Hi everyone

This is the calendar art for Rowe's home group. Some children painted an autumnal scene based on an impressionist style, some used pastels to draw Wassily Kandinsky circles and a couple of children were keen to choose their own design.  Feel free to come in and check it out! We have worked so hard and are very proud of our creations.

Kia ora Team!

What a busy couple of weeks we have had.

Readathon
On Thursday,  your child should have brought home a readathon card. We have discussed a reading goal for your child to complete each week as art of their readathon. Thank you for supporting your child with this by reading with them each and every night over the next two weeks. This is a great fundraiser for the PTA and is also highly beneficial for the children. 
The cards need to be returned to school on Friday 30th August.
As part of this readathon, there will be a 'Dress Up Book Character Day 'on Friday 30th August. On this day, your child can come to school dressed as their favourite book character.
Each child who returns their card, proving they have read each night, will receive a book mark. All of the returned cards will be put in to a draw for each year level (Y0, Y1, Y2 etc) and the PTA will draw a card from each level and that child will receive a book voucher at the school assembly.

Wearable Arts- Inquiry
We are full steam ahead with our Innovation Topic exploring Wearable Arts. Over the past week, the children have had the opportunity to view a variety of wearable arts, identifying how they have been made and their purpose. We have had a go at making prototypes to see what it is like to make a wearable art on a smaller scale. This was VERY tricky for some!
The children have now created designs either individually or in groups for them to make over the next 2-3 weeks. We are trying to make this learning as sustainable as possible and do not want anyone buying any items. We have a variety of materials for the children to use at school, however, your child may ask for some items to be provided from home.
Here are some examples of the children's designs. We will be sharing these with you at a Wearable Arts Evening in Week 7.

An attempt to create a garment for a toy.

Some of our designs.

Pizza Makers
It has been great to see the children learning how to prepare food safely when making pizzas. Here are our first group of pizza makers. They did a great job of cleaning and preparing the kitchen for pizza making, creating the dough and cleaning up the dishes at the end of the session. Well done team!

Making pizzas and following the steps.

Music Lessons- Recorder
Starting this week, the children in our team will be given recorder lessons on a Tuesday afternoon. Josie, one of our itinerant music teachers will be providing this instruction. Two home groups (Nick and Kate's) will have lessons with her this term, and Rowe and Paulette's home groups will have lessons with her in Term 4. We are really excited to be able to provide this opportunity for the children.

Up and Coming Events
28th August- 2.15pm Parent Meeting Keeping Ourselves Safe Programme
30th August - Book Character Day
2nd and 3rd September - Kowhai Trip to School of Gymnastics
6th September- Readathon Cards and Money Due in


That's all for now.
Have a great weekend
Kowhai Teaching Team

Hi everyone

This is our calendar art for Kate's home group. Kiwiana inspired drawings with colourful painted backgrounds. Feel free to come in and check it out! We have worked so hard and are very proud of our creations.

Welcome back!
We would like to welcome three new children to or team Jaiden, Jenna and Audrey who have joined the Kōwhai Team this term. It has been great to see our new children making friends and it is hard to believe they have just started.

Kōwhai Kid of the Week
Each Friday as part of our team hui, we will be identifying children who have been leaders in the hub, living our school values consistently during the week. These children will be able to make pizza on a Friday for their lunch. If your child is a 'Kōwhai Kid of the Week' they will bring home a certificate  (see below) and we will send an email to the parents to let you know. All you need to do is to provide pizza toppings for your child's pizzas. We will make the dough at school and provide the sauce base. The children were really excited to learn about this today!


DMIC- Maths
Our focus at the moment is on learning about fractions. The children have been working in their DMIC groups solving fractions of numbers. Each Friday we are providing the children with the opportunity to participate in Fraction Workshops. These lessons extend the skills and knowledge that the children currently have enabling them to have a stronger skill-based when working on group problems. It has been impressive to see the children's' understanding grow each week. This week we provided workshops on:
1. Basic Fraction Knowledge- How to read, write and represent 1/2,1/4, 1/3, 1/5 etc.
2. Ordering Fractions
3. Finding the fraction of a number, e.g., What is a 1/4 of 24?)
4. What is a proper and improper fraction?

Here is a cool website with fraction games.

Discovery- Learning through Inquiry
We are lifting the level of thinking and learning this term during our Discovery sessions and it has been exciting to see the children really challenging their thinking when learning during this time. The children have been learning about electrical circuits, how to create stop motion animations, using the sewing machine to make clothing, playing and creating new sports to name a few. This component of our programme not only gives the children agency to explore and learn about personal topics of interest but provides opportunities to problem solve, work and cooperate with others, take risks by trying new things and how to self-manage, to name a few skills. Here are some of the children this week.








Inquiry- WEARABLE ART
Next week we will be beginning to introduce our Wearable Art Inquiry. The children will be learning about the wearable arts, what makes them innovative, how people can communicate their creativity through wearable arts and how wearable art could be an ethical option in the future. If you have any items that might be of use for our inquiry (he children will be designing and making their own wearable art), please feel free to send items to school. We will be sharing our learning with you in Week 7 this term, with a performance in the hall.

Calendar Art
This week we have all been exercising our creativity by producing incredible artworks for our calendar art. We will have these on display in our hubs and will send out a blog post showcasing what we have created next week.

PE- Gymnastics
As Term 3 is often wet, our focus for the first half of the term is on gymnastics. Each Thursday afternoon, the children are participating in a variety of gymnastics activities aimed to develop coordination, balance, confidence and control of movements. At the end of this scheme of learning, we will go to the Christchurch School of Gymnastics. A notice about this trip will be sent home closer to the time,

PTA Cheese Rolls
On Monday, the children will be bringing home order forms for cheese rolls. This is another one of our amazing fundraising activities organised by our incredible PTA. It would be great to have as many people supporting this as possible. The cheese rolls are DELICIOUS!

Kapa Haka
This term, we have started our own Kōwhai Team Kapa Haka as Sherrilee is working predominately with Pōhutukawa and Kauri due to her availability. This has provided us with the opportunity to provide all of our tamariki with the opportunity to perform in a Kapa Haka group. Over the past two weeks, we have been learning the role of Kapa Haka and what skills you learn through performing as a group. Over the past two weeks, the children have been learning two waiata;
ehara e te mea and Tōia Mai
We hope to share our learning with you all later on in the term.

That's all for now
Have a great weekend ahead
Kōwhai Teaching Team

It is hard to believe that the end of the Term is now upon us. We have been so fortunate to have been blessed with such wonderful weather this term as this has enabled our tamariki to play outside.

Over the past couple of weeks, the children have been having a focus on the arts in the afternoons. This has seen the children exercising their creativity in many different ways including; pastel art based on Wassily Kandinsky's Circles, paintings depicting Diane Adam's contemporary work and shadow art using mixed media paint and paper. Children have also created their own characters out of salt dough, some based on characters from the famous series 'Moomins'. Children also had fun doing drama role plays and skits using journal stories and plays. What a fantastic term we have had! Some of the artwork is still displayed on the walls in the hub so please feel free to come to check it out.



Rocket Maths
This term, Kate and Dorinda have provided an extra maths session to boost the maths knowledge and ability of some of our students. This has involved the children in having 3 extra fun maths sessions each week. We have noticed a HUGE improvement in the confidence of some of these students when solving DMIC problems and stronger number knowledge.
If you would like to give your child extra maths basic facts practise, you can use this website as it has a lot of great drill activities.
Maths Playground is another great website with great games to develop maths skills.
If you have any questions about your child and maths, feel free to drop in and see one of us as we would be more than happy to help out!

Hillview Cross Country
We sent 12 children to the Hillview Cross Country on Tuesday. We were highly impressed with the wonderful behaviour that our students demonstrated. They all showed the school value, 'We Love Challenge'. It was great to see the children pushing themselves to achieve their personal best. Well done to all those who participated.



Next Term
Rowe is away for the first week next term, as she is having an exciting adventure white water rafting through the Grand Canyon. Dorinda will continue to teach in the hub in her absence.

Wearable Arts/ Innovative Inventions
We have a variety of fantastic learning planned for next term. The children will be involved in creating some cool wearable arts or innovative inventions as part of our inquiry learning. If you have some cool items that could be used for this (ducting pipes, foil, cellophane, clothing etc), feel free to bring the items in. There will be an evening show for you to view these creations in the latter half of the term.

Gymnastics
For PE, next term, the children will participate in a gymnastics unit here at school on a Thursday afternoon. For these sessions, the children do need to have bare feet. It would be advisable for the girls to not wear tights on this day. We hope to go to the school of gymnastics at the conclusion of this learning.



Music/Dance
Next term, the children will be participating in music and dance lessons each Tuesday afternoon. We are going to use the afternoons to develop a dance sequence to support our wearable art/ innovative inventions showcase. Josie Stanford, who is one of our itinerant music teachers is going to be conducting recorder lessons from week 5 for the children in our team. We are really excited to be able to provide this opportunity for our children. As she won't be able to teach all the children this term, she will continue her programme into Term 4, so all children have lessons with her.

Ear Buds
If your child has a set of earbuds that they can bring to school next term, that would be great. This will enable them to listen to the audio on the ipads or chromebooks.

That's all for now
Kōwhai teaching team