St Benedict's School Pānui ā-rorohiko (Online Newsletter) Term 3, week 4, 2025

Upcoming Events from our Calendar

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Term 3, 2025

Week 4 - Australian Maths, ICAS Digital tech, ICAS Writing exams
Tuesday 5 August - Perform education show - Maybe a miracle  9am  whole school 
                                      - Pickleball Wellington - Rooms 9 - 13
Wednesday 6 August - Te Reo & Kapa Haka / Year 7&8 Technology
                                             - BOT Meeting - 6pm
Thursday 7 August - Class Mass - 9:00 am / Class liturgies 9-9.45am               
                                         - Pickleball Wgtn - Rooms 2- 8 - 9am - 12:30pm
Friday 8 August -  FWFC DISCO

Week 5 
Monday 11 August - Murphy EPIC reward
Tuesday 12 August - Pickleball Wellington - Rooms 9 - 13
Thursday 14 August  Year 7/8 Handball Tournament FINALS Ākau Tangi
                                             Pickleball  - Rooms 2 - 8 
Friday 14 August - Feast of Assumption Liturgy in Library 

Week 6
Monday 18 August BSLA training Year 7/8 teachers
Tuesday 19 August BSLA training Year 7/8 teachers
                                       1:30pm - 3pm PUM for some teachers and support staff - school open and classes  combined
Thursday 21 August  1:30pm - 3pm PUM for some teachers and support Staff- school open and classes combined
Friday 22 August  1:30pm - 3pm PUM for some teachers and principals - school open and classes  combined

Items found in the School APP
School Notices
Teacher Messages
Documents Section
St Ben's Handbook

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

School Board Elections

We have received four nominations for our School Board. Please keep an eye out in your inbox for your link for voting and information about our candidates. 

Catholic Character

Sacramental Programme 2025 have been confirmed
The full Programme will run over Term 2 and into term three finishing on the 16th November with the First Communion Mass.
The Timetable is as follows...
                 Saturday  August 9th 2.00pm Reconciliation Practice
                 Sunday August 10th 2.00pm Reconciliation
                 Sunday 31st August 11.15am Confirmation Session 1
                 Sunday 7th September 11.15am Confirmation Session 2
                 Saturday 13th September 2.00pm Confirmation Practice
                 Sunday 14th September 2.00pm Confirmation Mass with Archbishop Paul Martin
                 Sunday 2nd November 11.15am Communion Session 1
                 Sunday 9th November 11.15am Communion Session 2
                 Saturday 15th November 2.00pm Communion Practice
                 Sunday 16th November 2.00pm Communion Mass
Please note that the Sunday Sessions start immediately following the Sunday Mass and all participants and their families should attend Mass before the sessions.
The Programme is being run on behalf of the Parish by Pat Collier and Natasha Telles.  
Please contact via email: sacramentalprogramme@stfrancisohariu.nz

Tumuaki Korero

Tēnā koutou e te whānau ō Hato Penetika,

Grandparents Day
Thank you to all who came to celebrate Grandparents Day with us, which is how St Benedict’s School acknowledges the feast of St Joachim and Anne who were Jesus maternal Grandparents.

The buzz in the staff room for morning tea was electric and the tamariki were so excited to share their classrooms with an array of nana and poppa, gran, gramps, grannie and granddad. In Room 3, they were even put to the test with their phonological knowledge!

Our Grandparents bus was full so some of our grandparents travelled with a class. This was a delight to hear about as a few years ago we only had a hardy group of 10 catching the Grandparents bus.

Father Alfred shared a beautiful sermon, and the Catholic Character team led the mass with reverence and poise. Thank you to all who made this such a special day.

Thank you
Last week I was privileged to support the Year 7/8 Handball teams who competed in a qualification tournament. I want to say a special thank you to Mana, Wendy and Terry who supported our teams so well. Our tamariki represented our school with pride and I was particularly impressed at how well the teams supported each other. Best of luck for the finals Year 7/8 Boys on the 14^th of August.

Year 7 and 8 Information Evening
Year 6 families, please join us for an information evening to meet the Year 7 and 8 teachers, see the classrooms, hear about the classroom programme and listen to some former students' experiences. This is a great chance to get a feel for our Intermediate school and ask any questions you may have. We hope to see you there on Tuesday 16 September @ 5:30 pm in Room 13. 

Whole School Art Exhibition and Strategic Plan - 4^th September 3-6pm
We would like to invite you to a special opportunity to help shape the future of St Benedict's School. During our upcoming Art Exhibition, we will be holding a strategic plan review session.

This session will use a SCOT review process to gather your feedback. A SCOT review focuses on:

• Strengths: What are we doing well?
• Challenges: What are the obstacles we face?
• Opportunities: Where can we grow and improve?

Your valuable insights into these areas will help us create a strategic plan that truly reflects our mission: "To provide a challenging, co-operative, supportive environment which incorporates Catholic ideals, attitudes and practices where children, teachers, parents and community work together to continue the full development of the child in learning for life".

The current strategic plan focuses on three key goals:

• Excellence in Education: Providing a tailored curriculum that ignites a journey of discovery and excellence.
• Catholic Character: Nurturing a transformative Catholic education that sparks the flames of faith and deepens bonds with our parish community.
• School Climate: Cultivating a positive school climate through improving communication, enhancing environments, and strengthening governance.

We will have dedicated feedback stations set up during the exhibition, and members of the school board will be available to discuss your ideas.

Perform Education Show

This week the whole school enjoyed the show 'Maybe a Miracle' performed by the Perform Education Show.  

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Grandparents Day

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Can you help us?
We are looking for volunteers to support the preparation of new resources and the ongoing upkeep of our library. These tasks are perfect for a quick 20-40 minutes in the morning or prior to pick up and are toddler friendly. It doesn’t need to be each week, just when you have the time to help.  We will even provide hot drinks!

Change in Communication
Over the past four years we have used a school mobile number to send reminder text for events the evening or morning of.  Unfortunately, our mobile provider has upgraded their system and is now charging us 50c per number in a group text – averaging $47 per message. Further investigation has found that all mobile providers are now doing this.  As this is not an ongoing cost we can maintain we will now use the mobile text for emergency communication only. Please make sure you have signed up, accessed and have notifications turned on for our school app. Most of our messages come out through this medium and a duplicate email, if you have chosen this preference, is sent. Please be aware that some email providers change their filtering systems regularly and these messages can suddenly be classified as bulk emails or spam and get sent to your spam folder. We also use the parent what’s app groups to share more time pressured information on occasion so please make sure you are a member of your Tamariki class groups.

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

Year 7 and 8 Information Evening

Year 7 and 8 Information Evening Year 6 families, please join us for an information evening to meet the Year 7 and 8 teachers, see the classrooms, hear about the classroom programme and listen to some former students' experiences. This is a great chance to get a feel for our Intermediate school and ask any questions you may have. We hope to see you there on Tuesday 16 September @ 5:30 pm in Room 13. 

Rooms 4 & 5 connect with Malvina Major residents

The first penpal letters received by Room 5 students from their new friends at Malvina Major. The students loved the effort that the MM locals had put into their letters and found them really interesting. We heard from artists, writers and other people that have had a lifetime of interesting experiences... we will continue to find out more with our next post...  Thank you to Cressie's dad, Albie for helping co ordinating this.

St Patrick's College Con Anima Fundraiser

Please support the St Patrick’s College choir, Con Anima, who are hosting a concert to help raise funds to travel to Dunedin for The Big Sing Finale!   We have the following St Ben's old boys in this choir: Matthew R, Sean D, Matthew B, Xavier J and Jack McD.

Sports Update

Handball Years 7 & 8 - Boys - 1st place, 'Most Impressive Attack' award with Harrison receiving 'Best Trick Shot'.  

Last Tuesday on the 29th of July 20 of the Year 7 & 8 students went to a Handball tournament at Ākau Tangi Sports Centre. None of my team had played much of this sport so it was a great experience. It took us a while to learn the rules and stop playing by netball rules though. In handball, you're allowed to take three steps with the ball before passing or shooting, and you have to dribble if you want to move more. It took us a little while to figure this out, but over the day, we got a lot better. Everyone at the tournament was really nice and great at explaining the rules to us. At the end of the day there was a short prize giving, our team (The Diamond Divas) received the “Best attacking team” award and Jillian got the “Best fast breaker” award.

By Charlotte, Room 13

On Tuesday 29 July 20 people from Year 7 and 8 went to Aku Tangi Sports centre to participate in a handball tournament. Each team played five games across four hours. Everyone gave it their best shot and scored many points. The boys team won the whole tournament winning every game they played, now they will now be going onto another tournament on Thursday the 14th of August. While the girls team did not make it to the next tournament they still gave it their best shot and stayed strong till the end.  

By James, Room 11

It was a fun experience playing against other schools, being with my friends and winning. By Henry, Room 12

It was fun learning how to play handball. I got more used to it as we played more games. As a group we worked as a team.  By Harrison, Room 12

It was an amazing experience being with my friends and learning a new sport. It was great to see other schools involved as well.  By Toby, Room 12

It was fun to meet my friends from other schools, our team was great at defence, and we had two awesome goalies, and we were able to beat other teams.  By Hosea, Room 12

We performed well as a team and achieved great results. My aim is to score a goal in the finals. By Rhys, Room 12

New Sport Shed System 
We are introducing a new system for the use of sports equipment from the top P.E. shed. The bottom P.E. shed is strictly only for teachers when they wish to play a game with their class.
When students wish to use a piece of sports equipment at morning tea and lunch the students will line up at the top P.E. shed outside of Room 3 and 4. The sports monitors will be outside the shed for a period of 10 minutes at the start of playtime to issue sports equipment to play with (we will record the students name and classroom).  The monitors will not open the shed after that period of time. When the first bell rings to signal there is 5 minutes of playtime left the sport monitors will be waiting to check off students who have returned their piece of sport equipment. If a student does not return the equipment they issued twice, then the student is not allowed to issue sport equipment for a period of 1 week.
This makes sure that P.E. equipment is not left lying in the playground and is available for everyone to use.
Written by Winston, Year 7 Room 13

KINETIC YOUTH

Kinetic Youth! Designed for athletes aged 7–13 years old this programme focuses on building strong athletic foundations through a fun, play-based approach to movement. Each session will help participants develop dynamic movement patterns that support overall athleticism while highlighting softball-specific skills. Perfect for young athletes at all levels, this programme is all about moving with purpose, building coordination, and laying the groundwork for success in softball and beyond. The programme will run for three consecutive weeks in each regional hub, so every athlete has a chance to get involved.

• Link to register: https://www.sporty.co.nz/viewform/361234

Student Celebrations

Our students continue to be EPIC

Congratulations to Natalie who recently competed in the Junior Wellington opens, Level 2 and placed 2nd overall.  This also included competitors from Christchurch.

Congratulations to Haidy and her Cheer team Aspire, who placed second in the Battle in the Bay competition out of 12 teams competing in the same level! 

Congratulations to Frank who received 'Player of the Day' at his first Miniball game.

ASC Highlights

School dates 2025 and 2026

School dates for 2025 
Term 3  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)

School Dates 2026
The Ministry of Education (MoE) have allocated two school days for delivering the new mathematics curriculum in 2026. Our Professional Learning and Development (PLD) days have been allocated at the beginning of the school year and subsequently make our start for 2026 a bit unusual.  The School Board have approved the following dates for 2026.

Please note there are two Teacher Only Days that are yet to be allocated in Terms 2-4, we will confirm these once they are allocated:

Thursday 29th and Friday 30th of January Whānau teacher Meetings
Monday 2nd and Tuesday 3rd of February MoE Mathematics PLD Staff only 
Term 1 Wednesday 4th of February  - Thursday 2 April 
Term 2 Monday 20 April - Friday 3 July 
Term 3 Monday 20 July - Friday 25 September 
Term 4 Monday 12 October-Tuesday  15 December 

FWFC

Kia ora e te whānau ō Hato Penetika,

Friends and Whānau Fundraising Committee 

Kia ora e te whānau,

Friends and Whānau Fundraising Committee (FWFC) update: 
The St Benedict’s School Disco is tomorrow!! 
Reminder of key information below. We look forward to a fantastic event!! Thanks to all our fantastic volunteers and Disco leads - Rach, Lizzie  and Theresa. 
When: Friday 8th August 2025
Years: 0-4: 5.30 - 7pm
Years: 5-8: 7.30 - 9pm
Where: The Village Church Hall, Ganges Road, Khandallah
Tickets includes entry to the disco, pizza, and unlimited water. 

Fizzy drinks, lolly bags, candy floss, popcorn and merchandise will be available to purchase. There will be a face painter at the early session, and an Instax photo booth at the later session. Everything will be $1 - $4, so bring your gold coins!

So we can plan our catering & merchandise, RSVP & payment is required by Friday 2 August 2025. Please pay into the HOK account (12-3141-0352804-00), referencing your child's/children's name/s and room number/s.https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScPSYSBS0fm7lTHwmkGyB8cdjLGxzSIUPj9ITzPe8P7MxyZ9Q/viewform 

Please contact Sarah or anything FWFC related: sarah.garty@hotmail.com 

Entertainment Book

'Yummy Stickers'

Thank you to Lucia & Lachie, for their collection of stickers.  We now have 1900 stickers.

This promotion runs until 20 October so send in your stickers and keep munching on 'Yummy Fruit'.   

Sticker sheets can be found on the 'Yummy Sticker' website: www.yummyfruit.co.nz or just pick a sheet up from the office.

Children's Opera - "Noyes Fludde"

Call for chorus members in Children's Opera - "Noyes Fludde"

NOYES FLUDDE is a work by renowned composer Benjamin Britten, telling the story of Noah and the Ark, which we will be performing on October 17 and 18.
We are currently looking for children to take part in the 'chorus of animals' - no audition is required, just a desire to sing and be part of what will be a terrific occasion!
 Any enquiries should be directed to Michael Stewart at dom@wellingtoncathedral.org.nz

Drama Lessons available at 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

ezlunch lunch orders