He mihi mahana ki a koutou katoa - Warm greetings to all.

Easter is almost upon us and we have been thankful for this lovely autumn weather over the last few weeks. It has allowed us to do many outdoor activities. Long may it continue through the next two weeks!

It was great to see so many of you at our Cross Country last Friday and the Orange traffic light setting just announced will mean we will see of you next term. Further information will be sent out tomorrow.

I will keep you posted as to what this means for you, your tamariki and our staff after that. 

Our main unit this term has been on diversity and today is our dress up day.  As usual you will be sent some photos so you can share in the day. 

I'd like to thank our staff for their focus on keeping the learning and teaching going even if they were isolating.  I'd particularly like to thank Kellie Englefield for setting up our home learning system and Jane Sewell and Anne in the library for ensuring tamariki got devices and or hard packs while they are isolating.

A special thanks to our new DP, Nicky Horne who was undeterred by COVID and worked hard this last term to set up all the intervention programmes, even with tamariki and staff coming and going from isolation.  The SENCO in our school is huge and Nicky had a lot of systems and challenges to deal with very early on so all credit to her, her team of Learning Support and our kaiako in ensuring targeted learning takes place.  Nicky has already met and worked with with many of you and if and when we open up under the traffic light system you will all see more of her.

Omicron doesn't take holidays, even if we do.  We anticipate that learning will continue to happen in many homes well beyond the two week holiday break. We may have had our peak but all indications are that we will live like this for a while to come. So continue to be vigilant.

Tomorrow - Thursday the school is CLOSED for Teachers Only Day.  Our staff are working on Maths in preparation for the curriculum refresh, revisiting behaviour management strategies and cooking in a Master Chef competition to celebrate diversity at our kura.  Watch out for the videos!

Happy Easter everyone.