Tēnā koutou katoa,
Yay for the sun today! Doesn’t it just make you feel happier? Unfortunately it is always sad when we lose a whānau from our community. Today marks the last day at Turitea School for Eli and Lachie as they relocate to the UK. I know you both will be missed by many here. Kia noho haumaru (safe travels) boys, along with parents Andrew and Alice on the next chapter of your journey. Hopefully we see you all when you come back home. You will always be part of Turitea.
Manawatū Turbos Visit:
On Monday, we had Joe Gavigan and Brayden Iose of the Manawatū Turbos come and hang out with some of our keen Year 4-6 students who love rugby. This is part of the ‘Adopt a Turbo’ initiative that has been running for many years. Why not get along to support our teams this Sunday at CET Arena? The Cyclones play Tasman at 2pm and the Turbos play Taranaki at 4.30pm.
Today’s Assembly:
We had our second fortnightly assembly and Matilda and Grayson from Tōtara were our hosts, again showing their confidence in standing and talking in front of an audience. We had some beautiful artwork on display. Keeping our uara (values) at the forefront, we further celebrated the following tamariki who have truly embraced these consistently throughout the school. I got in on the action too as I didn’t like being left out, so I will give out a ‘Tumuaki (Principal)’ award from now on too. But I gave out two this week because I didn’t give one at the previous assembly. Here are this weeks recipients:
Rimu: Greer and Ariki
Rātā: Nixon
Pōhutukawa: Sarah
Mataī: Michael
Tōtara: Mason
Kahikatea: Chris
Tumuaki: Te Aranga and Joseph
School Production:
As I mentioned last week, our school production now has a name: Past, Present, Future. The script is finished and items, songs and dances are being finalised. This week, we chose Harlow, Nina, Richie, Callum, Hannah and Ruby to be our lead narrators telling this pūrakau (story). Iti, Te Aranga, Munroe and Kyerin will also feature with lead roles too. It will all start to come together over the coming weeks ready for the big day on Wednesday 13th September. We have put out a competition for our kids to design the cover to our programme as well. These are due next Friday 17th August, so please encourage your child to get involved. Tickets went on sale this morning through Ticketek or you can buy them at the Regent ticket office. Adults – $20, Children (5-18 years) – $5, Family (2 adults, 2 children) – $45, Senior Citizens – $10. (Unfortunately these prices include Ticketet’s booking fee on top of this)
Maths Week:
Each day of this week for Maths Week, we have had various challenges around the school to do with Maths, where every class had solid mathematical discussions about predictions and sensible guesses around these. You might enjoy watching some of the challenges that I got made to do around how many skips I could do or how many basketball shots I could make in 30 seconds. What’s your guess? Check and see if I exceeded your expectations or underwhelmed you here and here. Cameron took on today’s challenge of how many widths of the court he could run in 30 seconds. Look at the persistence on his face!
Pre Enrolments for 2024 and Beyond:
Thanks to those of you who did this for me, we had a flood of responses. These figures really help me as I often have to give the Ministry of Education (MoE) projections for what our potential numbers could look like in the coming years, so they are able to make their decisions about staffing and resourcing etc. If you have someone yet to be enrolled, please can you do this by filling out the following form.
Kind Hearts Trip:
On Tuesday, Shane and Trish took their classes to the Kind Hearts Child Conference at the Awapuni Convention Centre. Huge thanks to the parents who came and supported this. Some valuable takeaways from our kids on the importance of being kind and links to our school uara (values).
From the PTA:
The school disco is set for Friday 25th August from 6 – 7.30pm in Tāne Mahuta. Free entry to current Turitea students. Our Friday kaiako of music and ex-Turitea student Oscar will be our DJ. The PTA will be selling Drinks, Chips and Chocolate. If you are the parent of a student in Year 4 and above, you are welcome to stay, but you don’t need to if you discuss with your child about high expectations of their behaviour and they demonstrate our school uara. We also reiterate that once they are in the hall for the disco, they stay there until the end of the night. It is not time to venture out to the courts, playground or field. We appreciate your support on this adaptation to the rule this year.
Lamb, Calf and Pet Day:
Last week a separate Hero post went out about entries for Lamb, Calf and Pet Day. You can register your animal here. Please can we have these in by Friday 25th August.
School Support:
Shout out to our leading local hardware stores this week for giving our school some free stuff. Mitre 10 gave us a Bokashi Compost Starter Kit worth $70 and Bunnings gave us 10x Hi-Vis Vests worth $120. We appreciate their support.
Activity Fee:
Thank you to those of you who paid these after the reminder last week. Please could you check on your Hero Finances to see if this is still owing and arrange payment ASAP please.
Boys Netball:
In an effort to encourage more boys to get involved in Netball, Michaela from Netball Manawatū is coming in at lunchtime next Wednesday to try and drum up some interest. Hoping to see lots of our boys there!
Ngā manaakitanga (Best wishes)