Kia ora e te whānau,
Thank you for your support on Monday enabling us to have our Staff Only Day. We were extremely grateful to have Jon Procter share his pearls of wisdom about the history of Papaioea (Palmerston North) and the Rangitanē Iwi. The pics below show snippets of our tour. I’m wondering if any parents are interested in this kaupapa (topic) also and we might be able to entice him into running another hikoi (walk) around these spots learning our local history, let me know…
Hopefully you were all able to enjoy the sunshine on Waitangi Day, a really important day for us all in Aotearoa, New Zealand as it marks the signing of Te Tiriti o Waitangi on this day back in 1840. Our Education and Training Act, which all school in NZ are guided by, states that one of our primary objectives is to give effect to this founding document of our country by making sure each kura takes reasonable steps to learn local Tikanga Māori (Māori Customs), Mātauranga Māori (Māori Knowledge), Te Ao Māori (a Māori Worldview) and Te Reo Māori (the Māori Language).
We are yet to have a ‘full week back at school’ yet, so next week will be a grind haha! Our akomanga (classrooms) are beginning to look bright and vibrant as our tamariki personalise and take ownership of their spaces. Joseph came and showed me his amazing self portrait he did in Mataī. Ka rawe (awesome) Joseph!
Kapa Haka:
On Wednesday morning, Whaea Tūrehu started back with us resuming her role teaching Kapa Haka to our whole kura. She tutors in a lot of different kura across the rohe (region) and told me that we are her favorite place to come to. She mentioned that she feels our school is a safe place for her being Māori and loves the whakahī (pride) and passion that our tamariki have for the four pou (pillars) mentioned above. This shows me that all of us at Turitea School are really doing our part to Toitū te Tiriti or Honour the Treaty.
School Finances – Hero:
In Hero, you will see a Finance tab on your Home screen. If you click on it you will see a School Donation and an Activity Fee for Term 1 has been added. School Donations are not compulsory, we do heavily rely on these to help us pay for the extra things that we love to have, that our operations grant we are given from from the Ministry of Education doesn’t cover. We ask for $100 per year if you have one child at school, $150 if you have two or more children at school.
The Activity Fee is there to help create less work for Julie in the office who used to deal with little bits of money coming in for trips that we go on. This also gives the teachers a budget to stick to when they are planning excursions or bringing experts on site to work with our children. Payments are preferred online; either through the Hero app directly or through Internet Banking; Westpac – 03 0726 0572091 00 and please include your child’s name and surname in the Reference and Donations/Act Fee in the Particulars.
Staff Meetings:
Just so you know, as a teaching staff we meet every Tuesday afternoon at 3.15pm. Sometimes if staff are out, then these hui (meetings) can take place on a Wednesday or Thursday. These are important for us to get on time, as it is our time to connect as a staff and we usually engage in professional development that upskills our teaching. However, we also promote an open door policy at Turitea and always encourage parents to come in and connect with your child’s kaiako to hear how their day went etc. If you’d like to talk about something that might take longer than 15 minutes, please email the teachers to meet with them or come in on a Monday/Friday.
Overnight Camp:
Full information for this was on a separate Hero post last week. It is next Friday 16th February so please fill out the form here if you want to join in this Turitea School tradition. If anyone has spare tents, please let someone from the PTA know, as we would hate people to miss out on this event if they don’t have a tent. Just a reminder to BYO plates, cutlery and drink bottles. This saves the team buying and disposing of these.
From the PTA:
We are excited at the start of every year when we get new families join the Turitea Whānau. We want them to all feel welcome here and what better way to connect with other parents than joining the Turitea School PTA. They promise you won’t get landed with a job upon arrival (unless you want that…) Their next meeting is on Wednesday 20th March in the staffroom at 7pm and you are all welcome. They will be out in force next Friday at the Overnight Camp, so come and have a chat with them, they are a pretty friendly bunch!
Giant Pumpkin Competition:
If you are a Facebook user, check out the page that Meryl created for people to share their progress with their enormous paukena (pumpkin). Thanks Corrin for sharing Jackson’s amazing pumpkin, which you can see above. This is the biggest one we have seen so far. How is yours going? Add your picture to the page.
Yummy Apples:
Thank you to those who have helped us collect these in the past. We are going to continue to collect these this year, and we rely on you all helping us do this. He rau ringa, e oti ai – Many hands get the job done. Your child will bring home a collection sheet this afternoon to stick on the fridge and assign them the job of ‘de-stickering’ the Yummy fruit and putting it on the sheet and send them in to Julie when they are full and we can give you another one. Last year they gave us over $700 worth of sports gear for collecting stickers.
Kelly Sport Afterschool Programme:
Yesterday we had the team from Kelly Sport working with all our tamariki, giving them a taste of their sessions. Next Tuesday their after school sports clinics are running again like last year for our Year 0-4 students. For more information and registration, click here.
Toys at School:
Just a reminder that we have to enforce a ‘No Toys at School’ policy at Turitea School. We have some issues with these in the playground when kids smuggle them into school. If you could help us enforce this, we would appreciate it.
Yeah Girls Cricket:
Sarah and Jess from MCA are back this Monday 12th February running this programme again for our Year 4-6 Girls. If your tamāhine (daughter) is keen to be involved in this, sign them up here and they get a free goodie bag. Bjorn is also coming out that day too, running a session for everyone promoting the Manawatū Cricket new initiatives Smash It!
Triathlon Series:
The Palmy Kid’s Tri Series returns this Monday 12th February for the next 5 weeks. These events are aimed at children aged 4-12 years. More information can be found on this flier.
Rugby League:
Linton Cobras Rugby League are having their final muster and first preseason training at Linton Camp this Sunday 11th February. They are looking for tamariki aged 7-8 born (2016-2017) and a few extra 10-11 year olds born (2013-2014) to fill the teams.
Triple P Positive Parenting:
The Triple P staff at ACROSS Te Kotahitanga O Te Wairua are excited to be able to offer parents free 2-hour ‘Positive Parenting’ courses in Term 1 2024. Find all the information here.
Design a Gumboot Friday Art Competition:
Check out their website if you have artistic tamariki and they would love to be involved in this to support their great cause.
For this term, we are helping our friends at Aokautere School who are having their school hall renovated, so every Friday afterschool we are letting them use our hall for their dance group, so if you see some new faces around the place, give them a ‘Kia Ora’ and point them in the direction of the hall.
Don’t forget that Scholastic Book orders are due by this Monday 12th February and you buy these through the Loop App or online.
Our Garden Club will be on the gate this arvo selling a few garden essentials if you have some loose change in your car, bring it along.
Hei ākuanei koutou (See you all soon)
Troy