All College fees are now overdue.  

Statements will be sent over the next week. 

Payment is required for your student to continue having access to the apps, resources and texts that the College offers under the Student Resource Scheme. 

Students with outstanding fees may not be able to attend excursions or camps. 

Payment Plans are available! Either CentrePay or Direct Debit plans are accessible for all families. 

Do you receive Family Tax Benefit A or B from Centrelink? If so, you can nominate a fixed amount to be paid from your Family Tax Benefit directly to the College to cover your child's education costs. Please contact us via email to set up your payment plan: finance@foxwellssc.eq.edu.au

Thank you to all of those who have already completed the Parent/Caregiver Survey. If you have not had a chance to complete the survey yet, please note that the online surveys will now remain open until Friday, 6 August 2021. This is your opportunity to provide feedback about what our school does well and how we can improve.

To have your say, check your email for an invitation from the Department of Education titled School Opinion Survey for parents and caregivers, 2021.  Can’t find your invitation?  If your family has more than one parent/caregiver, check that they haven’t received the invitation and/or check your junk email folder.

As always, if there is something you believe the College needs to know in order to enhance what it is we do well or to improve, please let us know by either sending an email or contacting administration, who can direct you to the staff member or member of Executive who is best placed to action your feedback. You can find out more about the ways in which you can contribute to our College by accessing our Foxwell Parent and Community Framework. 

We have crunched our numbers and are excited to announce that there are still places available on our camp for next term.

If you would like your child to attend camp, please ensure that you return your permission form and pay your $30 deposit early next week.

It's going to be a great event...

Year 8 Students who did not attend the Year 9 2022 Information Night, don't forget to collect your Year 9 Handbook from the Student Services Counter. 

Develop a specific plan for every upcoming test and exam

Now that the Assessment Calendar has been released [Refer to last week’s bulletin and attached in this edition again, for your convenience], challenge your child when they tell you that they’ll just study hard for the test or exam.

That’s too vague, and they may not even know what that looks like yet and they may feel as if they’ve never prepared enough.

Instead, develop a plan. Write down what resources your child is going to use, how many practice questions they intend to do, how many times they plan to read the notes, what study tips they can put into practice, etc.

Write all the steps down on a sheet of paper and create a rough timeline as well.

When your child has completed everything on their plan, they’ll feel accomplished and know that they’re well prepared.

By always having a plan, children learn faster and will be more efficient in using their time..

Create a conducive environment at home for studying

If you haven’t done so already,and if you want your child to be an effective student, they will need to have the right environment to work in. Children need all the necessary materials, their iPad, stationery, paper and study tools. They will also need a suitable table and lighting. Select a place for your child to work that is quiet but still a place where you can monitor and support their progress.

If children want to be productive, and develop sustainable habits, they definitely shouldn’t study on their bed or in their room with the door shut!

Before your child starts work, eliminate all distractions

Take a moment and think about the distractions your child typically faces when they’re trying to study. Common ones include messages, notifications on their phone, social media, YouTube, books, and magazines.

Remove these distractions before children commence work. Put their phone in another room, and turn it to silent. Switch off all notifications on their iPad.

Consider what the impact is for your child of listening to music as they work and respond accordingly. For some children this increases focus whilst for others it poses a distraction.

Use a stopwatch or timer

When children want to be productive, use a timer to help them focus. Using a timer adds a sense of urgency and they can see an end in sight when they are feeling challenged. A timer helps develop stamina and encourages persistence.

Try setting your child up to work in blocks of 30 to 40 minutes, followed by a short break. It's also useful to set the timer for their breaks too, so that they don’t take a 45-minute break when you only intended for them to take a 10- minute break.

Double-check that children have completed all the homework that’s due the next day

Set a recurring reminder on their iPad so that they’ll do this every school day in the mid-afternoon.

This will prevent them from scrambling at the last minute or pulling an all-nighter just to get the tasks done.

Every day, review all the new information your child learned in school earlier that day

If children do not have explicit homework set by teachers, it does not mean that they have no homework!

A quick review of the day’s key concepts/skills should only take a child about 20 minutes. Doing this helps to ensure understanding, so children stay on top of the new material. It also aides in committing information to long term memory.

If children really can’t do this review on the same day, ensure they do it the following day while the information is still fresh in their mind.

Keep an ongoing list of the questions your child has about the class material

As children read over their notes or complete homework tasks encourage them to keep a list of the things they don’t understand and the questions they have. As soon as your child is able to, they should ask their teachers about the items on the list.

It would be a good routine to develop, for children to attend WIN time the following monring to seek answers to their questions before the school day even commences. Remember WIN time occurs in the Learning Hb from 8.00-8.35am each morning and again in the afternoon from 3.00-4.00pm.

If children do consistently seek support when they do not understand, they won’t need to spend so much time studying for tests and exams, because they will already understand the information.

Every school night, remind your child to pack their schoolbag for the following day

This way, children won’t have to scramble in the morning to pack.

Set a reminder on their phone/iPad or put a Post-It note on their desk to ensure that they do this every school night.

Create a checklist for the things your child needs to remember to bring to school, and put the checklist somewhere accessible.

Ensure your child is awake a little bit earlier each morning so they don’t have to rush

For most children, waking up 5 to 10 minutes earlier is enough to avoid the unnecessary stress of rushing in the morning.

When children rush, they often forget things – which means that their day doesn’t start well. So the aim is to have children go to bed early, get at least eight hours of sleep every night, and set an alarm so they wake up a bit earlier.

It is recommended that the alarm clock is put at the other end of the room, rather than on a bedside table so your child won’t be tempted to hit ‘snooze’, or switch it off and go back to sleep.

Every school night, children should select all the correct uniform items for the following dayand lay them out ready to go

Encourage your child to take their school uniform for the following day, and hang it somewhere easily accessible, like on the door knob of their room door.

Ensure that they have selected the correct uniform and that all items are either formal or sports. Mixing and matching sports uniform items with formal uniform items is not permitted.

Ensure the correct shoes and socks are set out – this seems to be the biggest stressor/excuse students use for being late to school, 'I couldnt find my...'

Don’t forget to ensure your child, has their school hat, sitting there ready to go also.

This only takes a few minutes in the evening, but makes the morning that much less stressful.

Conclusion

Encourage your child to take one step at a time in developing their organisational skills and study routines. Start by identifying with them which areas they need to work on, and then prioritise them.

Encourage your child to adopt one new habit in the coming week. Once they’re comfortable with that habit, adopt one more.

Remember that no one is perfect. Your child’s journey as a student – and in life, too – is always about progress, not perfection!

Help your child to start making progress toward becoming a better organised and more focused student today!

This year, Foxwell SSC was fortunate to enter 4 debating teams into the Gold Coast Debating Competition.  Our teams were comprised of Year 7 and 8 students in the Junior B section.  Students debated on the prepared topics: “Children should not have mobile phones”; “Marvel’s ‘Avengers’ are good role models” and “Every high school student should have to participate in at least one extra-curricular activity”.  Students were assigned either the affirmative or negative case to argue prior to the debate and must prepare their case. 

Once our prepared debates were complete, our teams then faced the challenge of two short preparation rounds.  In these rounds, students were assigned either the affirmative or negative case and provided with the topic at 4:00 pm and had 2 hours to prepare their whole case before they presented at 6:00 pm.  As you can imagine, this is a difficult proposition for anyone!  However our debaters were amazing and prepared cases on the topics: “School exams should be banned” and “The Tokyo Olympics should go ahead”.  They were polished and calm and outstanding examples of accomplishment and good sportsmanship for our College, their families and themselves. 

Foxwell 1 was fortunate to make it through to the Junior B finals held this Wednesday night where they debated the topic: “Schools should not sell junk food.”  Arguing the affirmative side, Foxwell 1 emerged victorious!  Our first debating team to make a final and our first debating winners.  Well done to Emerson, Vicky, Leili and Zack!

We are so very proud of all of our debating teams for their commitment, effort and wonderful examples of grace under pressure.  They have worked so hard throughout Semester 1 and into this Semester.  We would also like to thank the families and friends of our debaters.  Without their support in driving students to venues, watching debates, celebrating wins and consoling losses, our students would not have these amazing opportunities.  We would also like to thank the teacher who supported and trained our debating teams throughout Semester 1 – Ms Arndt, Ms Sinhola and Ms Goddaer – for their time and expertise in mentoring our young debaters.

Debating teams:

Foxwell 1 – Emerson Smith, Vicky Rowe, Leili Fayyaztoossi, Zack Tunstall

Foxwell 2 – Taliea George, Summer Taylor, Isabella Ikenasio, Kai Jesudason

Foxwell 3 – Isabella Faint, Amritha Ravipati, Jelena Uzelac, Marwa Osman

Foxwell 4 – Isabella Dagg, RJ McQueen, Erin Barletta

More students have assisted our debaters by helping out when we required an additional speaker due to illness or unforeseen circumstances, or a chairperson, timekeeper or fourth person for short prep debates. 

Thank you for your assistance during debating:  Aria Cook, Skyla Davies, Jai Repia, Tawhirimatea Witehira, Caitlyn De Reuck.

We hope to have more success with debating in 2022.  If you would like to know more about this, please contact Danielle Goddaer at dgodd2@eq.edu.au

Health Update from Lung Foundation Australia: Vaping Information

Lung Foundation Australia is the Australia's Peak Lung Health Advisory Body to the Australian Government's Department of Health. We are a not-for-profit organisation working to strengthen the lung health of all Australians and supporting those experiencing a lung disease. For more than 30 years, as a patient representative charity, we have partnered with patients, health professionals, researchers, medical organisations, and the community to drive reform in the delivery of health services to benefit the 7 million + Australians impacted by lung disease and lung cancer 

A priority area of interest is tobacco control, smoking cessation and over recent years e cigarettes and vaping. Central to creating strong respiratory health for all Australians is ensuring Australians are free from addiction to nicotine and other substances which may cause lung diseases. We have consistently advocated for laws to increase the age of access to tobacco and flavoured vaping products, and stronger regulations for the monitoring and enforcement of tobacco and vaping products,

Many schools and learning institutions have sought the Lung Foundation's assistance to address the rising number of young people vaping in schools.

In 2020 Lung Foundation Australia, in collaboration with Minderoo Foundation, commissioned Curtin University to research the chemical ingredients in 52 flavoured e-liquids for sale over the counter in Australia. This Australian first project found results which are deeply concerning:

• 100% of liquids tested had incomplete or an inaccurate ingredient list
• 100% of e-liquids had between 1-19 chemicals which have unknowneffects on respiratory health
• 21% of e-liquids contained nicotine (although it is illegal to sell e-liquids containing nicotine in all Australian states and territories)
• 62% of e-liquids studied contained chemicals likely to be toxic if vaped repeatedly. Toxicity increases through the vaping process.

We presented the results of this research at an the first ever Young People and Vaping Roundtable funded by nib Foundation in December 2020.

An immediate outcome of the roundtable was new school resources co-designed with young people, educators, school leaders, and parents. These resources and have been rigorously assessed, against available evidence, by a panel of leading respiratory physicians and adolescent health professionals. We certainly value your feedback on the usefulness of the resources and encourage you to widely circulate such within your school or professional communities. 

We are pleased to share four resources for distribution to within your community. The resources can be downloaded via our website, here and include:

• Vaping and Young People for Educators - https://lungfoundation.com.au/resources/vaping-and-young-people-for-educators/
• Vaping and Young People for Parents and Carers - https://lungfoundation.com.au/resources/vaping-and-young-people-parents-and-carers/
• Vaping and Young People for Young Adults 18-24 years - https://lungfoundation.com.au/resources/vaping-and-young-people-young-adults-age-18-24/
• Young and Young People for Youth 12 – 17 years - https://lungfoundation.com.au/resources/vaping-and-young-people-youth-age-12-17/

In early 2022 a new online training program for teachers and young people will also be released and will include personal, relational, environmental, and product-related factors that influence take-up and use of e-cigarettes, and potential associated health risks. The project aims to promote the adoption/maintenance of healthy behaviours by preventing the uptake of vaping and aiding cessation of use for existing vapers.

Broadwater Athletics

Good luck to the 40 plus students attending the Broadwater District athletics trials on Monday and Tuesday next week.

South Coast School Sport

Last weekend we had two students compete at the Qld State Championships in Soccer and Rugby Union. 

Rugby Union – Brigham Siteine

Brigham made the Rugby Union South Coast team. They came away with the Gold medal for the State Championships. Well done to Brigham and his team. It is great to see another student from Foxwell make a representative team.

Soccer – Tom Deegan

Well done to Tom and his South Coast team who competed at the QLD State Championships for the 12years South Coast Soccer team. They played in Toowoomba in classic Toowoomba weather (very cold conditions). Tom and his team also came home with the gold medal for these championships. Great work Tom.

Inter-School Sport

Congratulations to all students who competed in our first ever interschool sport competition.

The student’s feedback was that they enjoyed being able to go out and play sport against other schools and to also try new sports. We have a number of teams that have made it through to the next round.

Congratulations to:

Netball

Yr 7 Foxwell 3

Yr 8 Foxwell 1

Basketball

Yr 7/8 Girls Foxwell 1

Touch

Yr 8 Boys Foxwell A 

More information about Cross over finals for these teams will be known in the coming weeks.

Broadwater Trials

Students wishing to trial for Futsal (indoor soccer) at the Broadwater level should go and see Mr Taylor for a note and details of the trial.

The trial is open to boys and girls turning 13 or 14yrs old this year. Nominations for this close on the 10^th of August.

AFL

Kayden Newton - Winner of the goal kicking accuracy competition

Primary School Visits

Our Sporting Minds Students visited our neigbouring primary schools to assist with their Athletics Carnivals. 

If you would like to highlight yours or your students achievements, please email Mr Simon Taylor - stayl328@eq.edu.au

Mr Taylor. 

Throughout August, the National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA) will be facilitating Pathways to Post-School Life online meetings for students, parents, and carers in each education region.

The same session will be offered twice for students, parents, and carers in South East Qld.

Tuesday, 10^th August 3:30 – 4:30pm & Thursday, 26^th August 10 -11am

The session will cover:

• • • • • • • NDIS Access information
            • Employment supports funded by the NDIS
            • Community participation supports funded by the NDIS
            • Other supports that may be available
            • Opportunity to ask questions 

The session will be delivered via videoconference using Microsoft Teams and the link is provided below. There is no need to register in advance, simply click on the link below to join the meeting 5 mins before the scheduled start time.

If you would like any further information or support on how to participate in these meetings please contact Victoria Leadbeatter, Head of Inclusion on vlead1@eq.edu.au

The same link (below) will be used for both meetings.

Microsoft Teams meeting

Join on your computer or mobile app

Click here to join the meeting

The following mental health week resources are available for parents and carers in their support of our young people. 

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We are pleased to introduce our School Based Youth Health Nurses (SBYHN) team. For Term 4, we will have Joy Xavier and Annie Wainwright at Foxwell each week on Tuesday. 

Joy and Annie will be providing an outreach clinic focusing on our students' health and wellbeing. We look forward to Joy and Annie's contribution to supporting our students on their wellness journey. 

What is ICAS?
ICAS Assessments are online assessments, designed to recognise and reward academic excellence. The assessments provide students an opportunity to have their achievements recognised. The assessments are based on the curricula for the relevant year. Students are asked to demonstrate a deeper, integrated, and thorough level of learning. To ensure an engaging and beneficial experience for all students, new ICAS assessments are developed annually for each subject in every year level.

What are the benefits of participating in ICAS testing?
• Provide objective ranking of performance
• Encourage students to attain greater academic success
• Require students to think beyond the classroom
• Recognise student success through medals and certificates

When will ICAS testing occur?
Students participating in the ALP or G-Stem Excellence Programs, will be funded to participate in ONE ICAS test and the cost will be deducted from the program fees.

Subject Official Sitting Dates

Digital Technologies -  9th August – 13th August (specific date TBA)
English 16th August – 20th August (specific date TBA)
Science 23rd August – 27th August (specific date TBA)
Mathematics  30th August – 3rd September (specific date TBA)

Who can participate?
At Foxwell SSC, students in the Excellence Programs of G-STEM and our Advanced Learning Program [ALP] are expected to participate in ONE ICAS test, as above. The cost of a single test for these students is accounted for within the Excellence Program fee structure, no additional payment required. Should parents of Excellence Program students wish their child to participate in more than one test, it will be at their own expense.

Should students outside the Excellence Programs wish to participate in ICAS testing, the cost is $17.05 per test.  Please pay this at our Admin office.  Further information and permission forms are also attached to this newsletter for your convenience.

ICAS_Parent_Letter_and_permission_form.pdf

If you have any further questions, please contact our Head of Department, Teaching and Learning – Danielle Goddaer dgodd2@eq.edu.au.

ICAS_and_Reach_Parent_instructions_for_locked_down_browser.pdf