Peachester State School

Welcome to the 2025 school year!  It is an exciting year with opportunities building on our previous efforts. Term 1 is off to a strong start with teaching and learning well under way. Students have been engaged in class for learning and having fun with their peers at break times. We have had a focus on setting up structured routines for the year so that our students know the expected learning behaviour to be successful at school. Thank you to all families who came along to our Classroom Information Sessions. It was great to see lots of parents and carers connecting with class teachers about their child.

Our curriculum is based on our great teachers aligning the way they do their work. Our literacy work is heavily supported with additional teacher aide and teacher support. It means that ALL students get supported for work at their level.

In 2020, we began our journey into Decodable Readers and the Science of Reading. In 2025 it has now become a requirement of the Department, but Peachester is already extremely skilled in this area and our students are leaps and bounds ahead of other schools in our local area and across the State and Nation. The Lexile reading program that follows our Decodables is a research-based framework that helps match students with texts that are just right for their reading ability. It not only aids in improving literacy skills but also fosters a love for reading by ensuring every student is reading material that is both challenging and achievable.

What really distinguishes us as a school is that we also offer a wide range of extra curriculum opportunities. We have a holistic education. We will continue to develop literacy and numeracy but do not ‘teach to the test’ (NAPLAN). We let those tests reflect where the kids are at and inform our programs. i.e. they are useful to inform great teaching not the end-product that we aspire.

We aspire for all students to be STRIVING, THINKING, CREATING. They are the actions that we think it takes to be “a healthy mind in a healthy body’. What we value in our actions is being Safe, showing Respect, and always being Leaners.

In developing a successful learning culture with well-behaved students there are three things students need to be successful learners:

• A) Work at their level
• B) Respect and trust in their teacher
• C) Friends

I must praise and highlight the commitment of staff for the start to our new school year and the enthusiasm of students. It has been a smooth start with parents and carers supporting our processes. 

At Peachester State School, we believe in making every learning opportunity count. Our approach is simple: we ask parents and carers to support reading at home using books chosen by our staff to match each student’s level. While students are welcome to read for pleasure, the decodable readers and Lexile texts are essential tools for building strong literacy skills.

Research tells us that homework can be beneficial—when it’s purposeful and directly connected to what happens in the classroom. For instance, a study on repeated reading at home showed that students who practiced texts they had already seen in class, with some word-level help from parents, became more fluent readers. Another study with second graders found that a moderate amount of homework—around 15 to 20 minutes a day—improved writing skills like punctuation and spelling.

The key is repetition. Just like building a clear path by walking it repeatedly, well-designed homework helps transfer learning from short-term to long-term memory. Sometimes your child will be given a reader that they have already read before. Please support the process and our knowledge that your child will be developing important skills by re-reading the same book. You can practice repeat reading each night by having your child read to you after school, an adult read to them at bedtime and then having your child read to you in the morning before school. (Obviously this is an ideal scenario, we know that households are hectic, and mornings are often chaos, but find a routine that works for you and allows your child to have increased exposure to the same texts.  

By working together, we can create a positive learning environment that truly makes a difference in our students’ educational journeys.

What a fantastic start to the year we have had. The children have settled into school very well and it is great to see them making new friends and enthusiastically participating and learning during class activities.

During language activities we have been focusing on the letters and sounds. The Preps are learning the letters, the sounds they make and how to form them. The Year One students are revising the letters and using them to read and write words and sentences.  We have also been reading stories identifying the character and thinking about our favourite parts and why we like them.

In maths the Preps are learning about the numbers to 10. They have been identifying numbers, making a group of objects to match a number, and making groups more or less. The Year 1 students are focusing on the numbers to 20 and then up to 100. They are filling in missing numbers in a sequence, placing numbers on a number line and looking at the numbers before and after a given number. They are also learning about the concepts of addition and take away.

Our Show and Tell roster has started and the students are enjoying bringing their items from home to show. This is an important way for the students to build their confidence when speaking in front of the class. This will help them also at the end of the term when we choose our favourite story and talk about why we like it. Thank you to the families for helping the students be prepared for show and tell. 

It has been a satisfying start to the year. The students have gotten themselves back into school routines and enjoying all that this beautiful school has to offer. I have felt very welcomed by all students, staff and parents. I can give a brief rundown on our learning so far:

During English activities we have been working on a different spelling sound each week, reading aloud in groups, improving handwriting, learning grammar rules and expressing opinions about literature. In Mathematics, topics have included place value, decimals, mapping, shape transformations and fractions.

We have recently started to visit different teachers for Science and HASS. Year 4 joins Mr Laurence and the Year 5 group stays with Mrs Harrison and myself. Science for the Year 4 group involves experimenting with heat and cold and the Year 5 group has been investigating properties of light. Mrs Harrison has the difficult job of explaining our political system for HASS.

Again, I want to extend a big thank you to everyone in the Peachester School community for being so welcoming. It is a joy to be here at this beautiful school. 

We have all been busy learning and getting used to the new routines and expectation within our new classroom. We have set ourselves three class promises:

1. We think before we do.

2. We are mindful of others and

3. We give everything a red hot go!

These are some of our learning highlights so far:

Erika – HPE it is fun, sporty and I love running.

Emily – HPE because its fun, its active and because I like sport

Balin – HPE because its fun and active

Merindi – Maths because I like the different multiplication methods like “Old School”, area and lattice.

Robyn – short because I like doing math.

Angie- HPE because I like playing T-ball and doing running sports.

Mabel- cooking and gardening because it is fun.

Sonny – HPE because its fun and you get to do sport.

Lucian – maths because of the joy of adding up numbers after I have multiplied them.

Connor – Gardening because I get to be with year 5 friends from the other class. 

Charlie – HPE because I like playing sports outside.

Penny – maths because of cartesian planes.

Lewis – cartesian planes because its so interesting.

Levi – doing different multiplying methods because it has so  many numbers to figure out and I like figuring out things and you have to solve it. 

Alyssa - Maths because its entertaining and I’m learning new things.

Molly – cartesian planes because they are always fun and exciting.

Hudson – cartesian planes because we could use the plotted points to make pictures.

Braxton – HPE because T-ball is pretty fun.

Zoe – English because we have learnt about Roald Dahl’s book “Esio Trot”

Ryder – HPE because I like T- ball and its pretty fun.

Indigo - I have enjoyed  doing cartesian planes in math.

Olive - I have enjoyed doing cartesian planes in math it was really Interesting and fun.

A Quick Captain’s Note…..

On Thursday week 3, the captains received their badges we were all very excited and grateful for this opportunity. These opportunities don’t come up very often and we are glad to be able to show you why we got elected to represent our school as captains. 6 students got positions there are two Coochin house captains two Stanley house captains and two school captains. Here are our thoughts about our roles so far:

Olive - I have been enjoying this opportunity I have worked hard and am so grateful to be Peachester 2025 school captain I can’t wait to represent Peachester State School.

Eliana is away at the time of writing this, but we think she is enjoying this role as school captain.

Indigo- I have been at this school since prep and my family has been to this school and have been waiting for this opportunity. I think of myself of a friendly, 2025 Coochin captain.

Braxton - I have been at this school since prep I am so thankful for this role.  I can’t wait for more opportunities.

Zoe - I am so grateful that I have this opportunity to try and be the best person I can be for Stanley team. I am so excited to see what new opportunities I will get next.

Ryder- I have enjoyed my time in Peachester school and I have been here since year 2.

We invite you to attend the Peachester State School P& C Annual General Meeting.

DATE:  Wednesday 19th March, 2025. 

TIME: 6:30pm

This meeting all positions will become available.  

On Monday 24th February, we had 5 of our students represent Peachester State School at the District Swimming Carnival held at the Caloundra Aquatic Centre.  

Asher K

Jarli H

Maddie P - (3rd place Breaststroke, 2nd place Freestyle & Butterfly)

Mabel G

Erika W - (3rd place Backstroke, 2nd place Butterfly & 1st place Freestyle)

Congratulations to all 5 students on your achievement.

Erika now progresses onto REGIONALS for her Freestyle event. Good Luck Erika!

Congratulations to the following past students of Peachetster SS.  These students are at High School and recently participated in their Swimming Carnival and they all received AGE CHAMPIONS.

Keeley H

Ruby P

Violet W

Isabelle D