Week 10 Newsletter
Wednesday/Rāapa 7th April
Contact Us
Email: office@witherlea.school.nz
Website: https://witherlea.school.nz
Location: 214-216 Weld Street, Witherlea, Blenheim 7201, New Zealand
Phone: 64 (03) 578 5568
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/witherleablenheim
Week 10 - Wiki Tekau
Safety Message from our Local Police
- Met with Josh Reidie our local Police representative
- Come up with a plan
- Talked to many of our older students - shared the plans
- Looked at McKenzie Street - made more plans
- Sent an important message to our community (this one)
We have approximately 3-5 NEAR MISSES reported a year on McKenzie Street, Weld Street and Wither Road and most of these are due to;
YOUNG students crossing either backwards and forwards across the road (play behaviour)
Being unsupervised and have a lack of depth/speed perception when judging ‘when to cross’
Or, crossing from behind a parked car/SUV where they are unseen or have little/no visibility
In Auckland a few weeks ago a 5-year-old student was killed by a vehicle on/near the school grounds. We DO NOT want this to happen at Witherlea.
Here is the plan from Josh;
Cars, bikes and vehicles use roads
STOP at the curb: McKenzie Street the best guideline is right at the corner where there are NO parked cars and visibility is at its best - also cars slow for corner turns
STOP - LOOK and take the time to actually see and be seen (extra few moments)
Walk your scooter all the way out of school and across McKenzie Street
Only cross once - DO NOT go back and forth (play on the road)
Use pedestrian or kea crossings to go across roads (where they are available)
If you are 8 or under it is best to have an adult who can see; 'how fast' and 'how far' vehicles are travelling - this develops from 8 years on as a general rule
NEVER cross in the middle of a road from behind a car or SUV = you cannot be seen
Please go over this with your children, especially those who walk or scooter home without an adult.
Principal Message
Kia ora koutou Witherlea whānau,
What an absolutely lovely break for Easter which started with our 'Teachers Only Day'. These days are essential for our teachers and staff to review what has been happening during the term, have time for learning and planning as a whole staff with a focus on our key learning area of Mathematics for 2021.
The eight 'Teacher Only Days' were given to primary teachers in 2019 to support major workload issues that the primary sector is facing with increased demands, time, energy, increased and complex needs and understaffing or disparity between sectors (primary and secondary). These have been a feature in the news of late. We will be using our Teacher Only Days to upskill, balance workload and ensure that our teachers have the time necessary to make a difference to ALL learners.
Our last couple of weeks are shorter due to the Easter break however we will endeavour to pack as much learning as possible within them.
We will end Term One with our Whānau Open Day which will see our whole school and community come together and enjoy performances from our teams and performance groups, a coffee cart will be onsite, classrooms will be OPEN with children showing their families and whānau all the learning and progress they have made. Our central learning theme for the term has been 'Belonging' which links to Social Sciences and Health currciulum.
All our families and whānau can join us on the top court at 11:30am. The day should finish at approximately 1pm-1:30pm where we are happy for families to start the holiday break together.
Our 'Pillar' of learning for Term Two is 'Hauora-Wellbeing' which links directly to our Health and Physical Education curriculum area and draws fundamental learnings from Dr Mason Durie's Whare Tapa Whā model. This will be the central theme of learning across the school with reading, writing and mathematics integrated into and through this - we will showcase our learning in this area at the end of Term Two.
We look forward to seeing all our families and whānau at our end of term event and look forward to handing out our Initial Reports which were created together this year which will support each of our learners to make progress and have success in 2021.
Ngā manaakitanga,
Andrea Harnett - Tumuaki
Whānau Open Day - Last Day of Term
The day will be organised in this order;
- Meet on Top Court for performances; Kapa Haka, Choir, Sign Language Club and Teams
- Open classroom - students will take their families/whānau on a tour showcasing their progress
- Sausage sizzle available for lunch = $2 per sausage (CASH ONLY)
- Students can go home for the term
Friday, Apr 16, 2021, 11:30 AM
Witherlea School
RSVPs are enabled for this event.
Nau mai ki te kura o Witherlea
We wish to welcome these new students and their families and whānau to our school and community;
Eleanor H
Welcome to School Certificates are given out at our Flag Raising on a Monday morning at 9am when we are in Alert Level 1.
Term 1 Events - Wahanga Tuatahi
Week 10 - Wiki Tekau
Wednesday 7th April - Friday 9th April
Wednesday 7th April
School Photos
Friday 9th April
Assembly: Introducing Punga Hub 1 @ 2:15pm
Week 11 - Wiki Tekau Ma Tahi
Monday 12th April - Friday 16th April
Monday 12th April
Flag Raising
Friday 16th April - Last day of Term
Whānau Open Day @ 11:30am-1pm
Be Kind, Be Safe, Be Fair Shoutouts
Holly T - showing leadership and resilience in the Ferns room. Tino pai Holly!
Kowhai Team
Ryder N - consistently displaying our school values, shows compassion for others and faultless manners.
Girvan D- consistently displaying our school values in all he does.
These students have been using their kind, safe and fair qualities within our school, towards other students and supporting our culture at Witherlea.
Early Words Recognition
Holly T
We are very proud of the effort towards learning that our youngest students put in as the Early Words is the start of mastery at Witherlea School.
Subway Lunches
Next term we are going to trial the Subway in Schools Lunch Programme. This enables caregivers to order their children a Subway lunch which will be delivered to school. The process is ONLINE and is between families and Subway - this eliminates any administration and/or money exchange for the school.
Our Subway lunches will be on Fridays beginning Friday 7th May. The menu is a limited menu designed specifically for schools and prices start from $4.50.
Orders must be placed before 8.45am via Subway Express on a Friday morning and will be delivered to school for our 1pm lunchtime.
Subway can only accept credit card purchases. See the attached flyer for more information.
Please note that Subway lunches are unable to be ordered if a school trip or event falls on a
Friday.
The University of Canterbury is delighted to offer the Kiwi English, Mathematics and Science competitions for Primary, Intermediate and Secondary schools. The Kiwi competitions are written by New Zealand teachers for New Zealand students and are based on the new Zealand Curriculum. The online competitions will be run in the last 3 weeks of Term 2 and the first week of Term 3. All participating students will be awarded a certificate and a prize will be awarded to the top students in each competition. The cost for a students to participate is $9.50 per competition entered.
Any year 5/6 student interested in participating need to collect a form from their class teacher and return it to the office with payment.
It can be paid via cash, EFTPOS or direct debit.