.

Sandra Saunders

Teacher’s Aide

Friday afternoon interschool sports Each Friday afternoon Year 5, 6 and 7 students play team sports against the other schools in the

district. This term the boys play basketball and the girls play touch football.

Each Wednesday afternoon from 3.15pm to 4.15pm Mr Knight runs a training session for any

students wishing to improve their sporting skills. The sessions have provided extremely popular

with the students and their practice is certainly paying off. The basketball court at school is

very popular at the moment with everyone practicing their shooting skills at lunch breaks.

On Friday 17th August, the College BCC2 team thrashed East Ayr State School’s EASS4 team with

a score of 32 to 6. The game was even played on EASS’s home turf and our boys came home the

winners.

Team members were: Joshua Kaminski, Caleb O’Shea, Joshua Magatelli, Jake Butler, Cohen Smit,

absent from the photo were Bernie Poletto, Jessi Kennedy and captain Joel McKeough.

Well done boys!!

Here are some of the Year 3, 4, and 5’s with their insects from Term 2.

Science Day at the ELC

Here we are growing crystals on a piece

of string. Please ask us how we did this

as we’d love to tell you all about it!

Star Gazing Night with Rob Black from NQ Astronomy Tuesday 18th September 2012 6.30pm to 9pm We are very fortunate to have Rob Black, from NQ Astronomy visiting the College on Tuesday 18th September to help us view the wonders of the night sky through powerful telescopes. All students, parents, friends and relatives are invited to the star gazing night. Rob is providing his services and equipment for free however we are asking for a gold coin donation to assist with the continued operation of NQ Astronomy. Rob advises the section now boasts 10 telescopes - ranging from a dedicated Hydrogen Alpha Solar scope to a 13" Dobsonian. It will start at 6.30pm and finish around 9pm and will be held on the College oval. It is on the last Tuesday of Term 3. There will be a sausage sizzle and softdrinks for sale on the night. Rob will do a quick 15 - 20 minute introduction to the night using a Green Laser Pointer (which is registered with CASA as per Government Regulations). Red light torches only please - a few layers of red cellophane over the lens of a low power torch is adequate. No DOLPHIN style torches please as they're too powerful and can cause hassles with night vision. Rob will explain all this to the students at his visit to the College the week before. Astronomy Sessions for the students with Rob Black Rob will also be visiting the College on Monday 10th September to provide an astronomy session for the students prior to the stargazing night. Rob is accredited in doing Solar Activities with students - providing safe and educational views of the Sun through NQ Astronomy’s solar telescopes. Rob will provide class talks on Astronomy and answer all the questions the students may have about Astronomy and space in general. Rob is providing these sessions for free and we are extremely grateful for this wonderful opportunity. Rob Black was recently granted the title of North Qld Ambassador for the Charlie Bates Solar Astronomy Pro-ject. The Project is based in the USA, and Rob is the only person representing it in Australia. Rob was grant-ed the title due to his work in Education Outreach and experience in Solar work.

Healthy Food Shack

Special Wednesday 5th September

Spaghetti Bolognaise $2

Dear Mums and Dads

Thank you so very much for all the help you provided with the interschool sports

canteen. I sincerely appreciate all the cooking, baking, bbq’ing, setting up,

packing up, bagging of lollies, brewing of coffee and serving our many customers,

that you all did with smiles on your faces. It was a very successful day and the

BCC have received numerous positive remarks from the community. Please

accept this as my heartfelt thanks as the day would not have happened without you.

Raelene Agius, Healthy Food Shack Convenor

Reminders

Permission Slips to be returned

1. Walkathon

2013 Enrolments Enrolment Forms for 2013 are now due. Mr Evetts is in the process of

working out class sizes and the number of teachers required for 2013.

ALL current students are required to have a new enrolment form

completed and returned to the office by the end of Term 3.

Woolies Earn and Learn

has finished!

The sticker card have all been

submitted and we reached a total

of 1731 sticker cards which means

we collected 51, 930 stickers!!

Has anyone bought a

school hat from Best and

Less recently? Can you

please let Fiona in the

office know if you have.

Coles Sports for School vouchers

The Coles vouchers have now finished

and Fiona is in the process of counting

them ready to send away for the

validation and redemption process. We

will let you know what the total is next

newsletter.

Dates for your Calendar

6th September—QCATS for Year 4 and Year 6 students

12th September—Prep Open Day—9am to 11am

13th September—QCATS for Year 4 and Year 6 students

18th September—Astronomy and Stargazing Night with Rob Black at BCC

19th September– Prep Information Night for parents—6pm to 7pm

20th September—BCC Walkathon

20th September—QCATS for Year 4 and Year 6 students

21st September—End of Term 3—School finishes at 11am

9th October—First day for students—Term 4

20th October—BCC Family Fair

26th October—Day for Daniel

2nd November—Fancy Dress Disco—ELC and BCC

12th & 13th November—Penelope Gilbert-Ng—Pastel Workshop with the students

17th October—14th November—swimming lessons

21st November—Swimming Carnival

Coles has Cokes,

Fanta,

Lemonade, etc

on special this

week

24 for $15

2 x 24’s $32

3 x 24’s for $45

Pizza Party Update Current Can Count

Prep - 2.2 cans per child

Year 1 - 3.4 cans per child

Year 2 - 3.3 cans per child

Year 3/4 - 1.4 cans per child

Year 5 - 0 cans per child

Year 6/7 - 1.7 cans per child

Inaugural B & C Schools Athletics Carnival

Last Wednesday the entire College community headed over to East Ayr State School for the first B & C

Schools Athletics Carnival. Thank you to all the parents, especially Raelene Agius, for helping out with

the catering. Those smoko plates are fast gaining a reputation and were the first things to sell out once

again!!

There were 12 schools competing and organising such a day was a mammoth task. Well done to Brooke

Stocker, Lisa Bello and our very own Ray Caine.

We have been advised that ribbons for running events were not handed out on the day so they will be

collected by Mr Knight at the District Athletics Carnival being held this Friday 31st August. They will be

distributed at school next week.

Shield Winners

Average

1st Place—Gumlu State School—17.50 points

2nd Place—Jarvisfield State School—17.11 points

3rd Place—Millaroo State School—17.00 points

Aggregate Points

1st Place—St Colman’s—740 points

2nd Place—Giru State School—731 points

3rd Place—Burdekin Christian College—651 points

Students who are going on to represent the B & C Schools at this Friday’s district sports day are:

Jake Butler—long jump, 100 metres, high jump, shot put, 200 metres

Corey Catanzaro—200 metres, long jump, high jump

Joel Catanzaro—shot put

Westley Darwen—shot put

Abigail Evetts—800 metres

Chiara Ferrando—long jump, 100 metres, high jump, shot put

Ryan Holm—shot put, long jump, 800 metres

Jessiah McIvor—high jump

Ryan Pedron—high jump, shot put

Alistair Pegg—200 metres, 800 metres

Ruby-Royal Pegg—high jump, 800 metres

Charlotte Piva—shot put

Bernie Poletto—high jump

Jenna Power—200 metres

Ben Sutherland—shot put

Well done students and Good Luck on Friday at the districts!!

Congratulations to our two age champions

Jake Butler and Chiara Ferrando!

Kindy/Pre Prep

Jayne Orchard,

Director & Group Leader

ELC Sports Day On the 9th of August we had our Sports Day. We had a great time. Mr and Mrs Christie, Drea’s Grandparents played the bagpipes for the March Past. We then we did some sporting activi-ties just like the real Olympics. We did Long Jump, Bean Bag Throw, Running Races and then Egg and Spoon Races. After that we had a Tug-O-War. That was a lot of fun. After all that we had shared some lovely food that the parents brought in and then we had a sausage sizzle. Thank you to all the children, their parents and grandparents who made this day special. I’d like to thank all the staff for their 110% input as well. A special thank you to Bill and Agnes Christie who played the bagpipes to make it an extra special day. Bill also doubled up and cooked the sausages on the BBQ. Science lessons at the ELC Last Friday we had two science experiments – making rainbows using milk, food colouring and dish soap and making crystals using water, salt and string. On the Monday we checked the crystals and guess what, crystals have formed on the string! The children looked at the crys-tals through a microscope. They described them as shiny, beautiful, sparkly and square shaped. Check out the photos later on in the newsletter. Library Our library day has been changed to Tuesday at 10.30am for the Pre-prep children. They will need a library bag. Please don’t forget to return the books each week so the children may borrow new books.

Please ….

1. Check children’s hair for head lice and treat if necessary

2. name items sent with your child’s name so that we can return them to the rightful owner.

3. provide us with your (and your child’s) CRN numbers and date of birth to put in the enrol-

ment. Without these details the Child Care Benefit (CCB) is unable to be processed

4. provide us with your child’s updated immunisation details if applicable

5. please check in the lost property box for your children’s belongings. Next Friday we are

going to donate any items left in the box St Vinnnies.

Vacancies

We can now take 24 children in the Kindy room, so we have a couple of vacancies now on Mon-

day, Tuesday and Friday.

ELC

Toni Smallman, Group Leader

Toddlers

During the last couple of weeks, we have had lots of fun. On the 17th August we had our annual Sports Day. We had a march past follow-ing Mr & Mrs Christie as they played the bagpipes. We enjoyed that. We did some running races and a bean bag toss. The most fun was the long jump into the sandpit and the tug-a-rope with our parents. We had a sausage sizzle and fruit for lunch. We went to have our sleep after lunch as we were very tired. We all had a great day. We have been busy doing our gifts for dad for Father’s Day. We hope you like what we are making for you. We have been singing and doing the actions to “Incy Wincy Spider”, “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” and “Open Shut Them”. The children are getting really good at these. Please remember to clearly name all your child’s belongings so that we can return them if they are left at the Centre. And please check your communication pocket regularly.

The ELC held their annual Sports Day on Friday 17th Au-

gust. The morning started with a march past led by Mr

& Mrs Christie who played the bagpipes and then the

children competed in running races, beanbag toss and

longjump into the sandpit. The morning was finished off

wonderfully with a sausage sizzle followed by fruit.

School Holiday Pottery Classes

The Burdekin Potters are once again running their pottery and screen printing classes in the school holidays.

The classes will have a Christmas theme.

Classes will be run at the Burdekin Potters shed at 5 Kennedy Street, Ayr on the following days:

Tuesday 25th September

Tuesday 2nd October

Thursday 27th September

Thursday 4th October

Screen Printing classes will be run on:

Wednesday 26th September

Wednesday 3rd October

Please phone Carolyn for bookings on 4783 1050 or mobile 0439 704 713.

______________________________________________________________________________________

Future Leaders Eco Challenge

On the 28th August, four BCC students and Mr Evetts joined fellow Eco Challenge

students at Maidavale State School for a day of activities based on environmental The

theme of the 2012 Future Leaders Eco Challenges is The Inshore Great Barrier Reef –

Bursting with Biodiversity. BCC is a Reef Guardian School.

Caleb O’Shea, Harper Darwen, Cohen Smit and Joshua Magatelli spent the day learning

about:

How to draw scientific drawings for Biological Courses

Creating their own worm farm from sugar can mulch

How to identify and conserve the sea turtle

Backyard biodiversity - invertebrate collection and

identification

Salvinia, weevils and water quality monitoring

Reef conservation, education and participation by

Reef HQ

Meet the Team Andrew Evetts—Principal

Jocelyn Lovelady—Prep Teacher Heather Mackay—Year 1 & Year 3/4 Teacher

Fleur Vigerzi—Year 1 Teacher Natalie Porchun—Year 2 Teacher Ezet Snyman— Year 3/4 Teacher Chris Knight —Year 6/7 Teacher

Judy Kedar—Year 5 Teacher Sandra Fowler—Year 5 Teacher Ray Caine— IT & H&PE Teacher

Wally Ford—Music Teacher Donna Higginson—Teacher/Librarian

Kim Smith—Teachers Aide & Library Assistant Leeza Goon-Chew—Teachers Aide Sandra Saunders—Teachers Aide

Ronda Downs—Prep Teachers Aide Audrey Heppell—Teachers Aide

Joanna Ford—Learning Support Teachers Aide Jayne Orchard—Director and Team Leader—ELC

Toni Smallman—Team Leader—ELC Gessie Wilson—ELC

Natasha Patterson—ELC Raywin Mayor—ELC

Jill Sutcliffe—ELC Cheryl Taylor—ELC

Rob Harper—Groundskeeper Bronson Hutchen—Groundskeeper

Jackie Gudge—Cleaner Zilya Bunakova—Cleaner