Monthly Archives: April 2021

Kauri Whānau: Holiday Update

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 In this post:

  • ShowQuest 
  • Quiz night help
  • Winter sport / Cross country
  • Learn, Create, Share

ShowQuest 

This is just a friendly reminder to check how you are going with sourcing a costume for your child to wear during our ShowQuest performance. The details were in our end of term 1 post. If you are struggling to find a costume for your child, please send us an email and we will see how we can help. 

We are in need of some parent / older sibling help at different times of the day May 17th (the day of ShowQuest). Please click here to see what is involved and let us know how you can help.

Quiz Night

We have a target of $5000 to raise to cover the costs of camp last term. Our cheese roll fundraiser brought in $2500, so we are halfway there! We hope to raise the rest at our Quiz Night on Saturday, May 29th. Many hands make light work, so please click on this link and let us know how you can help. We will be asking every family to donate a 'luxury' supermarket item so that we can make up hampers. 

Winter Sport and Cross Country

We are still in need of parent help on the day of the cross country and with our local winter sport competition. We are particularly short on netball and football coaches. Please click here to find out more and indicate if you can help.

Learn, Create, Share

One of the highlights of the week for many Kauri children is 'Learn, Create, Share', where their learning follows a personal passion. On the last day of term 1, we had our first sharing session. The children worked hard to create an object or presentation so that they could share their learning. We were impressed! Below is a slideshow to give you a glimpse into the learning that took place. We look forward to repeating this process and hope to open the next sharing session up to whānau.

End of Term 1 and Start of Term 2

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Urban Eel Project/Tuna Tāone

Last Friday we spent a fantastic day of scientific inquiry down at our river/ awa investigating the health of our river and discovering many things about the habitat. Thank you once again to all of the whānau that made it possible by being there as tautoko, support, and guidance for the tamariki. Jenny Bond from the Waterways Trust made a follow-up visit on Monday this week and the students were able to reflect on their findings and look carefully at the data that they had collected from the immersion day. Our next step in Term 2 will be to analyse the health of the Ōpāwaho river and look at ways we can make positive changes to the health of our local waterway and its surrounding habitat.


Learning Conferences

It was fantastic to connect with so many of you at Learning Conferences this week. These conferences provided a valuable opportunity to be able to update you on how your child/children are going at school, as well as to give you an insight into the learning that we are doing. As a follow-up to these short catch-ups with your child's homegroup teacher, we do encourage you to have regular chats with your child/children at home about what they are doing, and the things we are learning about at school. He taonga te ako, the treasure is learning. To help facilitate this, here is the link to our Pōhutukawa Learning Site for you once again. This site is a one-stop shop for a lot of the learning we do in the team; you can access our other learning sites from here, too! Remember, you will need to be logged in to a Beckenham email account to access the links so it's a perfect chance to sit down and take a look together.

Cross Country in Week 2

Our school cross country is coming up on Tuesday May 11th at 11:45am , which is in the second week of Term 2. We will be doing some cross country training every day in week 1 and going over the course. All students will participate in the cross country and we will be working together on basic running skills and personal goals for the event. Nau mai te wero, bring on the challenge!

Have a safe and happy school holidays, kia pai tō hararei. See you all in Term 2!

Beckenham Te Kura o Pūroto Newsletter Friday 16th April

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Principal's Patch

Kia ora koutou

What a busy and long term this has been! Thank you to all of the staff for their huge commitment to our tamariki, and especially to our teacher for the massive week they have put in this week with Learning Conferences going into the evening on both Monday and Wednesday. Thank you too to all of the children and whānau who participated in Learning Conferences. The information sheets that you received at learning conferences are the first report of this year. We are expecting the next report to be through our new digital platform - HERO - during Term 3. 


Great to see continued progress on our new classroom blocks.

School Website - Literacy Learning Page

We have updated our website with a new section on Literacy Learning. We will continue to add resources and information to this page.


New Staff for Term 2

Next term we will be welcoming three new staff to the school. 
Chelsea Carmichael will be joining the Koru (New Entrant) Team where she will start the third home group of new entrants who start next term. Chelsea is a Highlanders fan from Mosgiel and has been teaching in Melbourne for the past 10 years.



We also will be welcoming two new teaching assistants to the school - Sonya Watson and Charmaine Pedersen. (photos to come next term!

Ngā mihi nui
Sandy Hastings
Tumuaki - Principal

Important Dates

Upcoming Events

Fri 16 Apr: - Last day of Term 1

School Holidays

Term 2, Week 1:
Fri 7 May - Welcome Assembly 

Week 2: 
Tue 11 May - Whole School Cross Country
Thu 13 May - Cross Country (postponement date)

Week 3:
Mon 17 May - Show Quest Year 7 & 8
Thu 20 May - 12-3pm - South Zone Winter Sport
Fri 21 May - Staff Only Day (School Closed)

Term Dates

Click here to view 2021 term dates.

Citizen of the Week

Cassia Turner-Germon - Year 4

Cassia, you are amazing. You have a growth mindset and tackle challenges with a positive attitude! Ka pai! This makes you a role model for others in our kura. You are kind and caring, and always there for others. You show initiative in the way that you volunteer to help out and find different ways of problem solving. We look forward to seeing your lovely smile each day. Keep being your fantastic self. 

School Notices

Are you planning a big clean up during the holidays?

If so, you may have some items you might like to donate to our Koru Team to use in their Learning Through Play. 
We would love…
Old toy cars and vehicles
Sandpit toys including buckets, watering cans, spades, dump trucks, diggers etc.
Old baking equipment you no longer need for our mud kitchen
Bits of downpipe, guttering or other plumbing parts to use in the sandpit
Dolls clothes (to fit 41cm dolls or prem size babies), prams etc.
Pop up tent
Knights and dragons for our castles
Lego or Duplo
Surplus craft supplies
Plastic animals

If there is anything else you come across that you think may be suitable,  please see or email one of the Koru Team.

Showquest

Show Quest rehearsals are in full swing and the children are responding really positively to the challenge. Below is information about purchasing tickets to the show and important costuming information. Our performance date is Monday May 17th. On this day the children will be at the Town Hall from 10am until after their performance in the evening. 

Tickets
Please visit Ticketek to order your tickets. If you can't make the show, there will be a video.

Sports News

Cross Country

Our whole school cross country is coming up at the start of next term. This will be held on Tuesday the 11th of May in the afternoon. 

Seniors will have an earlier lunch and start first. The Junior students will start later in the afternoon. Timings will be confirmed during Week 1 of the term and sent out to you via the school newsletter. 

We encourage all the students to embrace our school value "We Love Challenge" and to try their very best. While for the majority this will be participating as a runner, there will be additional ways to make sure all our tamariki are involved in the event. Teams have started our practises already and will continue during the first week of Term 2. We know that some children will enjoy practising over the holidays. Happy running! 

Congratulations

Congratulations to our own Paul McKinnel who, with his team, won the Canterbury Club Championship, the Watson Shield, last weekend. We wish Paul and his team all the best for the National Club Championships this coming weekend!

Paul (in the blue cap, centre of the photo)

Community Notices

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

The Big Little Theatre Company

There are 2 shows in Christchurch, 1 at the Little Andromeda Theatre on the 22nd of April, and 1 at the Isaac Theatre Royal on the 23rd of April.

So what is the show about you ask?  It’s a  comedy of falsehoods, wit and questionable societal norms, Big Little Theatre Company's reimagining of Oscar Wilde's the Importance of Being Earnest will have you laughing out loud and hungry for a muffin.

Jack is in love with Gwendolen. Algernon is in love with Cecily. Cecily is Jack's ward. Gwendolen is Algernon's cousin. Jack told Gwendolen his name was Earnest. Algernon told Cecily his name was Earnest. Neither Jack nor Algernon are actually called Earnest but of course Gwendolen and Cecily both think their love is called  Earnest. Maddie and Morgan can't find Earnest anywhere on Instagram, someone misplaced a baby and Quin is just happy to be here. 

Confused? Good. You’ll just have to come along for a fun filled evening out to make sense of just who Earnest is and why he is so important.

Kahikatea Team Newsletter TERM 1 Week 11

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Cross Country

Our whole school cross country is coming up at the start of next term. This will be held on Tuesday the 11th of May in the afternoon. 
Child/ren will run in Year Groups.
Kahikatea is made up of Year 1 and Year 2 students. Some of our Koru students will run with our Year 1s. 
Seniors will have an earlier lunch and start first. The Junior students will start later in the afternoon. Timings will be confirmed during Week 1 of the Term 2 and sent out to you via the school newsletter. 

We encourage all the students to embrace our school value "We Love Challenge" and to try their very best. While for the majority this will be participating as a runner, there will be additional ways to make sure all our tamariki are involved in the event. 
Teams have started our practices already and will continue during the first week of Term 2. We know that some children will enjoy practicing over the holidays. Happy running!


Upcoming Excursion to Hagley Park & the Museum


Team Kahikatea will enjoy a fantastic excursion to Hagley Park to undertake a 'Park Explorers' Programme with the Council's Learning in Action Team, as well as a visit to the Museum to learn about Canterbury's history within the 'Christchurch Street' area. 

Our learning focuses are: 
* change in our local community 
* change in nature 
* life processes in nature
* biodiversity  
* scientific skills: observation, categorising, describing
* working together, communicating ideas and reflecting on our growing knowledge

We would love to start organising parent helpers for this event. Amber's and Charlotte's home groups will take the excursion on Mon 24/5/21, and Katie’s and Lisa’s groups will go on Tues 25/5/21. The trip will take a full day. 

If you would like to be a parent helper, please email Charlotte on charlotte.verity@beckenham.school.nz with your name, phone number, and your child's name. Note: unfortunately, younger siblings cannot come.


Handwriting & How You Can Help Your Child

The first start of our handwriting programme, Kinetic Letters (TM) is making bodies stronger. We work on strengthening different areas of our body, which supports our ability to write clearly and easily. Here are some the activities we do to strengthen each part of our body, and you might try practicing at home: 
* Pelvic Girdle: crawling, jumping, hopping, climbing 
* Shoulder Girdle: plank, chair or floor push-ups, pull-ups (e.g. on jungle gym or bars)
* Forearm and Wrist: practice the pencil grip, pegging, blocks, playdough, making (construction), finger action rhymes
* Positions for handwriting: practice sitting properly with back on chair, and legs under table; sitting crossed legged with straight backs
See teachers if you would like more ideas. 

Wellbeing 

We have started learning about emotions and feelings over the last fortnight. 
We have discussed how emotions can change our facial expressions, practised showing, describing and naming different emotions. Simply by naming emotions, we can help ourselves to manage them. 
Children watched and talked about this video (you might like to watch at home) and we made our feelings monsters.




ESOL Learning 

Our ESOL students have been working on giving directions, location language and prepositions, by playing games and giving directions 
to peers during their classes with Jeanette. Key terms we have discussed include: first, last, after, next, up, down, under, on, beside, inside, 
underneath and behind. 
Students have also shared aspects of their own cultures, which we have collated into a display in our hub:


 
Thank you for all your support this term and for making time to meet us for learning conferences in Week 11. We wish you all a very safe and happy holiday! 


Amber, Charlotte, Lisa & Katie 




Koru Team -Term 1 Week 11

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 Kia ora ki te whanau,

Can you believe it's week 11 and the end of the first term already! Time certainly flies in the Koru team with such fun busy days. We're sure you are all looking forward to some rest and relaxation and some precious family time together over the holidays. 

This week we welcomed lots of lovely little visitors who will be starting early in Term 2. It was lovely to have our new Koru teacher, Chelsea, join us on Wednesday to meet the new children. Chelsea will be joining the Koru team from the start of Term 2.

Chelsea Carmichael 

Over the last 2 weeks we have been exploring the story of The Little Red Hen and how we can show our school values 'We get there together' and 'We make a difference' to work together as a team during our Learning Through Play. We have seen some lovely teamwork being used to create some amazing work, and we've all been practicing getting there together to tidy up after our play.


Working together with a preschool visitor.

This group were sharing equipment beautifully while working together.

'Teamwork makes the dream work'

Showing how 'We get there together' to complete a building project.

Using our segmenting and blending skills to decode a word.

Playing Jump during a structured literacy lesson.

Creating animals from The Little Red Hen story to role play with.

Playing house games on the big field with the senior leaders.

Practising some yoga after a big morning of Learning Through Play.

Wow good balancing!

Working together and sharing tools in the sandpit.

Taking turns to jump off the decking.

Showing 'We get there together' by all helping to tidy up our classroom.

Showing great teamwork by working together on a project.

Putting the ideas all together as a team.

The collaborative collage project all completed.

Term 2...
We have some very exciting events coming up in Term 2 starting with the whole school cross country in the second week of the term, on Tuesday 11th May. The event starts with the senior children completing their run first. Our run will be between 2-3 pm, and we will give you more details closer to the time. The course for our children will be a run around Beckenham Park. We will familiarise the children with the course in the first week of the term and will get some practices in each day. You may also like to get your child out for some training over the holidays.

As we head into one of our winter terms after the holidays, children will not be required to wear their hats at playtimes. Hats will not be required again until the start of Term 4.

We wish you a lovely and safe autumn holiday together. We look forward to hearing about all the holiday adventures from your little ones at the beginning of Term 2.

Ngā mihi mahana ki a koutou,
Elizabeth, Jo, Stacey and Nicola