Week 1 Term 3

Kia Ora

Hopefully the beautiful sunny day is a taste of the weather for this term.
This term we welcome Mrs Emma Stratford to Room 3. I am very excited as I know the Mrs Stratford comes with lots of new exciting ideas to share as she teaches the maths and RE. Welcome to the Room 3 team.
We have a busy term ahead of us once again.
Sharelle Potter from Kelly Sports will be taking eight 45 minute sessions of gymnastics, which starts on Tuesday at 1:30 for us, for the first 5 weeks, followed by 3 Friday sessions.  Please be sure to wear your sports uniform so that you can move freely.  The first couple of weeks the skill being practised will be 'balance'.
School Photos - Friday 4th August.
School Mass - 9am Sunday 13th August - we look forward to sharing this celebration together.
As the school cross country will be held on Wednesday 16th August we will be practising our running for this as part of our fitness, so it would be a good idea to have runners to wear for this. If you know that you can make yourself available to assist on the day of the event we would be keen to hear from you.
Ski Day: Thursday 31st August with the cancellation day Friday 1st September. We will be sending information home as soon as we have costings for the travel. I'm practising my skill of patience as this trip has had its fair share of issues to resolve BUT it will be well and truly worth it. All children will need a windproof & waterproof outer layer (pants & jacket) for a day in the snow. Now might be a good time to beg and borrow some of this if you don't have these items to hand.
Interviews are in week 2. To book an interview please go to www.schoolinterviews.co.nz and use the code adtrg to book a time. A number of reports went home at the end of the term and Tara, Jada, Taine, Savannah, Bella D and Quinn's reports are in the pipeline. I would be happy to meet with you people as well if that suits, and you want to make a time.  As a class we will all be reflecting on the goals that we set in March, and adding or changing these.  Check out the homework book and have a chat about the goals we all set together -  add your thoughts as to where to next.
At the end of the term a "WOW" night is planned to celebrate learning. Watch the newsletter for more information about this.
Kapahaka: will be with Ms Tamati on Mondays every even week at 11am, and with Mr Yeoman and myself on odd weeks at 2:15.  This is the term of Polyfest in Dunedin.
Eisteddfod: A speech will be presented Monday 25th September. In class we will work on the format for this - an exciting opening, some really interesting facts followed by a strong ending (so that people know that you have finished).  We call this the 'hamburger'. I would encourage children to choose a topic that is a real passion for them as this way they will be excited about finding out interesting information to share, and will be enthusiastic in their presentation. Poetry eisteddfod assessment sheets are in homework books.  These give an idea of the oral language area that may need a bit more practice. The poems were fantastic at the end of the term, and our first poem for the term is written by a class poet.  Thank you for allowing us to share this, Jack.

Homework

1. Reading: who will be first to 150 nights of reading?
2. Spelling: we worked on long 'u' in week 9 and lots of people struggled with it.  Was it the end of term bugs? really tired? Who knows, but we are going to work on this again in week 1 and 2 this term to secure these patterns. Please make sure that your child is saying, listening then recording the sounds in order and looking at the pattern that is making the long 'u' sound - not just learning the visual pattern of the word.  We need to be able to use our tooling skills when writing independently.
3. Cross Country Training: the more you do something, the better you get.  Take a wee run outside to increase your fitness.