Welcome to Term 4 Newsletter 2024

Kia ora tatou, Talofa lava, Mālō e lelei, Kia orana, Bula vinaka, Namaste, Nǐ hǎo, Salve, Bonjour, Kamusta, de Groeten, Greetings.

I trust you have had some good family and friend connection time over the break, and you are ready for the new term ahead. It is a special time, especially for our Year 8 young people for whom this is their last term of primary school. We wish them all the best for a great last term ahead.

We head into Term 4 looking forward to a good run of weather where we can encourage our ākonga | learners to interact with each other and enjoy the outdoor activities we provide. Our PALs (Physical Activity student leaders) have been organising games and activities for the different age levels, and our staff are also offering other organised activities during the break times to support with development of new skills. We also have increased staff engagement during these times where we focus on connecting with ākonga. Our data regarding our whole school behaviours for Term 3, has shown a 37% reduction in behaviour posts from those in Term 2 - this in part, we put down to the change in learning timetable, the focus on providing engaging opportunities in break times for all our ākonga and the consistent expectations we have across all areas of the school. We sincerely thank our school whānau for your support in what we are doing as a school community regarding Positive Behaviour for Learning.

As indicated in our last newsletter, we have our third cohort of teachers attending structured literacy professional learning as provided by the Government. This will mean that all our Year 1-3 teachers will have had the prescribed professional learning before the end of 2024. Next Year, the Government will be providing all Year 4-6 teachers with their professional learning in structured literacy. Already, most of our staff have had experience in visiting other schools or learning about structured literacy over the last 2 years, however this very "structured" and consistent PD is important to maintain across the school.

We start the term as always, with our Mihi Whakatau, a welcome to our new children, whānau and staff. Please feel free to come along for the first half hour of the day to also welcome our new school community members.

I have added our enrolment information into the newsletter. This hopefully we prompt any existing whānau to pre-enrol their child, or let other friends you may have living in our zone to also do the pre-enrolment. This helps us in our planning of the classes for 2025 if we have accurate numbers.

Thank you for your ongoing support of our school.

Keep smiling

Shane

In this newsletter:

• Mihi Whakatau to start the term

• Reminder of our 2024 term dates (with the last term to go)

• Hats for Term 4 reminder

• Uniform guidelines and requirement reminders

• Enrolment opportunity for Ngā Rākau e Rua

• General enrolment reminders

• Term 4 Staff only day reminder - November 18

• 2025 Term Dates to help with your planning

• Reminder of communication @ Rangiora Borough School