St Benedict's School Pānui ā-rorohiko (Online Newsletter) Term 3, Week 8, 2024

Upcoming Events from our Calendar

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Term 3, 2024

Week 8
Saturday  14 September St Brigid's Kapa Haka Festival 

Week 9  - Mrs Savage attending the Trans Tasman Principals Conference
Tuesday 17 September  Year 5/6 Netball tournament (School teams)
Thursday 19 September  Kāhui Ako Cultural Performance Day Kapa Haka Group St Pats college - 9-12.30

Week 10  
Thursday  26  September  Inter - Regional Cross Country- Go Oscar!!!
Friday  27 September Last day of Term 3 

28 September - 13 October School Holidays

12 October - Second hand and new uniform sale - 2-3:30pm

Term 4, 2024

Week 2 

22 & 23  October School Photos (Inspire Photography) Summer uniform please. 

Term 1, 2025

30 & 31 January - Whánau meetings

Monday 03 February - Term 1 begins

Items found in the School APP
School Notices
Teacher Messages

Documents Section
Syndicate Newsletter  Term 1 and 2 
2024 School Dates
Winter Uniform Order form
St Ben's Handbook
Road Patrol Roster 

Widget link
Newsletter
SchoolDocs (Board Policies) 
Account information
Absences notification and rate of absences. 
School Calendar
MyKindo for lunch orders
HoK Facebook and Instagram

Tumuaki Korero - School Dates 2025

Tēnā koutou e te whānau ō Hato Penetika,

Thank you for the amazing baking !!!!

We wish Jina, Room 7 good luck for her performance as NEMO in the Finding NEMO Musical Starts performance at the Lower Hutt Little Theatre from 16-20 September.

Production
Thank you for being an amazing audience, taxi service, and all-round supportive community as we shared the production with you. The choreography was entirely our own, with the Year 7/8 dances choreographed by our students. We also appreciate all the positive feedback. Next term, we will be sending out a survey about our extra-curricular activities, including the production, so please take the time to fill it in. The link to photos is in this newsletter—please download them promptly as they will only be available for a short time

Positive Behaviour for Learning and KiVa Update

We have now finalised the pro-social behaviours we promote and our guidelines for responding to behaviour. We review our behaviour data daily with teachers, weekly with the leadership team, and at each board meeting. We’ve noticed two patterns we believe you can support us with to ensure our school remains a safe and happy environment for all.

The first pattern is that sometimes minor disagreements happen in the playground or classroom that tamariki don’t tell us about but later share with you at home. As a supportive community, you may respond by advising them to "just ignore it" or "not worry about it," since it might seem insignificant at the time. While we do want our tamariki to be resilient, dealing with annoying behaviours is often part of life. However, your whānau might hold a key piece of information that helps us identify behaviour patterns before they become entrenched.

You can support us by sending a quick email along the lines of, "I don’t think this needs to be followed up, but my child mentioned... Just letting you know in case it’s part of a bigger picture." We have many ways to support tamariki with their behaviour and it’s always more effective when we can address issues early, as patterns emerge, rather than when they are fully established.

The second pattern is linked to general illness and exhaustion among tamariki, which the production has contributed to. This is causing many tamariki to become emotionally dysregulated when they’re annoyed by others’ behaviour. Their patience is running low.

We’ve seen an increase in backtalk to teachers, forgetting safe play boundaries, focusing more on their own needs rather than the group's, and reacting to playground disagreements instead of walking away or seeking help, which escalates incidents.

You can help us by discussing with your tamariki ways to respect others' needs and how to recognise when they are becoming emotionally dysregulated. I also have a series of books called Aroha’s Way available in my office for any whānau to borrow if you think this might help.

Health and PE Curriculum Survey

Next week we will be sharing our biannual Health and Physical Education Survey. The survey will remain open until the beginning of next term.

School dates 2025
We have finalised our dates for 2025. The downloadable PDF  below will give you a printable calendar for your fridge.

Since the Board set the dates, the Ministry of Education has announced there will be two mandated teacher only days to support the new curriculum during the year. Schools will be able to choose when those days occur and need to give a term's notice to their communities.

We have not yet set these dates, as we are still waiting for information on the official providers we can work with for structured literacy in Years 4-6 and the new mathematics and statistics curriculum for Years 0-8, as well as their availability.

Finalised school dates for 2025 are
Professional learning – Leading by Learning 28th January with Geoff Childs
Staff Retreat 29th January with Pa Gerry Burns

30 and 31 of January Whanaungatanga meetings and Staff meeting days 

Term 1   Monday 3 February –11 April ( Easter and Anzac Day in holidays)
Term 2  28 April- 27 June (Includes Matariki and Kings Birthday)
Staff call back day in school holidays Friday 11 July
Term 3 s 14 July – 19 September Kāhui Ako Teacher only day  1st August
Staff call back day in school holidays Friday 3 October
Term 4  6 October- Wednesday 17 December (Includes Labour Day)

Onesie day

We raised $382 dollars for the Wellington Free Ambulance. Thank you for your support!

Mā te Atua koutou e manaaki,
May God bless and care for you. 
Tania Savage - Principal

Production Photo Gallery

Thank  you to Aneta and Jason Naylor for the fantastic photos taken during the production.  The link has a time delay so please view and download them as soon as you can.

Summer Uniform & P.E. Orders

In Term 4 the children will be wearing their summer uniform, please place your order with the office by 24 September if you require any additional items.  

Cancer Society support

Hello parents and caregivers of St Ben's School, my name is Immy Mazur and I would like to inform you that I am cutting off 40cm of my loooooong hair to donate to Freedom Hair to make a wig for someone who needs it. Before I do so, I have a goal of raising $500 to donate to the cancer society so they can use it for good. If you are interested in this good cause, please don't wait and help me reach my goal. There are so many people, young and old, who suffer from hair loss due to cancer treatment and we can play our part in making the world a better place by donating today. It does not matter how much you give because every cent is closer to my goal! 

 If you would like to donate please do the following:

1. Put a donation in the decorated box at the St Benedict's School office
2. Put a donation into the following bank account and mark 'Immy hair donation' – 06-0574-0273550-00

School Photos

Message from KiwiRail

A message from KiwiRail:

We will be doing some noisy work on the Johnsonville Line in Ngaio and Khandallah on the night of Wednesday, 18 September between around 7.30pm and 3.30am.

 We are using a piece of machinery called a tamper, which will be noisy for households within 100m or so of the railway. The tamper machine adjusts the track alignment by lifting the track and compacting the ballast underneath the sleepers to hold the track in place. It helps create a smoother ride for passengers. It moves at walking pace through each site and may run a couple of times through each site before moving to the next. If you are interested, you can see a video of our tamper in action here.

 There are three sites we plan to work at, starting at the south (Ngaio) and moving north:

1. Ngaio – from behind the library to a little beyond the ’Ngaio Village’ speed limit signs to the north
2. Khandallah – from Box Hill Station to Khandallah Station
3. Khandallah – from near the junction of Burma Rd and Kim St, up to the Rangoon St overbridge

 We apologise in advance for the disturbance. Any questions, please email contactus@kiwirail.co.nz. Enter your details here to sign up for occasional email updates from KiwiRail. Thank you for your understanding.

Student Celebrations

Congratulations to Hadleigh who was awarded MVP for his team the Year 5 Jaguar’s at the Wests Rugby Club end of year prizegiving. 

Congratulations to Luca T who received Most Valuable Player for the Wests Year 1 Kaka Rippa Rugby team and to Edmund F who was awarded Most Improved Player.

Congratulations to the following students who received awards at the Onslow Football Prizegiving recently:

Most Improved Player Gurkhas – Oliver L

Most Improved Player Delhis - Eleanor S

Most Valuable Player Oraris – Isla J

Most Valuable Player Colways – Peyton M

Most Valuable Player Lochiels – Daniel F

Most Valuable Player Simlas – James B

Most Improved Player – Charlotte McG

Breakthrough Girls Footballer of the Year – Grace F

 Eleanor, Peyton, Charlotte, Hazel, Daniel, James and Grace have all been selected to represent Onslow at the Weir Rose & McCartney Cup tournaments in the school holidays.

Sports Updates

Sports Uniform/Sportswear 

Mánuka Syndicate (Rooms 2-5) to wear sportswear on Thursday.

Kōwhai Syndicate (Rooms 6-9) to wear PE uniform on Monday.

Kauri Syndicate: (Rooms 12 & 13) to wear PE uniform on a Thursday. 

Touch Rugby

Kia ora all

With summer around the corner, St Ben's is getting ready for the Touch Rugby school competition that starts in Term 4.
Touch rugby is a fun summer sport for all, it complements a wide range of sports and is great for developing ball skills. 
The Term 4 competition is on Monday afternoon/evening at Alex Moore Park in Johnsonville and runs for 6 weeks, starting Monday, 4 November. 
Teams can be registered in the following grades:
• Year 1/2 Open• Year 3/4 Boys• Year 3/4 Mixed• Year 5/6 Boys• Year 5/6 Mixed• Year 5/6 Girls• Year 7/8 Boys• Year 7/8 Girls

If your child is interested in playing, please email Lizzie Hunter at lizziemid@gmail.com. Please also let Lizzie know if you are keen to help as a coach or manager.

We will also be starting up our social Sunday afternoon sessions again which all children are welcome to attend (you don't have to be joining a team to come along). Please contact Lizzie for more info on these.

Futsal Festival Update

Years 4-8

We will be leaving school at 9:00am on Friday 20 September.  The festival will finish at 2:30pm and we will head straight back to school.  Please note that we will likely be back to school after the 2:50pm dismissal.  

Every student will need to come in their sports uniform.  They will need a packed morning tea/lunch, drink bottle and appropriate sports shoes.

Thank you to all of the parent volunteers.  We are still looking for one volunteer for a Year 7/8 team. Please email molly.kelly@st-benedicts.school.nz if you are able to help!

The Year 0 - 4 Tournament was successful on Tuesday.  Thank  you to our wonderful Parent helpers.

Years 0 -3

Whole School Athletics

Whole school athletics will be held on Monday 14th October (Day 1 of Term 4, PP Friday 18th October) at Nairnville.  The Year 4 - 8's will be competing to qualify for Northern Zone Athletics (being held at Newtown Athletics Park on 4th November, PP 11th November).  The Year 0 - 3 will be participating in Athletic skills events run by Kelly Sports.  

2024 Construction St Ben's

Update 30 August

Room 7 is currently in  old Room 9 for a month to enable the rebuild of the decking and staircase to Room 7. The new staircase will take up a similar space as the current temporary staircase. 

The teaching walls are about to be installed in these classrooms and will be a fantastic modernisation of these classrooms. 

The Fire alarm and school bell upgrade is nearly complete. 

We expect that the work will be completed in time for the start of Term 4. 

Construction @ St Ben's

YUMMY STICKERS

‘YUMMY’ STICKERS’ – Now until the end of Term 3.   

Thank you for your collection of stickers.  

We now have 1977 stickers 

Last year our collection of stickers earnt us $720 to spend on sports equipment.   

It’s time to start collecting yummy apple stickers and the cut-out labels on the yummy 1.5kg apple bags.  You will find all your favourite yummy apples at your local New World or Pak’n Save (and some participating 4 Square stores).  Plus three new varieties now.

Eat ‘Yummy’ and support our school.  Crunch on apples and collect ‘yummy’ sports money. 

Collect the ‘cut out’ labels from the 1.5kg bags of ‘Yummy’ apples or individual ‘Yummy’ apple

stickers, available from New World and Pak’n Save stores.  Cash them in for Rebel Sports

gear for our school.  Send all your ‘Yummy’ stickers to the office.  

* Collect your sticker sheets from the office or visit www.yummyfruit.co.nz.  Let’s get munching.

FWFC

Kia ora e te whānau ō Hato Penetika,

Friends and Whānau Fundraising Committee update:

Father's Day breakfast What an amazing Friday morning at our annual Father's Day breakfast! It was heart warming to see so many dads, grandads, and role models gather for the event. If you couldn’t make it, be sure to check out the photos in this newsletter—you might spot yourself if you were there!  We’re thrilled to announce that we raised over $9,000 from the raffle and breakfast sales! These funds bring us closer to our turf and canopy project, with FWFC committing $50,000. Huge thanks to our sponsors, including Ian and Kim from New World Khandallah, for their generous contributions. Read more and view photos here in the FWFC newsletter. 

Next up is the summer school uniform sale: second hand items will be available for sale, Saturday 12 October 2-3.30pm in the school library. The school office will be open at the same time for new uniform sales. 

Any comments or questions on FWFC, please get in touch: sarah.garty@hotmail.com 
Ngā mihi nui, FWFC 

Entertainment Book

Holiday Writing Workshop

Love to sing?

The RSCM and Wellington Cathedral of St Paul is offering a two-day holiday programme just for you!
Make new friends, learn new music, and improve your singing skills with one of New Zealand’s foremost choral directors.The 2024 RSCM Two-Day Choir School offers two days of singing and fun, culminating in a service featuring the premiere performance of a brand new piece of music specially composed by the Cathedral’s Director of Music Michael Stewart.

WHERE: The Wellington Cathedral of St Paul, 2 Hill Street, Wellington. Wednesday, October 9, 2024 Drop Off: 9am Pick Up: Between 04:30pm - 05:30pm Thursday, October 10, 2024Drop Off: 9am Choral Evensong: 05.30pm Pick Up: 06.00pm COST: $140 for both days including lunch and snacks (there are a limited number of scholarships available - contact dom@wellingtoncathedral.org.nz)Billeting can be arranged with Cathedral Chorister families for singers coming in from out of Wellington.
The link to the website is: https://www.wellingtoncathedral.org.nz/choir-school and tickets  payment is via Humanitix: https://events.humanitix.com/choir-school

Parent Road Patrol Roster

NICHOLSON ROAD
(Mornings and Afternoons)
Parents: Please be present from 8:25am - 9:00am and again from 2:45am - 3:15pm

Wider Community Notices