PTA Newsletter July 2020

PTA Newsletter July 2020

PTA BULLETIN 2020


Here is a quick update of what the PTA has been up to, and what we have still to come this year.



We were so happy to get some community events up and running again after Lockdown with our disco and supporting the Mid-winter breakfast. It’s also been great to see the new playground being opened, after so much work by the BOT, staff and PTA to get that space into usable, playable shape. We have also been pleased to donate last year's Calendar Art proceeds to the purchase of the Seesaw software that enabled the junior classes to connect with their teachers and work online during Lockdown. We have also been able to help purchase Learning Through Play resources, with these funds.

Silent Auction

The prizes sourced by the PTA for the fair still need a good home! Our silent auction has been transferred online and is running at the moment- there are some absolutely gorgeous things to bid on. Follow this link to have a look at the treats on offer.  

It takes about 2 seconds to register and then you can browse the amazing packages put together by the prize team. Some of the things to buy include: scenic flights, nappies, nights out, bike helmets, bike seats, massage, pizza, coffee, beauty therapy, jewellery, original art, swimming lessons, ferry tickets, mohair rugs, massage - honestly our sponsors have been incredibly generous, so please go and have a browse. Get in quick, bids close on Friday 24th July.

Clubbercise

Clubbercise is a fun, sweaty, dance exercise class - set to pumping fun dance anthems from the 90s. 2000s and today! The lights are low, with disco lights flashing so no one can see how unco you are, but Chloe is a master teacher and even those of us with two left feet can join in and get the heart rate up! Tickets are $10, and thanks to Chloe’s generosity, almost all of the ticket price comes back to school. We can only do these in winter when the light is dark enough, so don't miss out, the first night is coming up soon 29 July at 7pm. Click this link to register and book your ticket. 


What else is coming up?

The Fair was our major fundraising event, and it’s cancellation has left a hole in our fundraising for 2020/2021. We had planned to update the sports uniforms and help buy resources for the digital curriculum, as well as our usual support of the annual bus trips. But COVID has meant massive disruption and uncertainty for our community, so we have decided that fundraising will not be a major focus for the PTA this year. We will run some key events because the school still requires support, but there is absolutely no pressure to donate to any of the events we run. The PTA will not be running a quiz this year (there will be a fun adults night out though, the Kauri hub are organising a quiz of their own, to fundraise for camp) Our main fundraiser will be the Read-a-thon - details to follow in term 3.


In spring our Top Team event on Sunday the 29th of November will become a Community Fun Day, incorporating Top Team, but also with food stalls and some of the fair games that our crafty fair team had already made. We will run the live auction at the Community Day to sell the beautiful collaborative art each home group made to auction at the fair.

Come and join us!

As always we would love to see you at our PTA meetings. They happen on the 4th Wednesday of the month, typically in the Green Room at school. Like our facebook page or check the school calendar for exact dates and places.


Mini-Newsletter, Friday 17th July 2020

Reminder: Term 3 starts on Tuesday 21st July.

Monday is a Staff Only Day and school will be closed.

Road Works on Eastern Terrace

We have been advised that the section of Eastern Terrace between Fisher Ave and Sandwich Road (where the ponds are) will be closed off for wastewater work being undertaken by Citycare. There will still be pedestrian access along this section, and through the parks.
Please allow the extra time needed if you are planning to drive to school, and be aware that you won't be able to park on this section of road. If you are able to walk or bike to school with your children, this would be a great option.

Year 6 Caregivers & Whānau meeting, Thursday 23 July

This is an important opportunity for all caregivers of our Year 6 students. Come along and find out how our Year 7/8 team cater for the learning needs of intermediate aged students.


Year 8 Whānau meeting with Joe Eccleton, Cashmere High School, in the Staffroom, Monday 27th July 6pm

Come along and meet Joe Eccleton, Principal of Cashmere High, who will be speaking about what Cashmere High can offer your Year 8 students, as they transition to high school in 2021.

Basketball 3 on 3 champions 

(final week of Term 2)
The ‘Beckenham Warriors’ came away with a hard-fought win in the final of the Year 5/6, A Grade Competition on Wednesday night at Pioneer Stadium. The team had gone right through the whole competition with only one loss. Luckily, in the final, we were back up against the same team that had previously beaten us… but this time we put it right! A huge thanks to Jamie for all your time spent coaching and for your expertise on the sideline. (Quinn, Robbie, Bella, Lola)


2020 ICAS Assessments (with updated link)

The University of New South Wales is offering your child to take part in the ICAS assessment programme. These are an optional assessment. offered to students in Year 5-8.

Entries are administered by the school. For further information, please consult the ICAS website - https://www.unswglobal.unsw.edu.au/educational-assessments/products/icas-assessments/. Each participant will receive a certificate and a detailed report of their performance.

Each assessment costs AUD$14.50 to enter. In order to ensure that you are paying the price we pay when we purchase them, we will invoice you once the entries have been submitted.

To enter your child, please fill in the google form. Entries are due Monday 3 August 2020.

Should you have any questions, please feel free to contact me via email - hannah.elliott@beckenham.school.nz. We will add the sitting dates to the community calendar when we have confirmed exact times.

Beckenham Te Kura o Pūroto Newsletter, Friday 3rd July 2020

Principal's Patch

Kia ora koutou

Hooray! The sun is out, and we made it to the end of what has been a very long and quite challenging term! Whilst the first three weeks back after lockdown saw high attendance with very low levels of sickness, the winter coughs, colds, sniffles, sore throats and occasional tummy bug have all been present and challenging both students and staff this last four weeks of term. The rain and cold over the past two weeks just added to that challenge, and Learning Conferences for two evenings this week have meant that teachers have absolutely worked to their capacity and beyond. As a staff, we are all very much looking forward to the first proper break since the Christmas holidays.

The huge rainbow that appeared over the school yesterday, captured by one of our lovely cleaners, Ellen.
This is an important opportunity to acknowledge again, the incredible dedication that our staff all have to our school, our children and their professional responsibilities. During lockdown, they didn't really stop, whilst they learned new digital skills and set up new ways of working to try and keep learning available for all of our children. We would also like to acknowledge the support that we continue to get from you, our parents and whānau, for the challenge that you took on in becoming the teachers during lockdown, and then supporting the different ways that we have needed to operate during the changing Alert Levels.

We do wish you all a very safe, warm and relaxing break over the next two weeks, and we look forward to seeing you on TUESDAY 21st July for the first day of Term 3.

Ngā mihi nui
Sandy Hastings
Principal - Tumuaki

Important Dates

Upcoming Events

Mon 20 Jul - Staff Only Day - SCHOOL CLOSED
Tue 21 Jul - First Day of Term 3
Thu 23 Jul - Year 6 Caregivers meeting - Kauri Hub
Wed 22 Jul - Y5/6 Zone Basketball, Hillview Christian School
Wed 22 Jul - PTA Meeting 19:30 - 21:30
Thu 23 Jul - Laura Williamson Y3/4 Catch-up Learning Conferences 1:30-5pm
Thu 23 Jul - Year 6 Whānau Evening in the Kauri Hub
Fri 24 Jul - Welcome Assembly 9:15am
Mon 27 Jul - Joe Eccleton, Pri8ncipal, Cashmere High @ Beckenham to talk with Y8 whānau
Mon 3 Aug - PTA Readathon starts
Thu 6 Aug - Board Meeting - All welcome
Wed 12 Aug - Canterbury Cross-Country - Halswell Quarry
Fri 14 Aug - Book Character Day! (Final Readathon day - come dressed as your favourite Book Character.

Term Dates

Click here to view 2020 AND 2021 term dates.

Year 6 Parents and Whānau evening - Thursday 23 July 7-8pm

We are very excited to invite the parents and whānau of our current Year 6 students to come along and visit the Year 7/8 hub on Thursday 23rd July from 7-8pm.
Please do take the opportunity to come and learn about our Year 7/8 programme, and find out from both students and the teachers about what our programme offers your intermediate aged children. 
Find out about how the Year 7/8 team operate, and what 2021 has in store, including camp programme, sport, extension, technology and general learning programmes.

Farewell to a very special friend

Most of our children will be very familiar with 'Beau' who has been our school 'Canine Educator' for the past 5 or 6 years. Beau belonged to Tracy Inwood, and would regularly accompany her to school and participate in learning in the hubs! He was a very gentle, loving and patient dog. 
Sadly, after 16 and a half wonderful years, Beau passed away earlier this week. We know that Beau will be so missed by Tracy and Phil, as we will also miss him, quietly keeping up with Tracy when she comes into school. 


Thank you, Beau, for all the wonderful memories!

ShowQuest - seeking a videographer

For the past two terms, a group of Year 7 and 8 students have been conceptualising and choreographing an entry for ShowQuest. This is usually an on-stage performance but in response to Covid, the organisers have switched to an online video entry. We are wondering if there is anyone in our school community has any experience or expertise that they could contribute to this project. Please, get in touch with Jenny, if you think you could help. The plan is to film early in term 3.

Dental Care during the School Holidays                                               

The Community Dental Service will be providing dental care for children enrolled with our service during the upcoming school holidays.  The clinics will offer treatment and relief of pain sessions by appointment only.   To make an appointment please call/email our Contact Centre which operates between the hours of 8am and 4.30pm, Monday to Friday throughout the holidays.
The following Dental Clinics will be open during these school holidays:

·       Burnside Clinic, 96A Memorial Avenue, Burnside,

·       Hornby Clinic, 2 Hei Hei Road, Hornby,

·       Lincoln Clinic, 35 James Street, Lincoln,

·       Timaru Clinic, Level 1, 18 Woollcombe Street, Timaru

The clinics will offer appointments between 8.15am and 4.45pm for school-age and preschool children requiring treatment.
If your child has dental pain because of an accident, please contact your dentist in the first instance.
To book an appointment at one of our clinics please: call 0800 846 983
Or email commdental@cdhb.health.nz

Sports News

Winter Sport

We are hoping to be able to continue to offer a local winter sport competitive programme with our zone next term on Thursday afternoons. Thank you to the parents who have already offered support with this. For this programme to run, we are in need of adults to manage hockey and football teams for Year 5/6 and 7/8. This is a six-week commitment.

School Cross Country Champions

Year 8 champions - Mia, Lucky and Erik

Year 7 champions - Mila and Jonty

Year 6 champions - Billy and Petra

Year 5 champions - Archie and Jayde

Year 4 champions - Lily and Jack

Year 3 - champions - Kawa and Isla

Zone Cross Country

Monday, was a fantastic day at Halswell Quarry for our zone cross country. Our competitors did our kura proud by showing exceptional perseverance and sportsmanship. It was great to see the way that the children supported each other. A special mention goes to Mia, Jain and Ruby who stayed back at the finish line to cheer every last runner over the finish line.

Congratulations to Jonty Mitchell, who placed 4th in the year 7 race, and Torin Jorgensen, who placed 5th in the year 6 race. Both children will be representing our kura at Canterbury’s in term 3.

Year 7/8 Zone Basketball

Congratulations to our girls’ basketball team who won our zone basketball tournament on Wednesday. 

Community Notices

(Notices placed here are contingent on space and do not reflect the views or opinions of the school.)

Hola , Kia ora !

Celebrate Argentina Day with us in Riverside Market on Friday 10th of July. Come after work and stay all night long!

Featuring:

- 6pm- Argentinean Street Food from El Quincho
- Live music: El Ristu + Open Mic - El Quincho
-7pm- Social cards games (Truco & Chinchon)
- 7pm- Argie Quizz - Upstairs Cantina
- 8pm- Social Tango - Milonga -upstairs at Cantina
-10pm - Fiesta Argenta at Castro Bar
- Dance until 3am with Argentinean DJ Sofia
-Riverside Market and El Quincho $50 vouchers

- Free Entry

- To make the event safe and comply with COVID 19 regulations, please register your name for the event.

Thank you for sharing this event with your amigos!

Hasta pronto, Gracias!

Denise Lovato

The Big Planting Day Farnley Reserve 

19 July (last Sunday of school holidays), 9am -12pm  81 Eastern Terrace Beckenham
An opportunity for families to get to know your local reserve, plant some plants and meet some of the regular Friends of Farnley volunteers.

Bring your own shovel and gloves if you have one (make sure they are named).  Wear warm clothes, sturdy footwear and bring your own morning tea.


Beckenham Te Kura o Pūroto Newsletter Friday 26 June 2020

Principal's Patch

Kia ora koutou

Learning Conferences - this coming Tuesday and Thursday

This coming week, on Tuesday and Thursday afternoon, we will be having mid-year Learning Conferences.
This meeting is designed to be a three-way conversation between you, your child and their home group teacher about their learning and wellbeing.
At the conference, you will receive a Learning Snapshot in place of a mid-year report, which will be a brief, written synthesis of some of the discussion you will have had about your child's learning.

NOTE that school finishes at 2pm on each of these days. If your child is booked into BOSCO for either of these days, they will be able to go to BOSCO from 2pm.
If you need your child to be supervised on either day, please contact Jacky in the office so we know to expect them, AND ask your child to go to the hall foyer at 2pm on those days to sign in to the supervision programme until 3pm. Children at BOSCO and in supervision will not be playing outside between 2 and 3pm.

If you haven't yet done this, please book a learning conference time for each child you have at school.
The learning conference bookings are for 15 minutes each (NOTE that in Year 7/8, even though you will be booking for 15mins, the conference will take 30 mins as your child has a bigger role in the discussion at the intermediate year level.) If you have more than one child to book for, please do not book back to back time slots, as you will lose some of your time in moving from one conference to the other.

The conferences can be booked by going to www.schoolinterviews.co.nz and entering the code yseec

Thank you, PTA!

A huge "Thank You!" to our PTA for the energy and commitment they put into ensuring that our School Disco happened this year. Thank you also to the staff and `whānau who came along to support with supervision and ensured that the children were safe and having a great time.


Staffing Update

At the start of next term, we will welcome another new teacher to our Koru Team (NE/Y1). Sari Farrant will join Jo, Elizabeth, Stacey and Sophie until the end of the year, to be the point of contact teacher for our fourth New Entrant home group.

Sari Farrant - new NE teacher

New Entrant Enrolments for 2020 and 2021

If you have a 3 or 4 year old at home whom you are intending to enrol at Beckenham, we would really appreciate if you do that this coming week. Whilst their 5th birthday might seem like a long way away, we are required to 'predict' our 2021 roll at the end of this week in our formal 'roll return' to the Ministry of Education, and this prediction will be more accurate with actual enrolments on our system.
If you have friends or neighbours with 3 or 4 year olds and you know they are planning to enrol at Beckenham, please let them know that we would like to hear from them sooner, rather than later! Many thanks.

Ngā mihi nui
Sandy Hastings
Principal - Tumuaki

Important Dates

Upcoming Events

Monday 29 June - Zones Cross Country event at Halswell Quarry.  9am - 12:45pm
Tuesday 30 June - Learning Conferences - School closes 2pm
Thursday 2 July - Learning Conferences - School closes 2pm
Friday 3 July - Final day of Term 2.  School closes at 3pm

Term 3 begins TUESDAY 21 July. (Staff only day on Monday 20 July)

Monday 27 July - Year 8 whānau meeting about Cashmere High (see below)

Term Dates

Click here to view 2020 & 2021 term dates.

Citizen of the Week

Hatsumi Yuge - Year 4

Hatsumi, You are a role model in our hub who naturally demonstrates our school values and you are always willing to lend a hand or help others.  You display a positive attitude to all aspects of learning. You show initiative and drive to do the right thing and help make the Kōwhai Hub a happy place to work. Your bright smile and warm friendliness everyday is appreciated by everyone around you. We love having you in our team!   

School Notices

Lost property from the mid winter breakfast

Please come to the office to claim these items.

Year 8 whānau meeting - learning about Cashmere High...

Joe Eccleton, Principal of Cashmere High, will be coming to speak to interested whānau about Cashmere High on Monday 27 July from 6pm - 7pm at Beckenham. Diary the date - more information to come.

Term Dates for 2021

At our Board of Trustees meeting this week, we finalised the Term dates for 2021. Click here to see these on our website.

Sports News

It is great to have sports news to share after the long period of no sporting activities.

This week we had a number of teams participate in a zone basketball competition at Hillview Christian School.
Congratulations to our senior girls who won their competition!


Zones Cross Country

These kids were superb representing BeckenhamTe Kura o Pūroto at the Zones Cross Country.  Some toe to toe action!




Congratulations to Jonty Mitchell, who placed 4th in the zones cross country, earning him a place at Canterburys next term.


PTA News

Again - a huge thanks to our PTA for the mid-winter breakfast and the school DISCO - both held in the last two weeks. We really appreciate everything you do for our children and community.

Community Notices

(Notices placed here are contingent on space and do not reflect the views or opinions of the school.)


The Big Planting Day!

An opportunity for families to get to know your local reserve, plant some plants and meet some of the regular Friends of Farnley volunteers.
19 July (last Sunday of school holidays)
9am -12pm 
Meet at Farnley Reserve
Bring your own shovel and gloves if you have one (make sure they are named).  Wear warm clothes, sturdy footwear and bring your own morning tea.
This is a community planting day.  Parents need to also attend and supervise their own young people.



Free Martial Arts for Taekwon-Do School Holiday Programme

Monday 13th July 2020 to Friday 17th July 2020
Visit  http://www.riccarton.itkd.co.nz/   for more information