Quick Notices

Wednesday 29 March 2017

Three way conferences

Three way conferences (parent interviews around goal setting with children present) are scheduled for Monday 10th and Tuesday 11th April.

Tuesday 28 March 2017

Art Exhibition

Hi everyone, the Room 13 kids have decided to have an art exhibition to raise money for a fun trip at the end of the term. We have not yet decided where we will go, but we will have some amazing art work shortly that you can bid on to raise the funds.
The auction will be a silent one.  The art will be on show in the foyer and a box will be located down there that you can place your bids in. We are aiming for around $10 each for either the movies, flip out, the Aquatic Centre or Rainbow Springs.  
Thank you in anticipation for your support.
Annie and Room 13

Monday 27 March 2017

Life Education with Berni and Harold

We had our second visit to the Life Ed van today and it was soooo cool.  We had a disco, learned about being a Hero, named some of the parts of our body and found out where they are inside us and we had our photo taken with the very famous Harold.  Here we are....








Swimming?

Today lots of us left our togs at home so instead of the whole class getting wet going over to the pool, we had our swim in the huge puddle outside the hall.  The rest of the class did Reading Eggs on the iPads and Chrome books.  It was such fun!













Rock Buddies

On Friday we made rock buddies for Golden Time.  Thank you to those parents who sent craft for us to add to our buddies.  The kids worked really hard on this activity and the buddies looked so cool.  Thanks to Liz and Suzie for all your help.  Here they are.....























Sunday 26 March 2017

Week 9 Notices

Hi everyone, can you believe it is week 9 already?  Easter is nearly upon us and so are those wonderful holidays.  Here is what is on in Week 9....

*Annunciation Liturgy: 10 am in the Hall.  We have begun talking about this so ask your children what they know about the Angel Gabriel's visit to Mary.  Everyone is welcome to attend these Liturgies.  
In Week 11 we will be re enacting the Last Supper and celebrating Palm Sunday where Jesus rode the Donkey into Jerusalem.  The children will be dressing up in Jesus clothes so this is just a pre warning that they will need to bring them to school during that week.  I have a few items but certainly not enough for 24 kids.

*We have our second visit to the Life Education Caravan on Monday.  The children enjoy this very much and we are learning about how to be a good friend, support others, be community minded and about what each of us needs to be happy and healthy.  Berni our Educator is amazing, I will post some photos on the blog after our visit.

*There is a fun Pasifika day planned for the 1st April and our Pasifika group will be performing.  Please head down and support our kids if you can.




*Maths: This week we are focusing on Multiplication and Division.  We will be looking at equal sharing to solve maths problems as well as 1/2 and 1/4.

*Writing: This week I will be assessing the writing for the Portfolio's.  The children will be writing a recount and a report.  These pieces of writing will be able to be viewed in their Portfolios at the end of the term.

*Reading: The reading is going very well.  This week we will be finding facts in our writing and producing posters to show what we have learned.

*The RE books will come home at the end of the week.  Please look through these with your child and send back to school on Monday.

*Wednesday 29th is locals free day at Crankworx.  It is a great opportunity to get down there with your kids and see what all the fuss is about!

*On Monday we welcome Maverick back to St Mary's.  He has been in Auckland but has returned to Rotorua.  We also say goodbye to Akain at the end of the term.  He and his family are moving to Australia and we wish them all the very best.

Have a great week
Annie

Sunday 19 March 2017

Week 8 Notices

Hi everyone, here we go for week 7....

*St Josephs Mass at 10 am in the Church, all welcome.  This is a very special Mass for our school because St Mary MacKillop, the founder of our school, was a Josephite Sister.  We still have a sister from the St Josephs order with us, Sr Carina, so we always make a special fuss of her on this day.  We also talk to the children about Mary MacKillop and how she walked in the footsteps of Jesus by teaching children their abc's and about God' love.

*Maths - this week we will be looking at place value: understanding tens and ones in numbers and how to use this knowledge to add and subtract.

*Writing - we will be writing reports this week.  We will look at communities and how bees live in a community where they depend on each other.  The reports will be around how we work together to achieve our goals.

*Reading -  I have completed all the reading testing. I have identified a few areas we all need to work on so this week we will be looking at:
*fluency - making our reading voices sound like speaking voices.
*comprehension - understanding what the writing is about and finding the message in the words.
The reading is progressing nicely, please keep up the practice at home - any book will do, as long as they are reading.  If you have concerns or you do not know how to help your young reader, please email me and I will send you some helpful hints.

*R:E: we will be working on understanding Mary MacKillop and her call to be a messenger for God.  We will look at how she came to found our school and the work she did in and around Rotorua.

*This week I will contact the parents of those children who are struggling to meet the National Standards.  It is important to note the progress that children make during their time at school and not simply measure them by a standard.  All the children in room 13 have made significant progress in just 6 short weeks, however, we are required to contact all parents if their children appear to be finding any aspect of school difficult.  The idea is that we all work collaboratively to move them along so they are working at a similar level to those in their cohort. Every single child in our learning family has something valuable to offer our group and we work on that premise every day.  Lets all just keep in mind that these darlings are only 6 and 7 and have a long way to go in their schooling.  We simply want to set them up for success right from the word go.

*Golden Time: this week we will be making rock buddies.  If you have any feathers, pipe cleaners, googlie eyes etc at home, please send them along.

Have a great week
Annie 

Sunday 5 March 2017

Week 5 Notices

Hi everyone, welcome back to Week 6 after another lovely Summery weekend. We had a busy week in Week 5 topped off by an awesome Gala on Thursday and fun Tug o' war Friday.  Here is what's on this week....

*I will be away for 5 days starting Thursday so Mary Kusabs will be teaching in Room 13.  She is very familiar with St Mary's and even some of your children and I know they will be well looked after.

*Maths: This week we will be working on several ideas in Maths.  The children have been grouped into 3 maths groups and are all working at different levels.  Some of us will be working on holding a number in our head and counting on, some of us will be looking at place value for 2 digit numerals and the rest will be looking at adding numbers together using tens.  I am currently working on testing the children to see exactly where they are, when I finish, I will send home a brief analysis of what they can do and what they need to learn next.  It would be great if you could practice some of the knowledge concepts at home. 
Mary will be covering one of the Maths Strands while I am away. They will be working on Measurement:Measurement: Length - standard and non-standard units and maths language.

*Writing: This week we will be focusing on where to put full stops and using wow words to enhance writing. The children are learning that when speaking, the full stop goes where their voice naturally stops. Some of them are getting really good and others still need lots of practice. Mary will be teaching Narrative while she is with the children. These are made up stories and the children love them.

*Reading: I am really pleased with how the reading is going. Lots of the children have already moved up a level since the beginning of the year which is pleasing. Keep up the practice at home and remember reading to your children is a great way for them to experience what good reading sounds like. I am testing all the children at the moment and we are also running teacher guided groups as well as buddy reading every day.

*R.E: We have had a busy couple of weeks with some important events in the Church. This time of Lent is an important and serious one and we will be discussing it and our Lenten Promises often over the next few weeks.

*No swimming this week but it does get very hot in Room 13 so if you send togs we can go under the sprinkler. We will spend some time outside under the trees reading and writing when it just gets too hot up there.

*Thank you for such a great start to the year. The kids are so settled now and really starting to listen hard and do their best at school. It's awesome and makes my job so much more enjoyable when we all work together as a team.

Have a great week
Annie

Friday 3 March 2017

Lego Fun

Today Laine, Oliver, Jun and Zak were building some cool robots with the lego.  They asked if they could photograph their creations to put on the blog.  Here are their photos....





Thursday 2 March 2017

Shrove Tuesday

Today we celebrated shrove Tuesday with pancakes.  Shrove Tuesday is the day before Ash Wednesday and the beginning of Lent.  It is the last day to feast before the fasting of Lent begins.   Here we are.....