Empty Soap Dispensers Needed

Isaac needs some empty soap dispensers for an experiment he is doing at school. He is after the pump type containers (e.g. liquid soap). If anyone has any around home they don't need Isaac would really love them please.

Whanau Hui

Term 1 Whānau Hui.

We pleased to invite you to join our Whānau Group at 7:30pm on Wednesday 8 March in the school library. This group is for anyone with an interest in Māori engagement and achievement at  Waimairi School. Among other things we will be planning our annual hangi and considering ideas for 2017 matariki celebrations. 

French Club

French club resumes from Monday next week at 12.30pm in He Tangata (Room 16/17). Children to take their lunch with them.

Swimming Sport Fun

Thank you to everyone who came along and supported the Kohara children today at our junior swimming sports. As you can tell by the huge smiles on the children's faces, they had a fabulous time and it great to see our children so confident, enjoying being in the water and participating in the activities. They loved being able to show off their swimming skills that they have been practising as well.

If you have any great photos, please email them to us as we'd love to include some on our blog.
tracy.campbell@waimairi.school.nz
monique.osullivan@waimairi.school.nz

Hot Drinks for Chilldren

Please encourage children who are ordering hot drinks to do this well before the bell goes for class - our rules around hot drinks for children are changing and the coffee shop will stop taking orders for children after 8.45am to allow children to have ordered and finished their hot drinks before class starts. We would also ask that parents do not bring hot drinks over to the classroom once class has started.

Thank you for your help as we all adjust to these changes. Your support is appreciated and we love the fact that you support our 4 Rivers Cafe so well.

Headlice

Unfortunately headline are doing the rounds again - there was a notice sent home today with information. Please check children's hair on a regular basis as these do seem to come and go frequently at school.

Sunhats

We have 16 children without sunhats at school and we would like to make that number zero!!!!
Please hunt out school sunhats and send them to school, especially with this lovely warm weather we are having.

Junior Swimming Sports Wednesday

Remember to pack:
* Togs
* 2x Towels
* Goggles
* Pjyamas

Look forward to seeing you if you can make it along :)

Rosalie's Cat

Check out this gorgeous cat that Rosalie has created. First Rosalie had to sew the cat before adding googly eyes and whiskers with the hot glue gun. Finally she added a collar to finish it off. Rosalie has worked hard to make small stitches so the stuffing doesn't fall out and we think it looks fabulous.

Congratulations Johnny!

Congratulations to Johnny for graduating from Rainbow Reading. We are all so very proud of the huge effort you have put in with your reading and we know Mrs Stoddart is so proud of you as well!

Here is Johnny with his special certificate and a wee treat from Mrs Stoddart to say well done!

Week 5 (28 Feb-3 Mar)

Welcome to Week 5.

Classroom Release
Room 19 have Art with Mrs McHaffie on Tuesday from 9-10.30am.

Junior Swimming Sports
We hope you can pop along to see our Kohara kids showcasing their swimming and enjoying a variety of water confidence games on Wednesday 1 March between 11.45 and 12.30pm in the school pool. Postponement day is Friday 3 March if the weather is unsuitable.

Reading Book Returns
Thank you to our wonderful helpers who have been returning our reading books to the reading room for us - your time is greatly appreciated.

Reading Folders
It is fabulous to see almost all children remembering their reading folders each day. These go in tote trays in the morning before school each day. Poetry folders of in the green boxes down the Room 19 end of Kohara.

Staff Professional Development Day
On Thursday both Mrs Campbell and Mrs O will be attending a professional development day over at Casebook Intermediate. Ms Jill Kelk and Ms Tania Stott will be teaching in Kohara for the day. Both Jill and Tania are regular relievers in Kohara and know the routines well so we look forward to welcoming them back to Kohara.

Parent Interviews
We are enjoying catching up with you all at our meet the teacher interviews. Don't forget you are most welcome to send us an email or pop in before or after school to chat if you ever have any concerns or just want to ask a question.

Swimming
Lunchtime swim (optional) for Year 1/2 children on Tuesday.
Junior swimming sports on Wednesday.
Class swimming on Friday.
Please pack the togs this week - especially on Wednesday as we would love to see ALL our Kohara children participating in our junior swimming sports. Remember to pack a pair of pyjamas for the children for our fun PJ race on Wednesday too!

Library day is Friday

Kapa Haka is on Tuesday

Craft Club/Sewing Club is on Tuesday lunchtime.

Have a great week :)

SPCA Visit

Our Term 1 Social Studies Inquiry is centred around the idea of being a responsible citizen.

What a fabulous morning we had today learning about how to be a responsible citizen when looking after animals. Richard and Courtney from the SPCA brought along Myrtle the dog and Vinnie, Trumpet and Junior the guinea pigs.

We found out that all animals need five things, just like people... shelter, love, food and water, exercise and vet care.

We loved hearing all the stories about the different animals and finding out how the SPCA help us here in Christchurch. We even found out we can join the Critters Club for free which gives you an interesting magazine twice a year which has loads of interesting information, stories, games and photos. We can tell some of our Kohara kids will be really keen to join this! We have added the link to the SPCA Canterbury page on the right hand side of our blog under 'useful links'. You can find details on how to join Critters Club on there under the 'get involved' section.

Richard with  Myrtle the dog.

Junior Swimming Sports

Our junior swimming sports is coming up on Wednesday 1 March.
Kohara is swimming between 11.45am and 12.30pm in the school pool.
We would love you to come along and cheer the kids on as they showcase their swimming and enjoy some fun confidence building water activities including a pyjama race at the end!
Postponement date is Friday 3 March.

Please send along togs, 2 towels, goggles and a pair of pyjamas to put on over their togs at the end (or shorts and a t shirt).

Friday Reminders

Friday is library day and our class swimming day. Please pack the togs as this is our last practice before our junior swimming sports next week.

Baking Help Needed

Khori, Hannah, Luca and Anika are doing a baking project to learn how to make pancakes. Is there anyone who might be able to help this week to do some cooking with them please. Either Thursday afternoon or anytime Friday.

Update: Thanks to Mel for her offer of help :)

Tuesday Swim & Sewing Club

Pack the togs if your child would like a lunchtime swim on Tuesday (optional) or they can also attend sewing/craft club if they prefer at 12.45pm after they have finished eating lunch.

Parent Night Summary

For those of you who missed our talk at our Kohara Whanau Dinner.

Here are the hows and whys of Kohara...

* We want to honour the NZ curriculum by developing confident, connected, actively involved, life long learners.

* We want the children to live the key competencies (self management, thinking, relating to others and participating and communicating) through authentic experiences.

* Reading, writing, mathematics is still the most important part of our programme.

* We believe in knowing our learners.

* We have high expectations for all our children.

* Our key words in Kohara are quality, detail and sequence. These words were selected because detail is important in reading and writing, sequencing for literacy and numeracy, and quality is important for all areas.

* You could call Kohara an inquiry programme, where children are creating, inquiring, learning, and practising skills. Kohara means to enthuse/passions - this is central to our class programme.

* We say if you can do that at morning tea or lunch time, then it's not learning in Kohara (e.g colouring in for the sake of colouring in). This makes learning more meaningful.

* Studies show that creativity in education for the children's future can't be underestimated. If you are interested in learning more please youtube Sir Ken Robinson/TED talks.

* In Kohara our focus is on the process, not the product. We promote a growth mindset - skills like perseverance, risk taking, not giving up, we may not know it YET but we will get there.

* The block challenge allows for meaningful conversations, negotiating, discussing options, collaboration, problem solving and creating ideas. Children have a specific challenge each day, it is not free play and they are encouraged to use detail to make the picture.

* Sketching supports detail, fine motor skills, writing, letter formation and spatial awareness.

Difference to Traditional Schooling

* Kohara may look a little different to when we went to school.

* Our main difference from 'old school, traditional classrooms' is what the children are doing when they are not with the teacher. In all other ways it is no different.

*We still do reading, writing, maths everyday as well as our topic or Inquiry studies, PE and Arts.

* In Kohara we work as one class although there are occasions when we split into R18 (Mrs Campbell) or Room 19 (Mrs O'Sullivan) - usually only for reporting/interviews and for classroom release time. In Term 1 Room 18 children have Mr Lukes for PE and Room 19 have Mrs McHaffie for Art while we have our release time.

So you may wonder what are they doing when they are not with the teacher...?

* The children have choice over when they complete some learning tasks (independent writing, free writing/spelling practice, poetry activity) and these must be completed by lunchtime. Some children prefer to do this at the start of the day whilst others like to do it later in the morning. We have class systems in place to monitor that these tasks are done and the children are already quickly picking up these new routines. They also have choices around what other learning activities they wish to do ( own choice projects, literacy and numeracy games, sketching, chess, puzzles, block mat, reading etc).

* Kohara is all about both/and and not either/or so this means while literacy and numeracy remain our core learning it is complemented by our Inquiry approach as well.

* Although we look busy with lots of different things happening at any given time, it is by no means less structured, as the children have many systems and layers of expectations in place (many you may not notice unless you talk to the children about what they are doing and why).

*The children still enjoy art, PE, music, and drama as well as project learning based around their interests.

Project Learning

*Through our project learning which we are just getting underway, the focus is on the process and the growth mindset and skills that they need to do to complete their project. The children plan, organise equipment, create, record the finished product (photos/writing) and then evaluate their learning. Our projects often inspire other children, or lead to further related projects.

*Often the most valuable learning comes from the process not necessarily the finished product. We encourage the children to have a go and not rely on an adult to do it for them as we celebrate making mistakes or being challenged as a good thing - an opportunity to problem solve, persevere or try new strategies and we are there to support the children with this.

* Our projects keep the children engaged and interested in learning. By pursuing their passions, they are more likely to be focused and be actively involved in their own learning.

* Kohara has no set timetable. At any time of the day you will find children writing, doing maths, reading, creating, problem solving, working cooperatively, discussing, organising, sharing, and doing many many more activities that are on offer. However, there is still a structure to our day in that teacher-led reading, writing and maths groups are still taking place throughout the day.

* We have one teacher who is working with instructional groups for literacy and numeracy whilst the other is roaming and facilitating or supporting the learning of the other children. 

The children may have either teacher for reading or maths and we deliberately cross group them to ensure we get to know all our children and their learning needs.

* A huge benefit is the relationships that we build as we are talking and working along side your child. We get to know all our children extremely well over the year.

* We have one book for most of our learning. Our book blog is a record of their learning over the year. Please feel free to look at your child's book throughout the year. We also have a sketching book to encourage this aspect of our programme also. Sketching promotes detail, fine motor skills (linked to handwriting, letter formations and spatial awareness).

Parent help

* We would love parent help this year especially with projects, baking, sewing, woodwork etc. We will send home requests later in the term once the children are settled in to routines and from time to time we might do a shout out for specific one off help for things as well.

* Please check our class blog EVERY WEEK for notices, celebrations of learning, projects, and information. We are aiming to try and have the blog on display in the mornings so if you don’t have computer access you are able to come and have a look before school. You can also access information on our class whiteboard and via the school newsletter, tweets and school facebook page. An easy way to get updates for the class blog is to subscribe by clicking on the ‘follow by email’ link and this will automatically email you our posts instead of having to visit the blog.

* We look forward to a great year with your children and learning more about what makes them tick! We can't wait for you to share more about your wonderful children when we meet for parent interviews. If you have any queries at any stage please feel free to pop in after school or send us an email.

Week 4 (20-24 February)

Welcome to Week 4 :)

Meet the Teacher Interviews
Thank you to those who have booked times with us for our upcoming Meet the Teacher interviews over the next two weeks. We look forward to seeing you.

Classroom Release Time
Room 18 have PE with Mr Lukes and Room 19 have Art with Mrs McHaffie on Thursday 11-12.30pm.

SPCA Visit
As part of our Social Studies Inquiry we have the SPCA visiting on Thursday morning to talk how about we can be responsible citizens when looking after animals.

Swimming
Please remember to send swimming togs along on Wednesday and Friday for our class swimming lessons.  Swimming is an important part of our PE curriculum. If your child is unable to participate due to a medical reason, please let us know.
Optional lunchtime swim on Tuesday for the children is they wish.

Sewing/Craft Club
Sewing/craft club has restarted for the year on a Tuesday lunchtime at 12.45 in the room off the library. All ages are welcome to attend once they have finished eating lunch and have been dismissed by the duty teacher.

Reading Returns Roster
A huge thank you to the wonderful parent who have volunteered to put reading books away this term. Your help is greatly appreciated.

Library day is Friday.

Kapa Haka is on Tuesday afternoon.

Whanau Dinner
Thank you to all those who were able to make our Kohara dinner and swim last Thursday. It was lovely to spend the evening with you and your children. We hope you enjoyed it.

Sunhats
W still have a lot of Kohara children without sunhats. Please check that your child has a navy wide brimmed sunhat at school every day (well named).

Have a great week :)

Requests

If anyone is able to help out with donations of newspaper for art or wood offcuts suitable for the children to use for woodwork projects, we would be most grateful.

Statistics

Kohara have been learning about statistics in maths. We have found out that statistics is a way to find out information about all kinds of things. We are using statistics to learn more about the children in  Kohara this year.

We have been:
* posing questions
* gathering data
* grouping and graphing our data
* interpreting our findings
* making connections

We have also looked at how we can record our data using tally marks and then using our skip counting in 5s to help count the information. Lauren has been practising using tally marks to make all kinds of numbers and exploring patterns (she ended up making tally marks to practise counting in 5s all the way up to 110!!) Here are some of the first ones she tried.

You could try having a go at home - start off easy drawing tally marks for numbers up to 10 and then challenge yourself to see what the biggest number is that you can make? Can you make 20? 50? 100?
Remember to group your tally marks in groups of 5 like this  llll