No images? Click here 17 September 2021Pinehurst School NewsletterOpening Words from the Executive Principal...Kia ora tatou, good afternoon, 你好, 안녕하세요 Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou katoa, ahiahi marie! It has been Te Wiki o Te Reo Māori this week, and I hope that you have enjoyed a little more te reo in and around our online classrooms. We have continued our approach of steadily building our knowledge and confidence in te reo Māori, and I’ve enjoyed using a little more as well. I feel honoured to be part of a community where around 75% of us are bilingual (or trilingual!), able to think as well as speak in more than one language. It’s an incredible gift, as our ways of thinking are often shaped by the patterns and richness of the language that frames our thought. I’m hopeful that an increasing familiarity with te reo Māori can further enrich us. Still on a connected subject, I talked with a number of parents about the connection between language learning and extension earlier this year. The lockdown has set our planning back a little, but I will be writing home in the coming weeks about extension next year. It’s not just about language, of course: we have other plans too. But it will be part of our package. We have had a truncated week, the “deep breath” of our teacher-only day on Wednesday hopefully offering a slightly different rhythm. I hope, despite the stormy spring rains, that you managed to make the most of the day away from screens. I know I did, and I felt refreshed the following morning. It’s exactly one month today since we moved into Level 4; we hopefully have just two more school days at this level; and, even though the online programme continues at Level 3, I think the slight relaxation of restrictions will enable us to take more deep breaths from next week. I’m not going to repeat the details I included in yesterday’s email, except for a few key points. Forgive me the repetition: at this stage, I’m keen to make sure the main messages are clear for everyone.
So we are hoping that we have just one week left of online learning! I know we all want to get back to school, but I also hope that you make the most of the next week as well. We realised last year that our approach to lockdown, where we are in each other’s homes for long chunks of the day, had the effect of bringing us closer together in some respects, even if it kept us physically apart. Our online programme has also reminded me, yet again, just how unbelievably fortunate we are to be part of such a strong, committed community, all dedicated to looking after our precious tamariki, our wonderful children, supporting each other every day. In the penultimate newsletter of the term, I usually mention staff who are leaving us at the end of term. We don’t, though, have anyone leaving us this term! And to the students in Year 12 and Year 13 who are planning to go to university at the end of the year: there’s still plenty of time left in school for you! Have a good weekend. The sun is going to shine, I’m told by my super-reliable weather app. And don't forget to scroll to the end of the newsletter to see all the great stuff that has been happening at home! Kia kaha, Alex Reed 如需阅读校长的中文留言和重要事件日期,请点击此处 Dates for your DiaryKia ora, I have spent a good amount of time this week helping to put together the Valedictory Book, a gift that we present to all our Year 13 graduating students. We have made a change to the book design this year and have focused on getting more photos of students into the book that illustrate their journey through the school. This has led me to meander through the schools’ digital archives to find photos, and to also reflect upon how quickly our students grow and change. I know that this change is even more pronounced for our parents as they can often wonder where the years have gone, and how it is possible that their bubbly little Primary aged son or daughter is now a high school graduate ready to move on to the next step in life. Although it can be a shock to the adults that things have changed so quickly, I always feel that our students are absolutely ready to leave school. Of course they will look back with a bit of nostalgia, but in the most part they are eager to get out and explore the world and take on the new challenges available to them. Other parts of my week have linked into this journey, and the support and education of our young people as they grow to make their own choices. I have been discussing with Mr Reynolds the Boys and Girls vs Wild Challenge, this trip is a reward for our Year 7 & 8 students that have engaged in the service and leadership programme. Like all our outdoor education opportunities, this trip will challenge and stretch our students in ways that we cannot manage in the classroom. Our Year 9 students have all had lessons with Mrs Griffiths over the past two weeks. These lessons have introduced them to Careers Central, a tool that they will be able to utilise throughout the college and an important link to the next steps in their education. Our Year 11 and Year 12 students are also making their subject choices over the next week. These are decisions that will help to shape the potential direction of their further studies, and I know that many of our students are looking ahead when making these choices. We have also put planning in place for the transition of students from Year 6 to Year 7, and Year 8 to Year 9. For everyone, change can be unsettling. This is obviously quite pronounced at this time. As a college we work very hard to support our students through change and transitions. We want to enable our students to have confidence in the decisions that they make and embrace change as an opportunity for new challenges and adventures. Nga mihi, Kieran Verryt, Principal of College
ScienceYear 8 Science students are demonstrating different types of forces (Gravity, Friction, drag forces) by recording a video on the Flipgrid. Social ScienceYear 9 Social Science students have been learning about Pirates. Here are some advertisements for people considering becoming a pirate. The conditions are awful and the pay isn't great but the students did find some positive things to say! SavY Financial LiteracyThe Student Council organised a financial literacy workshop from SavY. The workshop was aimed at Year 11 – 13 students and covered a number of different topics. These varied from Kiwisaver, debt, banking and investments, savings accounts, loans and smart borrowing in addition to university fees. SavY have created the online workshop with our movement to Level 4 and made it as interactive as possible. The students were engaged, asking questions and participating in polls. Thank you to the Student Council for organising this! Your Lockdown Maths Challenge for the weekKia ora tatou, It was a busy Te Wiki o te Reo Māori, Māori Language Week and Book Week this week as we celebrated the power of the written and illustrated word in the Primary with the theme of, ‘Reading gives you super powers.’ We all know how important reading is for developing minds and for those of us who love reading passionately we can imagine nothing better than to be curled up with a good book or five. I remember the day my Kindle arrived from Amazon in America, no more well worn books gathering dust under the bed and no more waiting for the shops to open to buy the next book in the series. You needed to buy a clip on light for those early versions in order to read at night, so thankfully the iPad app wasn’t that far behind. Some wouldn’t entertain an e reader, preferring the feel of the pages and I must admit to being very fond of the Shakespeare plays I have lining a bookshelf. History is contained in those pages, not just from the man himself but from furiously written side notes during lectures at university and memories of younger more carefree days. Books are everything and they do indeed give you super powers. Everyone has their favourite genres, as a child most of us would have loved the fairy tales, myths and traditional stories we grew up with. Fiction still plays an enormous part in the lives of most young readers. Some children love non-fiction, Science books in particular are very popular as they learn about all the fascinating things that enable life on earth to happen. Whatever the preference, being immersed in language, ideas, fantasy and facts is so important for child development. There are of course times as teachers when we have to say put down the book we need to focus on the lesson now but we encourage reading for pleasure and to develop comprehension skills every day, it is so important. Although Book Week has been structured a little differently this year in its online format we have still managed to have a parade of superheroes in class. Well done parents and teachers for managing to construct costumes out of just about anything you had in the house. The parades ranged from calm control to music filled organised chaos with one six year old claiming, ‘This is so intense,’ in the middle of his class parade as teachers tried to keep their faces straight. It was proof that we can once again be flexible and all work together to rise to the occasion. The daily book quiz encouraged great competition and we incorporated as much te reo Māori as we could to also celebrate Te Wiki o te Reo Māori, Māori Language Week. Interesting tales like the story of Rona and the Moon blended easily with our celebration of reading and the activities on offer. I hope you have been able to add to your vocabulary this week and learn some new words to use in Māori it is a beautiful language. Heoi anō tāku mō nāianei, that is all for now. Kia pai tō mutunga wiki, have a good weekend. Ngā mihi, Sian Coxon, Principal of Primary
Book Week in P1!Pirates and Parrots and Positive Self Talk in P5!P5 have continued to have a lot of fun making connections with their pirate learning this term! In Literacy we have shared some exciting pirate stories while also following our Big Write agents Ant and Max beneath the sea to find the treasure. We finally came upon the treasure and it was not quite what we all expected! In Science we have been learning about sinking and floating. We had to predict what items would sink and which items would float. Then we needed to do an investigation to find out if our predictions were correct. Using our results, we manged to build, and share, some fabulous pirate ships. Leslie even included an anchor in his creation! Emma created a boat and then went back and improved her design. In Art we have been drawing treasure chests, pirate ships, pirates, parrots, and a treasure map! In Health we have been learning about using positive self-talk to help us cope with negative events and feelings. We discussed better ways to think when we are struggling with schoolwork, friends, or learning a new skill. This linked well with our Global Perspectives where we learnt to toss a pancake, juggle, make origami fish, a salt dough creation, or an arcade game, to name a few. We self-reflected about how it felt to learn a new skill and how we had to persevere when we sometimes wanted to give up. One of our activities was to practise using positive self-talk so we could notice what we do well as we all have our own superpowers! Hope you like some of our costumes from our Superhero Book Week Parade too. P9 this week
P9 have had a super week as superheroes for Book Week! There were some incredibly creative superhero characters, made using items from home 😊. As well as the Superhero theme, we have been writing poetry, focusing on end-rhyme, alliteration, onomatopoeia and personification. Here are some of our fun end-rhyme poems. P10 Super Hero'sP12 Book WeekThis week in P13In P13 we have been having a go at writing some Haiku poetry. Haiku is a traditional Japanese poem that consists of three lines that follow the syllable pattern of 5-7-5. They are often written about nature or the seasons however we decided to write them about being in lockdown. We’re sure you can all relate to them. Stay safe everyone! Always bored at home Learning online everyday Missing each other By Joanna Ren
Oh, pandemic please I beg you to go away I am over blown. By Ethan Guo
Covid is spreading Wishing this pandemic ends Shoo Covid! I hate you! By Ethan Han
Teacher is online Wishing this pandemic ends No more Covid please! By Bianca Jin
Covid is danger So dangerous and deadly Covid GO AWAY!! By Mateo Palliser I’m locked in my house Level 4, I can’t go play Vaccine, please be soon! By Cruz Xu
Oh, Covid-19 Wishing this pandemic ends Covid, I hate you! By Raymond Yang
Go away Covid, We are always stuck inside, Let us live in peace! By Serena Yang
People stuck online You’ll be frustrated and bored Covid disappear By Eva Zhou P18 this week
Online learning has not slowed P18 down. Even though we would much rather be in class with each other, it’s still great to be able to connect with each other online and continue with our class learning. Food and Nutrition has been the focus for Health and the students demonstrated their knowledge of healthy eating and food safety by designing a poster to share their knowledge. For Art, we have been continuing with photography and learning to take photos that create an optical illusion, and also photos of pets in action. Celebrating Book Week has been fun with some students creating online super hero costumes with using Snap Camera. We have had a busy and exciting week in P23!Tuesday was our Superhero Day. We talked about what our superpower would be and chose a name to match our power. We designed a mask and a cape and came to assembly wearing our costume. Wonder Woman, Pancake Man, Ice Queen, Spiderman, Falcon and Elsa joined us for our assembly and we had a super time singing, dancing and reading stories. We can’t wait to get into costume again this Friday and see what fun things we will get up to. We wonder if Speedy Jones-Hill will fly past again? P23 have been busy helping our friend, Hetty, open a hat shop. Because we are really good at designing, she has asked us to help her with some fun and exciting hat designs, including a rainbow crown for the Queens Jubilee. We have looked at lots of different types of hats and talked about what they are used for. Ms Walton set us a challenge to design a hat of our own and we had a hat parade. Building hats, Police hats, caps, beanies, flower hats and riding hats featured, and we loved talking about all the different types of hats and seeing each other’s design. In maths we have been learning all about 2D shapes and using mathematical language to describe them. We are really good at this now and you can challenge us to describe a shape and find an example of one. We have also been practicing counting up and back to 30, we listen to a really fun song that gets us moving around and doing maths at the same time. We have also designed robots using only triangles and bears using circles, great fun. P23 LOVES books, so we were super excited that is was Book Week this week. Everyday Ms Walton reads us a story and we talk about our favourite books and what parts we liked. Our favourite so far has been SuperTato, which is about a superhero potato who helps the other vegetables in the supermarket. Ms Walton also got caught reading in a very unusual place, on her horse Luna. Luna enjoyed the book as it was all about different dogs. We are very much looking forward to more book activities on Friday. We have been so busy building lego, creating awesome art, reading and practicing our phonics. Primary Schools Diving CompetitionAre you keen to represent Pinehurst at Diving at the Auckland Primary School Diving Championships in Term 4 ? You must be able to do both forward & back dives (straight/tuck or pike) both jump straight & line-up pike/straight from 1M. If you are interested in finding out more, please email Year 1-8 Sports Coordinator kelly.lindsay@pinehurst.school.nz, no later than Wednesday 22nd September 2021. Lego Friday..... The Music Never Stops – for IG and AS studentsAt the end of every term the IG and AS students have presented a performance – either solo or group as part of their performance portfolio. The lockdown has, of course, presented us with some challenges but the students’ efforts to keep the momentum going over the last few weeks has been impressive. To hear Rosanne’s beautiful performance of Lala Land’s City of Stars, please click below. JC Music Concert featuring Elaine on the PianoA number of very talented Year 7 and Year 8 students auditioned and were selected to perform in the annual Junior College Music Concert, which was to be held in on the day we went into lockdown. Those students will be featured in the newsletter over the next few weeks, to celebrate their talent and effort. Today features Elaine (Year 7) on the piano who is performing Jasmine Flower Fantasia. PhotolifePhotolife have extended their free photo deliveries to school offer until the 19th September 2021. If you have not yet received your Keycode to enable you to order your child's photos online then please contact dawn.edmonds@pinehurst.school.nz Orders will be processed once we reach Level 3.
Pinehurst School Leavers MementoAs Pinehurst celebrates 30 years of memories and milestones, we are celebrating by launching a new range of NZ made jewellery that has been exclusively designed and handcrafted for Pinehurst by Meghan Balmer from 58 Facets Limited. Each item is made in NZ of sterling silver with a handcrafted pinecone pendant to represent our school and the seeds that come from ‘our Pinehurst’ – which is the name for a grove of pine trees. The necklace includes a 50cm cable chain and a solid pinecone pendant – both in sterling silver. A silver sterling pinecone lapel pin is also available, which arrived the week before lockdown. This has yet to be photographed but we will get this image to you as soon as we can. We are offering pre-orders for these items to our School Leavers as an initial launch to this exclusive range.
If you are interested in putting through an order, or have any queries, please contact sylvia.lum@pinehurst.school.nz |