School Newsletter – 1 March 2023

Term 1, Week 5

A Message from the Deputy Principals

Student Leaders 2023

We had a number of students who put their hand up to help out our school this year. We are looking forward to working with these students and are confident that they will do a great job and develop their leadership capabilities throughout the year.

Student Council Role

In this role students need to show respect , honesty , reliability, commitment, friendliness and compassion. They are role models of the Kohimarama Way. They meet regularly with Miss Hill to plan for school events such as  fundraising, disco, etc. They set up School Assembly each week, taking turns at being the MC, looking after sound, Collecting and counting the Greenie certificates and welcoming the  parents’ visitors.  Student Leaders also MC school events eg. School speech competition, Kohi’s Got Talent, and Cultural Evenings. 

House Captains 

Our House Captains work with Mrs Ellery and are a great help to us all at our school sporting events such as swimming sports, cross country and athletics. Before these events they run school house meetings to go over the organisation and motivate, encourage and support other students at these events. They are also responsible for any  teacher student sport challenges, collecting and announcing our house points each week at assembly and they have played a supportive role in the Snell Team fitness programme. These students need to be motivators, communicators, organisers and love to have fun.

Ambassadors.

This is a developing role and has only been in our school for a couple of years.  As the word implies this requires a person who enjoys meeting new people, someone with lots of empathy for others.  They need to be prepared to meet new visitors to the school and to talk about the features of our school with them. They need to enjoy communicating and helping others. These students also work with Miss Hill and go down to the local kindy to meet all the children that will  be coming to our school in the future.  We have plans to grow this role this year working with Travel Wise

 Peer Mediators. 

The Peer mediators also work with Mrs Ellery. They need to show compassion and friendliness to students who need support in either finding friends or maintaining friendships, and work with students who need support in the playground and talk about what they have seen in the weekly assembly.  Peer Mediators are taught how to be an active listener and support students when they have minor disagreements.  They are reliable and turn up for their duties on time informing me of any concerns regarding the timetable and/or students they have worked with during the break times. 

Librarians 

These students will be working with Claudette Ndenzako. They  help us in our day to day running of the library. This is another group of students who display reliability, responsibility and know how to be a member of a team. They issue and return books, and help students  to use the library. They shelve books, tidy the library, promote the library and books, assist with displays and use the computer. These students need to love and respect books and have an understanding of alphabetical and numerical order. They need to show a good deal of independence and be effective communicators with good listening skills

Sports Councillors.

They tend our PE shed handing out and collecting gear for students to use at break times and in PE lessons. They ensure that our gear is cared for and organised in the shed. As with many of our leaders they need to show reliability, commitment and independence. They will be working with Mr Forbes.

The Kohimarama Way – Friendliness

Friendliness begins with liking yourself and believing you have something to share with others.  Be kind to people you don’t know  You can be friendly just by walking down the hall, looking into people’s faces, and smiling.  They will probably smile back.  Show your friends you are glad to see them, by asking how their day is going and sharing your news with them.

News

Enviro

Congratulations to the following students who have been elected as Eco Warriors from their class.

Junior School:  Room 1 – Ryan, Room 2 – Scarlett, Room 6 – Ava, Room 8 – Stella, Room 17 – Harrison, Room 25 – Clara, Room 26 – Frankie, Room 27 – Chloe G

Senior School: Room 11 – Rosie B, Room 12 – Ava M, Room 13 – Dario L, Room 14 – Chetna W, Room 15 – Robbie C, Room 18 – Jeffery D, Room 19 – Helena L, Room 20 – Isablella H, Room 21 – Cohen and Asher, Room 22 – Liv and Isabella, Room 23 – Louisa and Daniel

Their first job is to keep a record of the amount of rubbish their class collects each day during their assigned rubbish duty.  Our goal is for ‘zero’ rubbish. To assist with this we are encouraging students to have a ‘wrapper-free lunch’ every day.

Gardening Opportunity: 

We are looking for  Kohimarama families that are interested in gardening, adopting a small area of the School Gardens, and maintaining it. Nothing too big or overwhelming. If that sounds like something your family would be interested in, please email Tamara Bartlett at tamarachristie21@hotmail.com

New Spelling Programme – ‘the code’

A schoolwide focus at Kohimarama School in 2023 is the teaching of Spelling through a Structured Literacy Approach.  All classes will be taught using ‘the code’, set out by expert Literacy Coach, Liz Kane. 
Lead teachers in Literacy have attended courses, and during our Teacher Only Days, staff have learnt how to use ‘the code’.  In 2022 three teachers trialled the use of ‘the code’ to support spelling programmes.  The data from this trial showed significant growth in the ability of students in both Reading and Writing. Based on the success of this trial Kohimarama school has decided to implement this approach across the school. 

“The intended outcome of teaching ‘the code’ is for students to apply their knowledge of letter-sound relationships, spelling patterns and irregular spellings, and morphology accurately, automatically and fluently when spelling, writing and reading (page 4)”.

In the first few weeks of school, teachers will be gathering baseline data via a phonological screening tool or a spelling check/s.  This data will be used to generate explicit teaching lessons.

Due to the structured nature of ‘the code’ and because it is taught in class by the teacher, you will notice your child will no longer be bringing home spelling words. This is because spelling homework in this instance does not reinforce the structured approach that we are using in class.

We will be holding a parent information evening to discuss this further and answer any questions you may have on Monday 13th March at 7pm. Please look out for a google form next week for you to indicate your interest in attending this session. 

If you have any questions please feel free to contact your child’s teacher

Certificates & Awards

Class Certificates

Congratulations to these outstanding students from Hillary Team and Snell Team:

• Room 11 – Jack B
• Room 12 – Ava M, Poppy M
• Room 13 – Bella G, Emma S
• Room 14 – Hobson R
• Room 15 – Georgia H, Dash B

• Room 18 – Scarlett F, Oscar H
• Room 19 – Nico G, John G
• Room 20 – Sam L, Grace P
• Room 21 – Elliot B, Ava C
• Room 22 – Liz Z, Paolo Z
• Room 23 – Lincoln C

Caught Being Good – “Greenies”

Thank you to all our students who are doing the right thing in the playground, there are a lot of us and it is good to see sharing and inclusion happening.  Our fortunate winners of ‘greenie’ prizes over the last two weeks are:

• Amani          Rm 1           for Friendliness        Atkin
• Scarlett        Rm 2           for Reliability            Atkin
• Remi            Rm 6           for Friendliness        Atkin
• Sophie         Rm 11         for Friendliness        Selwyn
• Ingrid           Rm 18         for Friendliness        Atkin

Kohimarama Road Patrollers of the week

Thank you to our Year 7 students for continuing to be Road Patrollers for the first two weeks of our year, to allow our Year 6 students to have their second training session with Constable Gordon and myself.  We really appreciate you stepping up and keeping us safe on the crossings – Bella, Louisa, Lachlan, Josh, Lily, Juliette, Hamish and Emily – you are awesome.

This week our Road Patrollers being recognised for completing their first week so well are Thomas, Madison, Lydia and Harry.  We do appreciate you for putting yourselves forward and learning a new skill, at the same time ensuring our two pedestrian crossings are safe for us to use each day.

PTA News

Hot Cross Bun Fundraiser

Let’s raise some dough for the school with mouth-watering Hot Cross Buns from Bakers Delight St Heliers! $2 from each order goes to the school. Orders open via Kindo until 4 March. Collect on 8 March

$50 Bakers Delight Voucher will go to the student who sells the most packs of Hot cross buns!

Sport Notices

Kohimarama School Swimming Sports (Years 5–8) Thursday 9th March, 2023

We warmly invite you to come and support our first major sporting event for 2023. Our swimming sports will be held at the Sacred Heart indoor pool (244 W Tamaki Rd, Glendowie)

Races will run from approximately 9.30am to 1.30pm. Whilst we can not provide accurate details of when specific races will commence, the order of events is provided below as a general guide. Events that attract a small number of entries may be combined.

Individual Medley

• Year 5 Girls
• Year 5 Boys
• Year 6 Girls
• Year 6 Boys
• Year 7 Girls
• Year 7 Boys
• Year 8 Girls
• Year 8 Boys

Freestyle

• Year 5 Girls 25m
• Year 5 Boys 25m
• Year 6 Girls 25m
• Year 6 Boys 25m
• Year 7 Girls 50m
• Year 7 Boys 50m
• Year 8 Girls 50m
• Year 8 Boys 50m
• Year 7 Girls 100m
• Year 7 Boys 100m
• Year 8 Girls 100m
• Year 8 Boys 100m

Backstroke

• Year 5 Girls 25m
• Year 5 Boys 25m
• Year 6 Girls 25m
• Year 6 Boys 25m
• Year 7 Girls 50m
• Year 7 Boys 50m
• Year 8 Girls 50m
• Year 8 Boys 50m

Breaststroke

• Year 5 Girls 25m
• Year 5 Boys 25m
• Year 6 Girls 25m
• Year 6 Boys 25m
• Year 7 Girls 50m
• Year 7 Boys 50m
• Year 8 Girls 50m
• Year 8 Boys 50m

Butterfly

• Year 5 Girls 25m
• Year 5 Boys 25m
• Year 6 Girls 25m
• Year 6 Boys 25m
• Year 7 Girls 50m
• Year 7 Boys 50m
• Year 8 Girls 50m
• Year 8 Boys 50m

Sport Results

Flippa Ball Results

• Year 3/4 Kinas
  Loss 3-2. POD Poppy M
• Year 3/4 Sharks
  Loss 9-1. POD Casey F
• Year 5/6 Blue Bottles
  Draw 1-1. POD Victoria E

Community Notices