Week 7 Update

Posted on 15 March, 201615 March, 2016 by Nicky Dunlop

Zone Swimming Sports: On Monday a team of our talented swimmers competed at the Zone Swimming Sports at Jellie Park. There were 12 competitors, swimming in relays, freestyle, breaststroke and backstroke. All students represented Beckenham School admirably. Special thanks to Katherine Ryan for her tremendous help on the day, as well as Mary-Clare Delahunty, Rod Gray and Katherine for providing transport back to school from the pool. Congratulations to all of our students for qualifying for the South zone swimming sports, and especially to Felix Strahl, Oskar Frampton, Juliette Gray and Henry McMecking for qualifying for the Canterbury swimming sports. Unfortunately the Canterbury swimming sports is on when we are in Dunedin on camp.

Welcome: Mark Shin has joined us in the hub for the rest of the term. Mark is a student teacher, working with Tracy.

Dunedin Camp: The second camp notice, which includes a gear list and programme is coming home today, both digitally and on paper.

Home Learning is due in this Friday. We love it when children hand their home learning in early.

Basketball: The children continue to respond extremely positively to the weekly basketball sessions with the Rams. On Thursday lunchtime this week, we will be holding trials for our basketball teams that will play on Monday or Friday afternoons (half an hour between 3:30 - 5:30) in term 2 and 3.

Passion Friday Foodies: It is the Mini Master Chef competition this Friday. The students are required to bring $5 on Friday to buy ingredients at New World. They are also bringing some ingredients and utensils from home. Please ask your child about this today, as they will have a plan they can share with you.

Writing: Yesterday we kicked off our latest writing topic with a 'Fear Factor' experience. Many children got to experience the butterflies in their stomach and the rush of adrenalin through their veins as their names were drawn from the box and they anticipated what would happen next. On Wednesday the children will start to write about fear within a chosen context. (We have restricted them for any death, blood and gore content!) The emphasis will be on descriptive writing, rather than narrative (story). Today in class we unpacked an exemplar, which is included in this post, below the photos. We are encouraging the children to focus on the following success criteria:

I have made a plan so that I know what each paragraph will be about
I have used strong verbs
I have included clues to help the reader infer
My punctuation assists the reader

You can support your child's learning at home in several ways:

Discuss ideas for the context of their fear writing today, Tuesday.
Ask them to show you their doc, (or better still - if you have a google account they can share their doc with you) on Thursday this week and Wednesday next week, and discuss their progress. This writing needs to be finished by the Thursday before Easter. We emphasise quality, not quantity, and have told the children we do not want to see more than two pages of writing. A big part of the writing process is re-reading and revising what has been written.
Encourage your child to spend some time working on their writing at home.
Check with your child that on Thursday this piece of writing has been proof read (it makes sense, spelling is checked and punctuation is correct) and edited (strong verbs, sophisticated vocabulary, figurative language have been used - it is the best writing it can be!).

Fearful anticipation of the first challenge.

Finding the crystalized eye-balls in buckets of ice.

What's Tracy going to make us do??

9 innocent eggs

5, 4, 3, 2, 1 ... crack!

The unlucky one.

Not much fear on that face!

Its sooooo cold!

Searching for the 'worms'.

What is in those nappies?

Walking on the glass path.

Exemplar

Fingers trembling, Jasmine fastened the strap on her helmet. Fear ran through her veins like liquid lead. Hands, upon which deathly white knuckles protruded, wrapped around the grips, strangling the handlebars of her bike. Inside her helmet all Jasmine could hear was the pounding of her heartbeat, echoing like a battle drum. She was terrified!

Looking around her she realised that she was not alone in her fear. The blood had entirely drained from Sam’s face; it glistened like damp porcelain. Jacky couldn’t stand still, jiggling from one foot to the other. Was it fear that prompted this erratic movement or was she wildly excited by the challenge that awaited them? Barry, not surprisingly, had a huge grin plastered across his face. Known as the ultimate adrenalin junky in the group, Barry was in his element. Jasmine despised him.

The warmth of the day had receded and a chilling breeze stirred the dried leaves on the forest floor. As it gathered momentum, the wind caused the upper branches of the pine trees to creak. The butterflies that were gathering in Jasmine's stomach began to move with greater intensity, dredging up a mild nausea that she fought to control. Dragging her gaze from the steep downward path, she breathed deeply to steady her trembling body.

As the last rays of light faded, a hush descended over the group. Robert cleared his throat to give the final instructions. Jasmine strained to hear; she needed every snippet of advice if she was to survive the ordeal that awaited her in the darkness. Beside her, the vibrations of Sam’s chattering teeth competed with Robert’s muffled voice. In desperation, Jasmine ripped her helmet off in time to catch Robert’s final warning. His words hit her like a punch in the stomach, knocking the lastl shreds of confidence from her being.

Why, she asked herself for the hundredth time, was she here? Why would her parents want to her to suffer this ordeal? Why had she agreed to come? Why was she about to plunge down a steep mountain track on a flimsy bike, in darkness, with nothing but the erratic beam of an ineffective head lamp for guidance? Why not? With a deep breath Jasmine released the brake from her vice like grip ... she was off! Wooohooo!

Getting Creative in the Intermediate Hub

Posted on 8 March, 20168 March, 2016 by Nicky Dunlop

Last week was art week in our hub. Children chose whether they wanted to learn about pop art, word art or street art. Once the choices were made the learning begun. Over five afternoons the children explored, designed and created beautiful art. There are a few finishing touches to complete and then we look forward to seeing everyone’s work displayed on our walls.

Tomorrow, Wednesday, all camp forms are due in. Please get any outstanding forms back quickly. There are spare copies on top of the filing cabinet in Room 16. The second notice, which includes our programme and the gear list, will be coming home next week.

Choir gets underway this Thursday. Those who are not involved in choir will be doing an alternate music programme on Thursday afternoons.

A number of Kauri children have organised teams for the PTA Top Team event on Saturday March 19. There is still time to get your entry in. The PTA have asked some of our senior children to help with the running of the events. Children who do this will receive leadership points for their efforts.

Our school duathlon is on March 24th, the day before Easter break. Many children took entry forms home today. There are extra forms at the school office. Please return entries to the box in the office foyer by next Thursday. If your child is keen to take part, please encourage them to get underway with their training this week.

Our next writing motivation is on Monday. We will share the exemplar with you, to give you an idea of what we are looking for in the children’s writing. Please ask your child to show you their writing later in the week. We encourage the children to keep working on their writing at home.

Another awesome week in the Intermediate Hub

Posted on 26 February, 201626 February, 2016 by Nicky Dunlop

The children have enjoyed the variety of activities and learning they have been involved in this week. They hung on every word of 'The Good Lie' movie. This gave them a good base understanding of the challenges faced by refugees. Hopefully your child has come home and discussed the movie.

A big thanks to Tracy for her superb organisation of the school swimming sports. Thanks also to the students who helped with media coverage and organisation. Congratulations to all of those who took part. Tracy will be announcing the team for zones once she has processed the results. The south zone swimming sports are on the morning of March 14 at Jellie Park.

Next week is our art week. We are spending every afternoon learning about and creating visual art. The children have chosen from street art, optical art and art using block letter words.

One of the big weekly highlights at the moment are our basketball sessions with the Rams. The children are giving 100% for the full hour and basic skills are progressing really well. Below is a video of the boys' training this week.

Next week we are closing the kitchen, as we have had some issues with children being in the hub at lunchtimes when they shouldn't. Please make sure your child doesn't bring lunch that requires toasting, heating or hot water. All going well, we will be back to normal kitchen operation in week 6.

Dunedin camp is getting closer! We currently have four parents who have offered to join us and we would like two more. If you can be available from April 4 - 8 and would like to spend a week in fabulous company, please let one of us know. The full cost of camp is $315, however the actual cost will be lower than this. We are in the process of finalising fundraising totals and Audrey has applied for a grant to go towards transport costs. As soon as we know the actual cost, I will pass this information on.

A couple of reminders: please check and return contact details sheets if you haven't done so already and get Year 8 girls' HPV vaccination forms back to the office.

Below is a picture of our Room 16 whiteboard for week 5. This outlines our timetable and may be helpful to have at home for some children, to assist with their organisation. We will include a timetable photo in the blog each week.

Intermediate Hub Update: Feb 19

Posted on 19 February, 201619 February, 2016 by Nicky Dunlop

Leadership
What a fabulous leadership week we have had, with so many highlights. We hope your child has come home with many experiences to share. We are hearing great things about the Year 7s being leaders in Year 1- 4 classes today. The Year 8s have applied the habits and leadership traits we have been talking about, in a range of ways over the past two days. Many of them have taken great leaps in confidence as they worked together in groups to achieve goals.

On Wednesday the Year 8s watched and discussed a TED talk about redefining leadership. We learnt all about 'lollipop moments'. You may want to view this talk so that you can reinforce the message at home.

As part of our exploration of synergy, we looked at the flight formation of migrating geese, with both Year 7 and Year 8. Here is a link to a slideshow that we unpacked with the children. Again, this would be something good to discuss and reinforce at home.

Social Studies
On Monday and Wednesday next week we will be launching into our study of refugees by watching and discussing the movie 'The Good Lie'. This is a PG movie. Check this review from Common Sense Media.

Remembering February 22nd
You are most welcome to join us on the park on Monday, from 12:30, as we stop to remember Feb 22nd 2011.

A big thanks to Simon, Rod, Elise, Mike and Gloria, parents and grandparents who contributed their time and skills to our leadership week.

Looking back on the week...

James teaches us about leadership in a very amusing way.

Year 7s synergise to draw a smiley face.

Using individual strengths to create a water container.

Supporting each other to scale the climbing frame.

Success!

The flying fox challenge.

Discussing strategies.

'Seek first to understand and then be understood.'

Year 8s 'unlock the grid' using non-verbal communication and teamwork.

More strategising

Aaron shares great ideas about goal setting.

'Sharpening the Saw'

Intermediate Hub Update: Feb 12

Posted on 12 February, 201612 February, 2016 by Nicky Dunlop

After two weeks in the intermediate hub, things are humming along nicely. Leadership groups are establishing, reading and maths groups are underway and the children are doing a great job of following hub routines.

Home Learning: Your child should have been working on the maths home learning that they were given on Tuesday. We have been so impressed with the number of children who have handed in this home learning already. Remember to encourage your child to check in with their maths teacher if there is any aspect of home learning that they are stuck on. This work is due in next Friday, Feb 19th. As this is a busy time for leadership week, we suggest they get it in by Thursday morning. Nicky’s maths class have Mathletics to complete at home as well.

Leadership Week: We are all excited about leadership week, Feb 15 - 19. Today Year 8 children brought home their second leadership camp notice, which includes a gear list. If you have not yet returned the permission form, please get this in on Monday. Year 8 food donations for camp need to be brought to school by Wednesday: baking for Coast, cereal for Mountains and a bag of fruit for Forest. Year 7s wear mufti for their leadership day on Wednesday and Year 8s wear mufti on Thursday and Friday.

Leadership Positions: On Tuesday we announced leadership positions. Our aim was to give children 30 points worth of positions. Some got more than this, and those who did not apply for many positions may have got less. Many positions are very popular, with nowhere near the number of positions as there are applicants. As you can imagine it is a tricky task, one we spent considerable time sorting.

It is the aspiration of a large number of children to be a House Captain in Year 8. As this is a high profile position, we need to ensure our House Captains have the necessary leadership skills and are very positive role models. As the children are placed in houses when they first arrive at school, the distribution of strong leaders by the time they get to Year 8, is often not spread evenly across the houses. When appointing House Captains, we look at the leadership qualities of the children who have applied. Sometimes we ask children who are strong leaders if they would like to change houses in their final year to have the opportunity to be a House Captain. This year our leaders were clustered together in a couple of houses and a number choose to move house, to take up this leadership opportunity. Throughout Year 7, potential leaders show us their worth through their personal actions and interactions with others.

Swimming Sports: This event is less than two weeks away, on Feb 25th. If your child has entered, they have been given a notice, which you should have seen by now. Please check their bag if you haven’t seen it.

Dunedin Camp; Please let your child’s home-group teacher know if you are keen to be a parent help on our Dunedin camp.

Some of our week in pictures...