Friday 8th May 2020Opening Words from the Executive PrincipalKia ora tatou, good afternoon, 你好, 안녕하세요 Every week, I promise Gracie, our very talented, patient translator, that my newsletter will be a short one. And then I get carried away and have to apologise to her. Today, sadly, I will be apologising again. Sorry, Gracie. You will by now have received an email from me with a link to a letter from the Chairman of the Board of Governors, and to more detailed notes from the school about how we will operate at Level 2 at Pinehurst. The links are here:
In brief, we are opening for all students one day after we go into Level 2. Teachers will need one day to prepare, and then we are all in school. So: if the Government announces Level 2 starts on Wednesday next week, our online programme will finish on Tuesday afternoon, we will have a teacher-only day on Wednesday, and all students will be at school on Thursday. These dates will only be confirmed on Monday, though, as we all have to wait for the Prime Minister to announce when we will be opening. As you would expect, we are taking more health and safety precautions than we have been asked to. This is because we are always very careful with the health of our young people, and we are continuing to take additional measures, as we have done all year. It is safe to send your children to school. This means that there are different pick up and drop off arrangements, and that room timetables and some other parts of the school day will be different for students. Please read the documents I have provided links to very carefully. The newsletter today is a great read: it’s a glorious mixture of activities in school and at home, and I love seeing all the smiling faces. We had 56 students in school this week, which means that we have 926 students at home. There has been some exceptional work from just about every student, and I continue to be delighted by the resilience and imagination they are showing in everything they do, as well as by the commitment and the creativity of our teachers. Thank you to our parents for continuing to support our whole community to come together and support each other during these difficult times. So, as we get closer to Level 2, let’s all look forward and cross our fingers that cases remain low, and that we emerge into the next stage of our recovery next week. There will be plenty of time for us to reflect on what we’ve learned – that’s for later – and even though times are tough for many people in New Zealand and across the world, including many in our own community, we need to remain positive and have confidence in our ability to adapt and to make progress together. On that note, you may have seen a series of media reports about unhappy schools this week. You will not hear Pinehurst complaining about the situation: it’s difficult for many in our country right now, and we have had to be flexible and learn new things very quickly. That’s true for our school, for our students, for our parents and for just about everyone across the world. Our job is to be smart and positive and find ways to make things work. I think we’ve done that so far, and will continue to do so, with the help of our community. And we are stronger, both individually and collectively, as a result: our independent spirit has been our strength! The Ministry of Education struggled a little at the start, but they have been supportive, and have improved steadily as time has gone past. We need to support them, just as they support us. You will also have seen reports about private schools receiving the wage subsidy. Pinehurst has not taken any money from the Government, and is not currently expecting to. The private schools who have done so largely have boarding facilities or early learning centres, neither of which applies to us. Enjoy the newsletter, have fun in what we hope will be the last days of Level 3, and let’s look forward to hopefully seeing everyone back in school before the end of next week. I can’t wait to see the students weaving their way between the falling russet leaves. Kia Ora, We have had another successful week online and in school as our students and teachers work together to create meaningful opportunities to learn. There have been many highlights and all year groups have reported continuing high attendance and engagement in online classes. Star Wars themed Kahoots were popping up on May the 4th which were lots of fun along with Big Writes, phonics, telling the time, the digestive system in science lessons, Health with Mrs Fleming where students were learning why people sometimes bully others and focussed lessons in numeracy and literacy as well as music, languages and P.E. In school the focus has also been on core subjects along with opportunities to be creative and engage in some theme based learning. On a windy Wednesday afternoon what better way to learn about aerodynamics than to fly kites with your classmates? Mrs Jones Hill had Year 3 making gingerbread in the shape of people, hearts and squirrels which might have been something completely different but looked like squirrels to me. Artist studies have continued with Van Gogh and Delaunay and there were some pretty spectacular zentangles(!) being created by Year 4 students. Whether our students have continued online or been in school they have almost all been involved in the continuation of their classroom programmes. We are so looking forward to having everyone back on site next week if the government gives the go ahead. We want to reassure parents that we will be providing high quality education in the most effective ways we can. We won’t need to put stress on students to catch up because our teachers have continued to provide authentic learning programmes. Any child that needs some extra support will of course have help but we are able to continue to teach what we have planned for the rest of the term. Primary aged children need lots of hands on practical learning and we can’t wait for everyone to be back onsite. There will be some limitations in Level 2 of course but we are very well set up to find different ways of doing things and will be looking for new opportunities to add value to learning. Have a restful weekend, hopefully our last in Level 3, stay safe. Nga Mihi, Sian Coxon, Principal of Primary NE work in HealthOur topic at the moment is Healthy Eating, and today we focused on fruits and vegetables which give us lots of essential vitamins and minerals. The students were challenged to make a ‘face’ plate using fruits and veges that they like. This was important because they were then going to eat it! They were also asked to label their items with the English and Maori words for them. There were some fabulous faces created. A Tea Party & Camouflage in P1In P1 we read the story ‘The Tiger Who Came To Tea’. We had a live tea party together and enjoyed something we had made – there were cupcakes, cookies, sandwiches and even ice-cream! Then we wrote some instructions for how we made them. In Science we learnt about how stripes help animals to camouflage themselves in their habitat. We dressed up and took photos with different backgrounds to see which was the best for not being seen. Can you spot Louisa and Hadleigh? Creative Fun in the Year 1 and 2 bubble!The children in the Year 1 and 2 bubble at school have had a lot of creative fun! From Lego to sculpture art, to masks and Mother's Day cards. There has been something for everyone to take home. Year 2 Letter WritingIn Year 2, we have been studying Drew Daywalt's picture books - The Day the Crayons Quit and The Day the Crayons Came Home. The crayon stories are about a box of crayons who are unhappy with their owner, Duncan and decide to leave the crayon box. Each crayon leaves Duncan a letter explaining why they are unhappy and what they would like him to do to solve the problem. Drew Daywalt uses humour in his stories and we have had lots of fun laughing at his jokes. This week for literacy we were learning to use Drew Daywalt's writing style to create our own book - The Day the Fruit Quit. To do this we brainstormed possible fruit characters and reasons why they want to leave the fruit bowl. We then each choose one fruit to write a letter from. Next, we used the app - Chatter Pix to publish our writing, the children used expressive voices to deliver their letters. 'The Day the Fruit Quit' by Junior BubbleThe Year 2’s have been reading “The Day the Crayons Quit” by Drew Daywalt. The Year 1 and 2 in-school students made a shared book based on this story. It was called “The Day the Fruit Quit” we worked collaboratively and discussed different ideas on why the fruit may want to quit the fruit bowl. I hope you enjoy our story read by Emily and Caleb from Year 2. News from P7 & P8In P8, students had to design a picture from the ‘The Day the Crayons Quit’. They could draw whatever they wanted but the aim was to use as many crayons as possible and to make their picture bright and colourful. P7 and P8 have also been working this week on creating a new story using ideas from ‘The Day the Crayon’s Quit’. Their new story was called ‘The Day the Fruit Quit’. The idea was to create ideas and brainstorm how each fruit in the fruit bowl was feeling. Phizzwizzards!The online P9 and P10 students tuned in to a live reading of the B.F.G. They have been introduced to the phizz-whizzing (brilliant) language of Roald Dahl and have begun their adventure with the BFG. The BFG is the kindest giant and wishes every child would have phizzwizzards (great dreams). The students have written a recipe on how to make a dream, with most of the students making phizzwizzards. They then got creative and made dream catchers which were decorated to reflect and capture happy dreams. Camels in Year 4The Year 4 bubble at school have started learning online about camel adaptation in the desert. We had a great time talking in details about how the different adaptions help the camel to survive in the desert. Our bubble then enthusiastically completed a fabulous mind map, focusing on each adaption along with some fun pictures. Alex's innovative idea!Year 4 student Alex has demonstrated his ability to ‘think outside the square.’ He has managed to express innovative ideas using a range of different materials and resources. I wonder what questions he asked himself when attempting his construction?
This is a terrific example of creating, innovating and imagining! Primary MusicTeaching Music online has been an interesting exercise! As most of you know, Mrs Du Toit runs a very practical, “hands on” music lesson with almost all classes, so being at home has menat getting very creative! The students have risen to the occasion. Many of the junior classes have made home-made shakers, drums and claves to play along to songs that are performed in class. They’ve also written rhythms, made instruments from recycled products, and danced around at home. The more senior students have honed their conducting skills using straws, chopsticks and rulers for batons, focused on various sections of the orchestra and looked at famous composers who continue to influence music written today. They produced some amazing Bach-inspired fugues from a Google Doodle. As much as we’ve had fun, we can’t wait to get back into the music room and play “real” instruments! RoboticsRobotics through distance learning has been a challenge, as our beloved sets and learning partners are elsewhere now. The students, however, have had some fun completing some coding challenges on their own at home. Among the many tasks, they were asked to create a maze for a Lego figurine and use various instructions to develop a code/path to lead their figurine through their maze. The mazes created varied in both design and code. It was great to see so much design, originality, detail and coding skills on display. Another task was to use Binary code and Braille to create our names and a message to send to each other. Some very creative and clever codes were created and decoded. Such fun! Kia Ora, The 11 students who have been at school this week have enjoyed their interactions. Our students continue to engage online and we are all hoping that on Monday the Prime Minister announces that we are moving to Level 2 so that we can welcome everyone back to school. When students return it will take time to reengage and settle into routines. It is important that if students are worried about returning that they understand that many others are feeling the same way. When we return, we will provide the students time to meet in Year group PODs/Homerooms so that they can rebuild social connections. We know it will take time to settle and all teachers will do their best to support students. If you have any concerns please get in contact with your child's Homeroom or POD teacher. This week we have received some positive news about our Year 9 Camp. Our providers have confirmed that they are all available and we can now confirm that we will embark on the Year 9 Camp in the final week of the school year, Monday 30 November – Friday 4 December. We are also continuing to plan our Year 8 and Year 12 Camps and know that these will be brilliant experiences for our students. When the move to Level 2 is confirmed I will write to all parents and students to provide greater detail around what the return to school will look like and how we will support students. I hope that you have a great weekend. Nga Mihi, Kieran Verryt Year 7 Lockdown PoemsYear 8 making cinnamon buns...On Thursday Year 8 students made cinnamon buns with Mrs Koopen. Year 8 & 9 BubbleThis week the Year 8 and 9 bubble have been busy with their lessons and using their down time to socialise and relax a little. Here are a few photos of them in their new environment. Year 9 Digital Technology in LockdownDesign TechnologyBoth the Year 9 and Year 10 students are at the start of a new project. Year 9 are designing a desktop accessory and Year 10 are designing a practical ‘metal gift’ reflecting some aspect of New Zealand that could be sold in a craft gallery/shop. Exploring the problem by using a mind map helps them identify opportunities that can inspire ideas for products. Both groups have explored different users for the products, functions, aesthetic themes, materials and manufacturing. The following examples are from students who’s hand drawn maps transcends being a functional thinking tool into beautiful works of art. Year 10 ChemistryDr Waddel’s Year 10 Chemistry class have been demonstrating their understanding of balancing equations. Students were asked to upload a video to flipgrid and using household items show they could balance equations. A lot of very original ways of doing this emerged. I hope any that involved chocolate or sweets got to be eaten later! Guest speaker joins A2 AccountingOnline learning can be a bit of a challenge. “Are you able to see the opportunity in the challenge find a way to use it to your advantage?” This is the question posed by to the A2 Accounting class today by a guest presenter joining them from the Netherlands, to talk about investing, manufacturing and the benefit of understanding financial numbers. Johan Oldenburg has a passion for helping young people and providing learning opportunities. In Johan’s view the 3 most important components of a successful business is its staff, the suppliers and the stakeholders. He discussed how each component affected the bottom-line, relating stories from his own experience in his manufacturing plants in China and Vietnam. He explained how he kept a watchful eye on the liquidity of his business in ratio to the total amount of garments produced. Cynthia Wu asked him if Covid-19 had affected any of his factories. His reply was that instead of looking at it as a challenge, he saw it as an opportunity. Johan owns textile factories which manufactures clothes. As normal retail outlets were closed, they turned their production process to making protective clothing geared towards health workers managing Covid-19. This clothing was in short demand all over the world at the time, so this was an ideal business opportunity. His factories have seen very little downtime, which is always good for cashflow. Furthermore, Johan shared some valuable business insights by explaining which areas he thought would yield the highest returns when it came to selecting shares. He also discussed how quality control can be demanding but had high returns through customer consumption and that in business honesty and loyalty are two respected qualities. In this short meeting and in more ways than one, Johan really showed to us, that challenges can be turned into opportunities. Thank you, Johan. Online learning - Year 13 perspectiveI didn’t quite expect my final year at school to consist of online classes, but for the past few months, I have really enjoyed the challenge of learning at home. At first, I found it quite difficult to adjust to the process, I missed the classroom environment of being surrounded by my peers and the abrupt change to learning at home was something I thought I wouldn’t be able to do for long. There were some issues along the way such as, internet difficulties, problems when online tests that wouldn’t save and teachers accidentally talking to themselves for 5 minutes because they didn’t realise they were on mute. However, as isolation went on, I realised this at home learning was actually quite beneficial. Being at home, I found there were less distractions, so I was able to focus more during class and without having any extracurricular activities on, I was also able to devote more time to schoolwork and finally I didn’t mind getting up at 8:50 occasionally ready for a 9am class. With everything being shut-down, outside of the classroom, I found myself doing things such as exercising more, going for walks, keeping in contact with friends and binge lots of Netflix. I was really missing playing sports, catching up with my friends and going out to eat. Skill wise I did find myself cooking a lot more than I usually would and I now highly rate my nacho making abilities. I do however think it was quite nice to take a step back from my schedule which was quite busy beforehand and found I was able to focus more on enjoying the smaller things in life. Overall, I have enjoyed the isolation period. Whilst there were a few bumps along the way, I do think I have developed greater independence from being at home. Although the process was difficult at first to get used to, a few months down the track has made this lifestyle almost feel like the new norm. However, I cannot wait to be back at school, surrounded by my peers and I’m hoping that my last year of school can finish on a higher note then it started on. By Isabella Abbott-Wheeler Practice makes perfectWinston Hu (Year 10) submitted the following outstanding performance of Beethoven’s Sonata Pathetique, movement 2. Winston is currently completing the two year long IGCSE Music course, where his performance portfolio is worth 30% of his end of year grade. We look forward to seeing his talents evolve even further over the next couple of years. Winston is also a member of one of our music chamber groups. Click here to view his performance. ISO Distance CompetitionWe want to see how many kilometres your school can cover in a week via walking, running, cycling and/or rowing* This is our second participation-based competition to help students and staff keep active, stay connected, and engage in some friendly sporting competition between schools during Alert Level 3. The competition opens from 9.00am Thursday 7 May and will be accepting entries until 9.00am Thursday 14 May. So get started! *For the rules, full competition details and competition submissions head to the College Sport website. Returning library booksIf you have piles of read library books at home, you can now drop these off in to the boxes at the front of the Pinehurst reception building. The library has sent out 62 book parcels to students working at home so far. If you would like a book parcel you can still sign up using the following form: Lockdown WorkoutsCollege Teacher and part-time Fitness Instructor, Ms Boam is doing 2 more lockdown workouts this weekend which will be on her YouTube page. One will be a 45 min cardio and the other will be a 20 min upper body and core workout. To get involved - here’s the link: https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCZa5VBuHepZVL6v7jGPRQ4A Destinations of the Graduating Class of 2019Arianna JaggardSince graduating from Pinehurst in 2018, Arianna moved to Melbourne to study full time at Transit Dance. During her time at Transit she has performed in four shows (sadly the fifth one, programmed for April, is currently on hold), has performed in professional gigs at Crown Casino, and danced in a music video. Her goal upon graduating is to secure a performance contract with a cruise ship company, or work with Cirque de Soleil. The recent outbreak of the Covid virus has had a serious impact on the audition processes for next year but she remains hopeful things will improve for the Arts industry. |