We are celebrating the births of two staff babies. Chris Panther's daughter, Frankie was born on the 12th February and Anna Clark's son Jack was born on the 15th February. Congratulations to these families!

Māra Kai|Food Garden

Thank you to the PTA who have installed a fabulous māra kai in the school. It will become a valuable source of learning and includes eight raised garden beds, three worm farms, a compost bin and potting bench and sink. Chelsea Smylie has put significant time and energy into realising this project for our community to enjoy. Thank you for your effort. 

Thanks also to a number of businesses that have supported the project:

• Canterbury Landscape Supplies for their donation of soil 
• Beaver Trees who delivered bark to site at no cost
• Oderings for the donation of plants 
• The PTA for providing the garden beds, compost bays, edging, potting up table and new worm farm frame. 
• Christchurch Airport contributed $1000 as a donation

Curriculum Focus 

Writing

Our teaching staff has begun professional development in Writing. This important strategic focus involves direct and explicit instruction to enable writing skills to become automatic. These skills include handwriting, spelling, punctuation and generating sentences. Automating writing skills can free up the mind to allow for creativity and complex thinking about what is being written. This video explains these ideas further.

One Hour a Day of Reading, Writing and Maths

Schools | kura with students in Years 0 – 8 are now expected to spend an average of at least an hour a day each teaching reading, writing and maths. A flier explaining this requirement and ways for parents to help at home is available at the bottom of this article.

Communication

Our Communication Plan outlines our priorities for clear, honest and  timely communication, and how we will communicate with the community. It is of particular importance for parents and whānau to know how we will communicate in an emergency that affects our ability to operate. 

Emergency communication will include:

1. Text -short initial communication and instructions for parents (130 character limit)
2. Hero - following communications with information about:

• Safety of the school community
• Location of the people
• Instructions for parents 
• When the next message will be sent

School Policies

Our Term 1 policies are available for review by all members of the school community. For instructions on how to view these, please see our School Policy Reviews article in this newsletter.

We have a new Cellphones and Other Digital Devices policy. The policy can be viewed in SchoolDocs and a PDF version is attached below. Feedback about the policy can be sent to principal@thorrington.ac.nz.