Week 6 NEWSLETTER

from the principal

New Attendance System

We all know that attending school is super important, and there is a clear link between attending school and feeling ‘at home’ at school during the day. The media have been reporting often over the last 18 months about the poor state of attendance in NZ schools…with ‘regular attendance’ sitting at around 50% (half of NZ children are not attending school regularly). The Ministry defines regular attendance as being at school 90% of the time…this means in a term if you have 5 days away you start to slip under this percentage, and no longer meet the Ministry’s criteria. Currently at DPS we have 65% of our children attending regularly (attending 90%+ of the time). While this is better than the NZ average…is it enough? Myself and the Board have been grappling with this…do we have an attendance problem here at Douglas Park or not? My gut feeling has been ‘No’...and when you factor in the children who are close to that ‘attending regularly’ threshold, that 65% figure jumps to around 90%...so overall, No I do not think we have a big issue here.

But…we do have children who we are concerned about, and we do have children where attendance does affect how they ‘feel’ while at school…as they’ve missed connecting with friends, missed vital parts of learning or just missed those opportunities to get involved in school life (sports, choir, road patrol etc etc).

We’ve been revamping our systems…currently letters go home twice a term to whānau when we are concerned about the level of attendance (Week 5 and Week 9). To be in line with Ministry requirements letters will now go home each time a child is away for 5 days in a term. These days away do not include days away sick…our message is still to keep your child at home if unwell…but rather we are looking at days away for other reasons. As the days increase over a term, so will our response…moving from letters to meetings. The meetings aren’t a negative…rather a chance to sit down together and see how we can work together to improve the attendance.

On Friday (tomorrow) we will be putting our new system to the test, and sending HERO posts/letters to the whānau that meet the criteria for days away this term.

Attendance is a partnership. The unspoken deal is…school has to provide a safe place, that is welcoming and a place where the learning is enjoyable and challenging. Alongside this, home has to ensure that the children get to school, and are prepared and ready to enjoy the wonderful learning on offer. It is important that children are ready to learn at 8.45am when the bell goes, and aren’t missing out on key learning by their absence. We value your support in helping make sure your child is at school, ready to learn each day.

REMINDER: If your child is going to be away/late, you can report this via the HERO app. This notifies teachers and the office and saves a call home from us to check where your child is.

Out of Zone Enrolments

Our out of zone process for Terms 1 and 2 next year starts this week. Please pass this info on to family or friends wanting to attend our school. Always (always!) someone will contact us after the process has finished and sadly they miss out.

Douglas Park is governed by an enrolment scheme (a school zone) and we only take out of zone enrolments twice a year. The next intake is for Terms 1 and 2 next year. Anyone who lives out of zone comes through this process. Even if you have children here already and have a younger sibling to start...if you live out of zone, you have to apply for your child to attend.

Contact the office if you need to put your child/ren down for a possible place office@douglaspark.school.nz

Enviro news

What's happening at DPS?

Writing - Whaea Deb's homeclass

Ring ring! Ring ring! “Yes, this is the detective.”

“I need to talk.”

Okay.”

“My brother has been murdered!”

”Okay, I’ll need a photo of him.”

The detective got the photo and then went to bed.

Beep beep! “ I need to get a drink of water. Oh, this water tastes like rotten eggs!” The detective looked at his watch. “ I’m gonna be late for my flight!” So the detective hopped in his lambo and got some Maccas. He got a grand Mac, some chicken nuggets and a grimis shake.

He hopped on the plane. He didn’t know that the murderer was on the plane. He was looking at clues and the murderer walked past him. “Hey, get back here!” Then the detective started running and so did the murderer.

The murderer grabbed a parachute and jumped and so did the detective.

Dint dint dint! “ Get back here you heartless man!” They landed on the ground. The murderer had a gun and started shooting at him. The detective’s heart was racing. The detective got shot in the arm. The detective slowly stopped and fell down. It started bleeding hard.

An excerpt from ‘The Story of Detective Detective’ by Abel Wilson

On Wednesday after Halloween Ashley arrives at school to see everyone whispering. “omg bestie did you hear about the murder yesterday?” My friend lisa said while running up to me

“What murder”

“The murder of Chabeki and Tod”

“Wait, you mean the most popular people in the school?”

“Ya, chabeki was killed the day before Halloween and Tod was killed on Halloween”

“Really” I said, shivering in fear. Who is gonna be next? Now that was a scary question. Otherwise it was your average day at school. Y’know the usual chemistry, history, english, and maths.

An excerpt from ‘Quick story, Scream Edition’ by Thane Warwood.

I ran, ran, ran and ran. I didn’t know or cared where I was going. As long as it was far, far away from that horrid place. “Ow ,” I whined. My broken arm was really hurting. The wind blew through my hair. I dodged sticks and vines like there was no tomorrow. “Ahh!” I yelled as I rolled down a small hill. I was so distracted by my arm I didn’t see the end of the forest. As I tumbled down I focussed all my energy into protecting my arm.

When I stopped I laid there for a moment pondering. What did I ever do to get here?....

I closed my eyes for a moment, trying to forget all about “that place”, when I heard a tree fall. “ Aah!” I squealed, frantically looking for a good place to hide.

“Aha! A Cabin!” It still looked inhabited but I didn’t care. I found my way to the bedroom and bolted under the wool covers, hugging my knees to my chest, my muddy pink pink sundress curling around my legs, cuts, burned all over my body. But I was safe. …W-was I?

An excerpt from ‘The Lost One’ by Ivy Pickett

SpORT

RE: Winter Hockey break up
What: End of season winter hockey break up.
Parents vs Children game and shared afternoon tea
Who: All winter hockey teams.
Where: Douglas Park School Turf and Room 15.
Why: To celebrate a successful winter hockey season!
When: Friday 1st September
Times: 3.15-4.30pm
Required: Hockey gear and a plate of food to share please.

Many thanks to you all for getting your child to Clareville for their games. It was a great season and we have seen huge developments in the players as the season has progressed. We look forward to summer hockey next term (watch out for information on Hero soon) and the next winter season!

A huge thank you to all our coaches who have volunteered their time and helped our tamariki develop into confident hockey players.

Masterton Intermediate - 2024 enrolments open now

MASTERTON INTERMEDIATE SCHOOL 2024 ENROLMENTS OPEN

PLEASE ENROL NOW

Please enrol online using the below link

bit.ly/3DrAvkq

We are encouraging online enrolments!

Order Subway online or at the office for delivery to school friday

Every Friday we have Subway lunches delivered to school. If you would like to order your child a subway lunch, the easiest way is to order online. Please make sure you put your child's class (teachers name) on the order as it makes it much easier to sort our end. Subway can also be ordered by filling out a form at the school office before school on a Friday. Please note that these must be ordered by early morning on the Friday to ensure your child's order goes through for that day.

Please note that the app you are looking for is Subway Express - School Lunch programme.