Bothwell District High School eNewsletter

Principal's Report

Dear Families,

Today we had the great pleasure of hosting Her Excellency, The Honourable Barbara Baker AC Governor of Tasmania. Her Excellency was accompanied by Professor Chalmers, Thomas Calderwood (Aide-de-Camp), Loueen Triffitt (Mayor), Katrina Brazendale (Acting - Deputy General Manager) and three Police Officers.

We completed a tour of our Agricultural Studies Facility and our Year 11 & 12 Buildings as well as some of our classrooms. Her Excellency was very impressed with the wonderful teaching and learning facilities we have for our students and enjoyed hearing about all of the programs we have in place and speaking with our young people.

Upcoming School Excursions

As we head towards the end of term, a reminder to families to please return excursion notices. Excursions to Bonorong (Early Childhood), Bounce (Years 3 to 5) and TMAG (Years 6 and above) need to be returned as soon as possible so students can take part in these excursions next week. We are currently finalising plans of having a House Picnic Excursion to the Cattle Hill Wind Farm for the whole school to finish the term (subject to venue availability). We will notify families next week if we are able to get the go-ahead for this event. If not, we will look at making a House Picnic arrangement at school in the final week.

Term One Progress Reports

Our students will be bringing home their Term One Progress Reports early next week. We will advise via Seesaw and Facebook on the day the reports will be school bags.

Bothwell School Association

The Bothwell District High School Association is the link between the priorities and needs of our school and the needs of our community. Parents and carers of students at Bothwell District High School are automatically members of the Association and are welcome to come along to our monthly meetings.

You don't have to be a Committee Member to come along to School Association meetings. All families are always welcome.

Bothwell District High School Association Committee Members for 2025

Katrina Brazendale, Parent Rep - Chair

(Position Currently Vacant), Secretary

Jess Downie, Parent Rep - Treasurer

Fiona Ellis - Parent Rep

Betty Branch - Community Rep

Member from Sheep Station Cup TBA - Community Rep

Laura Smith - Staff Rep

Helen Doyle - Staff Rep

and Principal, Erika Boas

The position of Secretary is currently vacant. If you are interested in joining the committee, get in touch with us: Email: BDHSAssoc@gmail.com

At our recent meeting we thanked outgoing committee members Susan Webb and Sarah Barrington. We also acknowledged outgoing staff reps, Christine Turner and John Webb. Thank you for your many years of service to the School Association.

Visit from Her Excellency, the Governor

Our Reading Focus

Our staff are participating in Midlands Collaboration once again this year as part of our Reading Focus. This week, the teachers travelled to Oatlands District High School to discuss fluency strategies to use in the classroom to improve reading and comprehension. Below are some images of our students taking part in reading activities.

Our Wellbeing Focus

We now have fruit bowls set up in each classroom. These bowls will be replenished with fresh fruit weekly to ensure students have access to nourishing food.

Thank you to Sophie (Grade 8) for implementing the spare food initiative. A basket is located in the office foyer with food for students to take when they require some extra food. We would happily take donations of non-perishable food items for the basket (especially muesli bars and le snack type items that students can pick up and go easily).

We continue to have Breakfast Club on Wednesday mornings and are looking at ways that we can extend to other days in the future. A picture below of some of our students enjoying breakfast together on a Wednesday morning. A reminder that our LIL students and families are also welcome to enjoy breakfast with us on a Wednesday morning.

Our Attendance Focus

We awarded the Attendance Cup for the first time this week to the Kinder Prep class for having the highest attendance rate since the beginning of the year. Moving forward the class with the most improved attendance will be awarded with the cup for the following week.

Learning Showcase:

Lil - March 5th

Nine little people came to Launching into Learning (LiL) on Wednesday 5th March. Four of whom it was their first visit. They had a wonderful time exploring the lovely activities awaiting them. It was also lovely to see them interacting and sharing.

LiL is held on Wednesday Mornings with Mrs Smith, and it has been wonderful to see our students engaged in hands on learning. Here Millie and Evelyn are making Cloud Dough.

Kinder/ Prep:

Our Kinder/Prep students have been exploring patterns during our maths lessons. Students have been learning to identify, create and extend patterns through a range of hands-on experiences. We began by looking at what makes a pattern and by finding them in our environment. We then begun exploring how we could make our own patterns through natural materials, shapes and colours. From there, they’ve been learning to extend these patterns and predict what comes next. We look forward to continuing our investigation into patterns for the remainder of the term.

Miss Jones

3/4 Class:

During the library lesson this week, our Year 3/4 students read the picture book 'Whoever You Are' by Mem Fox in their library lesson. They then each decorated a hand to contribute towards a harmony display.

5/6 Class:

The 5/6 class are studying adaptation in science. As a part of this work they were discussing camouflage in plants and animals. The students were then asked to camouflage a butterfly to place in the classroom. These are their efforts.

6/7/8 Class:

In Health last week the 6/7/8 class discussed what the word respect means and how it looks in a person. They then had to work in teams to create a respect person with words that represent what respect means.

9/10 Class:

Our Year 9&10 students had fun unpacking the World War One box on loan from TMAG and the Australian War Memorial.

WW1 – Commemorating 110 years since the ANZAC’s landing at Gallipoli.

Bothwell District High School are creating a presentation to be entered into the Department of Veteran Affairs, schools’ competition, Remembering Gallipoli: 110 years. This national competition recognises the work of students and teachers in schools that engage with veterans and honour Australia's wartime history. Each class is creating their own presentation that relates to Gallipoli for the overall school presentation. For the last two weeks we have been fortunate to have received a trunk from the Australian War Memorial with memorabilia that the students have had a lot of fun exploring.

The year 9/10 class are working with the Bothwell Historical Society to research people that were born in Bothwell and went on to fight at Gallipoli. The students have become very engaged in learning about these men and we are looking forward to their presentation, which will be on display at our annual ANZAC Service being held at 1:50 pm on the 5th of May. We welcome all our parents and families to join us. The service will be followed by an afternoon tea. There will be more information about this event in the coming weeks.

If you or your families have any links with Gallipoli, can you please contact Mrs Helen Doyle as we would be very interested in including this in our service or our presentation.

Some of the names that we have are: Tasman Laurence Webster; Edward Godfrey Hale; Duncan McRae; Athol Clyde Blake; Oliver Brown; Alfred Thomas Ellis; Alexander Fernance; Vincent Geard; Charles Thomas Hill; Clarence Jacques; so, if you have any information/memorabilia that we could use or borrow that relates to these people, WWI or Gallipoli we would be very grateful.

Class 1/2:

Exploring the Military Box from TMAG.

Kinder Prep:

Our students exploring the TMAG Box and having fun.

Secondary Students exploring the Box of Military items.

11/12 Class:

The 6 Year 11/12 students are working each Tuesday morning at the Bothwell History Society (BHS) where they are assisting with the digitising of historical records, creating flyers and brochures and learning valuable work skills to prepare them for the world of work. One of the main skills they are learning is the use of business software, and we can see a real improvement in their skills.

Did you know that in 1983 there was a picture framing and book repairs business in Bothwell? This is just one of the facts that the students are learning at BHS.

They are also regularly operating the new coffee machine and supplying staff and community members at events. Soon they will be undertaking formal qualifications for Barista, Food Safety and Food Safety Supervisor. We look forward to serving you at one of our upcoming events.

Careers:

Sports Carnival

Our sports carnival was very enjoyable with lots of families coming along to support our students.

Grade 3 & 4 students have been using crayons to draw fruit for a still life piece of work.

Class 3/4 enjoying Music class with Mr Ives.

A huge thank you to Mr Stuart Tait for donating a complete set of drums for our students to use.

Celebrating student success:

Term One: Assembly 1 Week 6
Grade	Award Recipients
Kinder/Prep		Hunter P Respect Always helping others and displaying excellent manners.
Grade 1/2	Avril G Growth For striving to do her best with her spelling and writing.	Piper B Responsibility For supporting her peers and being a leader in the classroom.
Grade 3/4	Lukas M Courage For his continued efforts in all learning areas, attempting new things and trying his best.	Logan W Growth For readily trying his best in class and showing great progress in spelling.
Grade 5/6	Mason P Courage For his active participation in discussions.	Jordy H Respect For his mature and respectful attitude.
Grade 7/8	Taylor P Growth For the outstanding manner she has settled into high school and for her efforts in her maths and science work.	Daniel P Growth For the mature way Daniel has settled into high school and is attempting his maths and science work as best he can.	Claire W Growth For the mature way Claire is attempting her maths and science work now she is in high school.
`Grade 9/10	Robert P All Values Positive and mature approach to all areas of school and displaying all school values	Ronni H Courage For thoughtful contributions to class discussions and enthusiasm to read in group settings
11/12	Danielle B All Values A positive and mature approach to the commencement of her Year 11 studies.	Natasha S Courage Demonstrating a courageous and positive approach to her Year 12 studies in a new school and new state.
Whole School Values	Harley M For having such a positive start to the year and displaying all of the Bothwell DHS values.

From our student Leaders

Reminders:

In the lead up to our next Celebration Assembly, our students will be participating in a ‘guess the number of eggs’ competition. Each student will have up to three guesses and the closest guess will win the prize. The Prize will be announced in our Week 10 Easter-themed Assembly.

Save the Date:

Easter Hat Parade and Assembly

Monday 7th April - 1.50 P.M. in School Gym

Premier's Reading Challenge

The Premier’s Reading Challenge is back for 2025!

Every year, thousands of students across Tasmania participate in the Premier's Reading Challenge (PRC). Open to students from kindergarten right through to Year 12, participants set a personal reading goal and aim to reach it during the ten weeks of the Challenge.

This year the Premier’s Reading Challenge will run from 16 June to 24 August 2025.

See Brigette in the Library to get booklets.

Bothwell Historical Society Inc.

Studiosity

Free 24/7 online study support via Studiosity

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Library members log in free with their library barcode and PIN/password

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You can also visit the Bothwell Library and speak to Tanya who will give you a membership form.

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Practice tests and worksheets

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