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Welcome to Term 4 - Senior School Newsletter

Term 4 Newsletter

Kia ora koutou!

Welcome to Term 4 of 2017. It’s hard to believe we are now in the final term of the year. It is fantastic to finally see the sun after a long, wet winter.  It was wonderful to see so many of you at our Art Exhibition at the end of Term 3 - thank you for coming along to celebrate the wonderful creativity and colourful work from across the school with your child!

With this term being only 9 weeks and 2 days and including Abel Tasman, Mount Holdsworth and the Year 8 Formal, it is certainly set to be a busy one!

Below is a run down on the term. Feel free to contact your child’s classroom teacher if there is anything you wish to discuss further.

Literacy

Our writing focus for this term is poetry, where we will be exploring the connections between poetry in song lyrics while exploring a variety of figurative language. We will be using current events in the media to create a ‘Year in Rap’ and aim to spend the Literacy part of the term developing vocabulary and ‘playing with language’!

We are continuing to develop comprehension skills through our reading programme (where we will also be exploring poems) and integrated inquiry topics.

Numeracy

We start the term revising some key concepts from the year. We will be focusing particularly on fractions, decimals, place value and operational strategies. In addition to this students will be covering the strand of Algebra. We also aim to give students some experience of open ended mathematical inquiry within our programs this term, while building their knowledge and flexibility with strategies.

Inquiry / Integrated Studies

Our major focus for Term 4 is our current Sexuality Road unit ‘Discovering Me’ which has been specially designed for Year 7 and 8 students. A parent information evening will be held on Thursday 19th October in the school library for you to come along and hear about, explore and ask questions about the program.  Throughout this unit we will be discussing relationships, the influence of the media, peer pressure, physical and emotional changes during puberty, reproduction, and the rights and responsibilities we take on as we get older. The classroom teachers will endeavour to keep you up to date with lesson content that has been covered through email. We think this is a great way of keeping you in the loop, especially if you’d like to initiate any conversation with your child at home. Once again, if you have any questions regarding this unit, please don’t hesitate to get in touch.

PPP - Personal Passion Projects

Due to popular demand we will be offering this opportunity for our senior students to delve into their passions once more in the first 3 weeks of term.  The teachers were blown away by the efforts of the students in term 2 and how the vast majority were confident at directing their own learning.  The students will have already completed their proposals and are expected to have everything they need ready to go by the Monday of Term 1.  They will have 3-4 full sessions a week over the first 3 weeks of this term to work on these, but it is likely that they will also need to use some of their own time at home to complete it.  We will share to our school community at the end of this period.

Physical Education

An exciting term for PE is planned, starting off with Athletics. The children will be taking part in Long Jump, High Jump, Vortex, Shot put, Discus and Sprints. A few of our students will also be representing us in the Wellington Regional Athletics meet on Tuesday 5th December.  We will also be having session with the team from Kiwisport and their ‘Run, Jump & Throw’ program.  This leads in nicely to our school athletics day on Tuesday 31st October. We end the term with Swimming starting again down at the local pool.

EOTC

Planning is well underway for the Year 8 Abel Tasman adventure and the Year 7 EOTC week. We will be meeting with the students regularly to ensure they are fully prepared for the exciting week at the end of the term.

We are also planning on taking advantage of our stunning local environment by utilising the Eastbourne bush tracks. This is excellent preparation for EOTC week where both groups (particularly our Year 8s) will be walking for long distances every day.

Other opportunities

This term brings the opportunity for our two teams of Year 8 students to participate in the Epro 8 engineering challenge.  This event will be held at Wainuiomata Intermediate School from 5pm on Monday 6th November.

Important Reminders

Testing

We are often asked by parents when we are carrying out our Term 4 testing so that they may support their child with early nights and ensure they are not away.  Although we do not wish there to be any pressure as we view the testing information as just one small part of the picture of achievement for your child over the whole year, we do appreciate this.  Most of our formal testing for the term will be carried out during the week beginning 24th - 27th October (the second week of term).

Reporting to Parents

Teachers will very shortly start writing academic reports for each student. This is a summative assessment on the progress and achievements your child has made throughout the year. These reports will be coming home at the end of the term. Also at the end of the term, students will bring home their clearfile with work samples from throughout the year. Along with this hard copy, students will also have work samples in their Google Drive account. We will be encouraging our Year 8 students to print or save their samples to a personal account or usb before the end the of the year.

Stationery Check

Many students are now missing pens, pencils, rulers, plastic pockets and calculators. These are necessary for everyday class work. Can you please ask your child if they need any items and replace them. Thank you.

Sun Hats & Drink Bottles

It’s term 4 and each child must bring a hat to wear everyday.  Students not wearing hats have to stay in the shaded area. It is also recommended the children have their own named drink bottle at school. As the days get warmer it’s important they are fully hydrated.

Footwear and clothing (personal hygiene)

All the children will be a lot more active this term and when the weather starts to get warmer we all start to sweat (and smell) more. We are recommending that students bring a spare change of clothes and suitable footwear for exercising at school. For many students it is time to start using roll-on deodorant - we are more than happy for them to use this at school. Please ensure your child wears shoes that they can comfortably run in. Jandals and boots are not appropriate.

Finally, if you have any concerns or worries (or indeed if you can support us with any of the activities for the term!) please contact your child’s teacher by leaving a phone message at the office or by email: teachers surname @ muritai.school.nz.

Melissa: coton@muritai.school.nz

Julie: small@muritai.school.nz

Ruth: hooke@muritai.school.nz

Annette: borgonje@muritai.school.nz

Thank you as always for your continued support,

The Year 7 and 8 team