Relationships – Whanaungatanga, Resilience – Manawaroa, Respect – Manaakitanga, Responsibility – Tiaki

A community of agile and collaborative learners – Proud of who we are, empowered to make a difference

Kia Ora, Nǐ hǎo, Hallo, Greetings,  

Welcome to all our new students and their families who have recently joined us: 

Thank you for attending the student led conferences and Hero sessions over this week.  I hope you found them informative and enjoyable.  If you have further questions about Hero, please contact Moira (m.rowlands@bbps.school.nz).  

Choir

Our choir did us proud, giving an outstanding performance at the HPPA music festival at Bucklands Beach Intermediate.  It was a wonderful evening of musical talent and singing, and a great opportunity for the local schools to work together.   Well done to our choir members who gave up some lunchtimes to train.  A big thank you to Tamsyn and Debbie for training and organising our choir.

Matariki

Twinkling in the winter sky just before dawn, Matariki (the Pleiades) signals the Māori New Year. For Māori, the appearance of Matariki heralds a time of remembrance, joy and peace. It is a time for communities to come together and celebrate.  Last Friday, BBP students and staff spent the day engaging in lots of different activities to celebrate Matariki.  The students were put into whānau groups with students from year 0 – 6 all working together, and moved around the school trying different activities.  All students had learnt about Matariki leading up to this day, so should be able to tell you all about it.  Thanks to Mrs McIntosh for organising the day.

 Nano-Girl 

Nano-girl had us all enthralled with the range of scientific demonstrations she did for us.  From blowing smoke rings across the hall, to using a leaf blower to make a hover-craft which James got to ride on.  Our young scientists left the hall inspired to go and try some of the experiments out.  Nan0-girl got the students to make a hypothesis (prediction) before each experiment.  She was blown away by how much scientific knowledge our students have already.   Thanks to the PTA for funding Nano-girl.

Communication

All of our school communication goes out through Hero.  If you haven’t yet installed the app on your phone, I’d encourage you to do so as you can stay logged in and it is very easy to report an absence or check a notice.   Hero allows us to message groups within the school, as well as the whole school.  Last week you were bombarded with messages, which I apologise for.  We are working on a streamlined communication strategy to ensure this doesn’t happen going forward.  Please do keep reading the communication. 

Planning for 2022

I know it seems very early, but the Ministry like us to predict our roll and generate our staffing numbers for 2022 based on the enrolments we know about and historical data. If you have a sibling starting in 2022 (or in term 3 or 4 in 2021), we would appreciate you jumping on Hero and filling out an enrolment form.  Likewise, if you have friends whose children are coming to BBPS in 2022, please encourage them to enrol online.  Many thanks for your help.

Thanks Mitre 10!

Mitre 10 Botany popped in for morning tea to give us a voucher for $250 which will be used to help the senior school develop their mindfulness space.   The voucher was in recognition of the participation of our school in the Howick walk/fun run.   Thanks Mitre 10!

Generous Community

Thank you to all of those families who purchased a pay it forward ticket.  Your kindness towards others in need is wonderful to see and part of what makes this such a special community to be a part of. Recently we have also had a number of local businesses make a one off donation towards one of our projects, which we are also very grateful for.  Being a decile ten school, we get the least amount of funding, so receiving these donations really helps us to be able to offer more for all students while maintaining our school.  If your business would like to make a donation to the school or one of its projects, please drop me an email.  We are currently looking at putting up some new shade sails between the library and room 10, and the possibility of a pool cover to keep the temperature warmer for longer.

Enviro in Action

Last term, some of our senior enviro enthusiasts were invited to take part in the “Clean Plate, Less Waste” e-book initiative.  This fantastic opportunity came through the sustainable school’s conference held at the end of 2020.  We were the second of eight schools that were involved in this pilot project. 

As you may have guessed from the name, the initiative aims to create an e-book of tasty food recipes, which the children can make for their lunches without having packaging waste.   During this experience the students enjoyed the chance to prepare (and eat) some nutritious, litterless lunch options.  We made three Japanese recipes – sushi sandwiches, onigiri (a shaped rice ball) and homemade teriyaki sauce.  

It was amazing to watch how focussed our students were listening carefully to the facilitators and watching what to do.  I was proud to watch them show so much respect, enthusiasm, ask questions and try new and old types of foods.

The final product was made available online to share with all students. Click on the links below for the recipes and an insight into our day.  You could try them out over the holidays.  See what you enjoy and perhaps they can become a lunch favourite – enjoy!

A big thank you to Howick local board, who funded the initiative.

Promo video: https://youtu.be/PxRpNcjpXr8

https://www.cleanplate.co.nz/e-cookbook

Mrs Knox (Enviro Leader)

 PTA

A big thank you to our wonderful PTA who organised food for the new parent morning tea, provided dinner for the teachers during student-led conferences and have funded the purchase of new soccer and rugby uniforms.  The last rugby jerseys were from the 1980s!  Thank you also to Moira for organising the Geography-a-thon and to you for supporting.  I was impressed by how much our students learnt – a great opportunity to build general knowledge.

Isaac and Assetwise have organised awesome prizes for our top chocolate sellers.  

 Term Dates

Term 3 – Monday 26 July – Thursday 30 September (Teacher Only Day Friday 1 October)

Term 4 – Monday 18 October – Wednesday 15 December (Teacher Only Day Thursday 16 December)

I hope you enjoy some quality time with your whānau over the break.  We look forward to seeing you next term.

Kelly Slater-Brown

Tumuaki

We know it’s been a tough period for most families and for our children. For this reason, when we discussed fundraiser initiatives for the year, we wanted to include something that could make a difference in the lives of the families of the Bucklands Beach community. Given the year we’ve had, financial wellbeing stood out for us as we all want to protect our families, our jobs, and our lives. We’re therefore excited to partner with Assetwise, a financial services company providing specialist advice for all your Kiwisaver, mortgage, and insurance needs. Assetwise shares our wellbeing vision and is offering our families a free, no-obligation consultation whether you want to review your existing policy, add to your portfolio or start your financial journey. For every policy confirmed, a contribution of $250 will be made towards the PTA’s fundraising. We encourage you to support this fundraising initiative by completing this form or for more information, contact Isaac Govender on 021 136 5183. Please also spread the news by sharing this offer with your friends and whānau.

Community notices.

There is a small change that Auckland Transport will be making to one bus service.

From the first day of Term 3 2021, The 428  from Botany To Bucklands Beach Intermediate and Maclean’s College will start running 3 minutes earlier than at present.  The bus will depart bus stop number 6231 from Stop A Botany Town Centre at 7:57am.  There will be no change to the route.

Please see attached for Art Class information

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