Te Aroha Primary School
Term 4 Week 2 2022
PRINCIPAL / TUMUAKI MESSAGE
Kia ora parents and whānau,
I trust everyone is rested and relaxed after the long weekend. A quick week and then just like that we are into November and only 4 weeks away from Summer. This week marks the beginning of Diwali - the festival of light and all things good, this is one of the biggest religious festivals in India.
We will be policing the wearing of hats from now on. The summer sun is harsh and we need to be protecting our tamariki from its harmful rays while they are out playing. The school bucket hat is expected to be worn by everyone except our year 8 students. They can wear a non-branded dark bucket hat as we don’t expect them to purchase one for an 8 week term.
This week the classes will do their writing samples in preparation for the Teacher Only Day next week where the teachers will be marking and moderating the samples. PLEASE NOTE the learning assistants will be at school so we can actively supervise your children if they need to come to school - just let us know prior to Wednesday so we can plan accordingly.
The TAPS Board of Trustees (BOT) are attending a training session tomorrow evening in Morrinsville. These sessions are always very valuable and will greatly benefit our new trustees in particular. I am attending a meeting this morning on the curriculum refresh that is happening from 2023. We will keep you up to date with developments as they occur.
Have an awesome week everyone.
Ngā mihi nui,
Justin Bertrand
KEY TERM DATES
TERM FOUR DATES 2022
- 24/10/2022 - Labour Day
- 26/10/2022 - PTA Calendar Orders due in
- 26/10/2022 - Basketball for Year 5 / 6 teams starts
- 2/11/2022 - Teacher Only Day
- 8/11/2022 - Senior Athletics
- 9/11/2022 - Junior Athletics
- 16/11/2022 - District Athletics
- 23/11/2022 - ‘Special Person’s Day’
- 25/11/2022 - Rainbows End Trip for Road Wardens/Mediators Friday 25th November
- 15/12/2022 - School closes for the year
Other term dates to be advised.
EXTRA NEWS and STUDENT VIEWS
SPORTS NEWS - Mrs Paul
Touch: Well done to everyone who took part on Friday night. It was such a lot of fun and our children were so well behaved. Big thanks to all the Team Managers and parents who came along.
What was disappointing was the number of people who just didn’t turn up. Whether you went away on holiday or just decided not to play - it doesn’t matter. It is not okay to sign up for something and then let your team down by not turning up. Thanks to the 2 families who let us know at the start of the week that they wouldn't be there - you gave us time to make arrangements. If you are sick, that is different but otherwise we need plenty of notice to make plans. If you don’t turn up, you actually show your team is not important so therefore will be taken out of the team to make way for someone else. This may seem like a hard line to take, but a lot of work goes into these sports, and it is not fair on everyone else.
Basketball: This starts on Wednesday for the Year 5/6 teams and the following Monday for Year 7/8. Please sign up to the Basketball facebook page to get the draws etc. Remember if you aren't at school that day you can’t play and please ring and let Lucy in the office know that you are a basketballer and won't be playing as you are sick.
MOUTHGUARDS are compulsory!
Zero Waste Sessions
Last week, all classes across the school had the opportunity to work with our Zero Waste facilitator, Vicki Semmens. It was interesting finding out about the rubbish we generate as well as ways that we can help reduce this.
School Hats
Hats MUST be worn during term 4. This is NOT optional, it is a health and safety requirement. Year 8 students are allowed to have a dark coloured bucket hat (no advertising on it), everyone else is required to have our school hat on. Any student without a hat will be placed in a shady area to play.
The statistics on skin cancer are very high in New Zealand and we wouldn't be meeting our duty of care if we allowed your precious children to run around without hats.
School hats are available to purchase for $15 from the school office.
Year 7/8 Technology at Te Aroha College
Please make sure your child has shoes that cover their feet (NO SLIDES PLEASE) and long hair needs to be tied up. Roll call for the bus at 8.30am outside Room 10. If your child is running late and misses the bus, please take them straight to the College.
PTA NEWS
PTA Bank Details
The PTA bank account has changed. Please use our new account number which is
TAPS Fundraising Club
12-3171-0212757-03
PTA Calendar Art information
All Calendar art was sent home last Monday (parents, please check students bags). Orders need to be returned (art work as well as forms) by Wednesday 26th October.
CLASSROOM ROUND UPS
WAIHOU / HUB 1 / JUNIOR BLOCK / YEAR 1-2
Room 1 - Mrs Johnson
Our class continues to grow as we welcome our new 5 year olds - Tayne, Marino and Lola. A reminder please that all children need a school hat for Term 4. These are available from Lucy in the office for $15. This week Room 1 and 2 will work with Matua Rawiri for a kapa haka session. This is very exciting for our younger learners. Mrs Maisey and Miss Marshall.will take the class this week and I will be back at school on Monday.
Literacy - Our phonics sounds for the week are u,m and n and we will focus on these words up, mum, me, dad. It is so encouraging to see our new students learning how to blend words to read and write them.
Maths - We will continue our capacity work this week. There has been some greater learning as children understand the concepts of more , less full, empty, nearly full, nearly empty, half full.
Reminders for the week -
Book Bag and Homework Book
Sun hat
Drink Bottle
Library Day is on Friday.
Room 2 – Miss Webb
Welcome to Week 2! We had a great start to the term last week. We welcomed Sidney and Rory to Room 2. We also enjoyed our zero waste lessons where we learnt about rubbish and the impact of littering on our environment.
Literacy: This week we will be completing a writing sample to assess our progress in writing over the year. It is great to see the benefits of structured literacy reflecting in the progress of all children in both reading and writing.
Maths: We will continue with our capacity unit this week. This has been a hit in Room 2 and we have been enjoying doing some hands on activities to compare objects by capacity.
Reminders:
Please remember your drink bottle, homework book and book bag everyday.
Our library day is Friday - please return your library book
School Sun hats are needed in Term 4
Please do not hesitate to contact me via Seesaw or email zwebb@tearohaprimary.school.nz. Have a great week!
Room 3 – Miss Swan
Kia ora koutou Room 3 whānau
We had a fabulous start to the term with lots of eager to learn tamariki! We have really loved our athletics training as a Hub and we love the new resources that have been made and bought for Room 3 including two cornhole boards!
Literacy: We are continuing with our narrative writing and delve deeper into character traits. This has been a tricky concept to learn in Room 3 as most children are used to writing recounts. It has been great to hear the class discussion when we are thinking of adjectives to describe our characters! In reading children will be continuing with our reading programme and as a whole class we will be focussing on the sound o_e (stone, bone).
Maths: In Maths we keep investigating number strategies in small groups and explore mass and capacity as a whole class with a variety of hands-on activities.
Reminders for the Term:
Our Library day is still on a Friday. Please bring back your library books each week.
Summer is coming! A drink bottle, school sunhat and wearing sunblock is needed. The majority of children already have their school sunhat at school. Please check with your child.
Room 3 tamariki need to bring their book bags (and contents) everyday.
Have an awesome week!
Please don’t hesitate to contact me via Seesaw or email mswan@tearohaprimary.school.nz
GOLDFIELDS / SATELLITE UNIT / JUNIOR BLOCK
Room 4 - Mrs Suzette Willis and Team
Kia ora koutou,
We have an exciting week ahead of us for our tamariki. We will be visiting the Petting Zoo on Wednesday at Goldfields School, as well as the Strawberry Farm at Te Aroha on Thursday (weather permitting). Our tamariki will enjoy strawberry ice cream during our visit to the farm!
Have a great week whanau!
TIKAPA MOANA / HUB 2 / MIDDLE BLOCK / YEAR 3-5
Room 5 - Miss Entwisle
Week 2 will be a short but busy week. We are excited to work with Matua Rawiri alongside Room 3 for a kapa haka session and can’t wait to see what waiata we will be learning. 😊
Reading: The Giraffe, The Pelly and Me is shaping up to be an interesting read.
Writing: Explanation writing will be the main focus of this week.
Mathematics: ½, ⅓, ¼, ⅕ - these are some of the fractions we are learning to read, write and make.
Reminders / Online Learning - Homework
Our Spelling words and weekly poem and other home learning based tasks are available on Seesaw. This work is optional.
Students have free access to learning sites such as: Prodigy, Sumdog, Sunshine Classics, Epic! And Mathletics.
If you have any questions or concerns please feel free to contact Miss Entwisle via the school office: 078848803; email: mentwisle@tearohaprimary.school.nz or through the Seesaw message function.
Room 6 – Mrs Bankier
It was great to see Room 6 back after the holidays.
This week we will be looking at:
- The celebration of Diwali.
- Finishing our AP&H show creations.
- Kindness and how we treat others.
- Practising Athletics each day - weather permitting.
- Completing a writing sample this week.
Our maths will be continuing to review our addition and subtraction strategies. We are also revisiting a range of areas we have learnt about over the year as quick reviews as fun class challenge games using Kahoot.it.
Please remember our Library day is Tuesdays.
Room 7 – Mrs Paul
What a busy short week we will have. Kapa haka will take up a large part of Tuesday. This week we will also have our first e-asTTLe writing assessment… I won't say which day as I don't want people not turning up!!
- In Maths we continue to look at algebraic equations and also strategies for addition and subtraction. This will seeus rounding and compensating.
- We will finish our car testing for Science. I hope you saw some of the video on Seesaw - the children were awesome at the last one… and certainly had lots of fun working together to complete it.
- Athletics practise will continue which the children mostly enjoy.
- Don’t forget hats or it will be a long lunch in the shade!
TE MOANANUI-A-KIWA / HUB 3 / SENIOR BLOCK / YEAR 6-8
Room 8 – Mrs McKenzie
Welcome to week 2! This one will be packed full of learning opportunities, athletics and arts/crafts!
In Writing, students have been told they will be completing a writing assessment this week which will take one lesson to complete. The remainder of our writing lessons will be narrative based. We are learning how to plan for a narrative to help entertain our audience through a plot, which has a beginning, middle and end. This will take a focused effort from all Room 8 students. Our Reading also links in with our writing, where we will be investigating and analysing the author's setting, plot, and point of view.
Maths will see us continue our statistics learning. Mean, median, mode are all part of statistics learning this week. Students love the ‘move n prove’ activities too where they get to share their thinking with the class. Make sure you ask them about it.
Athletics continue daily. Please ensure your child has a drink bottle, hat and comes to school with sunscreen on. The weather is warming up rapidly!
Our library day is Wednesdays, this week I want to see ALL Room 8 students choose some books for home and class reading.
Here’s to a busy but wonderful week ahead. If you have any questions, please remember I am always happy to chat with you via email, Seesaw or in person. cmckenzie@tearohaprimary.school.nz . Have a great week everyone!
Room 9 – Whaea Armstrong and Mrs Gamble
We all hope everyone had a nice long weekend and enjoyed the beautiful weather. As we head into the warmer months we remind our students to be sun smart. Slip, slop, slap and rap! Since we are a sunmart school, sunhats need to be worn at school during morning tea and lunchtimes. Year 7's need a proper school hat. Year 8's are permitted to have a plain black or navy full brim hat, (no advertising is permitted), and this is only being accepted in Term 4.
Writing: Last week we looked at narrative writing, focusing on structure and how to add more detail through using figurative language. As a lead up to our writing assessment, we will practice writing non stop for 40 minutes. This will encourage students to plan, write and edit/recraft within a given timeframe.
Reading: Identifying settings, characters, problems and resolutions within narrative texts is our focus for reading . We will also look at structural references, identifying what has changed and why the author has begun a new paragraph.
Maths: We made a great start on understanding perimeters and areas last week. This week we will look at volume and start our unit on statistics.
AP&H Show Art: Our sketches are looking great. We have so many talented artists in Room 9. We will continue with these and experiment with charcoal drawings
Athletics: Training will continue. Please send a seesaw message or handwritten note if your child cannot participate in these.
Have a great week everyone!
Whaea Armstrong and Mrs Gamble
If you have any questions please feel free to message us on Seesaw or email lgamble@tearohaprimary.school.nz aarmstrong@tearohaprimary.school.nz
Room 10 – Mrs B
Kia ora koutou - He tina ki runga, he tāmore ki raro - In order to flourish above, one must be firmly rooted below. Welcome to a short but busy week. We have some amazing sketches being completed to enter for the AP and H Show and will look at developing our still life sketching skills this week.
Maths: We complete our work on perimeter, area and volume with an assessment and begin our work on statistics.
Writing: We have had a lot of fun exploring narrative, which has helped us to explore features of figurative language. This week, we do a couple of 40 minute trial runs before completing a writing assessment> This encourages students to think, plan and write succinctly.
Cybersafety: Our class will be completing an online programme aimed at supporting them to be responsible and respectful online. You might like to talk to your child about what they do online (many students are in chat groups), which social media platforms they are using and how they are communicating with others when using these platforms. As you will be aware, a digital footprint is very hard to erase and using social media carries responsibilities to ensure that these sites are used correctly and appropriately.
*We begin our athletics rotations this week. Please let me know if your child is unable to take part.
*Hats - please make sure your child has their hat each day. We are a sunsafe school and so these need to be worn during break and lunchtimes whilst outside. Sunscreen is available from class as well.
Looking forward to an awesome week.
Arohanui - Mrs B dp@tearohaprimary.school.nz
Access to Period Products
We are very pleased to be part of the Ministry of Education‘s programme to provide free access to period products for students. Using these products is not compulsory and students can continue to bring products from home if they prefer.
Mrs B co-ordinates this, with products being discreetly given to students. If you would like your child to start receiving these products, please get in touch with Mrs B - by ringing the school office (07) 8848803 or via email dp@tearohaprimary.school.nz
LUNCHES IN SCHOOLS PROGRAMME
SPONSORS
We need these firms to keep our school cashflow and community relations going strong. They are generous to us which enables us to benefit your children so I would ask you look at the team of sponsors and where possible, use them as we all gain.
School Policies and Procedures
School Policies and Procedures
SchoolDocs is the tool we use for our school policies. These are kept updated with the SchoolDocs team ensuring legal and compliance matters are always up-to-date.
To access SchoolDocs simply :
1. Go to schooldocs.co.nz
2. Click Search for your school.
3. Start typing the school’s name and select it from the dropdown list.
4. Enter the community username tearohaprimary and password school
From there it is simply a matter of navigating to areas you wish to look at - enjoy the read.
School App, Facebook, Seesaw and our School Website
Please use these tools we provide - we use them to alert, inform and effectively communicate with parents.
Check it out - there is plenty for you to find out.
If in doubt please ask your child’s teacher as we will be using these platforms on a regular basis to keep our parent community informed and up to date.
Contact Us
Email: admin@tearohaprimary.school.nz
Website: https://tearohaprimary.school.nz/
Location: Jubilee Avenue, Te Aroha, New Zealand
Phone: 07-884 8803
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Te-Aroha-Primary-School-193399510687026/