Kia ora koutou Whānau,

Delilah and I at the top of Mt Grey.

It’s lovely to be back at school again. Delilah is nearly 6 months old and it’s been so nice having special family time with her at home. We had a month away in a campervan around the north island, which we all loved and have had lots of little adventures along the way! She will now be out on the farm with George, spending time with Grandparents or coming in to see her Mum and her Omihi whānau. She’s a lucky little girl.

Firstly I would like to say a big thank you to Penny for taking over while I was away. It was lovely to have complete trust in Penny and be able to just focus on our little girl. Penny did a fantastic job and I’m so grateful of the support she got from our board, staff and community. Thank you to Sally, Megan and Ruth for stepping up and taking on extra responsibilities while I was away.

I started back on Friday, all ready to help with the final stages of set up for our Omihi School Farm Race. Unfortunately it wasn’t to be and was out of our hands. Safety is our priority, so after seeing how wet and windy it got, I know we made the right decision. So much time and effort goes into an event that size, so it was a real shame to have to cancel again. We appreciate all of the time and effort that everyone put into it. A special thanks to Kate, Amy, Leighton, Nick, Sofia, Jane, George, Jeremy, Kurt, plus our whole community for donating your time and prizes. We are going to use the prizes for a raffle at the beginning of 2021.

Penny and I have been looking into our classes for next year. We are excited about our team and have had a small change around of year groups in each class. As we have more teachers for 2021 we aren’t going to be merging classes as often as this year. The classes for next year are:
Paemoana Year 0-3
Penny Vincent

Awaawa Year 4-5
Georgie Smith

Tūpari Year 6-8
Sally Mickleson

Awaawa will split on Monday afternoons and all day on Friday. Year 5 will go to Tūpari and year 4 will join Paemoana.

I will be covering release every Friday and across all three classes throughout the term. Sally and I will be working closely with the seniors and Penny and Georgie will work closely with their two classes.

Ngā mihi
Maree Lucas
Tumuaki/Principal
principal@omihi.school.nz

School Notices

Principal’s Award
The latest Principal’s award went to…Christian Esler!

Teacher only day
A reminder that it is teacher only day this Thursday, 12th November and Show Day on Friday, so there will be no school on these two days.

Year 5-8 Assembly
We invite you to our final assembly of the year on Friday, 20th November at 2pm.

Reports
Your child’s maths comment will be published on Hero this Wednesday.

Grandparents Day
Grandparents Day is on Tuesday 17th November. We invite our grandparents in at 9am to have a tour of the school and join their grandchild’s class, then join us for a morning tea at 10am. If you are able to bring a plate for us to share, please let me know - principal@omihi.school.nz.

Athletics
Congratulations to everyone who participated in athletics last week. Good luck to Lily Banks, Rowan Inkson, Charlie Murphy, Leni Wilkie, Christian Esler, Billy Esler, Tom Hazeldine, Xsara Mann, Emma Waldron, Sione Lealiki Waldron, Jack Sloss, Georgie Macefield, Violet Inkson, Maggie Hamilton, Daisy Kay and Monty Croft who are competing at Kowai Athletics on Monday.

Kapahaka Performance - Year 4-8
On Tuesday, 1st December from 10am-12pm our Year 4-8 children will be attending and performing at the North Canterbury Kapahaka Festival at Ohoka School Hall.  Our school has 50 tickets only for this.  The cost per ticket is $5.  If you haven’t purchased your tickets yet, please contact Ruth today. We will need transport to this event. Please let me know if you can help with transport or if you will be taking your child directly there - principal@omihi.school.nz. I will be taking the bus from Omihi as well.

Tough Kids Challenge
On Wednesday 18th November our Year 3-8 children will be competing in the Sport Canterbury Tough Kids challenge. This is being held at South Brighton and sells out every year.  This is a really fun event where children run/walk/crawl/jump/roll/climb/paddle their way through a range of obstacles and challenges.  We need parent transport for this, as we are not taking the bus. Please let me know if you can help with transport - principal@omihi.school.nz. Children need to be there by 12.15pm, ready for the 12.30pm briefing. It will be finished by 2.20pm. All information is on the Primary Sports Canterbury website.

Sports Spectacular
On Wednesday 25th November our Year 1-3 children will be heading to the Kowai Sports Spectacular event at Amberley Domain.  We invite parents to come and watch. I will be taking all children in the bus from Omihi. You are welcome to take your child straight home afterwards.

Camp - Year 5-8
A reminder to please send your camp forms back if you haven’t already.

Prize giving and whānau picnic
Our end of year prize giving is on Wednesday 16th December at 11.00am. We usually have a separate day where we have a whānau picnic, but we have noticed that parents are finding it harder to join us on this day due to it being such a busy time of year. So this year we will have our whānau picnic at school from 12.00-1.00pm after prize giving. A chance to catch up, eat some kai and celebrate our student’s successful year.

Community Notices

Tēnā koe,

Our Apps, Devices & Porn parenting evening is just over two weeks away (Thursday November 19th) and we would really appreciate your help in continuing to promote this within your networks. I know these conversations can be awkward, but the challenges are reality for our rangatahi and without courageous conversations change doesn’t happen.

This is an awesome chance for parents to not just gain knowledge, but more importantly the skills to have great conversations and support their young person to manage these often tricky subjects. 

This workshop will be really worthwhile for anyone with children of any age (it’s a conversation that’s best to start younger) and we’d appreciate your help in getting the word out!  Tickets are $5 but we don’t want anyone to miss out if this is a barrier so please get in touch if this is the case and we’ll get them sorted. 

For more information and registration you can check out Eventbrite or Facebook. Click HERE for downloadable posters and graphic for screens. Please let me know if you need any printed media delivered, and thank you for your support!

Ngā mihi,
Stephen McQuarrie, 0274659951, Rangiora Youth Community Trust, ryct.net.nz 

Biodiversity: Our Heritage & Our Legacy

The Hurunui Biodiversity Trust’s Invitation Address with Tā Tipene O'Regan has been rescheduled, for Monday 23 November. This will be an informative, entertaining and thought-provoking discussion with Tā Tipene, who is a distinguished Ngai Tahu kaumatua, scholar and advocate. He will explain ways Maori view the importance of our native biodiversity for its cultural and spiritual as well as ecological values, then discuss what sustainable custodianship of the land means from a Maori perspective and how to achieve this together so that our natural resources are in good shape to support generations to come.

 Time: 7 – 9pm, supper included. Venue: Omihi Hall, cnr SH1 and Reeces Road. $5 donation appreciated. RSVP by 19 Nov tohurunuibiodiversity@gmail.com, of via Facebook: Hurunui Biodiversity Trust

Kia ora koutou Whānau,

We have had a lovely start to our term. Agri Sports/Pet Day last week was a real highlight and we are looking forward to more exciting events coming up in the next few weeks. 

You will see from my notices below that this is a very busy term with lots of dates to remember.  Please go through and mark them in your calendar.  This term requires a lot of parent involvement with working bees, volunteering and transport of kids (and animals) to events.  I would like to thank our parent community for their continual support in helping us raise funds, keep our school clean and tidy and run and attend events.  We are incredibly grateful.

This will be the last newsletter that I write from the Principal’s Chair, as Mrs Lucas will be back on November 6th. We have been lucky to have her in for a few relieving days between now and then too. I would like to say a huge thank you to everyone for your support whilst I have been Acting Principal.  It has been a privilege to take on the role in such a special school and community.

Ngā mihi
Penny Vincent
Acting Tumuaki/Principal

School Notices

Pet Day
Pet Day last week was a huge success. I would like to say a huge thank you to Julie, Nick and Leighton for organising everything on the day.  Thank you also to Nick Hamilton, Jeremy Kay, Leon Parish and Neil Evans for coming in and being our judges.  I am glad to say that with a bit of a community effort we managed to catch the chicken which escaped across the road the next day!  Please can you return prize giving cups from last year so we can engrave them.

Athletics
Next week is a very busy one with athletic events for all of our children.  On Tuesday 3rd November (pp 4 November) our Year 4-8 children are participating in the Small Schools Athletics event at Waipara School.  The event starts at 10am which means children need to be at Waipara School by 9.45am.  On Wednesday 4th November (pp 5 November) our Year 0-3 children will be participating at the Waikari/Greta Valley Athletics day. This event starts at 9.30am which means children need to be at Waikari School by 9.15am.  We are asking parents to transport their children to and from these events please.  If you are unable to transport your child and cannot organise them a ride with someone else, please can you let us know by tomorrow. If we do not hear from you we will assume your child has transport organised. 

 School Photos
School photos are now ready to order.  All you need to do is head to http://www.claireinkson.com/omihi-school and enter the password which has been emailed to parents. From here you will be able to view all the images, order what you would like and they will be shipped to you directly. A huge thank you to Claire Inkson for coming in and taking the photos. 

Working Bee
This week is our Working Bee week.  Thank you to everyone who has put their names down for a job.  If you have not been able to put your name down for a job, you are more than welcome to add your name to one of the gardening options as ‘many hands make light work’.  If you have any questions, please feel free to get in touch and I can point you in the right direction. 

Farm Race
Our annual Farm Race event is coming up on Sunday, November 8th. We still have spaces on our volunteer form that need to be filled.  If you have not got your name down for anything and you or someone you know are able to help out, please email Jane ASAP at hamiltonglens@xtra.co.nz

Kapahaka Performance
On Tuesday, 1st December from 10am-12pm our Year 4-8 children will be attending and performing at the North Canterbury Kapahaka Festival at Ohoka School Hall.  Our school has 50 tickets only for this.  The cost per ticket is $5.  We will limit these tickets to three per family to start with.  If you would like to purchase a ticket, please email Ruth by the end of this week.

Grandparents Day
Our annual Grandparents Day was unable to happen earlier in the year because of Covid restrictions.  We now have a new date.  We will be holding our Grandparents Day on Tuesday 17th November.  This will run from 9-10.30 am.  Invitations will be sent home for this closer to the time.

Tough Kids Challenge
On Wednesday 18th November our Year 3-8 children will be competing in the Sport Canterbury Tough Kids challenge. This is being held at South Brighton and sells out every year.  This is a really fun event where children run/walk/crawl/jump/roll/climb/paddle their way through a range of obstacles and challenges.  Expect the kids to get wet and muddy!  More information regarding travel to this will come out closer to the time.

Sports Spectacular
On Wednesday 25th November our Year 1-3 children will be heading to the Kowai Sports Spectacular event at Amberley Domain. 

NZ Playhouse
We are looking forward to having NZ Playhouse come and perform their production of ‘Chilled’ for us this Wednesday.  I am sure the children will enjoy being the audience members instead of the performers this time around!

Amberley Show
All of our children have art entered into the Amberley Show this weekend.  Their amazing backdrop that they painted for production is also going to be on display.  Please head down and check it out.  Thank you to Jaz and Tom Hazeldine for helping with transport and setting up of our production backdrop down at the show grounds.

Reports
The teachers have been busy completing maths assessments over the past two weeks.  In week 5 of the term each child will have a maths comment posted on Hero.  At the end of the term children will receive a general comment and principal’s comment and their achievement sliders will be completed.

Community Notices

RESILIENT HURUNUI presents Dr Jo Fountain and Michael Bennett, Lincoln University. They will talk about the North Canterbury focused  Post-Quake Farming Project in the context of climate change and COVID-19, including opportunities emerging for Agri-tourism.

Thursday Nov 19th at 7.30p.m  Amberley School Hall $5 donation appreciated

Kia ora koutou Whānau,

I hope you have all had a lovely break.  I had a lovely break at home enjoying time with my chldren and feeding two lambs and two baby wild piglets which my husband very kindly brought home….. Miss J and Miss Mickleson both enjoyed time spent with family up in the North Island. 

We are looking forward to getting into the final term of the year. We have lots of exciting things planned for the term ahead.  Our inquiry this term is called ‘Beyond our Borders’. The children are going to be having a lot of fun exploring all corners of the world.  

We have a busy few weeks ahead so please take the time to read the whole newsletter to see what we have coming up.

Ngā mihi
Penny Vincent
Acting Tumuaki/Principal

School Notices

Welcome
A big warm welcome to Sione and Emma who are joining us.  We are really looking forward to having you with us.

Production
I would like to acknowledge the wonderful work of all the children in our production of Cinderella Rockerfella last term.  It was an amazing way to finish the term and we are so incredibly proud of what they achieved.  Thank you to the parents and community for your support with helping this happen last term.  We are working on getting the video of the performance shared with you as soon as possible. For the families who have not paid for their tickets - please can you organise payment online.

 Pet Day
We are very excited that our annual Agri Sports/Pet Day is coming up on Wednesday next week (21/10). Today the children will be bringing home an entry form.  Please fill this in and return to school by Wednesday of this week (14/10).  The day will start with Agri-sports at 9.30am.  All pets need to arrive at 12pm.  Judging and events will then take place and the day will end with prize giving at 2.30pm.  If you have any questions about this please let me know.

Working Bee
We are holding a working bee during the week of 26th October to 1st November.  We would like to invite our parent community to please put their family name next to a job on this Working Bee Form.  Each of the jobs has a number under it which clarifies how many families we think will be needed to complete the job.  When you are filling in the form, please place a date next to the job and then once you have completed it, sign it off.    If you have any questions, please let me know.

Farm Race
Our Omihi School Farm Race is not far away now, on November 8th.  A reminder that it would be great if you could please continue to generate interest in the event by putting up posters and sharing farm race social media posts.  A volunteer list will be shared soon so please ensure your name is down for this if you are able to help out.  We appreciate your support.

2021 dates
We have confirmed our dates for 2021.  School will start on February 3rd and finish on December 16th.  In term 1 there will be a teacher only day on March 8th.  There will also be three other teacher only days throughout the year (one each term).  We will confirm the dates for these later on this year.

Term 4 change of bus run
The bus run for term 4 will be Reeces Road, South then North.

Community Notices

Amberley Tennis - The opening at Amberley went very well this weekend, despite the spitting rain on Saturdays the wind on Sunday.  Love Tennis was well supported by many locals from around Amberley and North Canterbury. Next for us is to start the coaching for all who wish to start their journey or to brush up on their skills.

Tennis Coaching starts Sunday, 18th at 11am.

Anyone interested should turn up and we can get you registered and work out what day or times will work for you. Coaching will take place at Amberley Tennis Club every Friday (starting 23rd October) after school at 3:30pm and Sundays from 11am. We are again hopeful with grant applications that it will be heavily subsidised as in previous years, however, this is yet to be confirmed as this year’s funding is hard to find.

Many thanks - Simon Bennetto 

The Bitches' Box & Mel Parsons are back on the road with a BRAND NEW night of hilarity and entertainment! (some shows are close to selling out already, so don't dilly-dally. To book your tickets and for all event info click: 

https://www.eventfinda.co.nz/tour/2020/the-woolshed-tour-presents-lifes-bitch-mel-parsons

The Woolshed Tour presents 'Life's a Bitch' & Mel Parsons - an unmissable evening of music, theatre and comedy, complete with BBQ and bar. Each event will start with a fundraising BBQ dinner run by the local school or community group - come hungry and support your local kids.

Resilient Hurunui presents Dr Hamish Rennie, Associate Professor at Lincoln University,  lecturing on environmental planning, policy and law.. He will present The Resilient Farm Planning Tool which was co-developed with NZ Federated Farmers and prototype-tested in Hurunui.

Amberley School Hall, Thursday October 22nd,  7.30p.m $5 donation appreciated.

Kia ora koutou Whānau,

This is the last Principal’s Newsletter for Term 3! 

It has been a big, busy and vibrant term.  We are all crossing our fingers that we can share the pinnacle of our learning with you through our production of Cinderella Rockerfella next week.  All of the tamariki have worked incredibly hard in their production roles and I could not be more proud of what they have accomplished.  Though their numbers are small, their presence is mighty!!

As we draw to a close on Term 3 there are some things that we need to start thinking about for Term 4. Please make sure you read through this whole newsletter as there is lots of important information, including significant dates for next term.

Have a safe and happy Term 3 holidays everyone and I look forward to seeing you all in Term 4!

Ngā mihi
Penny Vincent
Acting Tumuaki/Principal

School Notices

Welcome
A big warm welcome to Kurtis Hullah who has joined us in Tūpari. 

Principal Awards
Congratulations to Daisy Kay, Maggie Hamilton and Tom Hazeldine who were our Principal’s Award recipients this term. 

Speeches
Congratulations to Jeremy Pennell, Maggie Hamilton and Daisy Kay who were our top three place-getters in our school speech competition.   Well done to Jeremy and Maggie who went on to participate in the North Canterbury Lions speech competition.  You represented our school with pride.

Production
Our two production performances (11am 23/09 and 6pm 24/09) are coming up next week.  Production tickets are now on sale.  The tickets are $5 each.  If you would like to purchase tickets please contact myself or Ruth and we can set these aside for you.  You are able to pay for these in cash or online.  The tickets can be sent home with your child or put aside for you to collect on the night if you are unable to get into school to pick them up.  Ticket sales are limited so make sure you grab some soon.

We are hoping to live stream or record the production for those that are unable to attend on the night due to distance.  If you know someone who may be able to assist with this during one of the performances, please let me know. 

Thank you for all your support with the costumes for your children.  We are having a full dress rehearsal tomorrow so please ensure your child has every part of their costume at school with them.  This includes plain underclothes for underneath the costume as no children will be wearing any school uniform as part of their costume. 

It is very important that your children are at school over the next two weeks during our rehearsals.  We would ask that any unnecessary absences be avoided between now and the end of term please.

We are looking for a pair of bloomers, earrings, a lunchbox with a handle, a step ladder and some old hair brushes and clips as props for our production.  If you have anything like this at home we would really appreciate being able to use it at school. 

Dental Van
The Dental Van will be visiting on Wednesday, 16th September for those children who require a check-up.  Please see attached notice on the website.

3WLC and Art Comments
It was lovely to meet up with so many of you last week and discuss your child’s progress and next steps.  If you have been unable to attend, your child’s teacher will be in touch to arrange another time that is convenient for you.  Arts comments will be published on Hero at the end of next week for each child.

School Photos
Our school photos are scheduled to take place next week on the morning of September 24th (Thursday).  Please ensure your child arrives at school with the correct school uniform.  Thank you to Claire Inkson for being our photographer.

Camp
I will be finalising our bookings for camp this week.  If you have any questions or your child’s attendance plans have changed, please let me by tomorrow.

Term 4 Dates
Here are some important dates to add to your calendar for Term 4:

Wednesday 21 October - Agri Sports and Pet Day
Saturday 31st October/01st November - Working Bee at school
Sunday 8th November - Omihi School Farm Race

Term 4 change of bus run
The bus run for term 4 will be Reeces Road, South then North.

Cricket Skills Sessions 
These will be available for 6 weeks starting in October for Years 1-4. The sessions will be held after school on a day yet to be confirmed. The venue is Waipara school. To register contact James Hoban via messenger or email james.hoban@outlook.co.nz.

Community Notices