Newsletter Issue 3

Kia ora, Nameste, Talofa, Konnichiwa, Guten Tag, Gidday, Vannakkam, ni Hao, Kia orana, Hola, Salam, Sa wat deekha, Dia Dhuit, Goeie Dag, Bonjour, Καλημέρα, Mālō e lelei, Greetings everyone

We hope this finds you warm and dry after a rather challenging run of weather at the beginning of this week. Our students and teachers, in particular our juniors, have demonstrated our value of resilience as they move around the school for their workshops with two classes out of action due to the build work in this weather. It was pleasing to note, despite all this, the great feedback given by our ERO Evaluation Partner last week when she spent a morning visiting classes with a focus on Literacy. She spoke about well structured, well managed classrooms with varied and responsive approaches to teaching and learning and respectful interactions between students and teachers.

‘E tipu e ako’ - Where Learning Grows

As usual, there is lots happening on the learning front. The heritage language group for Sinhala has begun. Hub 5’s carnival was a huge success last week with the students raising more than $1000 towards their camp later this year! This was a great example of real life learning and tuakana teina (big buddies supporting younger students). It was a delight to see our 5 year old students engaging with some wonderful games run by our Year 6 children last Friday.

All our hubs are gearing up for their production performances - this morning I got a sneak preview of some hyena masks and our set creation crew were hard at work painting the backdrop under the watchful eye of Miss Walters and a patient and committed community member - thank you! On Monday our Year 5's completed Road Patrol training to help keep our community safe with Constable Dann and Nadine Dechapunya.

Yesterday, Hub 4 students headed off to the Wellington Museum and took the cable car up to the Space Place. This was the end of one learning focus on Matariki, building on work they had done into the legends of Ngāki & Whataitai and the beginning of the next looking at navigating with the stars which will have a Science, Literacy and Te Ao Māori integrated learning focus. The students were a credit to us as always and a wonderful time was had by all! Thank you to the families who supported this visit.

Our academically strong Year 4-6 students have been challenging themselves with the ICAS assessments in Writing, Science, Maths and English (Reading) over the past few weeks and a small group of Hub 5 students have been engaging in the five Otago Mathematical Problem Solving Challenges. These challenges are predominantly aimed at Year 7 and 8, so it is inspiring to see the confidence and resilience demonstrated by our students in tackling them.

Our teaching team also continues to learn. Two of our Junior team are involved in the ‘Incredible Years Teacher’ training. The IYT programme is a six session programme for teachers of children aged 3-8 years. It is based on strengthening teacher classroom management strategies, promoting children’s pro-social behaviour, school readiness and cooperation with peers. Continuing with our PB4L (Positive Behaviour For Learning) journey, we received a very positive school evaluation from the Ministry of Education, which rated us the highest across all but one aspects that they assess in school (including positive behaviour teaching expectations, policies and classroom practices). Miss Walters, a committed member of our PB4L team is attending a network with other schools who have been on this journey this week.

Learning Support - Still a priority

Today our leadership team and members of the teaching team are attending a NZEI hui focused on building support for an education system that provides support for all our students, including those with additional needs. We will hear from Lily Doolan of Young Neurodiversity Champions, Te Rina Leonard CEO of Te Kura Correspondence School and ex-Ed Psychologist, NZEI President Mark Potter and others about the need to increase staffing of teacher aides in classrooms and MoE/school-based specialists, resource teachers, counsellors, advisors, therapists and psychologists.

You may be interested to hear that resoundingly Principal’s voices are emphasising the importance of a focus on Learning Support -

(Principal Matters, 14 August) Identifies that feedback from Principals includes:

• There is no crisis in maths achievement in New Zealand. Achievement has shifted neither up nor down in a decade. The most recent PISA results has New Zealand students in 7th place in the world, well above the OECD average.

• The biggest problem New Zealand faces is the growing gap between the highest and lowest achievers and that applies equally in literacy and maths. That is the real issue, to be acknowledged and addressed.

• To address the equity gap in student achievement requires further investment in teaching resources including, learning support, teacher aides, LSCs in schools, reducing class sizes, and ongoing PLD for teachers right across the curriculum.

Other issues schools are facing include:

• Staffing issues, especially unavailability of relief staff.

• The three-year political cycle creating barriers to long-term planning.

This Thursday (29 August) is the first ever NZEI learning support awareness day. Many educators will be wearing purple to raise awareness of the learning support needs of tamariki and to encourage the Government to see this as a priority.

Term 3 Pōwhiri

On Thursday next week we hold our term 3 pōwhiri for our new students and staff to Bellevue School. Invitations will come home to the families who are invited to attend and we look forward to formally welcoming them into our Bellevue Whānau.

Annual Emergency Evacuation & Reunification Practise

There are only three weeks to go until this important school event. Please see the additional information, including a link to the letter sent home to families, later in the newsletter.

John Parsons - Keeping Safe Online

Tomorrow evening! 6pm at Newlands Intermediate. We hope to see you there.

Reminders:

• Newlands Intermediate Enrolments - Final week!

For our families with children in Year 6 a final reminder that the enrolments close next week on 31st August.

• Our FUNdraisers committee mostly have students moving on at the end of the year and we are recruiting! There are lots of ‘wishes’ on the list including a rebuild of the little house that burned down and some new playground markings to brighten up our school. If you are interested in supporting our school to reach its fundraising targets then please get in contact with the team - see their update at the end of the newsletter.

Ngā mihi nui

Annette

Finally a reminder that our fortnightly newsletters can also be found on our Bellevue Website - scroll down to view 'previous Bellevue Newsletters' - and for more timely updates, you could follow our closed group Bellevue Facebook Page, if you are not already.

• Thank you to Newlands College who have gifted us a piano.

  This means that our old piano is looking for a new home. It is still in full working order though a little worn so if you or anyone you know of has a use for a piano and can pick up, please get in touch with the office - office@bellevue-newlands.school.nz or 4787037.
  

• Thank you to the families in Hub 4 who helped out with the trip yesterday to the Wellington Museum and Space Place. It was a fun filled and busy day and we really appreciated your support!

To assist our families with locating our Attendance Procedures, please note that the below link now takes you to a 'quick link' on our website to the Attendance Procedures in PDF form.

Please do always contact the office (office@bellevue-newlands.school.nz), or call and leave a message for absences. Do not reply to this newsletter as your message may not be seen.

It is less than a month until this important school event.

Following the newsletter today, the first of two letters outlining what you need to know for our whole school emergency evacuation and reunification practice will be emailed home. An image is included below.

Please read this carefully and, if required, be sure to check in with the office about your emergency contacts (which you have recently had home for updates) before Friday 13 September.

You will understand that there is a great deal of preparation that goes into making this practice as safe and streamlined as possible so we appreciate your assistance with timely contact.

Finally, we do understand that this practice creates an interruption in the busy lives of our community and so we thank you for your support and understanding.

Please follow this link to a copy of our advance warning letter that will be emailed home as a PDF also.

Annual Emergency Evacuation 2024.docx.pdf

The following policies have been updated on our SchoolDocs site to keep content up to date, to reflect legal advice and to ensure these reflect good practice for schools.

These changes are significant so you may like to take a look at these on our school site - bellevue-newlands.schooldocs.co.nz (username bellevue-newlands, password ‘grow’):

• Inclusive School Culture

• Bullying and Harassment

• Concerns and Complaints - including Raising Concerns

• Student Attendance

Username bellevue-newlands, password 'grow'

Yummy stickers

Just a reminder that we are now in the last term for collecting Yummy stickers to get sports gear for our school.

The promotion runs through until the end of Term 3, please send all stickers to your whānau teacher.

Congratulations to the students who have been selected as the main roles in the 2024 Bellevue production! Everyone who auditioned gave a fantastic performance and it was very hard to cast. The main characters in our production will be: Nuvini, Sanjay, Icazia, Guhan, Oliver, Gauri and Savinaya! More opportunities will be provided within Hubs for main roles.

The backdrop for our production is well under way! A talented group of students have been painting scenes from some of your favourite fairytale stories. See if you can pick which ones they have painted below!

Ticket order forms will be sent home on Friday 30th of August. Tickets for the production will go on sale from the Bellevue School Office from Monday 2nd September.

Adult Tickets $10

Child Tickets $7

The Newlands School Hall has a capacity of 350 audience members so be sure to get your tickets quickly!

Thank you for your support.

Whānau are invited to join other parents in our Newlands Primary Schools cluster to see John Parsons, who is an expert in internet safety for children. This is a must hear presentation for parents to understand the impact digital access at home is having on our tamariki from a very young age. At this presentation, John will share vital information and guidance for parents and caregivers on digital safety for tamariki now and in the future.

Key Details:

Date - Thursday 29 August

Time - 6:00pm to 7:00pm

Location - Newlands Intermediate School hall

FREE

Do you have a child turning five soon or next year ...or know someone else who does? Parents of students who live within the home zone and intend to enrol their child at any time in 2025-2026 are asked to please notify the school as soon as possible to assist the school to plan appropriately. It helps us to know as early as possible how many students will be enrolling as a five year old. Interested families may collect an enrolment pack from the office or arrange a tour of the school with the principal.

Out of zone enrolment applications are now being accepted for the first enrolment period of 2025 (Wednesday 18 December 2024 to Friday 11 April 2025). Up to five (5) places are likely to be available for out of zone students. The deadline for out of zone enrolments is Friday 20 September 2024. Please have a look at the school website for more details: https://www.bellevue-newlands.school.nz/enrolment.

We will continue to include a few snippets for families in our newsletter to support our collective understanding of neurodiversity under one of our guiding values of Empathy.

This week’s focus - understanding ADHD:

• Great video for building student’s understanding

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1t9UHQgtDfU

What is ADHD (from ADHD New Zealand) - Quick reference understanding for adults - https://www.adhd.org.nz/what-is-adhd.html

Aotearoa is at very high risk of a measles outbreak and not enough of us are immune.

To be immune, you must have had measles before OR at least two doses of a measles vaccine after the age of 12 months.

Local childhood immunisation rates are declining. Low immunity and the close contact nature of education settings means one infected person could quickly expose and spread measles to many others, starting an outbreak that could be hard to control.

People can be infectious before they develop measles symptoms and know they’re sick. Being immune is important for everyone’s safety – it’s the only way to make sure you won’t get or spread measles, even if you’ve been exposed.

See information on checking immunity here:

Measles immunity – Health New Zealand | Te Whatu Ora

My Health Record – Health New Zealand | Te Whatu Ora

If you aren’t immune, or you’re not sure, two doses of the measles mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine is your best protection. You can book a vaccine online:

Home – Book my vaccine

For suspected or confirmed measles cases at your facility, contact your local public health service urgently.

Multilingual videos to raise awareness about measles and MMR vaccine

The Ministry for Ethnic Communities, with the support of Te Whatu Ora, has released a series of three animated videos to explain what measles is, how to protect yourself from the disease and where you can access reliable health information.

The videos are translated and voiced over into 20 different languages, including:

• Chinese (simplified) with voiceover in Mandarin

• Arabic

• Spanish.

Check out the videos at:

Health videos for ethnic communities – Ministry for Ethnic Communities

Attendance: Health guidance available

Health guidance published by Health New Zealand | Te Whatu Ora is available to help you to decide if a student is well enough to attend school, including those students experiencing anxiety.

The guidance supports discussions with parents and caregivers about absence, the importance of minimising disruptions to learning, and positive re-entry to learning after sickness.

More information is available here:

Student attendance: A guide for parents and caregivers – Ministry of Education

If you would like to nominate our school to win $10,000 worth of sports equipment, please click on the link below. The more nominations we get the greater the chance of us winning!

https://www.aainsurance.co.nz/big-little

We are well into Term Three Bellevue Whānau

Our second FUNdraisers committee meeting of the term is this Thursday, 5 th September at 6.15pm

and…

WE NEED YOU!

Despite our pleas in past updates, we still don’t have enough members to replace those leaving at

the end of this year. Being part of our committee is a really easy way to give back to our school. It only takes a couple of hours of your enthusiasm a term and the feel-good factor of bringing the FUN to the kids really is THE BEST. Please come and join us.

The update on our events is below:

Kids Art Work

We don’t yet have a delivery date on the artwork which is currently being processed.

An update will come via this newsletter when we do have more information.

School Production – 25th September

I (Rebecca) was lucky enough to get a sneak preview of some props that are being worked on by

our students for the production coming up at the end of September. They look AMAZING!!

Ticket sales are coming up soon, so keep your eyes peeled for information on that!

This year, our FUNdraisers team are coming together with our Year 6 tamariki to fundraise toward

school camp. What this means is that there will be sales of chippies and sweets as you arrive in the evening to watch the production.

There is also a plan to have a LOLLIES IN THE JAR Raffle!

So please plan on having some cash handy and keep an eye out for these on the night!

End of Term Pizza – Term 3

Keep your eyes peeled for order forms coming home in the next few weeks.

Term 4 FUNdraising events

We have on our plan for term 4 the following events:

- A Wine fundraiser. This one is very much just for the adults.

- The annual end of year Bake Sale! (Such a student favourite!)

- We are also collaborating with the school for the FUNRun which is coming up.

- PIZZA!

FUNdraisers Committee Meetings

Next meeting: 5th September 2024

Meetings are currently held at 6.15pm (in the school staff room when possible) in week 2 and also

week 7 of each term.

If you have capacity to take on being an incredibly valued member of our community and

committee, please join us! You can contact Rebecca by email for information at

fundraisers@bellevue-newlands.school.nz

We will be operating from the school hall for before school and after school care during term time. All enquiries to linda@kapaikidz.co.nz Mobile 021 409641 or book via our website www.kapaikidz.co.nz

Space is limited, secure your spot!

Child care needed

Urgently require care for 4yr old girl for next 6 weeks, she will attend Bellevue when she turns 5 in September. Her older sister is currently attending the school. Hours 7.30am-3pm.

Contact Carlos 022 109 1321 or closhussein@gmail.com

Thursday 29 August

John Parsons talk: Safeguarding children and adults online

Newlands Intermediate 6pm - 7:30pm

Saturday 31 August

Newlands Intermediate Enrolments Close

Thursday 5 September

Term 3 Pōwhiri

FUNdraisers Meeting 6:15pm - 7:15pm

Thursday 12 September

Board Meeting 6:30 - 8:30pm

Monday 16 Friday to Monday 23 September

Te Wiki o te Reo Māori 2024 / Māori Language Week 2024

Friday 20 September

Whole School Emergency Evacuation and Reunification Practice

Wednesday 25 September

School Production - Doors open 6pm for 6:30pm start

Newlands Intermediate School Hall

Friday 27 September

Last day of Term 3

Monday 14 October

First day of Term 4