Kia Ora Koutou Katoa, Talofa Lava, Malo e Lelei, Ni Hao, Anyoung Haseyo, Konichi Wa, Gruetzi, Guten Tag, Bon Jour, Ola, Hello.

Walking around the school this week it is clear that our students are thoroughly engaged in their learning and excited by the variety of learning opportunities available eg students are enjoying specialist Mandarin and Te Reo Lessons across the school, specialist music lessons and in Year 7 & 8 they are planning for fundraising to purchase robotic equipment for their learning. Our Year 5 and 6 students are excited about their camp next week. Thank you to the teachers in the Year 5 & 6 team for all the planning and organisation that goes into amazing experiences like this for students. A big thank you to all of those parents attending who help to make camps like these a reality.

Camp Review:

Recently the Senior Leadership team sat down to review our Education Outside the Classroom (EOTC) Camp experiences. EOTC provides students across the school with a range of opportunities to develop personal and social skills to become active, safe and skilled in the outdoors, and to protect and care for the environment. EOTC provides students with many opportunities to learn outside of their classroom walls and enhances the delivery of the New Zealand Curriculum across the school.

All students have the opportunity to be involved in a variety of different experiences outside their classrooms which enhance and support their learning and are linked to focus learning goals across curriculum areas. Much of this time is day trips which support classroom learning but each year from Year 3 students also have the opportunity to attend school camp.

We aim to develop student capabilities through this learning progressively in relation to their age and stage of learning.

(see document below of overview of school camps across the school)

You will notice there are a few changes. These changes are in relation to listening to parent feedback over the last couple of years, the school’s annual calendar of events and staff feedback.

In Year 3 & 4 we have decided to do a day trip to the beach one year and in the alternate year to still do the overnight tenting experience – but to do this in a known, familiar environment that is our school back field. We hope this will take a bit of pressure off the overnight part of the camp at this age level. Being in Term 4 – this is a celebration at the end of the year together and the cost is not happening at the same time as another camp. If the weather is not great we can also sleep in the PAC and classrooms.

In Year 5 & 6 we have found an alternative camp to Totara Springs where we have been going for a number of years. This is Waitawheta Camp at Waihi. This camp will have an adventure/history focus and will be more cost effective and easier for parents to attend for the day. We will continue to attend Okataina Camp in the alternate year and this camp will have an increased bush focus.

In Year 7 & 8 we will continue to have two camps a year. These take place Term 1 or 2 and Term 3. Earilier in the year our Intermediate students attend a four day camp with a Leadership and Arts focus. In Term 3 they attend a sports camp at Totara Springs which sees each student live in over four days, taking part in multiple sporting opportunities in competition with schools from around the upper North Island.

We are so conscious of the cost of camps and the need to balance this with providing a quality experience for our students that is challenging but safe. Utilising expertise is vital in this day and age with any activities that involve risk in order that we meet Health and Safety requirements. This expertise costs. We add to this the need for safe, manageable environments while students and staff are away from school. We believe the changes we have made will enable us to still provide great, progressively challenging experiences as students move through their years at Tauriko School. Spreading events over different terms should also help with cost. We will send notices home in Term 4 for Year 3 – 8 camps indicating costs for camp for the following year and we will continue to encourage families to pay these off over time before camp starts.

Charter Review:

In Term 2 the Board of Trustees and I will begin the school’s formal Charter review progress with the school community. The meeting for this will be 6pm Tuesday 8 May. A notice will go out next week for parents/caregivers to RSVP shortly. Please keep an eye out for this. I look forward to having as many people attending as possible as the more input we have from the community, the more rigorous the strategic direction of the school will be. All those that attend will go in the draw for dinner at Mills Reef to the value of $200.

Looking into the Future:

Looking forward into the future and building an innovative and high quality school requires us at times to look outside ourselves and be supported to think creatively and consider new ideas. Lisa and I will be at the Future Schools Conference in Melbourne next week. Jo Te Whaiti will be Acting Principal while I am away and she will be supported by our wonderful Team Leaders and the rest of the staff.

Lisa and I also plan to visit three Melbourne Schools at the end of the conference to look more at 21st Century learning and spaces and learn from our colleagues in Australia.

China Trip

I will also be travelling to China on Easter Monday for the last two weeks of Term 1 as part of a Tauranga Mayoral delegation. I will be marketing our school as a quality educational option for Chinese International students with a range of other schools, Toi Ohomai, The University of Waikato, The Bay of Plenty Rugby union, Export Bay of Plenty, HZP & Co, The Mayor and Mayoress of Tauranga and Education Tauranga. Greg Simmonds, our BOT Chairperson, will also attend representing Priority One.

I will also travel to Wuhan during this trip to meet Wuhan Ruijing Primary School staff and students who communicate with students from our school online in the Little Diplomats programme. This programme is a wonderful way for our students to practise their mandarin and for the students at Wuhan Ruijing Primary School to practise their English. In this small way our students are also experiencing global citizenship.

Enjoy the last few weeks of the school term.

jìng shàng

Suzanne