Kia ora e te whānau o te kura o Parakawhara (hello friends & family of Gladstone School). It is crazy to think that we are now mid way through the term - congratulations to the Te Whiti whānau group who won the mid-term token count. Well done to the large group of swimmers who went down to the Carterton Pools on Wednesday. We now have 33 students representing the Carterton Cluster at the South Wairarapa Swimming Champs on Friday the 10th of March.

Thank you to everyone for donating cash, baked goods, time & energy for the FoGS fundraiser last weekend. This message was sent from the reunion committee: Thank you Gladstone school community for your magnificent contributions to the 250 lunches consumed by relatives at the Beetham family reunion held over the weekend!

A special mention must be made of Hayley Quirke’s organisation skills!

Reminder - 150th Celebration Committee - If you or anyone you know is willing and able to join us in organising this all important community event, please reach out - principal@gladstone1.school.nz. Thanks to those of you who have put your names down already.

The next fundraiser is coming around very quickly. We appreciate that there are lots of other things on that weekend including Relay for Life, significant birthdays and other things. If you are able to get a group together it is sure to be a great evening. Thanks very much to Liz Mason and Sarah McGregor for all of their organising that is going on behind the scenes. All of the money raised is going towards our students camps and EOTC trips.

We have had another great few days with our science facilitator Ben Laybourn this week. He has been in working with teachers on their lessons and is delighted with the science capabilities that our tamariki (children) are gaining. Our overarching theme for the term is flight. Hopefully your children have been chatting about aspects of flight and the science skills they are developing - Gather & interpret data · Use evidence · Critique evidence · Interpret representations · Engage with science.

A huge thanks to Mel Wenger who worked with a group of kids this week to extract honey. Lots of fabulous learning happening here. A big shout out to John Swinney who donated a box of honey to extract, we really appreciate it. Also to the Bee club who loaned us their extractor. We are so lucky to have the support of these people with our bees. This is such a great opportunity for our kids. The next step is to bottle honey harvested from our hives and pass it on to our community.

Our 'Whetu o te Wiki' are: Charlie Ashby; Maddie Nicol, Rosie Falloon & Guy Reynolds - doing the dishes and loading up the dishwasher on Friday. Tay Poshuma - for displaying constant manaakitanga. Apologies to Sophia Tosswill who got missed of the list (next week Soso).

Congratulations to the following tamariki (children) who were awarded certificates by their classroom teachers today - our focus this week has been on Ako (ah-core) - is reciprocal teaching and learning. When we focus on this we are looking for good learning behaviours, attention to work, creativity, curiosity, among other things. Students are also awarded certificates for other fabulous efforts in and around the school: Olivia Orsborn; Fergus McGuinness; Monty Murnane; Charlie Herrick; Ella Strang; Harry James & Fletcher Corkill.

Rā whānau (happy birthday) to students who have had their birthdays this week. We hope you have all had fabulous days.

Ko ngā rangatahi, ngā rangatira o āpōpō, our children are the leaders of tomorrow.

It is time for our ākonga to learn, understand and share our country’s kōrero tuku iho, historical stories that can be passed on through generations.

To keep things simple with regards to sports uniforms the expectation is that if kids are going off site for any trip/visit etc other than design technology, they need to wear their school top and black shorts/leggings/track pants.

We are looking forward to seeing many of you here at school this evening for 'Tent City' - it's the perfect evening for it and I am sure we will all have a lot of fun. Just a quick reminder that this is an official EOTC event aka camp, so the expectation is that there will be no alcohol.

We wish you a lovely weekend.

Ngā manaakitanga,

Belinda

Each Monday our wonderful FoGS committee organise school lunches for our tamariki. Parent Helpers get the food ready for handing out at eating time. Please contact Liz Mason (lizarthan@hotmail.com) if you can be a parent help.

Thank you to the following fabulous families who have offered help with lunches. Please find the list up until July. If any changes are required, please let Liz Mason know.

Week 6

Fri 10/3 - Y7&8 Design Tech Starts (each Friday until the end of term)

Fri 10/3 - South Wairarapa Swimming Sports @ the Trust House Pool in Masterton

Fri 10/3 - Carterton Residents Picnic @ Carrington Park incl. Kourarau Food Fundraiser

Week 7

Mon 13/3 - BoT meeting 6pm

Sun 19/3 - Super Bee @ School

Email: office@gladstone1.school.nz
Website: http://www.gladstone1.school.nz
Location: 1471 Te Whiti Road, Gladstone, New Zealand
Phone: +64 6 372 7601