Kia ora whānau. This photo was taken recently at lunchtime and shows some of our students creating chalk artworks. What I love about it is how engrossed they were in what they were doing, that they didn’t even know a photo was being taken. Thank you to Bev Boyd for capturing this.

Catalogues were sent home this week, BUT if you didn’t get one don’t despair - please check with your classroom teacher or the office to get your copy. Orders need to be placed by Wednesday 10 August. In this issue they are offering free books when you spend over a certain amount. See below.

It is NZ Maths Week next week! Although we celebrate Maths on a daily basis, this week is extra special as it is all about recognising how maths is EVERYWHERE!

I am happy to share with you our student Olivia’s achievement in the 2022 Hamilton Competition. Olivia won first place in the class Solo all strings 9 to11 years, and she was awarded for the best performance under the age of 10. Therefore she won two trophies, the Rolf Cup and the Registered Music Teachers Cup. Congratulations Olivia, we love hearing about your accomplishments!

The Yummy sticker promotion is set to go again for 2022, time to get crunching and collecting stickers. Last year threw us all some curved balls, but this year we are excited to be celebrating our 25th anniversary of running this promotion for schools. Everything is basically the same as previous years, sticker charts are the same and available on our website. One thing you may find, is some Hailstone Hero apple bags. We had a wild spring storm hit us in Hawkes Bay, damaging a significant amount of our apple crop with hail. Although these look funny, they still taste yummy. The official cut-out is not on these bags, but you can collect the round bar-code sticker as 10 points. These are Yummy apples but branded Hailstone Heroes and available in both New World and Pak’n Saves.

Tuesday 30 August is a Teacher Only Day so FOMS will once again be securing two Jump Trampoline exclusive hire sessions to fundraise towards an upgrade to the Year 3 and 4 Playground.

In Week 8 of this term, we will be celebrating all things Literacy. Throughout the week, there will be various activities the children will be able to take part in, including visits from guest authors. During the author visits, children will be able to gain valuable insights into what it means to be an author, and how authors work to engage their readers.

Jordan and Austin came to share their learning with me this week, and told me all about what they had been doing. Jordy was happy to share his recycled and reused materials dump truck, connected with the Sharing the Planet unit of inquiry. Austin shared his 100 days at school presentation, which was made out of 100 little seeds/beans glued together to make his "Happy 100 Days" poster! What a celebration of the time our newest children have spent at school so far! Each morning, our Year 0 and 1 students count the number of days they have been at school and learn about counting in bundles of 10 as well. 100 days at school is always a great excuse for a celebration. Tino mahi e tama!

Evie, Natty and Abby from Room 16 showed me their work this week and it was fabulous! The structured literacy programme is empowering our learners to know and use letter sounds so well, as shown by these three children who not only wrote their tricky sentences, but were able to use their knowledge of letter sounds to decode the words too. As Evie said, "Make the sound of the letters, sound them out, just like Mrs Smith said!" These learners are so capable and confident, it is a pleasure to see. Kua whakapau kaha koe tamariki.

This week we continued with the Learner Profile Attribute of being Balanced. This means that we look after our mind, our body, and our emotions. We try to stay happy and healthy by choosing good, healthy food, doing lots of physical activities, getting enough sleep and doing our best at school in our learning.

The Year 1 students have started a new Unit of Inquiry this term, called "How We Express Ourselves". This inquiry focuses on understanding different feelings and how feelings can be expressed and experienced through the arts.

At the end of Term 2, Year 3 completed our unit of inquiry investigating Where We Are In Place And Time, with a particular focus on homes and journeys. This week, children have set up the homes they created into a mini town called Fern Village. They have enjoyed using this town to learn about position and orientation. Children have written directions on how to get from one place to another using compass directions, left and right, and 1/2 and 1/4 turns. Well done tamariki!

The students in Room 11 have really enjoyed learning about their emotions and expressing themselves during our "How we express ourselves" unit of inquiry.

This Thursday, half of the Year 5 students visited the Chelsea Sugar Refinery to learn about the production of sugar. We went on a train tour - the train had no tracks. We observed the different stages of sugar - from the ship to the shelves in the supermarket. The baking class was enjoyable. We made delicious chocolate chip biscuits with a partner. Boxed them up and some survived the journey to get home - but many needed to be eaten. The interactive room taught us cooking skills, about the sugar plant, the history of the area and olden-day cooking tools. That concludes our trip. We loved it and would gladly go back. Sophia J Room 5

Last week, the Year 6 Team was lucky enough to participate in the Food For Thought Programme. This consisted of a nutritionist from Foodstuffs spending two sessions in our classes teaching us about what a balanced diet looks like. Also, we learnt how to read food labels so we can understand the difference between an "everyday food" and a "sometimes food".

It was a lovely sunny day on Thursday this week. The children gathered together and spent some time pulling out the weeds that have started to take over during the holidays. Each person also got to take home a mini succulent plant. We must also acknowledge the hard work of the Compost Club children, who work diligently on Tuesdays to clean up the garden with Mrs Sommers and Mrs VC.

Guitar Lessons are available at Milford School, with Dave Gatman from Musiqhub. If you would like to enrol your child to start Guitar Lessons or if you require any further information, please contact Dave on 021 2221456 or dave.gatman@musiqhub.co.nz.

Run by Young Guns Skate School at Takapuna Primary School | 23 Auburn Street, Takapuna on Thursday afternoons.

Buy anything from fashion retailer Shine On and use code 'MILFORDSCHOOL" at checkout. You will receive a 5% discount on your order and an additional 5% of your order will be donated to Milford School. Offer closes 8 August.

See attached enrolment information for Skids before and after school programme, including their weekly activity plan for Term 3.

Please note that the following advertisements are from external sources / businesses and are intended to be informative for the reader. This does not imply that they are endorsed by Milford School.