Category Archives: Kauri

Kauri Whanau: Term 3 Week 8/9 Update

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Excitement is building as we get very close to our Champion Street move. Read on for important messages about the upcoming week.

Sports uniforms:

If you still have a sports uniform at home, please make sure this is sent back to Tracy on Monday.

Talent Quest:

The finals of our school talent quest will be held on Thursday afternoon, Sept 22. Parents are most welcome to attend.

Writing:

The children have been writing movie reviews over the past two weeks. A number of children will need to spend time on their writing over the weekend. The reviews need to be completed by Wednesday.

Technology:

Next week the children are staying at school on Tuesday morning and going to South for technology on Friday. This change of timetable is due to happenings at South next week.

Thursday:

On Thursday morning the movers are coming to take the remaining things out our hub and transport them to Champion St; this includes quite a bit of furniture. That morning we have planned a walking trip to Pioneer Pool and back. School will cover the pool admission costs. Children are to wear school uniform, including their jacket and bring togs and towel in their backpack. We think the walk will take 40 minutes, travelling along the river. We plan to be back at school, and our empty hub, by 12:30.

Friday:

Children arrive at school at the usual time and travel to technology for the morning. No bags will be left at school. This will be the last time we will be in the hub. After tech, the bus will drop them at Champion St. You are welcome to join us from 12:30 - 1:30 for a sausage sizzle lunch, being put on by the PTA. After lunch the children will have their first afternoon in class at our new site. At 2:30, the buses will take the children back to Beckenham. Then the holidays will begin ... hooray!

Enjoying the first visit to our new hub on Tuesday.


Painting kiwiana murals for Beckenham School @ Champion Street.


We had some eager and very helpful workers on Thursday morning.




Kauri Whānau Term 3 Week 7 Update

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At this stage we are hopefully two and a half weeks away from moving out of our hub, so as you can imagine things are pretty busy. Read on for celebrations and notices.

Celebrations:

Te Whānau Mahi Tahi performed at the Cultural Festival last Friday evening. They were sophisticated, original and awe inspiring. Beckenham parents and staff in the audience were glowing with pride. Click on this link to see a video of their performance.

Our speech finalists presented their stories with confidence and enthusiasm at the south zone speech competition on Monday evening. Despite not getting placed, we thought they were fabulous. Special congratulations to Oskar for getting an honourable mention.


Cashmere High School Testing:

Testing for Beckenham students takes place on Thursday Sept 15th.
Starts: 9.00am, in the Performing Arts Centre (PAC). 
Dismissed: 12.15pm (approximately)
Students need to bring: A pen, pencil, ruler and some food for morning tea.
Cycles: Students will be permitted to leave their cycles in a designated supervised area.   All cycles should be brought to the Performing Arts Centre.
All students need to be back at Beckenham by 1:10pm.

Parent help needed:

We would love to have some parents / grandparents helping with two parts of our programme. Firstly if you have knowledge/skill in athletics and are free to help on the next two Monday afternoons, Sept 12 and 19, please let Tracy know. Secondly, we have a large group of children in the wearable arts group for arts academies. This group currently meets on a Friday (Sept 9 and 16) afternoon. If you are free to help out with planning, problem solving and advising, please let Nicky know. Wearable arts creativity will continue next term. 

Writing:

We have started our next writing topic: movie reviews. By the end of tomorrow, Thursday, each child should have started this writing. They have until Sept 21 to complete it. Please ask you child to show you what they have written so far, at the end of this week. The success criteria are listed at the top of their documents. 

Champion Street Update:

We are steaming ahead with our countdown to starting at Champion Street at the start of next term. Earlier this week we got the exciting news that Class Furniture will be supplying fabulous furniture for the Year 5 - 8 hubs while we are based at Champion Street. Occasionally staff from other schools will come to see the furniture in our 'living showroom'. We are currently moving resources to Champion Street. Below are three important dates for this term:

Tuesday September 13: 

After technology finishes at South on Tuesday, the children will be bused to Champion Street to see the school, have lunch and play, before returning to Beckenham by 1:30pm. 

Wednesday September 14:

There will be a parent meeting in our school hall to discuss the logistics of Year 5-8 at Champion Street. This meeting starts at 7:30pm and should take an hour.

Friday September 23:

Our children go to technology on Friday instead of Tuesday this week, due to activities at South. After technology the children will be bused to Champion Street. Parents are invited to join us for a picnic lunch and look around the school. At 2:30 the children will be bused back to Beckenham. This will effectively be our first day at Champion Street.

Kauri Whānau Update: Term 3 Week 6

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So much to celebrate and lots of messages too. Please read these important messages carefully.

We have enjoyed being part of learning conversations with you and your child yesterday and are looking forward to more of this tomorrow, Thursday.

Speech Finals: 

A big congratulations to all of the speech finalists who shared their entertaining stories with us on Monday afternoon. We were lucky to have Daniel Pengelly, assistant artistic director from the Court Theatre as our guest judge. Next Monday evening starting at 6:30pm, Jordan and Oskar will represent Beckenham at the South Zone Speech Competition, being held at St Peters School on Fisher Ave. It would be lovely to see some of our children in the audience to support our fine speakers.




Cantamath:

Last Wednesday our Cantamath teams competed against 90 other schools, solving maths problems at Horncastle Arena. Those of us in the audience were worked into a frenzy of enthusiastic support, as we watched the runners put their thumbs up for correct answer after correct answer. The Year 7 team answered every question correctly within the 30 minutes, earning a golden ticket (displaying their 100 points) and coming in sixth place! And then it was Year 8s turn to stun us with their mathematical talent. They also earned a golden ticket and were placed 9th. Wow!



Cultural Festival:

Te Whānau Mahi Tahi take to the stage on Friday evening at Horncastle Arena as part of the cultural festival. We know they will will be stunning and wish them all the best for a fabulous performance.

Year 8 testing at Cashmere High School:

A reminder that due to swimming lessons, our Year 8s who are enrolled at Cashmere High School for 2017, have their testing morning on Thursday September 15th. They are to wear school uniform and return to school for the afternoon.

Swimming:

We are now into the swing of our swimming programme. Some adjustments have been made to groupings so that each child's needs are being met. It is great to see nearly all children making it to school on time to catch their buses. We need to see that 'nearly all' become 100%.

Year 7 Camp 2017 Fundraising:

In term 3 we have the opportunity to run the sausage sizzle on Thursdays from 4:30 - 6:30pm at the touch competition at Waltham Park. We did this last year and raised quite a bit of money for our camp. This will be a good way to fundraise for our 2017 camp, which will be in term 1 of next year at Wainui. We need a small team of parents who would be happy to help with these sausage sizzles. Please let Nicky know if you would be happy to be part of this team.

The next three and a half weeks:

Hopefully you have or will take the opportunity to look at the rebuild display in the hall during learning conferences. On Tuesday we spoke to the children about the current timeframe that we are working towards. The plan is that we will be busing to the Champion Street site from next term. We are in the process of finalising dates for visits to Champion Street this term and an information / question answering evening for parents. We will let you know once these dates have been set in concrete.

Writing movie reviews:

We started our new writing topic this week, with a drama based motivation. Tomorrow we will be watching a short movie and looking at an exemplar to learn about writing a review. On Monday we will be offering a choice of three movies for the children to view and take notes on in preparation for writing their movie review. The movies are:
Remember the Titans - An American football story with a strong focus on leadership. (PG)
Cool Runnings - The story of the Jamaican bobsled team at the winter Olympics, with themes of persistence and overcoming adversity. (PG)
El Dorado - A cartoon movie with messages about what makes a good friend and the importance of friendships. (PG)

Wheelchair Rugby:

Last Friday the opportunity arose to try out wheelchair rugby. What a blast we had! The children had lots of fun and are hungry for more.









Kauri Whānau Term 3 Week 5 Update

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Life in the Intermediate Hub continues to be all go!

This week:

Wednesday: 


  • Nicky's maths class trip to Horncastle Arena to view Cantamath projects in the morning.
  • Cantamath problem solving competition at Horncastle Arena after school. Best of luck to Isaac, Alex, Rosie, Amelia (Year 7) and William, Kara, Dom and Oliver (Year 8) and our reserves Kaia and Oakley.
  • Speeches shared in all home-groups

Thursday: 

  • Canterbury winter sports tournament at Hagley Park. Best of luck our red hockey team and the red football team, as well as our rugby boys who will be playing with their St Patricks Bryndwr team.
  • Speeches shared in Mountains and Forest

Friday:

  • Speech finalists announced
  • Final basketball game for girls team. Boys have three more games.

Next week:

Monday:

  • Team speech finals in the afternoon.
  • Swimming starts and runs for two weeks, every morning except for Tuesday. Children need to come prepared with togs and towel in a plastic bag. We have two buses travelling to Aquagym each day. One will depart at 8:30am and the other at 9:00am. Please check below to see which bus your child will be on.

Tuesday and Thursday:

  • Learning Conferences. School closes at 2pm. Please contact the office or follow the booking instructions on the school newsletter, if you are yet to book your conference.

Being prepared to learn:

Stationery is dwindling for many children. Please make sure your child has the following: pencil, eraser, red pen, blue pen, ruler and glue stick. Being unprepared has a negative impact on learning.

Coast Home-group:

Please bring cotton buds and egg cartons for art tomorrow, if you have some at home.

Ski trip:

A huge thank you to the wonderful parents who helped out on our ski trip last Thursday. After a hiccup at the start of the day, all ran very smoothly. We were very impressed by the perseverance, positive attitude and support of each other, that the children displayed. There will be a display of written experiences and photos to view, when you come to the hub for learning conferences next week.










Wednesday: Last Soup Day

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Our final day for selling soup is tomorrow, Wednesday. $2 for a cup of chicken, pumpkin or tomato soup. Order soup by the flagpole before school. BYO cup or use one of our disposable ones.

Many thanks to those who have supported this fundraiser. Year 7 & 8 are extremely excited about their ski trip to Mt Hutt on Thursday. The soup profits have reduced the cost of this trip by 25%.