Kia ora e te whānau,

What a wonderful start we have had to 2025 in the Koru team! We are so proud of how our children have embraced 'We Love Learning' and 'We Love Challenge' this week while learning the school routines. We have noticed children independently doing their morning jobs, such as putting their lunch boxes and drink bottles on the shelf, and their bags in the cubbies; fantastic! 

Thank you for taking the time to attend our Term 1 learning conferences. These gave us an excellent opportunity to get to know you and your child and set them up for success this year.

On our first day, we had a very special welcome for Cade Englefield, our new Principal. The Koru team were superstars in the audience, watching with interest as Te Whānau Mahi Tahi, our senior Kapa Haka group, and Christchurch South Karamata Intermediate Kapa Haka group performed waiata (songs) and haka. 

We have had lots of fun exploring our space and discovering the activities offered during Learning Through Play this week. Here are some photos of tamariki in action.

 Kia ora e te whānau,

Thank you to everyone who has been applying sun cream before school, we are reapplying before the children go out to Big Play. A reminder that all children need a sun hat every day! If a child does not have a sun hat, they need to play in the shade of the Hall verandah at break times.

It is hard to believe we are nearly at the end of our school year! We will be beginning to tidy and sort our toys and resources in preparation for next year. You might even notice our walls will be getting bare as we take the children's work off so they can take it home. 

Returning books

We are collecting back all Literacy reading books from Literacy folders, these need to be brought back to any teacher in Koru. Please have a look around home and bring back all reading books to school for our end of year stocktake. You are welcome to keep your Heart Words and sound packs of cards to keey using at home. All Library books need to be brought back to school too. 

Transition Visits

We have been getting to meet and get to know the children who will be starting in Koru next year, as they have their school visits this week. It is wonderful to see how our Koru tamariki are showing all our school values to make our visitors feel welcome and to show them a fun time at school. 'We Make A Difference'. Our Koru children are also having a couple of visits to look around the Kahikatea Hub and see where they might be next year.

Teddy Bears' Picnic:

On Monday, December 16th, we are planning to hold a fun Teddy Bears' picnic, followed by games, out in Beckenham Park.

At 1:20 p.m., children will wash their hands, put their hats on, collect their lunches, drink bottles and soft toys, and we'll head out to have lunch under the big trees near the Big Adventure playground.

Once they have finished eating, children will be able to choose from a variety of game options: parachute games, Duck Duck Goose, or playing on the Big Adventure playground. 

Please ensure that your child has the following items on Monday, December 16th:

• lunchbox
• drink bottle
• sun hat
• soft toy (teddy bear or other)

 Kia ora e te whānau,

As we start to get to the end of term 4, we look back on and celebrate the awesome year we have had in the Koru team! The tamariki have settled into school beautifully, formed wonderful connections with their peers, and have adjusted well to school life. These last few weeks of term will be rather busy, but full of lots of fun!

We welcome Jasper, Kanoa, Olena, and Max who have started over the last few weeks, to our Koru team. They have all made a positive and happy start to school! Well done, tamariki!

Life Education

This blog post is focused on our time in the Life Education classroom that we have had over the past few weeks. We had two sessions which focussed on Big Emotions and the Qualities of a Good Friend. In these sessions, our tamariki met Harold the giraffe, and spent time with Helly, the educator in the special Life Education van. In our Big Emotions session, our tamariki learnt about the different emotions we feel and some strategies we can implement to try to move out of being in a 'stuck' feeling back into a 'stay' feeling. In our Qualities of a Good Friend session, our tamariki focused on "growing" a friend, and discussing the different attributes a good friend needs. We also heard some funny jokes from Harold, as well as having an awesome Disco party to finish our last session. 

The sessions were really enriching and engaging for our tamariki. Below are some photos of our time in the Life Education classroom.

Reminders:

• Our last day for school this year is Tuesday 17th December. School will finish at 12:30p.m. on this day.
• Reports have gone out on Hero, so please check this out if you have not done so already. A reminder not all children will be receiving an end of year report. 
• We're loving this warmer weather! Thank you so much for sending your children to school with sunblock and their hats. Remember - no hats, no play!

 Kia ora, e te whānau,

We have all been enjoying these warm days and the opportunity to spend some of our Learning Through Play sessions playing outside. There has been lots of activity in the sandpit, a favourite this week has been excavating ponds and filling them with water from the outside tap. You may have noticed some sandy shoes coming home! As the weather continues to warm up we will be involving more water play during Learning Through Play, so please make sure your child has a change of clothes in their school bag, incase they do get a bit wet when playing.

Cyber Safety

During the afternoons in week 3 (last week), we completed a unit on Cyber Safety. This unit focused on sharing personal information online and thinking about what kind of people we can trust when sharing our personal details online. We followed Hector the Dolphin, and his friends, as they navigated their way through some different online situations. During week 6 we will continue with Cyber Safety with the focus on understanding that their emotions can be a powerful tool to assess unsafe situations, the importance of checking with an adult before going online, and being open about their online experiences with a trusted adult.

Life Education

We enjoyed our first visit to meet Harold in the Life Education classroom this week. This weeks session was on Big Emotions, learning that all emotions are important but we don't want to get stuck in some emotions for too long. After we identified some different emotions and how they make us feel, Helly the Educator, in the van, showed us a few things we could do to try to move out of being in a 'stuck' feeling back into a 'stay' feeling. More information about the second lesson (next week) and some photos will be in our next blog.

We have a couple of short weeks coming up:

• Next Friday, 15th November, is Canterbury Anniversary Day
• Monday 18th November is a Staff Only Day so school will be closed to students 

Kia ora, e te whānau,

A very warm welcome back to our fourth and final term of the 2024 school year. We especially welcome the families of the new children to our Koru team: Atlas, Isabella, Oliver, Ruby, Remy and Johnny. They've all made a lovely, positive start to school. Well done, tamariki!

Routines:

All children have embraced our routines and have fallen back into the swing of things with impressive ease. Earlier in the year, the children helped to develop our Learning Through Play guidelines, as follows:

• Use gentle hands and gentle feet
• Treat everyone with kindness and care
• Use quiet inside voices
• Tidy as you go
• Follow instructions quickly and quietly
• Be part of the team at tidy up time
• Don't tip everything out of a container, just take what you need (unless it's a jigsaw puzzle!).

These guidelines were the children's ideas and we revisited them at the start of this term, just as a reminder, and also so that our new children would be familiar with them. 

Other routines, which the children have embraced once again, include: unpacking their bags when they arrive at school in the morning, including putting their Literacy folder in the right container; remembering their poetry books and library folders on Friday; lining up after break times; 'showing five' whenever they are sitting on the mat; and following the expectations in their small Literacy group lessons (sitting up, chair pulled in, focusing on the learning and 'whiteboards are for writing, not drawing').

Friendship list:

Georgia will, once again, be sending out an invitation to those of you who would like to have your details added to our Friendship List, so please keep an eye out for an email about this.

Term Overview:

We have a very busy term ahead of us. Some of the topics that we'll be focusing on include:

• our school-wide focus areas (including How We Play, Moving Inside, Speaking and Listening and Tidying)
• our Word of the Week continues (including Being an Upstander, Honesty, Inclusion, Showing Respect, Friendship and Determination, along with several other key values)
• Life Education (with a focus on friendship - further details in the next Blog post)
• Cyber Safety (and again with further details to come)