Welcome to Term 3, 2023

Kia ora parents, whānau and caregivers. Welcome to Term 3, we are now officially into the 2nd half of the school year. We have an exciting term coming up filled with engaging learning, cultural, artistic and sporting opportunities for our children to enjoy.

For those of you that are new to Te Aroha Primary School, we welcome you to our kura and are sure that you will thrive during your time with us.

I would also like to introduce our new caretaker, Mr Glenn Tonkin. You will see Glenn around the school working hard and maintaining our beautiful grounds that we have. Welcome aboard Glenn.

We also welcome Nicole to the crew. Nicole is our new cleaner and will be keeping the top block looking amazing. Welcome Nicole.

I Hope everyone has had a good break. A big welcome to Knoxx, Jade, Teina and Kade, our new five year olds, who have joined Room 1. Jenny Johnson will be away until 14th August, so Room 1 will be taught by Rosie Marshall, with Dolores Maisey taking the class on a Wednesday. The learning this term gets underway with Matariki. Our phonological focus is rhyming words and older students are working on blending 3 letter words and saying the word. In Maths we are sorting everyday objects into categories, then creating pictographs, bar graphs and finally making statements about the data. A reminder to please send shorts and a t-shirt to school for cross country running each day, it is very muddy on the field. The children are very excited about the 100 days at school celebration and they are counting down the days. We are looking forward to an amazing, fun filled term of learning.

To start the term off we welcome Edward, Marino, Sebastian and Niko to Room 2! We are now half way through the year and we have been learning to embrace the challenge that comes with being a learner and what it means to be an independent learner. This term our values focus is honesty. We will learn about what honesty is and how we can demonstrate this value as members of Room 2.

We are celebrating 100 days at school later this week and I know that this will be a memorable and exciting day for our Waihou students as we have been eagerly counting the days at school since the beginning of the year. We also look forward to starting our cross country training this term.

Welcome to Term 3! I hope you have all had a relaxing break and are ready to jump back into learning! Gizmo and Jeff have missed you all

This term we are hopping straight back into revisiting routines and expectations of what it is to be Room 3 TAPS kid. We are exploring informative report writing about a range of animals and insects and learning new vowel digraphs to go alongside our weekly poem.

Cross country is coming up so we will begin a daily practice. Please make sure your child has a named water bottle and a change of clothes.

Library visits continue to be on a Friday. Please bring along your poem/homework books and book bags everyday.

If you would like to touch base with me, please don't hesitate to contact me via seesaw or email mswan@tearohaprimary.school.nz

Hope you have an amazing first week back!

Term 3 will see Room 5 developing their sewing skills, building their fitness for cross country, as well as working on their dance moves for the upcoming whole school production. We look forward to a busy and productive term.

A warm welcome to you all for the start of Term Three! We have a very busy, but powerful term of learning ahead of us and we will be sinking ourselves straight into it this week!

A big focus to start is gaining an understanding of where our learning is in each of our curriculum areas and how we can make and reach our targeted goals.

We will become fraction experts in maths, skillful in editing our writing, and become reading extraordinaires. For our term topic ‘What’s the matter’, there will be loads of hands-on activities to stimulate our brains through explorational practical learning experiences.

Always remember, in Room 6, we have high expectations, we work hard and we also have fun! Your child is always encouraged to be the best they can be by always trying their best, and tackling new learning with courage. We will be creative, imaginative, and resilient so we can grow!

Welcome back everyone. Room 7 will be working hard at getting fit from day 1- getting ready for Cross Country in Week 4. Week 4 is no far way when it comes to getting fit! Our mantra this term will be....'Those who tell stories rule the world' which is a proverb attributed to the Hopi Indians. Term 3 is a great term to wrap up warm and read,write and tell our own stories. This will link nicely with our production which will come later on.

Welcome back to another exciting term at our school! I hope you had a fantastic break and are ready for the action-packed and rewarding 10 weeks that lie ahead. This term is filled with a variety of activities and learning opportunities that are sure to engage and inspire our students.

Here's a glimpse of what's in store:

- Firstly, we will celebrate Matariki with our awesome Kapa Haka roopu and continue Kapa throughout the term.

- Cross country training will keep us active in Health & PE. We will gradually increase over time, please pack a change of clothes to train in.

- Our school-wide production is underway, set to hit the stage next term. We will start learning our scene and preparing our costumes.

- The school speech competition offers a chance to showcase communication skills and gain confidence in public speaking. Lots of support and guidance offered.

- Our science unit, "What's the Matter," promises hands-on experiments and messy fun.Engaging science workshops await across the hub.

- "Our Stories" focuses on New Zealand Aotearoa histories, with museum visits and field trips planned.

- In math, we'll tackle fractions and review multiplication strategies on Mathletics. We will celebrate world maths day with hub challenges in our school hall.

- IDEAL spelling groups continue, boosting spelling skills and confidence in writing.

Learning is always our priority, and this term we empower students to become authors of their own learning. Let's embrace the craziness of term 3 and the exciting opportunities ahead!

Please always reach out if you need anything.

Mrs Young

Kia Ora e te whānau!

Welcome back to Term 3. We hope you have had a fantastic break and are ready for some FUN. We have a VERY busy term a head full of some exciting things and learning with lots of opportunities to engage in.

Our Learning this term:

- Mānawatia o Matariki. First week back is all about celebrating the Māori new year. We will be looking closely at what Matariki is all about, how we celebrate it and why it is important. We will also be listening to different myths and legends about Matariki and enjoying some delicious kai throughout the week.

- What's the Matter? In weeks two and three we will be engaging in some hands on learning by taking part in Hub workshops where we will be getting our hands dirty and creating a bit of mess with some fun science experiments, all focused around Matter.

- Aotearoa Histories will be our big literacy focus this term, looking closely at the different groups of people who migrated to Aotearoa. We will even get the opportunity to visit different museums and go on a Hub field trip.

- Fraction, Ratios and Proportions is our Maths focus this term. We will even take part in the annual MATHS WEEK where we will play games and complete fun learning tasks.

- Our Tamariki have taken a strong liking to the IDEAL spelling workshops and we are excited to see this continue this term on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday each week.

What else is happening this term?

- Cross Country is on this term so scrub off your running shoes and grab your comfiest running shorts as we will begin training each day in preparation for this.

- 'Lost in the Library' is all set to hit the stage next term. We will be working hard this term to learn our class scene, practice our dance moves and prepare our costumes.

- Totara Springs - T-minus 6 weeks until our year 7 and 8's head to the annual sports camp. Trainings will be everyday from 2:15pm and will be amping up as we get closer. Please make sure your are prepared each day for this.

As you can see, we have A LOT on this term. Learning is our priority therefore being responsible and having good self- management is key this term to ensure our tamariki are still meeting deadlines and are exceeding the expectations in class. We are thrilled to offer so many opportunities to engage in and are excited to embrace the 'craziness' the term has to offer.

As always, if you have any question, queries or concerns please do not hesitate to contact us via Seesaw.

Ngā mihi nui,

Whaea Armstrong and Linda Gamble.

Tohaina ō painga ki te ao - Share your skills with the world
Kia ora koutou - we have an awesome Term 3 ahead.

Term 3 is always the busiest of our terms with Speeches and Totara Springs. The term lends itself well to students showing and developing their self management skills and there will also be a class focus on our school value of EXCELLENCE and what this means and how it can be demonstrated, as well as a key competency focus on THINKING. There is lots of exciting learning to look forward to with Science Hub Workshops in Weeks 2 and 3 to explore "How Did that Happen?" (Material World) and discovering "Aotearoa - Our People" through the Aotearoa New Zealand History Curriculum. We will be continuing our IDEAL Spelling programme, which we also do together in our Te Moananui A Kiwa Hub. Watch out for your child's posts on Seesaw so you can share in the learning that we are doing.

I am very proud to be the teacher of Rm 10 and love working with the Year 7/8 students that make Rm 10 an awesome and exciting place to teach and learn. Looking forward to an amazing term together.

Arohanui - Holly Brittenden (Mrs B)