It was awesome to see so many of you at Learning Conversations this week. We really value the time to connect and talk to you all. If you missed making a booking, please get in touch with your child's ako teacher.

Good luck to all our student who have signed up to the soccer and hockey tournaments this coming Tuesday.

Coming up :

• Activation Spectacular (Winter Sports)  - continues for 2 more weeks on Wednesday.  This is  based at Selwyn Sports Centre and Selwyn Aquatic Centre. Students need to be at school at 8.30am and in class ready for the roll.

• Ararira's Got Talent!  This is happening next week, June 19th  Wednesday at 12.45pm. An in-school showcase for tamariki to share their talents. Children who have signed up have been practising at home and video entries are also welcomed.

• Hot Chocolate Thursdays
  This is every Thursday morning from 8.30am. Please purchase on Kindo as there will be no cash sales. Children must bring their own cup and drink this in the hall. We suggest a cup with a lid. Please do not come to the class/hapori with hot chocolate as we do not want spilt drinks. Your child will be asked to go back to the hall to drink this. Please enclose a container to put the cup in once finished. Thank you for your support with this and raising funds for the Year 8 camp.

• Matariki Celebration
  Te Hapori Tautoko is excited to bring you a Matariki Celebration on Friday 5 July 2024.
  This whānau information booklet linked here provides you with all of the information you need to know and ways you can support! It is set to be a wonderful evening and a highlight in the calendar for many. 

Please refer to the school newsletter and the website for further information and dates.

• Year 5 & 6 Winter sport starts next Wednesday - we are in the swimming pool for our 1st session. Please see the Hero notice for more information. We will have 4 weeks of Winter sport sessions at Rolleston.

• Learning Conversation bookings are now open on Hero - check on the app for available times. June 13th will be a slightly early finish so we can meet with everyone - please check Hero notices for more information.

• Ararira's Got Talent! An in-school showcase for tamariki to share their talents is happening on June 19th - children who have signed up have been practising at home and video entries are also welcomed.

• Next week is a short week with the King's Birthday public holiday on Monday and a scheduled teacher-only day on Tuesday. 

• The new prefab buildings will arrive at some stage next week and the area behind Huarapa has been fenced off with limited access.

• The THT has organised a movie night with two screenings on June 7th Friday night, so check out the newsletter for more information.

• Hot Chocolate Thursdays
  This is every Thursday morning from 8.30am. Please purchase on Kindo as there will be no cash sales. Children must bring their own cup and drink this in the hall. We suggest a cup with a lid. 

• Hot Dog Friday - 14 June
  Te Hapori Tautoko is providing a Hot Dog Day on Friday 14 June. Orders can be made via KINDO and close on Tuesday 11 June. At $3 each, these will make a yummy hot lunch!

Cross Country
As you will have heard our Cross Country event has been rescheduled to Wednesday 22nd May - we have walked the course which starts in the school grounds and continues out the front gate, along the LII stream walkway, around the duck ponds on Jimmy Adams Drive to the wetlands bridge where there is a white post that is the halfway mark - runners will then return across the bridge and along Jimmy Adams Drive following the same course in reverse.  We still need a few more marshalls for the course. Please contact your child's ako teacher if you are available to help.

Matariki Celebration
Te Hapori Tautoko is excited to bring you a Matariki Celebration on Friday 5 July 2024.
The whānau information booklet linked here provides you with all of the information you need to know and ways you can support! It is set to be a wonderful evening and a highlight in the calendar for many. 

Library day has moved to Friday mornings for the remainder of this term - books are issued for two weeks.

Hot Chocolate Thursdays
This is every Thursday morning from 8.30am. Please purchase on Kindo as there will be no cash sales. Children must bring their own cup and drink this in the hall. We suggest a cup with a lid. Please do not come to the class/hapori with hot chocolate as we do not want spilt drinks. Your child will be asked to go back to the hall to drink this. Please enclose a container to put the cup in once finished. Thank you for your support with this. 

Hot Dog Friday - 14 June
Te Hapori Tautoko is providing a Hot Dog Day on Friday 14 June. Orders can be made via KINDO and close on Tuesday 11 June. At $3 each, these will make a yummy hot lunch!

Term 2    Week 1 /2  Notices:

Ararira Cross Country event - new date

Our Ararira Springs Cross Country event will now be held on Wednesday 22nd May from 1:30 pm until 3pm.  We will need volunteers as the course will be different this year and marshalls are required to stand along the route.  If you are able to help please contact Whaea Meeghan as soon as possible. Meegan.coetzee@ararira.school.nz 

Hikuwai 4-6 will be walking the course on the afternoon of Friday 17th May.

Pink Shirt Day  Friday 17th May: 

Pink Shirt Day (gold coin donation to The Mental Health Foundation). Tamariki may wear their school uniform or something pink. The focus this year is 'Being an upstander'. More information can be found here.  

Parent help needed for Marae Trip s -  Y6s Term 2

This term , our Year 6 students will be visiting Ngati Moki Marae at Taumutu to learn about and engage with our local marae and cultural history. We will need a small amount of parent help for this.

We will be departing school at 9.20 am and returning by 3:00 pm for each of these trips. Costs for this trip are being covered by the term activity fee.

If you are interested in helping you will be expected to share your pepeha but we are able to support you with this. This trip will only be possible with the help of whanau. If you are able to come along as a parent helper please contact  your child's ako teacher.

Dates for trip:

Hikuwai 4 Y6s - Mon 6th May ( enough help)

Hikuwai 5 ( Whaea Sam) Y6's - Tues 21st May

Hikuwai 6 (Whaea Em) Y6's - Monday 20th May

Term 2 Focus

Literacy - 

Comprehending and creating texts

• use variety of sentence structures, text structures, and forms of punctuation (e.g., for dialogue)

• use a variety of planning and revising activities for creating accurate, clear texts in a range of modes

• use writing as a tool to think about, record, and communicate experiences, ideas, and information.

• 
  

On a Wednesday and Thursday students have opted into 1 of the following sessions for the term:

*Wonder Project Rocket Challenge- see the flier opposite for more information. We will need a supply of 1.5 litre soft drink bottles for our rockets so please start collecting :)

*The Fantasy Project - students design and create their own world and characters for an adventure story which they will then write.

*The Adventure Project - students will design and write a collaborative pick your path story

Maths

We will focus on our number knowledge , developing our understanding of adding and subtracting whole numbers and decimals. We have a four week focus on fractions which will include percentages and decimals. We will also be focussing on measurement through reading and understanding measurement tools and scales. This will include units of time and solving duration of time problems. We will also be learning how to describe and understand angles.

Inquiry

Using the whole school topic of MOVEMENT, we are focussing on the following question  - How does the migration of people or animals shape our world?

This term we will be learning about early migrations in the context of New Zealand and then relate that back to stories from our own whānau. Watch out for more information coming soon about our Arts show later on in the term.

Week 10/11  Notices

Parent help needed for Marae Trip  -  Y6s Term 2

Next term, our Year 6 students will be visiting Ngati Moki Marae at Taumutu to learn about and engage with our local marae and cultural history. We will need a small amount of parent help for this.

We will be departing school at 9.20 am and returning by 3:00 pm for each of these trips. Costs for this trip are being covered by the term activity fee.

If you are interested in helping you will be expected to share your pepeha but we are able to support you with this. This trip will only be possible with the help of whanau. If you are able to come along as a parent helper please contact  your child's ako teacher.

Dates for trip:

Hikuwai 4 ( Whaea Louise) Y6s - Mon 6th May

Hikuwai 5 ( Whaea Sam) Y6's - Tues 21st May

Hikuwai 6 (Whaea Em) Y6's - Monday 20th May

Pepeha

This week , your child will bring home their pepeha that they have been working on in class. Please help us by filling in any blanks such as iwi or how your family came to New Zealand. We will be practising our pepeha in order to share them when we visit the Marae so some extra practise at home would be helpful:)

    Safe Touch

We have  had a chat to our classes this week about safe and appropriate touch. We have talked about how we can keep our games appropriate. 

    Holiday Fun 

 The last weekend of the school break is the 

international City Nature Challenge where the world competes to make nature observations     and we want to beat Wellington!!!!!!!!!

Lincoln Envirotown are running an epic discovery session down at the Mahoe Reserve on Sunday 28th April, 2-4PM.

Details at https://events.humanitix.com/mahoe-blitz-24

Term 2 - Friday 17th May: Pink Shirt Day (gold coin donation to The Mental Health Foundation). Tamariki may wear their school uniform or something pink. The focus this year is 'Being an upstander'. More information can be found here.  

    HEADPHONES. 

Please could all students bring in a pair of headphones to support our learning in class . We regularly use audio stories, audio instructions and instructional videos as part of our lessons.

EPIC reading

Each ako class has their own log in. Epic is free 7am - 3pm on school days. Subscriptions are available for home use via the Epic reading site.

Hk4: xbs1331 

Hk5: lnt4761

Hk6: txi6955

VESTS:

For safety reasons, we expect that all students will wear a flouro safety vest to and from school. Vests can be purchased from The Warehouse.

PUBLIC HOLIDAYS

Monday and Tuesday are public holidays for schools. We will see you back at school on Wednesday 3rd April. 

HEADPHONES. 

Please could all students bring in a pair of headphones to support our learning in class . We regularly use audio stories, audio instructions and instructional videos as part of our lessons.

TOP TEAM

Postponed due to weather - new date is Friday 5th April. If you are still able to help or are now able to help please email your child's ako teacher. 

A massive thank you to all the parents and grandparents who had offered to help today. We really appreciate it. 

iBike - Year 5 ONLY

It is finally here! Please check the timetable below to see which day your child will need to bring their bike and helmet. Thank you to the parents who have let me know their child doesn't have a bike, Selwyn Sports will bring bikes for them. 

 A bike in good working order. It would be helpful to do a simple bike check of things like  brakes, tyre pressure, wheels spinning freely and light oil on chain. 

Children will need to be in their school uniform. Please make sure they have a jumper/jacket in case the weather is cool. 

Kindness Lesson

We have been working as ako classes on the caring value. We did a lesson today where we shared hurtful words and folded a piece of paper every time a hurtful thing was shared. We tried smoothing out the paper at the end but we couldn't get it to look as new, signifying how hurt can stay with us.

Week one is done! We have loved getting back into the swing of things and hearing about everyone's wonderful holidays. Read on for updates and information. 

Library

• All classes will have library on Wednesday

iBike

• If you have a Year 5 child please complete the ibike forms below by Wednesday 7th Feb. Once everyone has filled it in a timetable will be available which shows days and groups. 

Hats

• All students must have their hat to play everywhere on Monday and through to the end of Term 1. If they don't have a hat they will be restricted to the hall, library and some veranda areas. This is part of our sun safety plan. 

Footwear

• We are active during the day and encourage students to wear the appropriate footwear for running around. Crocs are best kept for home as they often don't offer the support / safety that a pair of trainers offer for active lessons.

Music Lessons

• If your child is away sick, on a class trip or holiday it is the parents responsibility to email the music teacher

Camp

• We have shared photos of the camp with the students and have invited them to share any questions they have. More camp information will come out next week. 

• Please do not order subway and sushi this week as we won't be at school.

Devices

• If you are bringing your personal device to school please start bringing it from Monday next week onwards. We are beginning to use these. 

• These must be charged at home, we do not allow students to charge personal devices at school. 

Coming Up This Week

• Waitangi Day - Tuesday 6th - public holiday

• School Newsletter - Wednesday 7th

Welcome to school for 2024! We are all so excited to get started and have lots of great learning opportunities and experiences planned for Term 1. 

Louise - Hikuwai 4 - Team Leader 

Sam - Hikuwai 5

Em - Hikuwai 6

DEVICES

• Please check the image below for the apps your child needs on their personal device for this year. These apps will need to be downloaded at home. 

• Headphones: we use devices regularly and having a set of headphones brought from home means that students can access all information (e.g. stepsweb, audiobooks, etc.). These need to be named. 

HATS

• Our school requires all students to wear plain coloured bucket hats in Terms 1 and 4 during break times. 

CAMP

• Our Year 5/6 Camp is  in Week 4  Wednesday 21st - Friday 23rd February at Living Springs, Governors Bay. Please find the packing list here.

• Over the next two weeks we will send out the bunk room allocation, camp menu and camp timetable. Parent helpers who were confirmed in Term 4 will be invited in for a meeting during the next fortnight. 

iBIKE

• This event is for Year 5 students only. Please read the letter below and fill out the google form if your child is in Year 5. 

COMMUNICATION

• The Hikuwai 4-5-6 team will be sending home notices fortnightly via this blog, on odd weeks. Please read these carefully as they have lots of important information.

• The school newsletter will come out on even weeks, on a Wednesday.

• If you would like to get in touch with us please use the above emails or come in and see us. We do ask that you go to your child's ako teacher first. 

SCHOOL BOOKS & STATIONERY

• Please label all books and stationery with your child's name (these will be your child's and live in their tote tray)

• We will write on the subjects together during the first week.