Category Archives: Pohutukawa

Pohutukawa Team Newsletter Term 4 Week 1

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Kia Ora Parents / Caregivers


We are so excited to be back at Beckenham in our new hub. It is lovely to see you all again and catch up with siblings regularly throughout the day. The children have settled into routines quickly and there is a general buzz of excitement about being home.


In the mornings before the bell, we are opening the middle doors through to the Koru team and the children can spend time together doing activities, chatting or playing if they want to. We will be spending time together throughout the term as ‘buddies’ as well.


There are a few events coming up this term which will be keeping us quite busy. Below is an overview of the main points to note:

Keeping Ourselves Safe


As part of our Keeping Ourselves Safe unit that runs throughout the first 6 weeks of this term, the children are going to become chief babysitters for an egg. Yes, an egg! It will be boiled for safety.


The children will be responsible for their egg for 4 days and will have to take care of it at all times. If the children want to leave their egg, they need to arrange another person to egg-sit.


The children can name their egg and will be creating a room for it. We are requesting that children bring a shoebox to school to create a room for their egg and any other materials they may want to spruce the room up.


The aim of this activity is for children to learn to look after themselves and others - a theme that comes through the Keeping Ourselves Safe programme.


The children will hopefully get an appreciation of all the hard work you do as parents!


A Keeping Ourselves Safe Home Learning Booklet will be going home today with the children. Please spend some time going through this with your child to reinforce the messages they are learning at school.



Maths - Probability



Our focus in Week 3 for Maths this term is Probability. Part of this unit is creating a probability based game. If you have any cardboard or cardboard boxes at home, we would really appreciate using them for this learning.



Athletics Day



Next week, on Thursday 26th October we will have our Years 5-8 Athletics Day out in Beckenham Park. The postponement date is Monday 30th October. We will meet families out on the park to begin at 9:30am and be finished by 3:00pm. The long jump will be held at Hillview Christian School on Friday 27th October. The long-distance races will be held at Hillview Christian School on Wednesday 1st November.  


Children will need to bring a hat, comfortable sports shoes and drink bottle. It would be a good idea to apply sunscreen before school and we will have sunscreen available to apply throughout the day. Children can wear clothing that is appropriate for athletics and their house t-shirts if they have one.

Choir


Next week, on Friday 27th October the Pohutukawa Pitch Perfect Choir will be going to the Christchurch Schools’ Music Festival rehearsal at Horncastle Arena. If children are involved in long jump, they will be met by a teacher at Hillview, after the rehearsal.   



Cycle Safe Programme


In Week 7, from Tuesday 28th November - Friday 1st December our Year 6 children will be involved in the Cycle Safe Programme. A parent information and permission letter will be sent home soon.

Pohutukawa Team Newsletter Term 3 Week 8

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Kia Ora Whanau

We are rapidly nearing the end of a fantastic Term 3 and looking forward to being back at Beckenham School next term.

Ferrymead Trip 

We had two amazing trips to Ferrymead where we did lots of learning about how much change has affected our lives over the past 100 years.
   
When we arrived, we dressed up in the school uniforms children used to wear each day. Even the teachers had to wear fancy frocks! 

We explored some of Ferrymead Park before heading off to our lessons.



  

 




 





We had a lesson in the school room with Miss Black who was very strict about us lining up silently, sitting up in our seats with straight backs, following instructions without talking, reciting our timetables and doing our handwriting perfectly in ink. We also did some housework where we washed clothing on the washboards, used the wringer, made beds, cleaned tables and ironed clothing using an iron heated on the coal fire. Then we went to explore the old printing station where we used the embossing machine, stapled wee booklets and printed our own posters. We also learned a lot about how phones used to work by having a turn at connecting calls between two people, dialing the old rotary dial phones and figuring out how to hold the phones so we could listen and talk at the same time! 

Challenges 

Last term, we put out a survey asking our children about their use and understanding of our values, their learning within the curriculum areas and what they wanted more of at school. From this survey, 'Challenge' time was started earlier this term.

The challenges focussed on exploring our Key Competencies:

  • thinking
  • relating to others
  • understanding language, symbols and text
  • managing self 
  • participating and contributing

Here are some of our challenges:








 


Drama

During this term, our Arts focus has been on learning different techniques to create a performance based on a well-known story. We developed our understanding around role, action, space, expression, and voice then worked collaboratively to create and present a play to show our learning. We needed to work together as a team, listening to each others' ideas respectfully and making decisions fairly.


Here we are, learning about freeze frames and thought tracking by creating a scene in 10 seconds from The 3 Little Pigs. 

Special Achievement 

Maria arrived at Beckenham School from Brazil in May with very little English. This week, she completed her speech in English and Portuguese. She has also been learning Te Reo. The determination and persistence required to achieve this is outstanding. What an amazing achievement! 

Here is Maria's speech in both languages:  

Fast food 

Hello my name is Maria and I’m going to tell you what fast food can do to your health and the many things it can do to your body.

Quickly made, quickly served, quickly eaten. That’s fast food. Perhaps badly made, poorly served, quickly eaten is more appropriate.

But fast food can taste so good. Some people don’t stop to eat fast food and the bad thing in all this is fast food can have a lot of  fat stuff and this is not good for our health.

Fast food can be really good to eat with your friends but can make you sick with diabetes because it is not prepared properly. Some fast foods just throw things in the recipes and cook. It’s so bad for our health because they put bad ingredients in it.

So now I am going to tell you in Portuguese (my original language) what fast food can do for your health. 

Feito rápido servido rápido e comido rápido.esse é o fast food possivelmente não feito muito bem,mau servido,e comido rápido isso é mais apropriado 

Mas fast food pode ter o gosto muito bom.mas algumas pessoas não conseguem parar de comer fast food e a pior coisa nisso e que fast food pode ter muita gordura e isso não é bom  para nossa saúde. 

Fast food pode ser muito bom para comer com os amigos mas pode fazer você ficar doente com diabetes porque nao e feito apropriadamente. Alguns fast food só jogam as coisas na panela e cozinham isso não é bom para nossa saúde porque eles podem ter colocado os ingredientes errados.

Então eu acho que pessoas não podem comer muitos fast food porque pode fazer mal para nossa saúde.

End of term outing 

We are off for a visit to Wharenui Pools and Margaret Mahy Playground on Friday 29th September. We will depart from Beckenham School at Eastern Tce at 8:40am and arrive back at Beckenham School by 3:00pm. Thank you for the wonderful offers of support from our parent helpers. We are looking forward to an exciting day out! 

Pōhutukawa Team Newsletter – Term 3, Week 4, 2017

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This term, the students in Team Pōhutukawa are involved in a Science/Technology/Drama/Social Studies interchange. One of the topics that the students are learning about is chemistry.

In chemistry, the students are exploring the difference between physical and chemical change by conducting a variety of exciting science experiments.

Here are some photos of their experiments:

These students are learning how soap makes things clean.

These students are studying super-absorbent polymers that can absorb over 200 times their mass in water.

These students are conducting tests to determine which substances are acids and bases.

These students are conducting a colour change experiment.

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These students are learning how chemistry applies in the kitchen.

Egg Cartons

If you have any spare egg containers, please send them in for one of our up and coming challenges. 

Stationery 

It's getting to that time of the year where pens, pencils and glue sticks generally start to deplete. Can you please talk with your child about which items they might need to stock up on and send them to school. Thank you very much. 



Ferrymead Heritage Park Trip

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Dear Parents/Caregivers,


Pohutukawa Whanau are arranging a trip to Ferrymead Heritage Park this term as part of our conceptual learning around ‘Change’. The purpose of this trip is for the children to experience life as a child in the 1900’s in an authentic township and to allow children to see the technological progress that humankind has made to improve our lives.


The trip to Ferrymead will take place over two separate days.
  • Year 6 children will attend on Thursday 24th August. Year 5 children will bus to Champion Street as per usual.
  • Year 5 children will attend on Thursday 14th September. Year 6 children will bus to Champion Street as per usual.


On both days the bus to Ferrymead Heritage Park will depart from Eastern Tce at 9.00am and will return to school by 2.30pm. Children will need to meet their teachers in the East Hub by 8.45am on the day of their trip. When we return to school, we will have some reflection time in the East Hub before heading home for the day.


Students will need to bring:
  • Water bottle
  • Lunch and morning tea (no lunch orders on the day of their trip)
  • A warm layer of clothing
  • Comfortable shoes for walking
  • Any medication they will need i.e inhalers for asthma


We will need parents who are willing to travel with us to and from Ferrymead and who are happy to be responsible for a small group of children while they are there. Please contact your child’s homeroom teacher if you are interested in attending.


To cover the cost of the lesson and bus, a contribution of $15 will be added to your school account.


Kind Regards,


Nice Bruce nick.bruce@beckenham.school.nz

Pohutukawa Team Newsletter Term 3 Week 1

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Kia ora whānau!

We got off to an exciting start to the new term on Tuesday with an awesome science experience. The whole hub was quietly settling into the day when all of a sudden alarms sounded and the screens around the hub announced that a biohazard had been detected. How exciting!


A top secret transmission then came in, in which we were told that there had been a number of biohazards found around Champion Street.


All of the special agents rushed outside and searched in the areas highlighted on the map. 


Once all of the substances had been found, they were brought inside and Agent X (Nick) explained how to conduct experiments to identify the substances. Each group got a beaker or flask filled with a blue substance. Next, children carefully placed dry ice into their vessel. The reactions were amazing!








Learning about Change

 Our conceptual unit this term is 'Change'. Children will be learning about change in a range of forms across the curriculum areas of Social Sciences, Science, Technology and Drama. When learning about Social Sciences, children will learn about the way inventions have shaped the way that we live and made improvements to our lives.


They will be following the Inquiry process to ask questions, gather information, analyse to understand this new knowledge and then present their learning. So far, topics range from anaesthetic, air travel and elevators, to internet and the first PC.


Maths - Geometry

Our maths focus for the first few weeks of this term is Geometry, with a focus on identifying and classifying 2D and 3D shapes, and representing objects with drawings and models.


Coffee Cup Collection

One of our weekly challenges this term will involve the use of a coffee cup - just the cup. If possible, can the children each bring a clean, coffee cup to school next week (it can be used). We have spares if needed. 

Grass Seed

One of our other challenges this term involves grass seed. If anyone has any available can you please let Amy know - amy.buick@beckenham.school.nz . We are aiming for approximately 240 tablespoons.  


Kind regards,
Amy, Gayle, Nick, Katie and Kat