Mary's Garden End Of Year Trip Photos

Yes, magically they have arrived.  A selection here in no particular order.

Mufti Day Tuesday

Oops I forgot to add mufti day on the weekly blog.
We are raising funds for Ben Whitaker's Food For Thought venture with under privileged children in Buenos Aires.  A gold coin donation please.

If you are able please bring a something for the Food Bank basket to the mass at night.

Children need to be seated in the church by 5:55pm.

A great prize giving today - super to see so many parents able to come to this celebration.

Week 10 Term 4

Where has this term gone? The last post for the year already.Thank you to those parents who biked with us or joined us for lunch on Friday.
Unfortunately the Mary's Garden plantings were in the office and many people had already left for home by the time we realised that was where they were.  They are in Room 3 and can be collected from there on Monday please.

Monday 12th: Happy Birthday Mrs Waldron

• 12 - 1pm shared picnic lunch. Room 1 & 2 fundraiser for the development of the outdoor learning area outside Rooms 1 & 2.  American Hot Dogs & ice creams - these needed to be preordered by Friday. Please join us for lunch BYO if you haven't put in an order.
• 1pm 2016 Prize Giving in the church. We are performing with Room 4 and are lucky enough to have the talented Mr Yeoman accompany us.

Tuesday 13th:

• Room 3 shared lunch at 12:30.  We will farewell Casey and Archie, as they leave us at St Gerards. Please bring finger food that is simple and healthy.
• Graduation Mass 6pm - we farewell our Year 8 students. We will be sitting as a class in summer school uniform.  It is expected that all children attend this celebration.

Wednesday 14th:

• School finishes at 1pm - as buses won't be running please arrange to collect your children at this time.

Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas with family and friends, remembering that Jesus is the reason for the season.

Safe holiday travels, and safe travels to the Jenkinson family as they relocate to sunny Nelson for 2017.  Thank you so much for all you have both done for the school.  You will be very much missed.

Big Little Day Out

Don't forget this Sunday is the Big Little Day Out down where the old swimming pool was.  Last year it was an amazing day - good music, great people and lots of yummy picnic baskets. $20 per family.
This is our opportunity to give something to people who have so much less than we do this Christmas. Part of the funds raised go towards the children that Ben Whitaker works with in Buenos Aires - those that we didn't see when the TV cameras were show casing the city during the Olympic Games. You won't be disappointed - the line up of entertainment is fantastic & yes the Ward family is there too.  People giving of their talents to help others.
Hope to see you there!

Shared Lunch For Casey

On Tuesday next week Room 3 will have a shared lunch to farewell Casey, as she leaves for Nelson.  We will all miss you and your family so much, Casey.
We will eat at 12:30 so that we can spend the whole lunch time in the playground.  Please bring a small plate of healthy food to share.

Photos of the trip today will have to wait - obviously the i-pad is not connected  to my internet so nothing has arrived to my computer - I also don't have a cord that will let me get the photos directly.  Sunday perhaps.

Years 3 & 4 Eisteddfod Performers

What a fantastic job everyone made of their speeches - a wide variety of topics too.
Grace Brydges, Sophie Tait, Charlie Donaldson,  Alia Ryan, Keira Mc Fadyen and Kimberley Dacosta will be representing Years 3 & 4.

Week 9 Term 4

Another busy week ahead - whew I hope I have it all here!!

Here's what's happening!!

*Monday 5^h December: Bike Check with Mr Milford in the afternoon.

*Eisteddfod Classroom Presentations: Monday & Tuesday mornings 5^th -6^th Dec. Names of those performing on Thursday will be on the blog and in the newsletter on Wednesday. 

*Tuesday 6th Vision Meeting 7pm at school.  The "School Vision' group  have worked extremely hard to word these documents. which reflect what our school is about. Consultation has been done with the Board of Trustees and the staff - now is the time to present their work to the school community. A short meeting is planned where there is the opportunity in small groups to hear from the 'team' about their statements about Love, Learn, Grow.

*Wednesday Morning 7^th December: We have been invited to watch Alexandra Primary School’s Musical Production,  9.30 am. It would be great to have a couple of parents to walk with us.  No preschoolers in the theatre though please.
* Wednesday: $5 in a named envelope to classroom teacher for mini golf on Friday if you wish to play.  I have 1 already.

*Thursday 8^th December: Eisteddfod Assembly, 1.30 pm.

*Friday 9^th December: Room 3 & 4 Bike Excursion - be ready in Room 3 at 9:am.  We will need to check day bags and bikes that needed some attention.

* Friday:  orders for the picnic lunch from 12-1pm before the prizegiving on Monday 12 December. If you wish to buy lunch, you can buy it as Year 1 and 2 are raising funds for the new play based learning area that we want created in front of Room 1. 
American Hotdogs $3 | Ice cream in a cone $1 | Iceblock- juicy $1

*Sunday 11^th December: Little/Big Day Out – Music Concert & Fundraiser for Ben Whitaker’s ‘Food for Thought’ Programme in Buenos Aires. 12 noon – 8 pm at the Old Swimming Pool area. Admission $10 per child and $20 per family. Please support this great outdoor concert - Ben is an ex-pupil and Mrs Lyons brother.

*Monday 12^th December: 1 pm – Prize Giving Assembly. Rooms 1 & 2 fundraising lunch.

*Tuesday 13^th Dec: Graduation Mass – 6 pm.

*Wednesday 14th - last day for 2016

*Thursday 15^th December: Teacher Only Day.

Favourite Family Recipe:

I only have two family recipes in so far. Please keep them coming. It is very important to the success of the Recipe Book that we have as many authentic recipes and photos and stories as possible. 

The Recipe Group.

Thank you Adam for doing last week's homework and sharing a scrummy truffles recipe.

Sadly, Lily Adams who has just returned to our class, has come down with chicken-pox. We wish you a speedy recovery, Lily - we have missed your smiley face in Room 3.

Looking forward to an exciting, busy week.

Bike Safety with Mr Milford

Great learning today with Mr Milford. All bikes have been checked and some people have notes in their bags for major things that need to be fixed.

• Please check that tyres are inflated - many were not and that will make our journey on Friday really hard work. Tyres need to be inflated to 35 - 40 psi - free air at all the petrol stations. 
• Check out the ends of the handle bars if the hand grips are worn - they are very dangerous if we were to fall on them.  It was suggested that using a cork over these works fine if you don't want to purchase new grips.

After the inside chat about bikes, the outside inspection and feedback from the inspection, we all looked at how to fit a helmet so that it would protect us in an accident.

Thank you parents for getting the bikes here today - great learning for us so that we can make sure our bikes are safe and know what to check before we take on those summer rides with friends and family.

These are the parts of a bike that MUST be safe according to law.

Checking those brakes with Mr Milford

Are my pedals okay? Do they have reflectors?

What is important about fitting my helmet.

 What a line up for Mr Milford - at least we are under the shady trees!

National Costumes for Mufti Day

What a great opportunity for Jelena and Lily to wear their special dresses that they bought while they were visiting family in Switzerland and Germany respectively.  I hope you will still fit these and talk about them when we have the cultural assembly in 2017, girls.

Morning Programme 2nd December 2016

Today saw these crazy kids from group 1 sharing their morning programme.

First up was Casey, who shared with us all about herself and her family.  After listening to Casey, we all felt we had a whole new person in our class.  Who knew Casey might have been "Kaycee" - her Mum liked this spelling but her Dad thought people might spell it wrong, so they settled on the more traditional spelling!  Casey has  done a lot of travelling in planes, trains and automobiles and currently she just loves TRUFFLES! 😋  Casey is looking forward to making new friends in Nelson, to spending time with her family and learning the different ways at St Paul's Catholic school.
We will miss her dearly.  All the very best Casey. 😊

Next up was Greer who spoke to us about a famous "bug man" that she is interested in - Ruud Kleinpaste.  Ruud is a Dutch man which means he was born in Holland but now he lives in New Zealand.  He is called an entomologist which is a person or scientist who studies insects.  Greer is interested in insects too and she would like to be an entomologist as well.

Next was Adam, who told us how to make Truffles.  He shared a different recipe with us to the ones we made for Christmas craft.  They sounded absolutely scrum-diddly-umptious as well.  We all decided that we love truffles,😋 just like Casey!

Otis was up next with a book review, or rather a series review.  Otis introduced us to the "13-Storey Treehouse" books by Andy Griffiths and illustrated by Terry Denton.  Do you know what... Andy and Terry are actually some of the main characters in the stories!

Otis  told us the characters live in an EPIC treehouse with lots of fun activites on each level.  And guess what else, each new book in the series add's another 13 stories onto the last one.  So to finish off Otis tested us with our addition:  "if The 65-Storey Treehouse is the lastest book I'm reading, what number book do you think I want for Christmas...?" 

Charlotte's, our place is Ashburton.  Ashburton is a town in Canterbury, on the east coast of the South Island and is where she was born.  Charlotte loves going to the park in Ashburton to have picnics with her family.  There are lots of beautiful flowers and peacocks there and they often feed bread to the ducks that are there. 

Rooms 3 & 4 Assembly

Too much happening!! I forgot to add to this week's blog that Rooms 3 & 4 are in charge of the assembly this week. We are not presenting anything special as there are lots of 'tidy up' items before the end of the year.  Would be great to see you there.

Christmas Crafts

The Christmas rotations this week have seen some very excited children and some fabulous creations - gets us in the christmas spirit.  Thank you to the parents who helped with these, especially Maree Jenkinson who helped in the junior block in the morning, and organised the baking in the afternoons for the recycled christmas baskets.

Room 7 stars and Room 3 christmas baskets.

Will post the nativity cribs and stained glass windows when I find the pictures.

Final Information - Bike Ride

All children took this note home in hard copy - here it is again in case it gets swamped by all the other paperwork at this time of year.

Thank you to the following parents who have made themselves available to join us on Friday 9^th December on our bike excursion:

·      Kate Love

·      Danny Knowles

·      Bernie Brown

·      Maree Jenkinson

·      Lisa Reilly

·      Haines Battrick

·      Tracey Reid

·      Nadia du Plessis

·      Emma Stratford (First half)

·      Maria Shea

·      Regina Forstner

There is the opportunity to play mini-golf at a cost of $5 per child. If your child wishes to play, this money needs to be handed in to their classroom teacher by Wednesday 7^th December. If not, there will be plenty of other (free) activities available to do at the same time.

On the day we will meet at school in our classrooms to do the roll and check that everybody has the required gear. This includes a full packed lunch, water bottle, covered shoes for biking, sunhats, bike helmets, jacket, togs and towel.

We expect to leave by 9.15 am and return by 2.40 pm.

A reminder that we are having a Bike Check this coming Monday 5^th Dec at 1.30 pm with Mr Milford. Bikes can be delivered any time that is convenient that morning. Please deliver them to the grassed area outside Room 4. Having safe bikes is part of our Risk Management. This allows time for any major issues to be sorted.

Thank you in anticipation.

Markelle, Adele and Chris

Speeches Assessment Criteria

Time:  Year 3 = 1.5 minutes                   Year 4 = 2 minutes

Writing:

Write a speech using this structure:

*Introduction – Who? What? When? Why? How? Try an interesting question or comment to “grab” the audience’s attention.

*Paragraphs/Headings: Each paragraph will be about a different part of the topic. Show a clear sequence of ideas.

*Conclusion: Sum up your topic. Leave the audience with an interesting thought or message.

Presenting/Speaking:

·      Speak clearly so the audience can hear all that is said.

·      Use expression in your voice.

·      Pause for effect.

·      Use pictures or props to add interest.

·      Make eye contact with the audience.

Assessment	Developing (1)	Achieved (2)	Achieved to a high level (3)
Content Introduction “grabs” attention Clear structure (Opening/paragraphs/conclusion)
Clear sequence of ideas
Interesting vocabulary
Delivery/Expression Clear voice Good pace/used the full time Eye contact Stance/Props TOTAL =      / 25
	+ 1 mark for Plan