Category Archives: Pohutukawa

Pōhutukawa News – Week 7, Term 2, 2021 (Part 2)

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Kia ora ano, e te whānau. Here is the second part of the latest news from Pōhutukawa.

Shoes, Ngā Hū

Mud, glorious mud! We certainly have our fair share of it these days. The mud that is making its way into our learning spaces is always a challenge at this time of the year. Because of this, and for the time being, we are asking tamariki to remove their shoes, hū, before entering the Hub and to leave them outside the door, under the eaves. As mentioned before, we have wonderful underfloor heating to keep feet warm, and we will be having an explicit teaching lesson next week on how to pair our shoes neatly outside the door to stop them wandering off by themselves! If you'd like to supply your tamariki with slippers or warm indoor socks, you are most welcome

On the topic of shoes we would like to ask you, if possible, to ensure that your tamariki are wearing running shoes or sneakers on both Wednesday and Thursday. Although we do some form of fitness every day, Wednesday and Thursday is when we run our winter sports programme and suitable footwear is a must. This ensures that students are able to safely carry out the skills that the kaiako, teachers, and the winter sport coaches are teaching them. As always your support with this is greatly appreciated and please let us know if we can support you in any way with this.

BYOD

We are so lucky to have such a huge uptake of whānau signing up their children to bring their own devices to school. We'd like to ask these whānau to please remind your children to bring their devices to school, and fully charged. This enables the school Chromebooks to be used by those students who do not bring their own devices to school.

Ngā mihi, kia pai ō rā whakatā - have a great weekend!

Pōhutukawa News – Week 7, Term 2

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Ngā mihi e te whānau, warm greetings to you all. 

 House Points

Our focus for this fortnight is our kete value of 'We Make a Difference". The whakatauki, proverb, that accompanies this value is 'Nā mātou he rerekē te ao'. This translates as 'The world is different because of us'. Kaiako, teachers are on the lookout for students showing co-operation , initiative and making a positive difference for one another in the playground, in the classroom, and around the Hub. 

Once more, we encourage you to talk about this value at home over the next week or so, reflecting on how we can all show that 'We Make a Difference' in our daily lives. 



Wonder Project - The Rocket Challenge

Nau mai te wero! As part of our continuing inquiry into 'Change', we have been working alongside some wonderful ambassadors from Engineering NZ (including Pōhutukawa whānau's own John Aramowicz) in undertaking the 'Rocket Challenge'. So far in our STEM journey, students have discussed with our Ambassadors why Health and Safety is a fundamental part of the engineering world, undertaken test flights of bottle rockets, reflected on variables, discussed Newton's first law of motion, and designed and created prototypes of their very own bottle rockets. 

It has been great to see the children developing their skills of collaboration, problem solving, and innovation while creating their bottle rockets. We have suggested that they speak with you at home about their project, and students are welcome (but not expected) to bring in anything that may support the creation of their rockets. Suggestions include glue guns, lightweight plastic, or cereal boxes (for fins), washi tape, etc. Here are some photos of our journey so far, and a video of a first "test flight".



House Points

This week we've been excited to reintroduce the use of House Points at Beckenham Te Kura o Pūroto. We will have a fortnightly values focus, and house points are being given out to children who specifically display this value. The points accumulate in teams in a running tally and will culminate in a shield presentation at waiata assembly for the winning house every second Friday. Each morning excitement abounds as the tally is shared in the Daily Notices. Our focus for this fortnight is our kete value of 'We Care'. 

Teachers, kaiako, are on the lookout for our values in action in the playground, in the classroom and around the Hub. Happily, we have already noticed a huge lift in tamariki showing awareness of this important value. We encourage you to talk about this initiative at home over the next week or so, reflecting on how we can all show that 'We Care' in our daily lives. Arohaina te tangata me te taiao, we care for people and our environment.





Winter Sports

Our winter sports programme kicks off next week. Every student has elected to join, and will be involved in either competitive or development hockey, netball or football. We are still looking for parent assistance on Wednesday afternoons from 2pm - 3pm to help support our tamariki in the development groups. No expertise in any of these sports is required. All we would ask is to support the children in running some skills based activities with the support of our teachers. If you think you could help us at this time, please get in touch with your child/ren's home group teacher. Your support would be hugely appreciated.

Information for Competitive Winter Sport players

Competitive winter sport starts next Thursday and will run for ten weeks.

Children who are not in a competitive team will choose from three options back at school. 

Outcome

The desired outcome of our winter sport programme is to provide an opportunity for interested children to play sport. The primary aim is for children to have an enjoyable experience. It is awesome that we have children trying a sport for the first time or joining a team in a sport that isn’t what they would usually play on a Saturday morning. To accommodate for potential variance of ability, adults are instructed to be flexible and make adaptations to the game as necessary. 

Sportsmanship

We set high expectations for our tamariki around sportsmanship. A model we often use is The 3 Rs:
Respect for my team
Respect for the opposition
Respect for the referee and the rules of the game

Game Locations

Most games start at 1:45 and children should be back at school for 3:00. 

Hockey - Beckenham Park (The 7/8 A grade team will play at Sydenham Park on turf) 

Football - Hansens Park 

Netball - a variety of local schools. 

All travelling teams will be walking to their game, (the ⅞ A grade hockey team will travel by car). They will be accompanied by teaching staff and/or parents. A huge thank you to the parents who have volunteered their time for this. 

Covid- 19 Guidelines
All schools will be keeping records of children and adults at each location in case we need to do contact tracing. 


Safety Gear and uniforms

Uniforms will be issued by Anne Chin at the library. Instructions will be given via the daily notices. 

Essential safety gear

Hockey - mouth guard and shin guards are essential

Football - shin guards and football boots.

Netball - short nails and no jewellery.

If your child needs shin guards or football boots, these can be lent out from school if required. Hockey players will also be able to borrow a hockey stick if needed. 

ALL CHILDREN WHO CARRY PERSONAL MEDICATION, SUCH AS AN ASMTHA INHALER MUST CARRY THIS WITH THEM TO THEIR GAME. ANY MEDICATION USUALLY HELD AT THE OFFICE WILL BE COLLECTED BY A TEACHER.

If you have any questions, you can contact myself or the teacher in charge of the sport that your child is playing. 

Football - Jenny and Steve
Hockey - Gayle
Netball - Caitlin and Anna


Pōhutukawa News – Week 2, Term 2, 2021

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Ngā mihi e te whānau, warm greetings to you all.

School Cross Country

What a fantastic day we had for our school cross country on Tuesday afternoon. As it turned out, the weather was perfectly planned and it was lovely to see so many whānau come along to tautoko, support the tamariki. It was so pleasing to see the students giving their best and supporting each other to achieve their goals. You, and they, can feel very proud of their efforts. Congratulations to all of our young athletes who have qualified for the Zone cross country. More information about this event will follow


The Wonder Project

This term as part of our continuing inquiry into the concept of  'Change' for 2021, we are taking up the Rocket Challenge as part of the Wonder Project, which is run by Engineering New Zealand. Students will work with their homegroup teacher and a Wonder Project Ambassador to design, build and launch their very own water rocket! We are lucky to have John Aramowicz (Luka's dad) as one of our ambassadors, along with 3 other volunteers, all of whom are STEM professionals. This project teaches students about Newton's laws of motion, the engineering design process, and also promotes creative thinking and teamwork. This project aims to get the tamariki excited about a career in science, technology, engineering and maths. He taonga te ako, the treasure is learning! To enable our project to take off, we are asking for your help. Each student is being asked to bring along a clean, washed 1.5 litre plastic bottle with the lid attached from which we can create our bottle rockets. Your help with this is greatly appreciated.

Muddy Months

As we head into winter we are noticing the inevitable increase of muddy shoes and clothes as students come back from play and lunch, having played sports and games on our beloved Park. We have spoken as a hub about the need to show We Care for our school environment by taking off muddy shoes before we enter the Hub and lining them up neatly outside the door. We are lucky to have wonderful underfloor heating in the classrooms, so feet stay nice and warm. In addition to this, we suggest that if your child is coming home with very muddy clothes, please consider supplying them with a spare pair of school shorts and a spare school top for them to change into once they finish their games. We appreciate your support with this.

Upcoming Dates

Wednesday, May 19 - School Photos

Friday, May 21 - Staff Only Day

Tuesday, May 25 - Zone Cross Country at Halswell Quarry

Monday, June 7 - Queen's Birthday (School closed)

Tuesday, June 8 - Staff Only Day

Help Needed for Winter Sport

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Winter Sport

Winter sport starts in Week 5 of this term. We would love to be able to provide every child who wants to participate in competitive winter sport a place in a sports team. To make this possible, we are still looking for adults to accompany teams. Ideally, this adult would be comfortable having a go at refereeing a game. This is something we can support you in learning how to do if you are new to it. If you are not comfortable refereeing but would be available to support a team, please do still get in touch. The most important thing we need is for the children to be adequately supervised.  

Unfortunately, at the moment we still do not have enough adults for a competitive winter sport to go ahead, and we are still looking for support to help with football, netball, and hockey.

Please get in touch with Jenny Diggle directly at jenny.diggle@beckenham.school.nz or with your child's homegroup teacher. Mā tātou kātoa te waka e hoe, we are all rowing the waka together!