Term 1 Week 6 2025
- Principal's News by Ange Padgett
- Team Mango We All Belong!
- Prep News by Mieke Munko
- Year 1 News by Evan Barrett
- Year 2 News by Jessica Burnett
- Year 3 News by Kris Olsen
- Year 4 News by Barbara Cornford
- Year 5 News by Greg McCallum
- Year 6 News by Danielle Price
- Curriculum News
- Sporting News by The PE Department
- Community News
I’m so proud of the efforts of our students and the care they are showing others, themselves, their learning and the environment. We couldn’t have asked for a better start to the 2025 year. We’ve seen improvements in many areas. A huge congratulations to students for using strategies to assist when solving problems or dealing with frustrations. The January/February behaviour incidents, when compared to 2024, have significantly reduced, resulting in teachers being able to spend more time on learning conversations rather than management conversations. We are proud of our students and our teachers for all the hard work done in this area. We are aware that this improvement only occurs when we all work together. Thank you also to our parents/carers for working in partnership with us.
The school has also already seen an improvement with increased student attendance. Maximising learning leads to improved academic outcomes, solid friendships and a reduction in anxiety for our students. Our school-wide attendance data is over 93%. Let’s keep it up!
The P&C AGM will also be held on Monday 10 March at 6.30pm, followed by our regular monthly P&C meeting. Executive positions will be declared vacant and voting will occur for 2025 executive positions. I would like to extend my thanks to Amy S for her unrelenting support of our school. Amy will be standing down as she embarks on her own career in teaching. Amy has always been supportive of our school, staff and students. She has been a pleasure to work alongside. Thank you also to Belinda for her work and assistance in the secretary role. Belinda has also been extremely responsive to our school needs. Thank you to Phoebe for assisting with the book work. Thank you to Mel for her ongoing assistance. Lastly thank you to all 2024 P&C members for your assistance in helping our school. The P&C partners with the school to fundraise and promote community school events.
Annual General Meeting (AGM) is being held on Monday 10 March 2025 at 6:30pm in Wandani
What is an AGM?
The AGM is a meeting where P&C members attend to review the previous year’s activities and finances, discuss matters related to the school community, and elect a new executive committee for the year.
What is an executive committee?
The executive committee are volunteers (usually parents of students) and consist of a:
President – acts as a representative of the P&C Association; encourages communication between the P&C, the school administration, and the community; encourages participation of parents in the P&C and P&C-related activities
Vice President – acts as an understudy of the President; provides support to all executives
Treasurer – has financial management responsibility for the P&C, including all subcommittee accounts
Secretary – collates agenda papers; prepares and presents minutes for each meeting; manages all correspondence.
Anyone can nominate for these positions, however there is an expectation that the person nominated holds the position for the full year, until the next AGM is held, where nominations are held for the next executive committee. Executive committee members can be re-nominated the following year if they choose to stand again.
Who can attend an AGM and what is P&C membership?
The AGM and all monthly P&C meetings are open to all parents and carers. There is, however, no obligation, as a general member, to attend every month. You will receive the minutes via email and can contribute via email correspondence if you are unable to attend.
Members are parents and carers within the school community who give a voice to the school community, while working in partnership with the school. There is no financial membership, and all activities are voluntary. Being a member of the P&C is a great way to gain a better understanding of what is happening within the school community, provide feedback and advice on school policies and activities, and meet new parents and carers.
If you'd like further information about P&Cs, please have a click on the following links P&C Queensland or Queensland Education
We would love to see you all there.
NAPLAN
NAPLAN commences in Week 7. Students will be busy undertaking numerous assessments over a two-week period. During this time, we aim to keep interruptions to a minimum. Please refrain from picking students up early unless absolutely necessary. If you are aware of any upcoming appointments, please communicate these with your child’s class teacher as soon as possible. We thank you for your anticipated understanding. If you have a child in Year 3 and Year 5, please reassure them that NAPLAN isn’t something to feel anxious about. Students just need to try their best! Please ensure students have had a great night’s sleep and a hearty breakfast.
Parent Teacher Interviews
Next week you will receive an email from the school with instructions on how to book in for our upcoming parent teacher interviews. Interviews will be held over a four-week window including the last two weeks of Term 1 and the first two weeks of Term 2. Each teacher will choose dates and times depending on when they are ready to share assessment results and other information.
We encourage you to book a place so you can discuss your child’s learning, social and emotional progress and engagement. If your child has a personalised learning record, updates from this can be shared as well.
Hearing Awareness Week is from 1 to 7 March.
It is an annual event that highlights the issues affecting Australians living with hearing loss.
Did you know 3.5 million Australians aged 15 and over, which represents 22% of its population, have mild to severe hearing issues? An average of one in six Australians have a hearing disability. The week aims to spread awareness about the positive impact of looking after our hearing health, which contributes to our quality of life, social engagement, career, confidence, and communication.
In Australia, World Hearing Day 3 March 2025, is during Hearing Awareness Week.
Key messages for 2025 from World Health Organisation:
- By 2030, over 500 million people are expected to have disabling hearing loss requiring rehabilitation.
- Over one billion young people face the risk of permanent hearing loss due to prolonged exposure to loud sounds during recreational pastimes such as listening to music and video gameplay.
- How we hear in the future depends on how we care for our ears today as many cases of hearing loss can be avoided through the adoption of safe listening and good hearing care practices. For those living with hearing loss, early identification and access to timely rehabilitation are essential to achieving their highest potential.
- You can take steps today to ensure good hearing health throughout life.
2025 Parent and Carer Sessions
As we plan our upcoming parent/carer sessions, we want to hear from our community. Please complete the below the survey link.
We value your input and look forward to bringing you relevant content throughout the 2025 school year.
School Photos Timetable
Our annual School Photos will be on Wednesday 26, Thursday 27, Friday 28 March. All students must wear their formal uniform. Please see below for your child's allocated day.
Date claimers
For this week (refer to the term overview for exact dates, times and locations on our website)
Week 7 – School Tour, Year 1 & 2 swimming, NAPLAN, Playgroup
Ange Padgett
Principal
apadg6@eq.edu.au
Care Class and Focus of the Week
This week in Care Class we will be focusing on Care for Learning by showing resilience when completing assessments. Resilience is generally regarded as the ability to cope with and bounce back after adversity. This can extend from day-to-day challenges through to life changing events. Being resilient doesn’t mean not finding things difficult or not getting upset. It means being able to deal with things that are difficult and move on. We will also discuss stress and reflect on ourselves as learners.
Learning, Walks and Talks
Some of our Prep classes recently hosted ‘learning walks and talks.’ This involves members of the Prep and Leadership team going into classrooms and talking to the students about their learning. Children were asked questions including what are you learning, how are you going, how do you know, what’s your next step and where do you get help? The visitors were very impressed at the way our Prep learners talked about their work including describing the big purpose – sharing ideas about stories with others.
Playgroup
There is no playgroup for our pre-Prep friends this week. This is in line with our department guidelines about minimising unnecessary travel during this time. We look forward to seeing our playgroup friends again on Friday 14 March.
Mieke Munko
Deputy Principal-Prep
mmunk1@eq.edu.au
Attendance is vital in Year 1!
Did you know? Research shows that in Queensland, higher student attendance at school is associated, on average, with higher student achievement.
Why is regular attendance at school important?
Regular school attendance will mean that your child gets a better chance at life. Your child will achieve better when they go to school all day, every school day:
- they learn better
- they make friends
- they are happier
- they have a brighter future.
A set routine can help
- have a set time to go to bed
- have a set time to get out of bed
- have uniform and school bag ready the night before
- have a set time for starting and finishing breakfast
- set a time for daily homework activities
- speak about school positively
- be firm, send your child to school every school day including their birthday and the last day of term!
If your child is unwell, they should stay home and rest. Please notify the office if your child is away or respond to the SMS you will receive if they are absent without explanation. If your child is well, please make sure they are at school so we can keep on learning! I will reach out to any families with children lower than expected attendance rates, this is to offer any supports that might be needed, and work together to achieve regular school attendance.
Evan Barrett
Deputy Principal –Year 1
ebmcf0@eq.edu.au
At Mango Hill State School, we use the HIGH 5 strategy to help solve problems. Students learn to use the five steps to Care for Self when they are experiencing unwanted interactions from others. Students are aware that while it may be appropriate to work through each of the five steps in some occasions, on other occasions it is appropriate to skip straight to ‘Report’ and seek out a staff member on duty wearing a fluro vest. Please talk with your child at home about the HIGH 5 strategy and practise using each of these steps.
Maths – Location Focus
In Week 6 we began a new Maths unit. The big purpose of our new unit is to use maps and directions to locate features. We will practise using directional language to find points of interest. You can help at home by talking about left and right, discussing directions when travelling, and having your child give you directions to move around the house (e.g., “Take 3 steps left, 2 steps forward, 4 steps right”).
English – Speaking Practise
In English we are working on our speaking skills, such as tone, volume and pace. You can support your child by discussing these elements during story time or when sharing about your day. Encourage your child to practice these skills when telling you about their day.
Year 2 Swimming
It has been wonderful seeing our students enjoying swimming and practising safe water skills. Please ensure your child arrives on time and is prepared with their swimming gear on their allocated day to avoid missing the bus. The final swimming lesson will be in Week 10.
Before and After School Routines
Please remind your child where to wait before and after school.
- Before school: Students should wait in the Junior Undercover Area. There is light supervision from 8:00 am, and you are also welcome to wait with them until the 8:15 am bell. On the bell, you can encourage your child to walk independently to their classroom where their teacher will be waiting for them.
After school: Please do not wait outside of classrooms as this is distracting for our students who are still learning. You may wait in the Junior Undercover Area until the bell rings. After the bell, students waiting for older siblings should wait in the sibling pick up area (near the uniform shop). If you're waiting with your child for their older sibling, please wait in the Piazza and supervise them closely. Children should not be playing or running around, and should not be present in the Piazza without parent supervision. There are no ball games permitted in the piazza.
Wishing everyone a safe Week 6!
Jessica Burnett
Deputy Principal- Year 2
jburn289@eq.edu.au
Care for Self
Last Friday, during our Care Class lesson, students focused on the important concept of Care for Self, with an emphasis on creating Ready Plans. Each student worked on developing their own personalised Ready Plan, selecting strategies that will help them manage co-regulation both in and out of the classroom.
As part of our Team Mango way to wellbeing, students who consistently demonstrate the Four Cares—Caring for Self, Caring for Others, Caring for Learning, and Caring for the Environment— can earn Golden Tickets. These tickets are entered into a weekly draw, giving students a chance to win a fantastic prize.
This week, three standout students not only demonstrated these core values but had their names drawn during our virtual parade, earning themselves a well-deserved prize and a Care for Self sticker on their Sole Sticker Chart. They're one step closer to becoming Care Champions!
Skipping into Year 3
This term in PE, our students are diving into the Criss Cross skipping unit, where they are honing their fundamental movement skills and applying creative strategies to tackle movement challenges. Over the past few weeks, we’ve seen remarkable progress, with many students showing resilience and a growth mindset as they significantly improve in this challenging movement concept.
Criss Cross skipping is a skill that can easily be practiced outside the classroom—whether in the backyard, at the park, or almost anywhere. It’s a perfect example of the old saying, “practice makes perfect,” and our students are proving just that as they continue to develop their skills with each session.
Deputy Principal
Week 6 update
How quickly has the middle of the term come upon us! Students are very engaged in their various units of work from giving speeches, giving peer feedback on the speeches, making complex symmetrical patterns with at times various rotational axis and even looking after worms and observing decomposition….. It is great to see how engaged they are in every aspect of learning they are exposed to. I can already see them growing into Year 4 students – sounds funny to say that, but they are no longer the Year 3 students they were at the start of the year.
Photos below are of 4E’s Science wall and decomposition with the help of worms.
These next photos show students in 4E and 4B working on their English Unit. They are working collaboratively in groups identifying topic specific vocabulary such as characters, plot, visual and sound effects from the short film they had watched. Students are also working in pairs practising delivering their presentation. When practising, they are learning how to best use elements such as expression, pace and engaging the audience with eye contact.
Talking about the great learning happening in classes, the topics being studied and the amount of teaching and learning which has already been completed and which still students still need to be exposed to this term, it makes the following topic so important and that is attendance.
While teachers will always work to ‘catch students up’ following absences, it is never the same as, in time explicit teaching, exposure to concepts and time to practice.
Below is a bit of a snapshot of Year 4 attendance for the first six weeks of this term.
Barbara Cornford
Deputy Principal –Year 4
bcorn3@eq.edu.au
Educational Achievement
In Maths, students have been working on applying their knowledge and skills of transformations in unfamiliar context. This task included students making a new logo for the ‘Metro Strikers’ soccer team. The logo needed to include a design that was visually balanced and dynamic, using a combination of reflections, translations and rotations.Attached is an example from 5G, I think you would agree the new design is a much improved result from the original logo.
In English students have continued their work on developing their narrative writing while also investigating what makes a narrative enjoyable to read.
5E has explored a range of language features that make a narrative more interesting including onomatopoeias, hyperboles, idioms, verb groups, similes, metaphors and personification. I can’t wait to read your finished narratives 5E!
Have a great week and stay safe.
Greg McCallum
Deputy Principal- Year 5
gmcca24@eq.edu.au
Statistical Investigations in Year 6!
This week, our Year 6 students have started discussing data sets and critiquing claims presented in advertisements based on statistics. Some of the key terms students have been understanding is discrete and continuous data, distributions, interpreting, comparative displays and variables. Some ways you can support at home are discussing different representations of data in newspapers or on the news and discussing what they represent.
Playtimes
Our Year 6 students have been having lots of fun during their play breaks. Lots of students attend the different clubs throughout the week. Each of the teachers share the different play areas our students can go to before each breaktime. Check out the club roster below for our Years 4-6 students.
Danielle Price
Deputy Principal- Year 6
dxobr0@eq.edu.au
What’s happening in Maths
This term, students from Prep to Year 6 have been engaging in real-world statistical investigations. Through these investigations, students have been collecting, representing, interpreting and comparing data.
Future Science
Ms O’Connor is thrilled to announce the commencement of our Future Science program. This program is for some of our pre-selected Year 6 students, focusing on Chemical Reactions! This exciting initiative is a collaboration between our school and Mango Hill Secondary College, offering students a unique opportunity to deepen their understanding of chemistry in a hands-on and engaging way.
Throughout the term, students will explore a range of chemical reactions, investigating how substances interact and change. They will conduct experiments, observe results, and communicate their findings using scientific language, just like real scientists!
This program is designed to extend and challenge students with a passion for Science, preparing them for future STEM learning. We look forward to seeing our young scientists in action as they experiment, analyse, and discover the wonders of chemistry!
Year 3 and 5
NAPLAN Key Dates:
- NAPLAN practice for Years 3 & 5 Wednesday 5 March
- NAPLAN 12 - 24 March
Library
The library needs your help! If you have an hour to spare on Monday 10 March, between 8:30am-12:30pm, please drop in and help us cover some new books and student resources. Thank you for your support!
Have a fantastic week
Rachael Beard & Marissa Krosman - HODs
Physical Education News
Pine Rivers Interschool Sport - PRIS (Year 5-6)
Nominations are now closed for students wanting to participate in PRIS. Invoices will now be forwarded to those students who have returned their consent form. A payment of $36.00 is due by Week 7, Friday 14 March 2025. This covers all competition costs. There will be no partial refunds if one or more sessions are missed.
MHSS Cross Country (Year 3 - 6)
On Monday 31 March 2025 (Term 1, Week 10) the Mango Hill State School Years 3-6 Senior Cross Country will be run. Attached is the timetable (please note there are 2 pages) and map for the day. Students will be instructed during PE lessons of their course and will also complete a walk through prior to the day.
All students from Year 3 to Year 6 will be running their cross country course. Students have different distances for their races (see below). The course is colour coded with markers, so depending on their race distance, students follow different marker colours (this is also on the map attached).
Students who place in the top 3 for their race will receive ribbons on the podiums straight after their race. For each event students accrue house points that go towards the Cross Country House Championship. Each event has the following points:
Therefore, each student that participates in an event will receive at least one point for their house. We strongly encourage all students to participate in the cross country, however if your child cannot complete the course due to injury or illness can you please inform their class teacher.
On the day, students will still assemble in class as per normal at 8.30am. They will then come to the oval with their class (at their designated time as per the attachment). Some frequently asked questions have been answered below:
- My son/daughter is in Year 4. Do they run in the Morning or Middle session? For sporting events students compete according to their ‘Year of Birth’ not their grade level. Therefore, if your son/daughter is born in 2015 - they will run in the morning and if your son/daughter is born in 2016 – they will run in the middle session.
- What do students wear? – Hats must be worn to the oval but students are allowed to complete the course without their hats on (sunscreen is provided and all students must put their hat back on immediately following the race). Normal sports uniform shirt is to be worn (no house coloured shirts). Normal sports uniform shorts can be worn and students are permitted to wear running shorts/skins during the race.
- Do students have to wear shoes? – Yes, closed in footwear must be worn. Students are permitted to wear running shoes (no spikes) during the race but must change back into normal school footwear post-race.
- What do students need to take to the oval? – Students must take their hat, water bottle and brain break (if running in the morning session) to the oval. In addition, they will need any medication including Epipens and asthma puffers etc.
- Can students qualify for Districts? – Yes. Students aged 10 - 12 years (Born 2015-2013) are also eligible to be selected in the Mango Hill Cross Country Team to compete at the Pine Rivers District Cross Country Trials which will be held in Term 2. If a student places in the top 5 for their race and they complete the course in a suitable time, they will be selected in the Mango Hill State School Cross Country Team. They will receive further information about this closer to the event date.
All family and friends are welcome to come and support students who are running. Spectators are encouraged to wear house colours to show support for Barton, Flynn and Walker houses. A reminder to parents and carers that plan on attending, please make sure you remain in the designated spectator area.
MHSS Junior Cross Country (Prep - Year 2)
On Friday 28 March (Term 1, Week 9) the Mango Hill State School Junior Cross Country will be run. Attached is the timetable for the day and a map of the course. Students will be instructed during PE lessons of their course and will also complete a walk through.
All students from Prep to Year 2 will be running their cross-country course and will have different lengths for their races (see below). The course is colour coded with markers so depending on their race distance, students follow different markers (this will also be on the map).
We strongly encourage all students to participate in the cross country; however, if your child cannot complete the course due to injury or illness can you please inform their class teacher. On the day students will assemble in class as normal at 8.15am. They will then come to the oval with their class. Some frequently asked questions have been answered below;
- What do students wear? – Hats must be worn to the oval but students are allowed to complete the course without their hats on (sunscreen is provided and all students must put their hat back on immediately following the race). Normal sports uniform shirt is to be worn (no house coloured shirts). Normal sports uniform shorts can be worn and students are permitted to wear running shorts/skins during the race.
- Do students have to wear shoes? – Yes, closed in footwear must be worn. Students are permitted to wear running shoes during the race but must change back into normal school footwear post-race.
- What do students need to take to the oval? – Students must take their hat, water bottle and brain break to the oval. In addition, they will need any medication including Epipens and asthma puffers etc.
All family and friends are welcome to come and support students who are running. Spectators are encouraged to wear house colours to show support for Barton, Flynn and Walker houses. A reminder to parents and carers that plan on attending, please make sure you remain in the designated spectator area.
Mr Hills, Mr Newell, Mr Lisha and Miss Wilson
Physical Education Teachers
