Kia ora whānau

Triathlon training is underway!

It was lovely to head along to the Markham St Festival on Saturday and support our local events. Then a reality check when we were sent back to level 2 last night. We are following guidelines from the Ministry of Education and Ministry of Health and are crossing fingers that we are back to level 1 soon, so we can go back to enjoying the freedom we were getting very used to and these fantastic local events.

Each year we try to limit our fundraising to two main events, so we aren’t continuously asking for parent input. Things are slightly different this year as after cancelling our Farm Race twice last year we have decided to have a break from that event. Our fundraising helps us to fund our third teacher and enables us to have our lovely small class sizes. The fundraising committee will be asking for support with the following events this year:

* Selling raffle tickets
* Selling/buying pumpkins
* Helping with car parking at the Waipara Wine and Food Festival
* Running the bar and raffle at the Omihi Spring Ball

The Waipara Wine and Food Festival is on Sunday 7th March. If you are able to offer half a day to help with car parking, please contact Jane Croft on hamiltonglens@xtra.co.nz.

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

School Notices

Omihi School Raffle
All children have been given 20 tickets to sell. Please send back the money and the tickets by Friday 5th March.

Pumpkins fundraiser
Sofia Sloss is kindly organising the pumpkins for us. Please email Sofia if you would like to buy pumpkins and she will deliver them to you. She is happy to do a run to Waikuku as well. They are $5 each or 5 for $20. You can give cash straight to Sofia or pay to the school bank account before delivery. If you are paying to the school bank account, please copy Ruth in on your email to Sofia.

Year 5-8 Triathlon
This is on Wednesday 24th February at Amberley Domain. The briefing is at 12.30pm and the race starts at 1pm. All information has been emailed out to parents. Parents need to pick children up and take them to the domain. They can go straight home after the event. Parents are very welcome to come and watch.

Year 0-4 Triathlon
This will be at Omihi School on Tuesday 16th March at 2pm. Penny and Georgie will be in touch with more details closer to the time.

Year 4-8 Swimming Sports
These are at Amberley Pool on Thursday 4th March from 9.30am - 12.30pm. Parents will need to take students there and then drop them back to school afterwards. I am not available to drive the bus that day, so please try to carpool or contact me if you have any trouble. We are entering the children into events at the moment, please talk to your child about whether they will swim widths, one length or two lengths.

Running Club
The children are keen to start running club again. I am struggling to find the same day that suits each week, so if your child is keen please let me know and I can send out a weekly email with the day and time on it. We will aim for 8am for Year 5-8 and lunchtime for Year 0-4.

Waiswim
Waiswim lessons start daily on Monday 22nd February for two weeks. Each child will be part of a group lesson for 20mins. Please send togs each day and a rash vest if you have one.

Farm walks
The Lucas farm walk is still going ahead for Awaawa tomorrow and the Pennell farm walk on Wednesday for Tūpari. Please ensure children have their hats, good walking shoes and a drink bottle. We will travel there by bus. Please ensure car seats are at school if needed.

Bloomfields Preschool and Amberley Library
Awaawa are going to Bloomfields Preschool and Amberley Library on Tuesday 23rd February. Please ensure car seats are at school if needed.

Mini ball and Hockey
Waipara School are putting together a year 5/6 mini ball team and a year 7/8 hockey team and have offered us to join them. If anyone would like to join, please let me know.

ICAS Assessments
ICAS assessments are optional each year and are paid for by parents. If you would like your child to complete these or would like more information, please contact me.

Library Books
Please can you return any library books which were borrowed over the holidays.

Community Notices

Waikuku Surf Life Saving
Please vote for the Waikuku Surf Life Saving in the Mainpower Community Fund. A number of our students are part of this club.

Kia ora whānau

What a lovely start we have had this year, welcoming Miss Smith, Macy, Liza, Leo, Alex and Lavi to our Omihi whānau. We are excited to have our cleaner Sharryn joining us as a part time teaching assistant for term 1. It was also lovely to meet Tamar’s new baby boy Dovi, who was born on the last day of school in 2020.

It’s been so nice to hear all the stories about what everyone has been up to in the holidays. We had a lovely time in Akaroa and enjoyed taking Delilah out on the boat and on lots of hikes with her in the backpack. The teachers and I also had a fantastic two days in Akaroa planning for this year and spending time exploring the wonderful landscapes of Banks Peninsula.

There are lots of exciting things going on this term, so please keep an eye on our calendar to keep up to date. As always, the teachers and I are available if you need to chat or want to come and see us. This year Ruth is working Monday afternoons from 1pm and all day Wednesday. She will respond to emails on those days, so if it is urgent, please feel free to email me.

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

School Notices

Congratulations to our Prize giving recipients from 2020:
Omihi Values - junior - Isobel Harris
Omihi Values - senior - Violet Inkson
Speech cup - Jeremy Pennell
Sportsperson of the Year - Charlie Murphy
Excellence in Arts - Daisy Kay
Academic - Maggie Hamilton

Beach Ed
Here is all the info for Beach Ed at Waikuku Beach on Thursday 4th February.

Hats and togs
Please ensure children have hats and togs at school every day. We encourage children to wear rash vests in the pool if they have them.

Sushi and Subway
We have the opportunity to have Sushi and Subway again this year, but only if we have parents that are able to pick them up. Subway is from Rangiora and Sushi is from Amberley. Please let me know if you are able to help with this.

Whānau Picnic
We welcome all of our whānau on Tuesday 9th February from 5-7pm for a picnic. BYO picnic, the BBQ will be available for you to use and the pool will be open.

School Raffle
Sadly last year we didn’t end up having any fundraisers, as the Farm race was cancelled twice. We have all of the prizes from the race that we are putting together for a raffle. Each child usually sells 10 tickets at $10, but after feedback, we have changed the price to $5 and each child will have 20 to sell. These will be sent home in the next couple of weeks. There will be one other fundraiser this year, once the fundraising team have met we will be in touch with further details.

Waitangi Day observed
Waitangi Day is observed on Monday 8th February, so there will be no school on this day.

Pumpkins
The Glenmark Lions have kindly donated pumpkins to the school for us to use as a fundraiser. We need someone who is happy to take the pumpkins and organise payments and pick ups. Please let me know if you are able to do this. Last year Nick brought them down to school a couple of afternoons for people to pick them up.

Farm Walks
The whole school will be participating in farm walks this term. Paemoana and Awaawa will be walking around our farm and Tūpari are walking on the Pennell’s farm. Dates are in the calendar. We will take the children in the bus, so we don’t need help with transport, but parents are welcome to join us. Awaawa and Tūpari are walking in week 3, and Paemoana is later in the term.

School of Rock
Music Lessons Term 1 - How does it work? - One day a week there will be group, individual and/or band music lessons available at the school within school time. In the lessons the students will learn the fundamental techniques associated with their instrument and a "song". The "song" could be anything from new school to old school, classical to rock.  These are optional private lessons that parents pay for.

Music Google Enrolment Form: https://forms.gle/xqsPnahSiH4Mat8E6

Community Notices

Resilient Hurunui
Resilient Hurunui starts the year with a talk from Dr Nicholas Prince, Lecturer in Agricultural Systems Management at Lincoln University. He
will be speaking about how farmers can address social concerns for issues such as water quality and CHG emissions. Feb 18th at 7.30p.m, Amberley School hall, Douglas Road, Amberley. $5.00 donation

St Andrews College
The St Andrew’s College family wish to extend an invitation to you and your family, and prospective families from your community, to join us for refreshments and hors d’oeuvres for a St Andrew’s College promotional evening. We very much hope you will be able to join us.

Venue:  Waipara Hills, 780 Glasnevin Road, Waipara
Date:  Monday 1 March
Time:  5.00pm – 7.00pm
RSVP:  Please click here to register before Monday 22 February

Kia ora whānau

As I sit here and write my last newsletter of the year, I am reflecting on a very crazy and unpredictable year we have had. A big thank you to our students, staff and community for their continued support to help us navigate our way through 2020.

We say thank you and farewell to Megan and wish her luck for her adventures back in the Wairarapa. Thank you to Tamar who has been a wonderful teaching assistant this year and we can’t wait to meet your new baby in the new year. Thank you to Ingrid, Wendy and Pete who helped us to look after our gardens throughout the year.

Thank you to our Board of Trustees for all of their support. Farewell to Ingrid, Jaz and Nicholas, and welcome to Emma who has been co-opted on from the start of 2021.

Farewell to our Year 8’s - Maggie, Tom, Violet, Xsara, Ace and Toby, we wish you all the best for your exciting year coming up. We also farewell Charlie and Arthur, and can’t wait to hear all about your new schools in Christchurch. We hope you come back and visit us.

Penny, Sally, Georgie and myself are on a planning day tomorrow. We have some exciting plans ahead for 2021, and look forward to sharing these with you in the new year.

Have a lovely holiday and a very Merry Christmas. We are looking forward to our first Christmas with our little girl.

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

School Notices

Structured Literacy at Omihi
This year we have started implementing a structured literacy approach to our literacy programme. Next year we will be moving forward with this throughout the school, as well as setting up an intervention programme that Penny will be leading in the afternoon. Below is some information around what structured literacy is, and in term one we will be running parent sessions around what it looks like for us at Omihi. We look forward to sharing more of this with you in 2021.

Information about Structured Literacy
Children in NZ schools are currently taught in a whole language programme. This is an implicit approach whereby children learn to read and write along the way through exposure to text. When reading children are encouraged to use strategies such as 'look at the pictures or the first sound' and take guesses at a word. Evidence based brain research has shown that this is not the way our brain learns to read. While some children are lucky to learn by osmosis through this whole language approach, many are not. It is currently common for 30 - 40% of NZ children to be below in reading and writing despite interventions such as reading recovery being put in place.

Structured literacy teaching means the knowledge and skills for reading and writing are explicitly taught in a sequence, from simple to more complex. Children learn to decode simple words such as tap, hit, red and fun before they read words with more complex spelling patterns such as down, found or walked. Decodable books with restricted spelling patterns are used in a structured approach that links with the knowledge and skills that children have been taught. Structured lessons also allow mastery of letter and sentence formation so progress is made in writing too. Structured literacy emphasizes oral language abilities essential to literacy development, including phonemic awareness, sensitivity to speech sounds in oral language, and the ability to manipulate those sounds. Structured literacy approaches will reach a much wider range of children and provide reading success for able and struggling readers.

Camp 2021
Year 5-8 students will be going to Wainui for our 2021 camp between 22-24 September. We will give you more details on cost in term 1 and will be asking for parent helpers closer to the time.

Kahui Ako - Community of Learners
Thank you to Sally who was our Within School Lead for our Kahui Ako this year. Sally did some great work around Enviroschools and Digital Technology. Penny will be our new Within School Lead in 2021 and will be focusing on Structured Literacy.

I am continuing as Support Principal for our Kahui Ako in 2021 and will be Acting Lead Principal for term 2, while our Lead Mike Hart is on sabbatical.

Prize giving
We welcome you to our prize giving on Wednesday 16th December at 11am. Our whānau picnic will follow from 12-1pm and the pool will be open during this time.

Kapahaka
Our students did us proud at Kapahaka last week! I have filmed each performance and will upload these onto Hero. Thank you to Matua Rihari, Sally and Megan for working with our students throughout the year.

Reports
The teacher and principal comment, along with Maths/Reading/Writing graphs will be published on Monday.

Stationery for 2021
You can order your school stationery here for 2021 - https://www.myschool.co.nz/omihi. It will be delivered straight to your home. The school books will be issued from school at the start of the year and we will invoice you directly for those.

Community Notices

Hello Summer Pool Parties
We are excited to be hosting a pool party at our school on Tuesday 19th January between 11-1pm. These are free, and all are welcome!

Kia ora whānau

Miss Smith has been relieving for us ahead of starting here in 2021.

Thank you to all the parents who have been helping with transport for our numerous events this term. Due to events being changed around throughout the year, we have ended up with a lot in term 4, so we appreciate your support. What lucky children to have so many wonderful opportunities!

On Friday I met with students regarding their feedback on what they love about our school and what we can do better. This is something I do each term and I truly love it. We call ourselves ‘one big whānau’ and we definitely are. I asked our students if we could share the feedback with parents this time as I was so humbled by the lovely things they had to say about their teachers, their school and their friends. You should have received this on Friday. Some of the trends that jumped out to me were that they love that we are a small school, that everyone plays together and the amount of opportunities they get from being in a small school. (Plus they love that we have a swimming pool, a basketball court and a school dog and ‘school baby’ ;) )

I feel lucky to be principal here.

Ngā mihi

Maree Lucas
Tumuaki/Principal

School Notices

Principal’s Award
Last week’s Principal award went to…..Charlie Murphy.

Welcome
Welcome to Liza Elphinstone who came to visit us on Friday. Liza will be starting in Year 5 in 2021. She has 4 year old twin sisters who will be turning 5 later in 2021.

Camp
Thank you to Penny who has organised our school camp. The children are very excited about going away on an adventure to Arthurs Pass.

Stationery for 2021
You can order your school stationery here for 2021 - https://www.myschool.co.nz/omihi. It will be delivered straight to your home. The school books will be issued from school at the start of the year and we will invoice you directly for those.

Library Books
Please can you ensure all library books are returned to school by Friday, 27 November. The Amberley library is going to be issuing every child with 10 books over the summer. Yo is picking them out to suit each child. Lucky children!

Kapahaka - Tuesday 1st December
Children need to be in their kapahaka uniform and meet at Ohoka Hall at 9.30am on Tuesday 1st December. The school bus will leave from school at 8.30am, so the normal Omihi bus run will not be running that morning. Here are the transport details.

Year 0-3 Sport Spectacular
The Sport Spectacular is on at Amberley Domain from 10-2pm on Wednesday 25th November. Mrs Lucas will drive all the children in the bus and Miss Mickleson and Tamar will stay with the children. We welcome parents to come along and watch. Please ensure children have their sunhats, lunch and a drink bottle.

No Lunches online this week
Due to Camp and Sports Spectacular there are no lunches online this week.

No school bus
The school bus is not running on the morning of Tuesday 1st December, due to kapahaka.

Mufti Day - Friday 4th December
Please can you send a can of food for the Foodbank on our mufti day.

Year 7/8 visit to ARA
As part of our Careers programme, the Year 7-8 students will be attending ARA with Waipara, Greta Valley and Broomfield School on Thursday 10th December. The students and Miss J will be travelling in the community bus that Waipara School are organising. We will let you know further details nearer the time.

Pool Key
The pool is now open and keys can be purchased from the school office. The cost for school families is $50 and you will be refunded $20 when you return the key at the end of the season.

Prize giving and whānau picnic
A reminder that our prize giving is on Wednesday 16th December at 11am, followed by a whānau picnic between 12-1pm at school.

Community Notices