News and events for the week ending 7th February 2020 No images? Click here Friday 7th February 2020Opening Words from the Executive PrincipalKia ora tatou, good afternoon, 你好, 안녕하세요 I’m really not used to heatwaves. I grew up in Nottingham, smack in the middle of England, about as far away from the sea as you can get in the UK. I have a couple of memories of playing tennis on terrible municipal grass courts in the glossy summer heat, the ball bouncing in unpredictable directions whenever it hit a divot, but that’s about it for the sun. Most of my memories feature fog, drawing shapes with my finger on misty bus windows, piles of damp leaves in the street and unpleasantly wet feet. So this week, lovely though it has been, has been a bit of a tough one for me. I walk, eat, even think slowly in the heat. But it’s been a good one in school. The Year 6 camp took off for the Waikato on Monday morning, and they’ve been having a great time down there. A little homesickness at times, but lots of energy and excitement too. Back on campus, it’s been great to see so many of our students coming back, and also to see everyone settle into their new routines. All the classes I have visited have been positive, focused and full of enthusiastic learning. The biggest leap is probably for the new entrants and the Year 7s. The new entrants already seem like they’ve been here for years, happily adapting to school life with Miss Dobbins and Mrs Watters; and the Year 7s are getting there too. It’s a big change to navigate your way around multiple classrooms and teachers, to learn many different routines, tackle homework from a number of teachers with differing expectations, and to learn how to use Schoolbox. It always takes some of our students a little while to get there. But we’ve been delighted to see how quickly nearly everyone has settled in. Next week sees the first of our Duke of Edinburgh tramps for all of our Year 10 students. It’s probably a good time to talk about why we put so much emphasis on camps, on our Service Leadership Award in Years 7 and 8, and on the Duke of Edinburgh Award from Year 10 upwards. It’s the same principle behind our curriculum structure in Year 7, actually. We offer students challenge in a safe, structured environment; and the challenge requires them to think, learn, adapt and sometimes fail. And through that process they develop resilience. It’s all huge fun, of course, especially the outdoor activities and their English homework, and there are all kinds of knowledge, understanding, teamwork skills and everything else you can imagine there as well. But I think it’s also the resilience that young people develop from testing themselves in a range of contexts that matters: knowing yourself and knowing that you are capable of far more than you imagined. Coronavirus update: A final quick word on the coronavirus. I’m continuing to write home every couple of days with a quick update, and I will write at more length if and when there are developments that mean we have to do things differently. For now, though, we are monitoring carefully, sustaining our hygiene and handwashing measures, talking to students about the virus, ensuring that they have accurate information and that they understand the importance of everyone in our community supporting each other, and making sure that we are welcoming back our returning students after their 14 days isolation with big, open arms. It’s been a tough start to the year for the children who have had to come back later than their friends – pretty much everyone will be back by the 24th, by the way – and we are making sure that they are supported on their returns. Our very best wishes to all those who have friends and families affected by the virus: please let us know if we can support you in any way. I am also aware that one or two of our neighbouring schools have changed their policies around isolation. We will not be changing ours. We established our policy on January 24th, and have applied it consistently. Our policy is precautionary and is very cautious – we know the risk is very low indeed – but it is based on careful consideration of advice and information from inside New Zealand and from overseas. We are continuing to read widely and follow developments carefully. One of our aims is also to ensure complete confidence within our school community. I’m very happy, of course, to talk to anyone who wishes to ask questions about our policy. Have a lovely weekend. Biec Vein, Primary & College TeacherBiec has been part of the Pinehurst community since the end of 2005 when she and her husband enrolled their daughter at Pinehurst, having recently returned to NZ from Hong Kong. During their time in Hong Kong, Biec worked in Human Resources for local companies as well as global conglomerates. After their children were born, Biec decided to combine her HR training skills with her love to work with children and went back to study and became a Cambridge qualified ESOL teacher. She taught at the English Foundation School Services as well as started up her own English tutorial company. Back in New Zealand with her two children at Pinehurst, Biec returned to university to complete her post graduate diploma for teaching and joined the Pinehurst staff team to start the Mandarin programme. Apart from Mandarin, Biec has also taught PE, Art, Social Science and Health. She is currently teaching Mandarin to students from New Entrants through to Year 9. In her early days as a parent, Biec was one of the founders of 'Pinehurst Family and Friends' currently called Pinehurst Connection, she also initiated and developed the lunchtime gymnastics programme with another parent and today she is the teacher in charge of the programme. Born in Vietnam to Chinese ethnic parents. Biec and her family migrated to NZ as refugees in the 70's. If you're interested, ask her and she will be more than happy to share her journey with you! Biec has been a keen learner of languages from a young age. Vietnamese was the first foreign language she learned and since then she has learned other languages at school and university (where she learned Mandarin). Her next target language is Italian. Kia Ora, I hope that you enjoyed Waitangi Day and the slightly disjointed week that has ensued. We have had many students return throughout the week and by next Monday the vast majority of college students will have returned to classes. We have made some changes around Education Outside the Classroom (EOTC) this year for which we need parent assistance. We require parent permission whenever we take students away from the school site. This includes for compulsory events such as Athletics Day and whole year group field trips. We are working on systems to make this process as easy as possible for parents. Please check through the communication that we send you to allow yourself time to respond. Next Tuesday we have our Year 7 Information Evening, the first in a range of information evenings that we will coordinate throughout the year. We hope to meet many of our Year 7 families to introduce key staff, discuss the structure of the college and to provide information about the upcoming Year 7 Camp. On camps, our Year 10 students are the first college group to embark on a trip this year with the students of Matai and Kauri Houses tramping on Waiheke Island next Thursday and Friday. Rimu and Totara students will tramp on Monday and Tuesday of the following week as they start their Duke of Edinburgh bronze award. Congratulations to the students who achieved in their scholarship programme last year. Logan Cho, Erin Williams and Jessica Ma achieved 8 scholarships between them across the following subject range: Mathematics, English, Biology, Physics and Chemistry. Nga Mihi, Kieran Verryt, Principal of College Congratulations to the Digital Media and Design students from 2019!This was the first year of this exciting Art and Design course now being run at AS level. Students made a range of digital media content ranging from animated architectural fly-throughs, websites, short films and photographic displays. These images are by Anja Krehl (cityscapes), Chantelle Baldwin (old vs new technology), Rachel Yang (travel), Riya Odedra (architecture). Static Electricity in Year 11One advantage of the dry weather has been exceptionally good demonstrations of static electricity. Our Year 11 Physics students were treated to some impressive displays of electron repulsion via individual strands of hair. Friction generates an excess of electrons in the metal dome which are looking to escape via the path of least resistance, which, in this case, were Alana and Yuki. International Robot Olympiad 2019The NZ Robot Olympiad took 3 of our students to Thailand over the summer holidays to represent NZ in the International Robot Olympiad. Congratulations to Charles Shen, Sejong Park and Oscar Zhao who all spent a lot of time and effort on this competition, and got great results as follows: - Charles Shen (Year 8) got a Bronze medal from Creative Robot and got a Bronze medal from Creative Robot. - Sejong Park (Year 7 ) got a Technical Award from Robot in movie and got a Technical Award from Creative Robot . - Oscar Zhao (Year 4) got a Technical Award from Robot in movie. Kia Ora, Classes are starting to fill as more of our Primary students are able to join us in the classroom and spend time reacquainting themselves with routines and the business of learning. There are a lot of smiles around the place and teachers are continuing to comment on how wonderful their classes are. On Monday morning we said goodbye to Year 6 as they travelled to Lakewood Lodge in Huntly. Lakewood is an amazing camp, naturally it has a lake for kayaking and swimming and also for flying across on a zip line which is fantastic fun. There are horses, a climbing wall, a mud run, waterslide and the famous survivor camp where students get the opportunity to camp outdoors and cook their own food. Every year when we visit we are always struck by what a wonderful setting it is and how that has such a calming effect on everyone who is there. We love to go on camp at the beginning of the year whenever possible as it gives the opportunity to get to know everyone in the year group and to forge new friendships. Students are encouraged to push themselves out of their comfort zone in order to develop skills that are harder to teach in a classroom setting. Courage, perseverance, leadership and confidence are top of the list along with independence, negotiation and taking turns. We also witnessed politeness, great manners and kindness as students supported each other to have the best time they possibly could. What an amazing start to the year our Year 6 have had and we are really looking forward to their leadership in 2020. Next week our swimming programme starts for Year 4 and they will be joined by Year 5 the following week. Year 6 will enjoy Waterwise later in the term along with upcoming day camps for Year 3 and Year 0-2. Year 4 will go to camp in March and Year 5 in May. Along with class visits to a variety of educational settings and visiting science, health and wellbeing outside providers we are looking forward to extending our learning programmes by taking advantage of what the world outside of the classroom has to offer. As most of our students are back in school we will hold our planned information evening for the parents of Years 4 to 6 students on Tuesday 11 February at 6pm. We hope to see as many of you there as possible. Ngā mihi, Sian Coxon, Principal of Primary Great start to the year in P1!It has been a great start to the year in P1! We have welcomed lots of new faces to the class and to Pinehurst. During the past two weeks, we have all enjoyed getting to know each other and our school – including the fabulous playground. The class has settled in well and we are all looking forward to meeting the rest of P1 very soon! In P1 we have had lots of fun learning new things. In Phonics, we have started to learn the initial sounds. The children have all been so proud of themselves for what they can do already as you can see from all the happy, smiley faces in the photographs. Miss Dobbins has been impressed to see the children already beginning to say the sounds and blend them together to make words – how fantastic! The photographs show the children enjoying themselves as they spot the initial sounds and match them to pictures, as well as developing their fine motor skills through phonic based activities. Some of the children are also using the magnetic boards to make their own words. Super effort, P1! Magnificent Maths in P2This week P2 have been learning all about the concept of ‘one more’ and ‘one less’. They have been participating in a variety of tasks and activities which allow them to consolidate and extend their learning. Opportunities to develop gross and fine motor skills are also incorporated into maths focus lessons, for the development of pencil control and handwriting. Miss Watters is so impressed at how well they have settled into work. Even in just a short week, they have made such progress in managing themselves and developing good work habits. Well done P2! Rina, developing her gross motor skills, whilst practising correct number formation. She is painting with water and large brushes to strengthen her shoulders. Jayden making the number 15, using Numicon. He is recognising that one number represents a ten and the other is five ones. Thea is counting one more and one less, whilst using tweezers and pom-poms to develop her fine motor skills. Antony finding one more or one less than a given number and recording on a mini-whiteboard. Daisy taking her learning outdoors. She is rolling the dice, finding the starting number and then jumping backwards to find one less. Portraits like Picasso in P13In Year 4 we have started our exploration of Pablo Picasso as an artist and have also had a look at his amazing work. His Cubist portraits certainly made us laugh and we have had fun having a go at making our own unusual and crazy portraits. Here are some portraits from P13. I Spy in the PrimaryI Spy... Rippa Rugby in Year 3! I Spy...Year 5 recording their speed at multiplication to track their progress through the year. I Spy...cotton wool balls being used to demonstrate states of matter! I Spy... P9 representing Waitangi Day by wearing feather Korowai cloaks! Pinehurst MusicThe Addams Family Production - Rehearsals underway It was a very exciting week for our Addams Family cast as our rehearsals got underway. It was a pleasure to witness the vocal potential of the group, under the skills-full guidance of Cherie Moore, our Chorus Musical Director and a vocal itinerant teacher at Pinehurst school. The cast then read through the script, as a group, the following day, in order to become better familiar with their characters and contexts. The College cast will continue to meet twice a week to focus on singing, dancing and acting in order to get ready to wow the audience at the end of July. Congratulations to Brooke Souproanuck Over the summer holidays Brooke (Yr 13) gained Distinction in her level 6 Musical Theatre Trinity exam. Along with two students, she was also selected for the Kiwi Allstars trip to New York, Atlanta and LA where she attended workshops run by key industry personnel. Brooke is one of our three Arts Council leaders this year and will perform as Alice Beineke in our Addams Family production. Congratulations Brooke – we have no doubt you have a bright future ahead of you. Itinerant Lessons started this week Music itinerant lessons began this week, with over a 100 students taking the opportunity to have one-on-one lessons with fifteen highly qualified itinerant staff on weekly basis. Our itinerant staff often work in the music industry and have valuable performing and industry relevant skills to impart on our students. If you wish to enrol your child in itinerant lessons, please read through the information on this page and complete the enrolment form at the bottom. With the support of the board, Pinehurst School is pleased to offer a Brass Bursary to any student who would like to learn/or continue developing their performing skills on a brass instrument, take itinerant lessons at the school and commit to participating in a music co-curricular group at Pinehurst. For more information and how to apply, click here. The Phoenix Aquatics clubA number of Pinehurst students are members of the swim programme - Phoenix Aquatics club. In December of 2019, the club were placed 1st at the Auckland Junior Championships in the girl’s team and 3rd club overall. The following Pinehurst swimmers were extremely successful at the Auckland Championships producing the following results: At the start of 2020, the club competed in the Anthony Mosse Open meet, again in Auckland. Anthony Mosse was one of New Zealand’s most successful swimmers and this is a prestigious competition with all major clubs taking part. Again, Pinehurst students acquitted themselves well with a strong set of results. The following weekend, Jack travelled to Wellington and competed in the Wellington Regional Championships where he achieved the following results:
Surf Lifesaving SistersYear 13 students Cenedra and Paige Waddel have been members of Mairangi Bay Surf Lifesaving Club since they were eight. When they turned 14, they completed their Bronze Lifesaving award to become lifeguards in the senior club. They continued to represent the club at a national and regional level also winning a few ribbons along the way. Last patrol Paige did her first actual rescue in the IRB as a crewperson when she saved two surfers in their twenties and their boards, hauling them into the boat. Both Cenedra and Paige have been involved in event guarding activities such as the Harbour Crossing and the 3.5km Omaha Gem Beach series. Over the last 3 years Cenedra has volunteered over 630 hours to date and Paige 600, patrolling, coaching and event guarding with 65 of those hours being in the last 2 months. Lifesaving involves lots of components in which many different awards can be gained. Both Cenedra and Paige have their level 1 and 2 first aid certificates, VHF radio award, Intermediate guarding award and IRB crewman. Both are a member of the IRB racing team and are working towards their IRB driver’s exam. In the next few weeks they will be competing at Regionals in the 4-man canoe. We wish them all the best! Term 1 Tennis CoachingTennis coaching will begin in Week 3 this term. If you would like to play, please send an email to confirm a spot.
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