From the principal: 2021 Week 3, Term 2
Tēnā koutou katoa
Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou
Welcome to Term 2 week 3.
Thank you to all of the families that came to our senior parents evening. Please remember that you can always contact your children’s teachers and deans through email or by calling up the school and making an appointment.
Community
As one of ARCH values - Community - it was great to see all of the students getting involved with the Greymouth Council’s ten year plan. The council were really impressed with our students' responses and ideas and have asked some of our school leaders to talk to them on 2nd June about the submission. This is a great opportunity for our young people to really make a difference in the future of Māwhera.
Ākoranga
I’ve been thinking about learning and understanding how we learn even when it is hard for us. I was talking to a student about finding certain things in class difficult and I was telling them about my challenges in lighting fires - to be honest it’s a bit of a family joke. I don’t like lighting fires and I like even less keeping them alight. I always find myself getting distracted by other things and one thing about fires is that you have to keep checking on them. I’ve had to find ways to make sure that I know what to do and keep myself on top of it! After watching youtube videos, phone calls, talking to people at work, alarms on my phone to remind me to check it and general trial and error I think I pretty much can do it and keep the house warm(ish). This weeked I used coal for the first time and again I had a number of conversations including with the people at the petrol station and I also looked on the internet for help before I could start to use it successfully.
I had a purpose (the why) for what I was learning (to make sure I wasn’t cold), I could link it to my prior knowledge of how to light a fire, albeit badly, I had methods to support me in how to do it (using technology and asking for help) at different stages, I could see improvements (fire lasted for a while), I still made mistakes but kept on going - resilience.
Our rangatahi need to see us as adults finding things difficult and trying hard to succeed. None of us can do everything well!
On Tuesday we had our second Accord Teacher Only Day looking at Mana Ōrite mō te Mātauranga Māori and Literacy and Numeracy in terms of school culture the NCEA changes. We worked alongside JPII and enjoyed the kōrero with them. Thanks to Whaea Erin, Whaea Kylie, Angela Seyb and Sandra Quick for all of their work. Also, thanks to Shelly Chapman and Miriam Rees who worked with our teacher aides. This day brought up answers, questions and ideas which we will follow up in the coming weeks. Our next day is 11th August and then on 2nd December. Also, on Friday, July 2nd we have a Staff Only Day, where our focus will be on Culturally Responsive Learning and Teaching.
“Whāea te iti kahurangi - strive for success”
Ngā mihi nui
Samantha Mortimer
Principal