Morningside State School eNewsletter

Principal News

Welcome back to school

A very warm welcome back for Term 3 especially if your family is joining our Morningside school community for the first time. We are looking forward to a great term. Please take the time to read our newsletter each fortnight to stay up to date with what is happening around our school.

We encourage parents to contact our teachers and school if there are changes to family matters that might impact on their child at school. We can help to support your child if we are aware of these changes. If your phone, email and / or address details have changed over the break, please contact our office to update them.

Our Guidance Officer, Sharon Wilson will be working at another school this term and we welcome Sharon Fowke back to our team. Sharon will be at Morningside State School each Monday – Wednesday.

Facilities work during the holidays

Over the holidays several projects around our school were completed to help improve and refresh our site:

High water pressure cleaning around the school.
Extra turf restoration on the oval at bottom of the stairs.
Some glass replaced in school and OSHC.
Pool canteen – epoxy flooring and new bench tops installed.
Pool fencing installed behind the library.
Wall outside library has been painted.

Prep – Year 6 visual arts Teacher for Semester 2

Now that “Dance” is finished for the year, this semester our Prep – Year 6 students will be engaging in their “Visual Arts” curriculum with Mrs Butler. Students will have a lesson each week with Mrs Butler and this week the students will be learning about the Elements of Design and the Design Principles. Please chat to your child about their learning.

2025 School Opinion Survey

The annual School Opinion Survey will be conducted from 28 July to 22 August 2025. All families, school staff and students in Years 5 & 6 will be invited to participate. We encourage you to take this opportunity to have your say about what our school does well and understand where we can improve. The survey invitation will be emailed to families.

Is your family leaving Morningside State School at the end of this year?

As Education Queensland Schools are staffed according to enrolment numbers, it is very important that we have an accurate knowledge of our enrolment numbers for 2026. This will help to ensure that classes can be developed before the end of this year and there is minimal disruption or need to reform classes at the start of the school year in 2026.

If your family is leaving at the end of this year and will not be returning to Morningside State School in 2026, we would appreciate you letting our office know as soon as possible. Please also let our office know if your child / children will be returning late to school in the 2026 school year. School starts on Tuesday 27 January 2026.

Please contact our office on admin@morningsidess.eq.edu.au .

2025 NAPLAN

Last week parents of children in Years 3 & 5 received a copy of their child’s NAPLAN report. Congratulations to all students who participated this year. NAPLAN is one test that can provide parents with information about how their child is going. This information should be considered in collaboration with school report cards and feedback from class teachers at parent / teacher interviews.

It is pleasing to note, that Morningside State School performed well in the tests this year. Well done, Morningside!

Year 3

Domain	Morningside Mean	State Mean
Writing	428	398
Reading	410	392
Spelling	407	391
Grammar and Punctuation	416	393
Numeracy	403	394

Year 5

Domain	Morningside Mean	State Mean
Writing	478	464
Reading	492	483
Spelling	488	476
Grammar and Punctuation	500	487
Numeracy	485	480

2026 Prep Enrolments and Interviews

If your child will be turning 5 by June 30, 2026, they are eligible to enrol in Prep next year. Our 2026 Prep interviews are starting this term, and these interviews are an important part of the process to help our new children have a positive and successful transition to Prep. Please contact our office if your child is due to start Prep in 2026 and you have not yet completed the enrolment forms. A “Prep Orientation Day” and “Meet the Teacher Day” will be held in Term 4.

School uniform

It has been great to see children embracing our new uniform. Full transition to the new uniform will be by the end of 2027.

Parents and children are reminded that children can currently wear the following uniform items as part of our current uniform policy that has been endorsed by the P&C.

Blue & gold checked dress.
Royal blue skorts
Royal blue or grey shorts
Royal blue polo shirt
Blue & gold checked blouse
Royal blue button up shirt with gold piping
Sport house colour polo shirt
Enclosed black shoes, white socks
Gym shoes for PE and sport
Royal blue school approved sun hat (Prep: Yellow legionnaire’s cap)
Royal blue or black tights
Royal blue tracksuit pants
Royal blue fleecy jumper/jacket or school microfibre jacket
Long grey pants
Hair accessories in school colours (i.e. gold, royal blue or blue/white checked)

Stop Drop Go zone on Pashen Street

Parents are reminded that there is a “Loading Zone” on Pashen Street in front of the school gates near the Prep playground. This means, between 7am – 9am and 2pm – 4pm on school days parents cannot park in this zone and leave their car. The intention of the zone is to allow cars to pull in so that children can enter or leave their vehicle and for the car to then leave. The maximum time a car can be in the zone is 2 minutes. To allow the zone to operate smoothly we request that parents do not park in the zone for more than 2 minutes or leave their car. The Police and Council regularly patrol this zone and will give infringement notices to drivers not following the road rules.

Supervision before and after school

Parents and students are reminded that teachers are not rostered on duty before and after school for formal supervision of students. This means that children who arrive at school before 8.15am should be enrolled in OSHC unless they are enrolled in a supervised extra-curricular activity such as band.

Our first bell sounds at 8.35am and formal learning commences at 8.45am.

Children in Year 1– Year 6 who arrive after 8.15am should sit quietly under the roof in the Green Space until the first bell sounds at 8.35am.

Prep children need to be supervised by an adult (PKM - at the front of the school, PSB and PBM in the covered Prep eating area) before school every day and escorted to class by the adult at the first bell.

After school children should proceed directly home, unless they are enrolled in OSHC or a supervised extra-curricular activity. Prep children should be collected from their classroom by an adult.

Please note, the school playgrounds “Out of Bounds” before and after school as they are under the license of OSHC and should therefore only be used by children enrolled in OSHC.

Everyday counts!

Success at school starts with attendance. The table below shows the amount of learning time a child can miss if they regularly miss school. Please support your child’s learning and ensure they regularly attend school. Where possible, we encourage parents to make any medical appointments and extra holidays outside of school time. Please contact the school if your child will be absent or if you need support in getting your child to school. A text alert is sent each day to a parent if a child is absent, and the school has not been advised.

If your child misses……	That equals…..	Which is……	And over 13 years of schooling that is……	Which means the best your child might perform is…..
1 day per fortnight	20 days per year.	4 weeks per year.	Nearly 1.5 years.	Equal to finishing in year 11.
1 day per week.	40 days per year.	8 weeks per year.	Over 2.5 years.	Equal to finishing in year 10.
2 days per week.	80 days per year.	16 weeks per year.	Over 5 years.	Equal to finishing in year 7.
3 days per week.	120 days per year.	24 weeks per year.	Nearly 8 years.	Equal to finishing in year 4

Mobile phones, smart watches and electronic devices

If students choose to bring their phone to school, they must switch it off as soon as they get in the school gate and sign it in at the office. The phone can be collected when the student is leaving school and can only be switched on when the student leaves the school grounds.

Smart watches and other devices can be worn; however, notifications must be switched off as soon as the student enters the school gate. This means that phone calls and messages cannot be received or sent whilst the student is at school. Notifications can be turned on again when the student leaves the school gate.

If notifications on the Smart watch cannot be switched off, then the watch must be signed into the office when the student arrives at school. The watch can be collected when the student leaves school but can only be used when the student leaves the school gate.

Have a great fortnight!

Sheryl Kennedy
Principal

Deputy News

Welcome back Term 3

Welcome back for Term 3! I hope all our Morningside families had a relaxing and restful holiday.

PBL Badges

PBL badges have been handed out to students with amazing effort and behaviour grades on their Semester 1 report cards. Congratulations to students who have received their silver and bronze badges. It is great to see so many students putting in sustained effort and maintaining such a high standard of behaviour. Well done MSS!

Heater visit

Morningside State School had a special visitor on Thursday 17 August, Heater. from the Brisbane Heat BBL team.

Heater was here at Morningside to promote Queensland Cricket’s before and after school programs Cricket Blast and Backyard Blast.

Thank you to all our sport captains for assisting Heater on his visit

ICAS

ICAS tests will be starting soon. Parents have until Monday 28 July to sign up and pay for your child to participate.

Please go to the Parent Portal to sign up to your chosen subject areas using the link and code below.

Registration for all subject areas closes on Monday 28 July at 11:59pm.

This year, our students can elect to sit the following assessments:

Subject	Sitting Dates	Cost (AU$)
Digital Technologies	Monday 4 Aug	$20.95
Writing	Tuesday 5 Aug * Year 6 Monday 4 Aug	$24.95
English	Monday 11 Aug	$20.95
Science	Wednesday 20 Aug	$20.95
Spelling Bee	Thursday 21 Aug	$20.95
Mathematics	Monday 25 Aug	$20.95

Have a great fortnight

Adam Gilmore
Deputy Principal

Dates to Remember

Administration

Student Resource Scheme, Camps and Excursion Payment Reminder

Payment reminder:

Activity
SRS – Student Resource Scheme $245 + Swimming $20
If paying in instalments, please see the following payment due dates: 1^st Instalment $82 SRS + $20 swimming was due on 7 February 2^nd Instalment $82 SRS was due on 2 May 3^rd Instalment $81 due on 25 July
Cairns Camp instalments: $450 was due 21 March $448 was due 16 May $448 was due 20 June
Band Camp $90 due 11 September
Currimundi Camp $261 due 15 August
Please check your Q Parent App All outstanding invoices are visible on the QParent App and can be paid through the App.

Payments can be made as follows:

Selecting the payment link at the bottom of your invoice
BPoint - the BPoint code is 1002534
QParents
Direct deposit (BSB 064136, Account 00090111, Account Name Morningside State School) – please note student’s full name
Credit card payment over phone via a secure BPoint number on 1300 631 073
Directly at office
Centrepay – Centrepay is a voluntary bill-paying service which is free for Service Australia customers. Use Centrepay to arrange regular deductions from your Services Australia payment. You can start or change a deduction at any time. The quickest way to do it is through your Services Australia account online. Go to servicesaustralia.gov.au/Centrepay for more information.

Instrumental Music News

Balmoral Beginner Band Workshop

Many of our beginner students attended the Balmoral Beginner Band Workshop at the end of Term 2. They did a fantastic job, learning 3 new band pieces, new music concepts and gave a wonderful performance for parents at the end of the day. We are very proud of their excellent behaviour and hard work.

Our Year 6 Instrumental Music students can attend the Southside Senior Music Workshop on Tuesday 9 September to Thursday 11 September. This is a fabulous experience involving 3 days of music making with excellent specialist musicians and students from the entire Southside district. We wish them well for these exciting few days.

Instrumental Music recruitment

For students wishing to join the Instrumental Music program at MSS, interest forms will come out at the start of Term 4 for 2026 entry.

Reminders to apply will be in the school newsletter. The concert band program features wind, brass and percussion instruments. Students learn in small groups in 30-minute lessons each week and attend a band rehearsal before school on Mondays.

Tara Neal
Experienced senior teacher- Instrumental Music

Japanese News

日本語のコーナー

Bring on Semester 2 Japanese fun, engagement and adventures!!!

Preps are exploring the world of loved cute and cool Japanese mascots. We will be using colour, size and body part language to introduce and describe our mascots. We kicked off our unit looking at sensei’s favourite mascot Tazuni. Here is a clip of her story.

Click here to view more information

Year 1s and 2s are exploring the world of ‘Bento’ and focusing on sharing information about foods contained in our lunchboxes including colour, size, shape and taste with Sensei and peers. So far, we have learned about kyaraben (character lunchboxes). These beautiful lunchboxes are designed to entice Japanese children to eat a range of healthy foods. We are amazed at the designs and how much time and effort goes in!

Year 3s and 4s are heading out shopping in Japan (in their minds!), exploring similarities and differences in customer service, ordering and currency. As part of this learning, students will be challenged to use Japanese language in shopping role plays with peers and Sensei to show their speaking and listening skills. We love this Simpsons Family clip and discovering sometimes things get lost in translation!

Year 5s and 6s are using language to explore free time activities in both Australia and Japan. As part of this learning, we will be participating in some fun cultural activities. We will be using our hiragana reading knowledge to translate a diary entry as well as write about and describe our own weekly schedule.

Japanese Clubs for Term 3

This term, ‘J Club’ continues with lots of culture and crafts. ‘H & J Club’ continues for both breaks every Tuesday. Please see attached Flyer for J Club activities for this term. If you would like more information on Japanese at Morningside State School, please email jkwal0@eq.edu.au.

See program below.

Until next time. またね。よろしくおねがいします。

Silby Sensei
Japanese Language Teacher (jkwal@eq.edu.au)

Chappy News

Chappy Vlad

OSHC News

Winter Vacation Care was filled with fun, learning, and adventure as students enjoyed an exciting range of activities, excursions and incursions over the holidays. During the first week of school holidays, we ventured to BungeeFit and learned some awesome tricks using bungee harnesses and hanging silks and hoops. We also had some special ocean friends visit from SeaLife to teach us more about protecting animals and the ocean. In week 2, we took a trip to the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary and met many different animals from snakes and crocodiles to kangaroos and wombats. We also had a magic themed day where we had fun dressing up as wizards and fairies, and watched a real magician perform!