St John’s Girls’ School Newsletter 11 August 2017 Principal’s Comments Tena koutou katoa – Greetings to you all. Welcome A warm welcome to Frances Keast and her family. Frances joined the Year 8 girls in Room 5 and has settled into the class and the hostel very quickly. Safe Use of the Internet We need to work together to ensure your daughter is using the internet safely. As parents we don’t want to invade our children’s privacy but it is important that we know what they are viewing and what they are putting up online. It is also important that they are aware of the dangers of befriending strangers on social media. Ensuring they only have people they know in real life on their contact lists is one way of guiding your daughter to be internet aware. As parents we need to check our children’s devices. Often the girls don’t think about the repercussion of what they do/put online, eg filming themselves in inappropriate clothing for an online forum. We have been impressed with the response from parents when we have discussed issues. By working together, we can prevent problems occurring. Mid-Year Data – in relation to National Standards – excluding New Entrants Our aspirational 2017 target is to get all girls achieving at or above the mathematics standard for their age/year level. Due to the hard work of our very capable teachers and support staff, and the work you are doing at home, we are really making progress with this. Please keep encouraging your daughter to learn her basic facts, using the cards. National Standard achievement showing the number of all girls in each group (number of Maori Students) then the same data shown as percentages Thank You A big thank you for your fundraising efforts with the basic facts. We try to centre the major fundraising around learning, consequently the Basic Factsathon this year and the Spellathon on alternate years. The $3000 raised will go towards building some new playground equipment. I can’t wait for this project to get underway as there are some stunning ideas! Thank you to the parents and friends of St John’s who put their hand up to take the year level netball teams or offered to umpire. We really appreciate this as we realise that most people are working these days and it means taking a day off work to accompany the girls. Thank you! ICAS RESULTS Congratulations to the following girls on achieving wonderful results in the first two ICAS exams. Digital Technologies: Science: Merit: Kobi Harpur, Jane McDowall Merit: Meg Wisely, Kate Goodeve Credit: Samara Beck Credit: Samara Beck Have a lovely weekend. Nga mihi nui (Kind regards) Brenda Mackay Total 116 girls (17 Maori) Working towards the end of year standard On track to meet the end of year standard On track to exceed the end of year standard Mathemacs Total All (Maori) % (% of Maori) 17 (2M) 15% (12%M) 59 (10M) 51% (59%M) 40 (5M) 35% (29%M) Reading Total All (Maori) % (% of Maori) 14 (1M) 12% (6%M) 33 (5M) 28% (29%M) 69 (11M) 60% (65%M) Wring Total All (Maori) % (% of Maori) 25 (4M) 22% (24%M) 57 (8M) 49% (47%M) 34 (5M) 29% (29%M)
Transcript
St John’s Girls’ School
Newsletter
11 August 2017
Principal’s Comments
Tena koutou katoa – Greetings to you all.
Welcome
A warm welcome to Frances Keast and her family. Frances joined the Year 8 girls in Room 5 and has settled into the
class and the hostel very quickly.
Safe Use of the Internet
We need to work together to ensure your daughter is using the internet safely. As parents we don’t want to invade our
children’s privacy but it is important that we know what they are viewing and what they are putting up online. It is also
important that they are aware of the dangers of befriending strangers on social media. Ensuring they only have people
they know in real life on their contact lists is one way of guiding your daughter to be internet aware. As parents we need
to check our children’s devices. Often the girls don’t think about the repercussion of what they do/put online, eg filming
themselves in inappropriate clothing for an online forum. We have been impressed with the response from parents when
we have discussed issues. By working together, we can prevent problems occurring.
Mid-Year Data – in relation to National Standards – excluding New Entrants
Our aspirational 2017 target is to get all girls achieving at or above the mathematics standard for their age/year level.
Due to the hard work of our very capable teachers and support staff, and the work you are doing at home, we are really
making progress with this. Please keep encouraging your daughter to learn her basic facts, using the cards.
National Standard achievement showing the number of all girls in each group (number of Maori Students) then
the same data shown as percentages
Thank You
A big thank you for your fundraising efforts with the basic facts. We try to centre the major fundraising around learning,
consequently the Basic Factsathon this year and the Spellathon on alternate years. The $3000 raised will go towards
building some new playground equipment. I can’t wait for this project to get underway as there are some stunning ideas!
Thank you to the parents and friends of St John’s who put their hand up to take the year level netball teams or offered to
umpire. We really appreciate this as we realise that most people are working these days and it means taking a day off
work to accompany the girls. Thank you!
ICAS RESULTS
Congratulations to the following girls on achieving wonderful results in the first two ICAS exams.
Digital Technologies: Science:
Merit: Kobi Harpur, Jane McDowall Merit: Meg Wisely, Kate Goodeve
Credit: Samara Beck Credit: Samara Beck
Have a lovely weekend.
Nga mihi nui (Kind regards) Brenda Mackay
Total 116 girls (17 Maori)
Working towards the end of year standard
On track to meet the end of year standard
On track to exceed the end of year standard
Mathematics Total All (Maori) % (% of Maori)
17 (2M)
15% (12%M)
59 (10M)
51% (59%M)
40 (5M)
35% (29%M)
Reading Total All (Maori) % (% of Maori)
14 (1M)
12% (6%M)
33 (5M)
28% (29%M)
69 (11M)
60% (65%M)
Writing Total All (Maori) % (% of Maori)
25 (4M)
22% (24%M)
57 (8M)
49% (47%M)
34 (5M)
29% (29%M)
TERM DATES:
Term 3
August
15th ICAS Maths
Yrs 7 & 8 netball tournament
18th Ski Day Yrs 5-8
21st Polyfest 10.10am—10.20am ILT Stadium
BOT meeting 5.30pm
24th Disco 6-8pm
29th BOP meeting 7pm
30th Gym Festival. Seniors am, Juniors pm
31st Room 4 Speech Exams
September
1st Father/Daughter netball
6th School Photos
11th BOT meeting 5.30pm
15th Christian Education Speeches 1pm
25th Dance Exams
26th Dance Exams
27th SMAC Maths
29th Last Day Term 3
Congratulations to the following girls who received awards
recently—
Room 1 Emma Corson, Kadi Cantley, Leah McEwan,
Sophie Purdon
Room 2 Esmé Middlebrooke, Meila Spain,
Jessica Hay, Zoe Laughton
Room 3 Sarah Hartstonge, Sofia Campbell-Wall,
Andreeva Stephen, Lilly Roughan
Room 4 Kaitlin Swain, Grace Pope, Brooke Acker,
Hannah Middlemass
Room 5 Anna Coveney, Paige McKenzie x 2
Frances Keast
Room 6 Meg Wisely, Grace Watson, Meg Pope,
Rebecca Laverock
Room 7 Samara Beck, Ruby Kubala, Sarah Hay,
Ivy Turner
Values Cup:
4 August Eva Sexton Rm 7
11 August Isabella Willis Rm 4
ROOM 4—Years 4 & 5—Miss Smillie
Room 4 have been extremely busy over the past 3 weeks. We are excited and enthusiastic about our inquiry topic and
making fantastic progress. We are well underway with our inquiry task board and the outcomes so far have been
exceptional. Some girls have created TV advertisements for potential products for the fair using the iMovie app and
have written a jingle to make it catchy. We have a number of girls making 3D models of their dream shop and these are
looking outstanding. There are a number of girls surveying the school to find out what products are most likely to sell at
the school fair and are creating graphs on Excel to display their findings. We also have reports being written about
famous entrepreneurs, bird feeders being created and tested, and many more activities relating to our inquiry.
The creativity in Room 4 is flowing and we look forward to sharing our work with you over the term.
Laura McDowall’s Sweet Shop
Amanda Henderson and Lucia Hughes’ Survey Results
How it is the end of Week 3 already? Time flies when you are a busy Year 8!
We are in the midst of exciting disco planning at the moment and we are sure everyone has spotted the advertisement in
this newsletter announcing our very cool theme. Dust off your tiaras and press your ball gowns girls! Everyone in the
class has a role in organising the disco and we are fortunate to have Paige's keen eye for detail leading us as CEO. We
are working in sub-committees of budget, decorations, tickets and advertising, and food and drink. Mr Hughes is not
responsible for any of the planning. It's all up to us. We are pretty excited!
Maths is a lot of fun at the moment as we are taking on a 'Home Improvement' quote assignment. This allows us to use
and consolidate our perimeter, area and volume learning. When we have calculated costs based on our measurements
we send our workings, annotations and explanations to Mr Hughes in an 'Explain Everything' video from our
iPads. We are really enjoying the assignment and even though some parts are very tricky, we are persevering and
learning lots!
We are digging our teeth into PrEP now and quickly learning
that while some ideas seem like a lot of fun to create and sell,
they won't make profitable business ventures. We have a lot
to learn along the way!
This week we welcomed Frances to our class. She has joined
us from Waiau Area School and is a boarder at Gilmour
House.
Each Monday we have been challenging ourselves at the
Adventure Southland ropes course. This week we abseiled
and rode a massive flying fox. It was very cool and we all
encouraged each other a lot. Mr Hughes tried to encourage
one of us to be brave last week by saying "he'd do it if we did
it." We held him to that promise and he conquered his own
height fear this week!
Here is Frances abseiling on her very first day at school.
ROOM 5—Year 8—Mr Hughes
SCHOOL FAIR
Only 11 weeks to go until our fabulous school fair. Next week we are
starting to put together our stalls so look out on Facebook for helper
and equipment requests.
We just want to say a huge thank you for the awesome prizes which
have been donated to our action and raffle. If any families or
business would like to donate a prize please contact
Louise 021448704 or Maria 021678176.
Stalls wanted—We have three to four spaces available for stalls on
fair day so if any family has a business selling home made items that
they sell at shows, or similar fare, and would like to participate in
the school fair please contact the school office with your details and a
member of the Parents’ Association will be in contact.
ROOM 7—Year 6—Mrs Taylor
Room 6 are very proud and excited about the pyjama pants they have created in sewing technology. They have
worked extremely hard to develop confidence in the whole design process and are feeling more confident in
independently using a sewing machine. It is wonderful to hear the girls’ enthusiasm about using these skills to create
further garments at home.
In literacy Room 6 have been working hard on developing consistency in their cursive handwriting. The girls are
thoroughly enjoying this and are developing lovely neat handwriting styles. We have also been studying a number of
fairy tales in writing and analysing their characters, plots, settings, conflicts and resolutions. We are about to write our
very own fractured fairy tales where we make a modern twist on a traditional fairy tale. We hope to share a couple in
our next newsletter piece.
The girls are very excited about beginning our PrEP programme where they create their very own business or venture.
We are currently writing curriculum vitaes and will now apply for jobs or positions of interest in our ventures. The
girls have wonderful ideas for their ventures which is very exciting.
We are looking forward to the upcoming gymnastics festival, ski day and Polyfest performance. The girls have been
practising hard for their gymnastics and we are looking forward to showcasing their talent.
ROOM 6—Year 7—Mrs Hawke
Lately in Room 7 we have been doing a lot of fun things. In English we have been writing narratives and using
figurative language. This includes similes, metaphors, idioms, hyperbole and the best part about figurative language the
onomatopoeia like boom and crash. It is a lot of fun and Mrs Taylor is preparing us for a writing assessment. This term
we have started reading circles. We picked a novel we wanted to read and each group decides how much they will read
and which role they will carry out before the next meeting. We record all our work on a shared Google doc.
In maths we have been learning about 3D shapes, maps and scales. We have also been playing games that help us with
our learning for example Greedy Pig. The best part about maths is doing speed
tests on our iPads. We think that it is really fun, because we can see how we are
getting better.
Every class has been starting to think about a PrEP venture. Room 7 has been
learning about the importance of money and trades. There are many ideas that we
have for PrEP. There are plenty of things we need to think about so we can make
our business. We are looking forward to being creative.
Another activity we have been doing is learning to use the sewing machines. We
have made patchwork pot holders or pot mats. Mrs Unpicker has been really
busy, but we have all improved with practice. We could choose which we made
and our own colour schemes. So far three people have finished.
On Wednesday the Year 6 netball team played in the tournament. They won 5
out of 8 of their matches. This placed them 12th overall. Great job girls.
Overall class has been very fun and we have really enjoyed all the activities. We
hope that our Newsletter has informed you about what we are doing.
By Jane and Ruby
SPORTS NEWS
SOUTHLAND PRIMARY SCHOOLS’ NETBALL TOURNAMENT
TOUCH RUGBY
HOCKEY
PHOTOS
REPRESENTATIVE NEWS
Over the past fortnight we have had two St John’s netball teams represent our school at the
Primary Schools’ Yrs 5 & 6 Netball Tournament held at ILT Stadium Southland.
The Year 5 team were coached by Mrs Jo Keary. Their tournament was held on Thursday 3rd
August. There were 24 teams entered and our team had two wins and four losses. They won
their final game of the day to finish in 17th place.
The Year 6 team went to tournament on Wednesday 9th August. They were coached by Ms Diane
Scully and Laura Pope.
Ms Scully sent the following email, “The girls did amazing yesterday. Laura and I were so proud
of the effort they put in and how well they did. It was a long day and they gave it their
all. We came 12th out of 35 teams, so a pretty good effort.”
Both teams showed some great determination and team spirit. I am sure they gained
some valuable experience and hope they enjoyed their day.
Well done girls!
The Year 8 team competes against 23 other schools next Tuesday, 15th August. A big
thank you to their coach for the day, Mrs Sue Middlemass. We wish the team well.
Hockey has 3 more weeks to run with finals night and festival day to be held on Wednesday 30th August. Good luck
to our girls and Maia and Harrison who play in our Year 3/4 team.
Information regarding the Invercargill Cobb & Co primary school touch rugby competition is now on
the Touch Southland website. The competition starts on Wednesday 18th October which is the first
Wednesday of Term 4. A letter will be sent home next week with further information
If anyone has taken any photos of our after school sports teams in action, please feel free to email them through to me
as it would be nice to put some in the sports section of the newsletter when space is available. Thanks.
