Elm Park School Newsletter 24th May 2013 - Term 2 - Week 3

Friday May 24^th  – Term 2 - Week 3

Value Focus for next week: Initiative and Perseverance

From The Principal

Kia ora tatou katoa, Talofa, Malo e lelei, Bula vi naka, Kia orana Nga mihi nui ki a koutou, Namaste, Nihao, Greetings to you all. 

Head Boy and Head Girl - Congratulations to our Head Boy and Head Girl for 2013, Anahita Mistry and Lachlan McClintock. We look forward to working with all the Councillors throughout the year to ensure that Elm Park’s culture and environment is the best it can be.

Board of Trustees Elections - Voting for our BOT representatives close next Friday 30 May at noon. A Ballot box is available in the office.

Uniform - At last our shipment of stock has arrived in our uniform shop. Our long sleeved winter jacket is available now. See Sheree Houghton for your child/ren uniform requirements.

Parent Information Sessions - Thank you to all the parents/family and whanau that came to our information sessions on the e-portfolios which is our method of reporting our student achievement data and next learning steps to our families.

Kind regards

Trish Plowright

Principal

                  Key Events For Your Diary

Mon 6 May.............. Term 2 Commences

Thur 23 May............ New Parent Orientation

Mon 27 May............ Chocolate money due

Thur 30 May............ BOT Elections Close at Noon

................................ A Team Netball vs Mellons Bay

Fri 31 May............... Mufti Day

Wed 5 June............. Netball Field Day Lloyd Elsmore

Tue 11 June............ B Team Netball vs Bucklands Beach

Week in Review

LOST PROPERTY - Parents please remember to label all clothes - especially raincoats, shoes and jackets in this weather. Our lost property box is outside room 9 – please check here regularly as sometimes lost items are taken home by other children and it is not noticed by parents until washing day.

CHOCOLATES - Thank you for the support with chocolates, to be in the draw for the prizes you need to return your money by Monday 27. Please return what you can't sell on Monday and if you want more then just let us know.

ENTERTAINMENT BOOKS - Entertainment books are due to arrive soon.

MUFTI DAY – Friday 31 May – dress like a King, Queen, Prince or Princess for Queens Birthday weekend – bring your gold coin donation.

CYBERSAFETY – On Wednesday in the auditorium the year 5’s and 6’s went to see a cybersafety show. Our hosts for the show were Laura and Tai.  They were teaching us how to be safe online. They did a play to show us what happens if we don’t make smart choices online. The story was about a girl that moved houses and schools. When she arrived, being online was popular in that school. Later on she was getting cyber-bullied. It was important for us to see what can happen so that we can be safe and smart when using the Internet for our learning.  By Asenla and Faiza

YOUTHTOWN BOAT TRIP - On Friday 17 May, the school councillors and house captains travelled to the ASB showgrounds to view a public boat show and take part in water safety activities. When we got there we were divided into groups. Each group got a name of a sea creature, for example ‘The Octopus’. A lady gave a speech and then we were on our way! Each group took part in one water activity and a number of water safety games. At the end everyone got stickers, booklets and water-proof bags. Once we got back to school we all agreed that the trip was a fun learning experience! By Ashleigh

PINK MORNING TEA – This week our staff had a Pink Morning Tea to raise money for Breast Cancer.  This went very well and we were able to raise funds for this worthwhile cause.

NETBALL - Netball season is well and truly underway at Elm Park.  This year we had over 100 children interested in participating in the sport in some form.  As a result, will have six teams representing our school in various competitions.  Our A Team played Pakuranga Heights School last week and won convincingly 20-3.  It was a great team effort and our team showed a lot of flair.  Our B Team played Cockle Bay School this week and unfortunately lost 4-1. The team played amazingly well given a lack of training because of the wet weather.  Trials for the 4 field day teams are continuing at the moment and we expect to name teams at the end of Week 4.  Our upcoming games are as follows:

A Team - Week 4 Thursday v Mellons Bay

B Team - Week 6 Tuesday v Bucklands Beach

Netball Field Day

Week 5 Wednesday at Lloyd Elsmore.

We would love to have you there to cheer us on.

Looking Ahead

HOMESTAY PARENTS - Interested in becoming a Homestay host family and your first language is English? Please email Mrs de Haast at katherine@elmpark.school.nz or phone 5770196 for more details.

SCHOOL CROSSING - Parent helpers on our school crossing are very concerned about children and parents who are racing across the crossing on the red man.  Please, we ask again for parents to set a good example to children – the only time you can step onto the crossing is when the man is green.

ROAD PATROL – We are in desperate need of help for road patrol.  We specifically need a volunteer for Thursday afternoons If you are able to assist us, we would love to hear from you.  Please see the school office.

ROOM 19 – Room 19 are seeking donations of colourful old (chipped) crockery, broken tiles, mosaic equipment to use in their mural for Inquiry.  The theme is 'Paradise' and it's based on New Zealand icons and habitat.

BANKING - The ANZ Bank is open on Wednesday mornings before school in the library. Our bank tellers are eager to help students to bank their money into their accounts.

Focus on Children

Room 19 has been learning to play songs using the new boomwhackers.  For the end of term Assembly last term,

we learned how to play the introduction to Pokerface, and the school loved our performance.

How is learning to play Boomwhackers helping our learning?

Dylan:  "It gets me relaxed.  It's fun and it also teaches me concentration.  It's a good way to teach because you have fun while you're learning."

Daniel:  "I think we're learning teamwork.  You only play one note in the song and you have to work together to make it sound like a tune."

Leila:  "Keeping to the rhythm is quite tricky, but I learned that you need to have perseverance."

Faheemah:  "I'm learning to understand musical notes, as I don't play any other instrument.  I'm also having to practice my reading skills to stay on track with the group."

Samantha:  "I had to learn to work with other people in a team.  Some people didn't get it as easily, so I had to learn to be patient."

Lydia:  "It's helped me to focus a lot more.  I learned that I need to be on-task the whole time, and counting the beats so that I'm not off time."

Nate:  "It teaches me to give other people a turn, and to wait for my turn."

POSITIVE SOCIAL INTERACTION WINNERS
Congratulations to the following students who were selected and acknowledged this week for their responsible, friendly behaviour.
Room 1	Sky Herewini
Room 3	Vernon Xiao
Room 4	Alexius Hay
Room 5	Olivia Lai Kan
Room 7	Cullan Wiltsher
Room 8	Reef Ryan
Room 9	Jash Patel
Room 10	Alshalay Le Noel
Room 11	Adison Makaola
Room 12	Chloe Stopforth
Room 13	George Cui
Room 14	Elizabeth Davies
Room 15	Teodora Jotanovic
Room 16	Selina Wu
Room 17	Tarquin Fitzgerald-Jolly
Room 18	Myra Singh
Room 19	Helen Lam
Room 20	Zhaoyu Tang
Room 21	Niu-Alinghi Peni
Room 22	Brian Wei
Room 23	Rlisha-Blue Kauraka
Room 24	Khalida Nazif
Room 25	Carlos Chee
Room 29	Mahdia Fayaz
Room 30	Erin Lai Kan
PERSONAL PRESENTATION
The following students were voted as the overall week’s winner in their year level for the most neatly presented in their uniform.
Year 1:	Soena Zeneli
Year 2:	Pula Rathnasekara
Year 3:	Artemas Kelsall
Year 4:	Ronald Filipo
Year 5:	Annea Timms
Year 6:	Joshua Spooner

ROOM 5 - Please visit Room 5's blog : http://room5eps2013.blogspot.co.nz/ We will be showcasing something every week. We would love to hear what you think, so please leave a comment.