Kaurihohore School Week Two, Term One News
Manaaki te katoa - be kind to all.
Respect - Empathy - Kindness
Kia ora koutou
Another year has started well, as if we have not even been away! Children have settled back into routine quickly and classrooms are humming along.
We welcome Cathy Hadfield and Sue Jensen to their new roles in our school and know that you will support them well as they settle into our school community.
We also welcome Vikki Tuckey to her new role of classroom teacher in Rūma Kahu and Tanya Gwyn into her role as LSC (Learning support coordinator)
Attendance
Please advise us straight away if your child is going to be away from school for any reason. You can use kauriabsences@gmail.com, the school loop app, or phone the school office and leave a message. Please ensure you give us the reason for absence as we are required to have this for our records.
Below are some known dates so far:
Beach Trip - 26th of February - whole school
2nd-5th March Year 5 and 6 camp
3rd/4th March - Rm 6/9/10 Sleepover/Camp
Good Friday - 2nd April
Easter Monday - 5th April
Easter Tuesday - 6th April
Term one Ends - 16th April
Please note Easter Tuesday is a day off mandated for Schools. Inter-school swimming sport dates for Year 4-6 will be added soon and we will advise you when we know of this date.
Beach Trip
This will be held on the 26th of February. This is ‘empty classroom day’ on location. Please ensure you have returned your child’s permission form to the school office. Due to the fact we are at the beach, we require a high level of supervision and really need your help to make this day possible. If you can provide supervision and transport on this day, we would really appreciate it. Please do not arrange transport for your child prior to the day, as we will sort children into cars on the morning of the beach trip. Basically we will assemble in the courtyard, ask you to collect as many children as you can take, and have you write their details on a form before you leave. If we have more cars than needed, we urge you to carpool, however we will not really know this until the day.
Reporting for 2021
Over the last two years we have been working on designing a system of real-time reporting. Trying to ensure you have the information about your child’s learning when you can make the most use of it, rather than waiting for a report.
Our intention for 2021 is for every class teacher to report to you twice in the year, when assessments have been completed in reading, writing and maths. Giving you a clear picture of your child’s current achievement and their next steps. We will then report each term on your child as a learner on a report form that will be cumulative. Each term you will receive a comment about your child and it will be added to the previous term's comment, this will mean at the end of the year you have four comments, one for each term, building a picture of your child’s journey through school along with two lots of achievement data in literacy and numeracy. To fit with our real time reporting philosophy we will not be holding parent interviews, instead we will be asking you to come in if you need to speak to us and offering an open door policy for you to meet with us if you have any concerns. Responding in real time, means acting now, not waiting for an interview. We are more than happy to talk to you any time about your child and an appointment can be made to do this. This then means we are acting on current information, rather than waiting.
Please come in and see your child’s teacher in the first instance if you have any queries or concerns, you can set up a time via seesaw, email, or simply by popping in.
Room Names
This year we have opted to give our rooms names, rather than numbers. This symbolises that our classrooms do not rigidly follow a sequence of levels as a numbered system would suggest, that we are a collective rather than being segregated by age.
Turangawaewae and Whakapapa
This year as part of our local curriculum we want to know more about our school whakapapa and turangawaewae. As a school we have a rich European history, with so much documented. Our early Māori history however is limited to the names of the chiefs that sold the land to the government of the time. Next year we want to start our journey into finding out more about the important places and people that have played a role in our history as a school and location. We want to know more about the narratives of the important places that surround us. To genuinely do this we need to establish connections with mana whenua who can help us, not only to teach staff about the history, the important places, but to connect our children to the narratives. We also want to form a connection with a marae that allows us to deepen our cultural understanding so we can bring this into our school environment and our classrooms. This is something our whole staff is very passionate about, and as a staff we are all working on developing our own te reo Māori abilities.
If you would like to be part of a group that drives this learning, we would love for you to join us on this journey, please email us if you would like to be part of this with us, we would love to have you on board. He waka eke noa (we are all in this together.) We intend to have a community meeting this term to discuss this further. You could email us below if you have any ideas or thoughts that can help us on our journey.
jo.kake@kaurihohoreschool.co.nz or michelle.douglas@kaurihohoreschool.co.nz or principal@kaurihohoreschool.co.nz
Our ultimate aim is for our school to have rich narratives to share about our ‘whole’ history and for children to have an understanding and appreciation for the important places and a connection with the people that can help them to deepen this understanding.
Reading
As I talked about in our newsletter last year, our staff has been (and is still on) a journey to transform reading and how it is taught in our school. We are implementing a structured literacy approach and thanks to a Ricoh for their massive donation of $3000 which we eagerly spent on decodable books that can be used throughout all of our classes, for all of the children that need them. Structured literacy means we use an approach that matches the research on how the brain learns to read. We will be taking part in further professional development on this at some stage this term. You may have seen items on the news around this approach, it is important to understand that this is not just about phonics...it is about an explicit and systematic teaching of the building blocks of reading, to ensure all children get the best possible start.
Environmental Goals 2021
We will be working this year towards several environmental goals. First up we want to do a waste audit and refresh our children’s understanding of rubbish and the implications for our environment and their future. We hope that by doing this we can refresh understanding and enthusiasm for our zero waste lunch box approach. We also want to work towards planting manuka and kanuka in the Autumn, so will be asking for more help to move mulch this term at some stage. This planting will be along the end fenceline of our school and will encircle the end of the bike track adjacent to the native bush area.
Seesaw
Please make sure you are hooked back up to seesaw and checking this regularly as it is our main way of communicating with you. If you are not able to access information online, via seesaw, our blog, email or our facebook page, please make sure your childs’ teacher is aware of this so they can send home hard copies with your child.
Results of the Christmas Raffle
Last year's Christmas raffle raised a whopping $8200 towards classroom resources. We appreciated all of your efforts in selling tickets for this. A huge thank you for Dianne for the mammoth effort of organising this.
Hats and Drink Bottles
All children must have a hat with a flap, or a hat with a wide brim at school every day. Please make sure it is named. Having one to leave in their bag is a great idea. No hat, no sun. Please no caps this term. It is also vital that children have a bottle full of water at school each day that they can access this easily.
Toys and Lollies
These are not to be brought along to school please. On Thursday children can bring their nerf gun, they are able to bring a bike or scooter any day or tools that they may want to use. Please remember that anything they do bring is their responsibility, if your child struggles to take responsibility for their belongings, do not send them along to school.
Easter Raffle
This term Dianne will be organising an Easter raffle. All money raised from this will go towards purchasing more resources to support structured literacy in the school, which is a great cause. She will be sending home tickets to sell soon. We would like a donation from each family towards the raffle, this does not need to be chocolate and can be anything from chocolate eggs to toys, books, other types of treats etc. You can start dropping off items as soon as you have them. Thank you in advance for supporting this school fundraiser. If you have any baskets that may be suitable for holding raffle items, or would like to help Dianne out in putting these together, please come in and see her.
Parent Support Group
This year the parent support group will be organising the school gala. We encourage as many people to join this fabulous group. The gala will be specifically targeted at the all weather canopy which will go over our current turf. You can contact Janet Hammond for more information about joining or other ways you can help out. janet.hammond@xtra.co.nz or 0274 335 867
Contact Details
Through the process of gathering information for camp, we have noticed contact details and medical information does not match our records. If you contact details have changed, or your child has either developed a new medical condition, or their historical condition has resolved itself, we need to know. Please pop into the office and let us know or send an email message.
Thank you to the Beattie Whānau
We were very grateful for the donation of socks and belt bags for each child in the school. We appreciate you!
Ngā mihi nui!
Need to do now…
Update medical and contact details for your child if needed
Return permission slip for the beach trip
Collect and bring in an item for the Easter raffle
Send in permission for your child if they are on one of the camps
Make sure you are connected to seesaw and checking it regularly
Ensure your child has a drink bottle, hat and change of clothes at school each day
Food for thought...
Noho ora mai - stay well, look after yourself
Leslee Allen
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