PRINCIPALS PANUI UPDATE

Monday 27 April

Thank you all for your continued support and cooperation as we move from Level 4 to level 3. It has certainly been a time of challenges and stresses as well as enlightenment and re-discovery as we have had to live life in our own bubble without the many things we took for granted. I love the analogy of Papatuanuku taking a rest

On Tuesday we will move into COVID- 19 Level 3. Under level 3, Te Kuiti High School will be partially open from Wednesday 19 April. However nearly all caregivers / parents have decided to follow the advice of the government and are keeping their children at home.

After contact with nearly all year 9 & 10 students and their whanau we will have between 1 to 8 students returning to school on Wednesday. If you are thinking of sending your child to school but have not been in contact with the school, you must make an appointment with the Principal before your child can attend. This is imperative as the addition of more students will dramatically affect the organisation of our school during level 3.

ORGANISATION FOR MOVE TO LEVEL 3.

We are required to put strict health and safety measures in place to ensure the health and wellbeing of in-school staff and students are not compromised. Students will be placed into a bubble of 9 students and one supervisor. They will remain in this bubble and in a specific learning area for the duration fof level 3. If we have any extra students, we will have to re- organize to make two bubbles, secure another learning area and organise another supervisor for this bubble.

STAFF

There will be only 5 staff at school during the time we are in level 3. The senior leadership team of Whaea Bobbie, Matua Hannibal, and Papa Thomas plus the supervising teacher and Whaea Karen in the office. All other teaching staff will continue providing distance learning to our students from their homes..

ORGANISATION WHILE IN LEVEL 3

• School will be open from 9 am to 3 pm each day with half hour breaks at 11.00 am and 1pm. It is important that students arrive at school no earlier than 8.45 am.

• If being brought to school, drop off and pick up is in the main staff car park. All students are to meet the supervising teacher outside the main door entrance at 8.55 am.

• There is no bus transport running during level 3.

• Students need to bring their own device to work and must wear full school uniform.

• The learning programme for each student will be a continuation of the distance learning programme provided by their teachers.

The learning area will be in C block. It will be organised to

• allow good movement with a separate entrance and exit way

• allow for 1 mitre physical distancing,

• have hand sanitiser being readily available,

• provide a staff safe place

• be thoroughly cleaned at the end of each day, especially the hard surfaces.

During their breaks, students will be restricted to the area immediately in front of C Block, including deck and onto the field. They will be supervised by in-school staff.

ACCESS TO SCHOOL DURING LEVEL 3

I am strongly advising that no staff, parent, caregiver, whanau come into the school from Wednesday 29 April until the end of level 3. If for any reason you need too, please adhere to the following health and safety requirements.

1. Come into the school through the main door entrance only.

2. Check in with Whaea Karen at the main office area. Your name and time of entry and exit will be recorded.Your details will be added to the contact tracing registar

3. If there is anyone in the main office with Whaea Karen, please remain outside the main door entrance until that person has left the office area.

4. If you are there to see anyone, you will be asked to wait outside in the foyer. You will not be allowed entry into any other part of the school, unless it is an emergency.

5. Once you have completed what you wanted, check out with Whaea Karen at the main office and leave the school immediately.

NOTE:

• Please abide by the 1 metre physical distancing inside the buildings and 2 metres outside and also all signage relating to COVID- 10 around the school.

• Hand sanitisers will be available in the main office; please use.

• Appointments with Papa Thomas, Whaea Bobbie or Matua Hannibal MUST BE pre arranged as there will be no unscheduled face to face meetings.

• If you are sick in any way, please DO NOT COME TO SCHOOL.

At present, Level 3 will continue until 12 May. At level 2 Schools will be open, but parents will still have the option to keep their students at home.

As per my earlier notification, Ministry of Education (MoE) are still in the process of getting devices to senior students at this very late stage of Level 4. If the majority of devices from MoE has not arrived by Thursday then we will start a process of getting school chrome books to our senior students.

No reira whanau ma

Kia noho haumaru i to koutou mirumiru. (Stay safe in you bubble)

Papa Thomas

THURSDAY 23 APRIL PRINCIPAL'S PANUI UPDATE

MOVE TO COVID-19 LEVEL 3.

Further to my panui on Tuesday, this Panui has the details of the what, when and how we will be moving to Covid 19 Level 3. There is a lot of information here so please read carefully.

“Schools and early learning centres can be accessed from Tuesday 21 April, for cleaning, maintenance and any other preparations. The plan is for schools to re-open for a Teacher Only Day on 28 April as part of their preparation, and we expect those who need to attend, to be able to from 29 April.

WHANAU

The key message for whanau is that if you can, keep your child at home. Physically send your child to school ONLY if you need to. If your child has a health condition that means they are at a greater risk of a severe illness you must keep them at home. If your child is sick please also ensure you keep them at home.

All YEAR 9 & 10 students will be contacted by phone or email by Thursday 23 April to establish if they will be attending school from Wednesday 29 April or not. If you have not been contacted and want your child to attend school please contact the principal at principal@tkhs.school.nz or phone or text 0273234283 before Saturday 25 April.

Only students who confirm at this contact that they will be attending school from Wednesday 29 April will be allowed to attend Te Kuiti High School during this time. No other student will attend Te Kuiti High School until we move to Covid-19 Level 2.

HEALTH & SAFETY.

Schools will not be able to open, and remain open, unless they comply with all public health, workplace health and safety requirements. In order to ensure the safety of our students and our staff who do come to school, we will be operating with strict enforcement of health and safety measures as outlined below.:

1. 1. • 1. Staff and children will stay home if they are sick

        2. There will be physical distancing with 1m distance between students and staff at all times ( including desks or group tables, school transport, staggered breaks, starts and finishes) and 2m while outside

        3. Processes to support contact tracing will be in place e.g. all students sitting in the same place every day.

        4. There will be no school events or assemblies

        5. The number of contact students and staff have while at school will be limited

        6. Hygiene measures such as frequent handwashing, making hand sanitisers available in classrooms, bathrooms and staffroom, and daily cleaning of all surfaces will be in place each day.

In this sense we are working to organise the following

• Students will be working in bubbles of 2 staff to 8 students. or a combination of, depending on numbers.

• Bubbles will be assigned learning spaces and will be restricted to specific parts of the school and cannot mix during breaks.

• Physical changes will be made to the layout and resourcing of these learning spaces to accommodate physical and social distancing,

• Bubbles will have staggered start and finish times for the day and different break times.Staff access to staff room will also be staggered.

• Hand sanitiser will be at entry to learning spaces and bathrooms.

• Bus transport to school will be available, however, strict physical distancing will be adhered to.

• Contact tracing registers will be set up and identify which students and staff are in each learning space and record when and who they have contact with during the day It also includes recording who the adults are in contact with as well as recording visitors on the site, including parents.

• Break time activities cannot include sports with less than 2 m physical distance or where the same equipment is touched by different students (balls, ropes, sticks etc.)

Teaching & Learning Programme during Level 3

Each bubble will remain in the same learning space all day. Learning will continue to be online. Teachers will mainly be in supervision roles Students will be expected to bring their own devices to school to work on.

STAFF

Under Alert Level 3, school staff are expected to be available to return to working onsite. However not all staff will be able to work on site. Staff must stay home if they;

• are sick with COVID-19, or unwell generally.

• need to self-isolate, as per Ministry of Health guidelines, due to recent travel or close contact with someone confirmed to have COVID-19.

• are caring for dependents who need to self-isolate, as per Ministry of Health guidelines.

AND

• They may choose to stay at home if they, or someone they live with, meets the definition of a vulnerable person, including those with underlying medical conditions, especially if not well-controlled, and the elderly, as described here

• Some staff may not meet the definition for being excluded from the expectation to be available to work on site if required, but may not wish to come on site due to perceived risk.

• Staff with parental responsibilities will be accomodated

The full organisation of next week's opening of the school for students and staff will be communicated on Monday after confirmation of students attending is known.

Kia noho pai ki o koutou mirumiru ( Keep safe in your bubbles)

Pai Mārire

Papa Thomas..

PRINCIPALS PANUI

Tuesday 21 April 2020

We hope that Term 2 and our remote learning programme has been a success for you so far. We know there have been a number of challenges for you to deal with but we have been getting some great feedback about the learning that is happening and thank you for all your support.

Yesterday 20 April, the Government decided that we will move into Alert Level 3 on 28 April. That means we will be open to receive students from the 29 April. We will start to prepare our site from tomorrow.

The key message for you is that if you can, you should keep your child at home. You should only physically send your child to school if you need to. If your child has a health condition that means they are at a greater risk of a severe illness you must keep them at home. If your child is sick please also ensure you keep them at home.

In order to ensure the safety of those children and our staff who do come to school, we will be operating with strict enforcement of health and safety measures.

I want to assure you that we will continue to support your child’s learning at home.

We will be in contact with you this week to find out whether you can keep your child learning from home, or need your child to attend in person.

The Ministry of Education has advised that they are working closely with health to develop clear guidance that will support schools to safely re-open their premises to students and staff. This will help us work through the public health requirements that we all need to meet. As you will be doing, we want to be sure that what we do will keep our community as safe as possible.

For now, we will continue to support your child’s learning by distance while we progress our planning for what Alert Level 3 will mean for you and for our school. We will be in touch again soon with more information. As you have been doing, please keep connecting with your teachers with any questions you might have.

Na Papa Thomas

Tumuaki

Te Kura Tuarua o Te Kūiti

PRINCIPALS PANUI UPDATE

Thursday 16 April

The first day of term 2 2020 was very different. No teachers, no students and no school to go to.The age of teaching and learning online began.

I asked teachers to comment on how they found working with their students online. The majority of the teachers had positive comments about what the students were feeling; some said they were missing school, others were now bored with staying at home, there were excited voices, some good stories about the holidays and also the amount of work that students have already done online for other teachers.

There were issues with double scheduling of online meetings yesterday as some students attended meetings that were scheduled at the same time as whanau meetings. Teachers have been told that any online meeting they schedule with their classes, must be written on the calendar on this site. Because of this extraordinary position we find ourselves in, there needs to be a higher level of collaboration and cooperation between staff, school and whanau as it means school administration and management, other staff and whanau are kept in the loop.

The length of online meetings will fluctuate. With whanau group, it is a pastoral care time where relevant information is given, concerns are aired and where whanau teachers can keep in touch with their students. Online Subject meetings or tutorials are more specific to teaching and learning. However, teachers are mindful that their meeting is not the only meeting students have during the day and, unlike the classroom, there is an off switch.

Attendance Data for Whanau Group meetings 15 April 2020

MCAU 12 / 17 MHIL ? / 14 MLUP ? /19 MVOS /20

RBEL 5 /16 RFOL 9 /18 RKEA 8 /16 RMUR 5/19

TBAI ? /14 TBRI 6 /21 TBUC 7 /20 TSHE 8/1

WCHI 13 /19 WFIE 5 /17 WHUN 9 /19 WSAN 6/13

Though the above data does not paint a good picture of attendance, it is early days and there are many factors to consider.

• Today we finalised the order of 30 devices for the seniors from the ministry, and they should be getting to the students tomorrow and early next week. We will also be couriering about 30 of our Chromebooks to students today.

• Some students didn't know how to log in

• Others were late

• Others have no internet access

Teachers will be keeping an attendance log and id there are any concerns with student non- engagement being followed up by Manukura and Deputy Principal/..

Finally, the start of term begins a new learning curve and path for many of us, not least our students. I hope the first 2 days of the term have not been too challenging or stressful as we all navigated through what for many of us, is very different and to a large extent, strange. We are all travelling a pathway that is very new; so getting lost, taking a wrong turn, going backwards or just stopping for a breather is all part of the journey we and our students are taking. Enjoy it.

Pai Marire

Papa Thomas.

PRINCIPAL PANUI Update Wednesday 14 April 2020

Kia hora te marino

Kia whakapapa pounamu te moana

Kia tere te karohirohi

I mua i to huarahi

Koutou ra te whanau whanui o te Te Kura Tuarua o Te Kuiti, te hapouri hoki o Te Kuiti

ena ra Koutou katoa

DISTANCE LEARNING USING ONLINE PLATFORMS

The use of technology in education has increased significantly ever since the internet became more accessible and devices became more readily available. Management, administration teaching and learning did not rely on technology but was a significant aide.

Covid - 19 has changed this. For the foreseeable future technology is the major way in which education will be delivered.

WHAT IS THIS GOING TO LOOK LIKE AT TE KUITI HIGH SCHOOL?

Wednesday 15 April is the official beginning of term 2. Te Kuiti High School will be open to Distance learning only. Nobody is allowed physical access to Te Kuiti High School buildings and grounds without special permission from the Ministry of Education. This special permission can only be applied for by the Principal.

On the Te Kuiti High School website we have established a special page COVID-19 & Remote Learning. It will become the go to page for the duration of our time at Covid-19 Level 4 and Level 3.

On this page will be::

• Principal's Panui page with latest information

• Ministry of Education Updates page

• Student Information page

  • Similar to the daily notices.

  • Google Meets calendar showing when staff will be online with their students. Staff will also tell individual classes and students

  • All staff email addresses

  • Messages from teachers

  • Message from Whanau teacher

• Guide on how to use the main Google platforms staff and students will be using Google classroom, Google meets, go Gmail/ Docs/ Calendar. If you are not familiar with these platforms please let your teachers know.

• Mana Page

  • A page where

    • Student work is displayed

    • Department initiative

    • Report on a significant event the school was involved in

    • Ex- pupil achievements

WHAT IS DISTANCE LEARNING

It is teaching and learning where the teacher and students are in separate locations outside of school. In this situation the place of learning is their respect homes.

• A typical distance learning day for a student may consist of

  • 2 or 3 online meetings

  • Working on 2 or 3 online assignments/ activities

  • one on one online tutorial with a teacher

• You will work independently- when you start and when you finish is up to you

• The expectation is that you will participate in all calendared individual subject or whanau group meetings

• hand in work or assignments on time.

• Use your email as your main form of individual communication with your teacher.

WHAT DISTANCE LEARNING IS NOT?

• IT IS NOT TIMETABLED- in other words you do not follow a normal timetable of classes as you would if you were at school.e.g. 9am English, 10 am Maths, 11.am interval etc.

• You do not start at 8. 55 am and finish at 3.15 pm

• You do not work on a subject for a set amount of time then move onto the next subject.

• No one manages your time or behaviour but yourself.

HOW LONG IS THIS DISTANCE LEARNING GOING TO LAST.

This information is on the MoE Updates page

Assuming the alert level does change, current planning assumptions are that;

• Thursday 23 and Friday 24 April - the school site is accessed for property inspection and necessary maintenance and cleaning.

• Monday 27 April is a public holiday (ANZAC Day observed)

• Tuesday 28 April will be a staff-only day.

• Wednesday 29 April would be your first day. NOT ALL STUDENTS WILL RETURN.

WHAT HAVE STAFF DONE TO PREPARE FOR DISTANCE LEARNING

Each subject area has produced a plan of how and what they will teach. They are all using Google Classroom and Google Meet as their main platform for delivering teaching and learning. Some teachers are adding other platforms such as Zoom, YouTube to enhance their teaching.

WE have many staff members who are familiar with these platforms and use them regularly in their normal teaching practice.Those staff members who are not familiar or confident with online platforms have had significant help and will continue to have help over this period.

Staff have been involved in online meetings on a regular basis either as a department, as Heads of Departments, as Senior Leaders and as a whole staff. These meetings will continue on a regular basis.

I can honestly say that my staff are ready to teach our students using the technology available.

HOW CAN PARENTS HELP

The emotional and psychological impact of this crisis on New Zealand, is huge. Some families are experiencing loss of employment; many are experiencing the stress of the whole family being underfoot day after day; and most are simply struggling with the challenge of a changed world-of isolation and uncertainty. Young people having to learn from home adds another level of stress and can be unsettling for the whole household.The simplest advice that can be given to parents is to stay connected, remain child-centered, and avoid worry where you can.

With distance learning here are some practical advice

• Structure the day for learning, free time, healthy meals and snacks, and physical activity. However do allow flexibility in the schedule—it’s okay to adapt based on your day.

• Set up a specific place in the house for learning. Make sure this space has all the necessary resources and is in clear view of everyone. Try and avoid direct glare or reflections on the screen.is where you can check where there

• Talk with your child about keeping safe online. N4L has set up a free safety filter that parents can set up on their child's learning device from home. This filter blocks websites containing known cyber threats like phishing scams, malicious content and viruses, while also protecting children from content deemed the worst of the web (like adult sites). just go to switchonsafety.co.nz to find clear instructions on how to do this.

• Look at the work sent to your child from the school and help your child establish a reasonable pace for completing work.

• If your child has a hard time completing the set work or assignments, email the teacher of that subject.

• If any other issues arise that you may need help and advice the following order of contact is recommended.

  • Your child's Manukura

    • Rora - Teagan Houchen

    • Maniapoto - Alan Ford

    • Tawhana - Greg Londt

    • Wahanui - John Hunt

  • Bobbie Kearins SLT in charge of Distance Learning

  • Hannibal Ikahihifo SLT in charge of student welfare

  • Ray Tuck, SLT in charge of Technology infrastructure

  • Principal, Papa Thomas Tumai.

Finally no matter when we get out of level 4 and 3 we will not be going back to 'normal'. We need to learn from this crisis and plan for a system of teaching and learning that give more independence to our students; that will develop learning programs that cater for the individual student, not to the middle, and to become more dependent on technology because technology is the tool of this generation.

Na Papa Thomas

PRINCIPAL PANUI: Update Friday 10th April

YEAR 11 TO YEAR 13 STUDENTS

Over the past 3 days I have rung nearly every year 11 to year 13 student that attends Te Kūiti High School asking about their preparation for distance learning from Wednesday 15th April. MoE have made a priority of these senior students because of NCEA commitments and are providing the resources for their learning.

The main questions asked were;

• Did they have access to the internet in their homes,

• What device were they using to complete their distance learning work,

• Have they begun the work already uploaded by some of the teachers and

• If they had, what was it like; e.g. easy, hard, how different

• Have they contacted their teachers yet.

They were also told to access this site asap as it had or will have all the information about distance learning at Te Kūiti High School for the duration of national isolation.

As a result of these phone calls I will be arranging devices for loan to 20 students, hard copy NCEA resources to be sent to two students and will try to arrange internet access for 3 whānau.

Unfortunately there were 37 phone numbers that when called, went to voice mail, was unavailable, was disconnected or was unanswered. If you are a senior student that has not been contacted and want to know if you are eligible for a loaned device, access to the internet or wanting hard copy NCEA resources, please email principal@tkhs.school.nz with a contactable phone number by Tuesday 14th April.

YEAR 9 & 10 STUDENTS

Year 9 or 10 students needing to loan a device please contact Bobbie Kearins at bk@tkhs.school.nz

We are making the school chrome books available. However, because access into our school is very restricted, collecting and distributing these chrome books will need to be coordinated with the MoE and therefore will take time. When they become available, they will be couriered to your address.