A big thanks to all the parents who have supported our learning this week. It has been quite a week, with lots of highlights.

Volleyball at Koru Games:

A spark of enthusiasm for volleyball was ignited when we were playing against Carisbrook School in Dunedin at the end of term 1. Our team was well and truly beaten, but really enjoyed the friendly mixed session that followed the game. Jenny kept that enthusiasm going by running a volleyball passion group in term 2. With more skill and experience under their belts, the children were keen for another challenge. That came in the form of the Koru Games, a South Island multi-sport tournament for Year 7 & 8s. We sent two volleyball teams to the three day tournament this week. They had a great time and thrived on the competition. Our B team won four games and lost three, finishing in 10th place. Our A team won 6 and only lost the final, finishing in second place overall! Thanks to Carisbrook for selecting volleyball as one of our tournament games and starting us on this road to success.

'People must act to sustain what is valued'

... is our key conceptual understanding for inquiry this year. We are in the midst of a focus on sustainability around food. This week that took the form of visits to the supermarket to undertake research and the making of re-useable beeswax food wraps.

Next week's programme:

Touch Canterbury will be working with us Monday - Thursday next week to teach and play Turbo Touch. Each group will have a half hour session each day.
On Thursday we will be having a passion day, so that we can complete passion projects that are looking to take more than 90 minutes to wrap up.
Technology will be on Friday next week. This means that Tuesday is a normal start time and on Friday children will need to be at school by 8:30am.
We wrap up the term with the school talent quest on Friday afternoon.

This week creative juices have been flowing in the Intermediate Hub, as we have been busy creating calendar artwork. We continue to be very impressed by Te Whānau Mahi Tahi. This week they performed for the group of Chilean students who visited as part of our language programme on Monday, and welcomed a large group of teachers who were meeting in our hall on Wednesday.

Parent help needed:

Next week we are planning on visits to New World supermarket for each home-group, as part of our inquiry into sustainability issues around food.  We will also be making wax food wraps at school. For each of these activities we require some parent help. If you are free and willing to help out on either Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday afternoon, please fill in this form. 

Congratulations:

We were super proud of our representatives at the zone speech competition on Tuesday evening. Both delivered highly entertaining speeches and both were placed third!

Te Whānau Mahi Tahi

Lots to celebrate this week and a few important messages.

Te Whānau Mahi Tahi

Our senior kapa haka group are looking forward to their performance at the Cultural Festival on Monday evening. A reminder that these children have a rehearsal at Horncastle Arena on Monday afternoon. They will be leaving school at 2pm and the bus will return between 3:45 and 4pm.

Headphones at school

This week we will be encouraging a number of children to upload a google extension, ReadWrite, to support their learning in writing. This extension reads text, that the child has written, back to the child. It pauses for punctuation. By using this extension children will be able to pick up sense and punctuation errors in their writing more readily. In order to use this, headphones (or ear buds) are required. Please remind your child to have these with them at school.

Speech Competition

We had a very exciting and entertaining speech final at school on Monday afternoon. A huge well done to everyone who took part. The English teachers from Cashmere High, who judged the competition, were very impressed with children's enthusiasm and talent for public speaking. A special congratulations go out to Vienna and Lily who won their competitions. These girls will go on to the South Speech competition on Tuesday September 11, starting at 6:30pm in our school hall.

Cantamath

What an exciting day we had last Wednesday at Cantamath. A large number of our entries in the display competition gained Highly Commended and Excellence awards. In the teams section our Year 7s did a great job for their first time. The Year 8s were very pleased with their result, scoring 80 / 100 (double their score from last year) and with only 9 schools scoring a higher result. The official results sheet, certificates and badges are yet to arrive.

Mosaic Art Project

GirlBoss Workshops

The girls who took part in the GirlBoss workshops last week, which explored future options in STEM subjects, came away very inspired. We will make the most of this opportunity in the future. Below is some feedback from the girls.

Our full on term continues, with a focus on Cantamath and speech delivery this week. After that things settle down a bit, which we are looking forward to. It has been a hectic five weeks so far!

Cantamath:

Tomorrow morning, Wednesday, we head off to Horncastle Arena at 9am. We will be back by 10:30am. 33 children have individual entries in the display competition and all children have been involved in class projects. We are looking forward to seeing how everyone got on and to get inspiration for next year.

In the afternoon our teams compete in 30 minutes of action packed, noisy and exciting problem solving. Good luck to Kate, Freddie, Gemma, Daniel, Santi, Adam, Georgie and Gabriel. If you would like to come along and support the teams, you are most welcome. Parents and staff will be sitting in section H upstairs. Year 7s start at 4pm (meeting at 3:40) and Year 8s at 5pm (meeting at 4:40).

Speeches:

Tomorrow we start our speech deliveries in class. Hopefully your child has brought their speech notes home to rehearse. If not, these can be accessed via Google Classroom. Children who feel they cannot present to their home-group will be videoed delivering their speech. Our hub final will be on Monday afternoon next week, starting at 1:30. Parents are most welcome to attend. We will be announcing finalists this Friday.

GirlBoss workshops:

We have over 30 girls taking part in GirlBoss workshops tomorrow. We are excited to be able to offer this opportunity. The girls will be inspired to fulfil their  dreams in STEM (science, technology, the arts, engineering and maths).

Congratulations to our Beckenham ski team:

Winni, Boyd, Paolo, Ben, Freddie and Lena skied their hearts out on Sunday at Mt Cheeseman. They were competing in the Canterbury primary and intermediate ski champs. We were so proud of their third place intermediate team achievement. With the majority of the team being in Year 7, we have high hopes for next year when they will be a wee bit heavier and a wee bit faster!

Last winter sport:

This Friday is our final session of winter sport at Hagley Park. A huge thanks goes out to all of the parents who have committed to coach and manage teams on a weekly basis. The children would not have this opportunity without your involvement. Can you please wash and return sports uniforms early next week. There is a tub by the courtyard door for returns.