Midyear Conferences, 2025 Transition Programmes, Kapa Haka, Choir Kids Sing Concert, Health Education & Police Support, Winter Tournament, Whānau Connect Evening, Mathematics Curriculum Update and Representation

Kia ora e ngā whānau,

Midyear Conferences

Thank you for attending our 3WC opportunity to meet with your child’s teacher and discuss their progress. This is an important discussion to have and if you missed this opportunity pleased feel free to contact your child’s teacher to arrange a time. Room 6 parents your opportunity is coming up in two weeks. You will receive a separate email with instructions to make a booking.

2025 Transition Programs Underway

The Waimea Intermediate School staff have enjoyed visiting our contributing schools and meeting the Year 6 students and their parents recently. We are yet to visit Richmond Primary (students and parents) and Henley School parents.

Kapa Haka

Our Kapa Haka are working towards competing in the nationals later this term, held in Nelson and participating at our Waimea Kahui ako Cultural Celebration Day. We are in the process of updating our Kapa Haka uniform and look forward to seeing it being worn on stage later this term.

Choir – Kids Sing Concert

On Wednesday 21 August 6 pm our dedicated choir are performing in the Kids Sing Concert held at the Nelson Centre of Musical Arts. The Kids Sing is a choral festival for Primary and Intermediate schools held in 8 regional centres and involving around 3,500 children nationwide.

Police Education Programme

It is great to welcome Constable Hamish and Constable Carol back to the school to support the teacher’s delivery of our Term 3 Health Education program that covers the following topics across four lessons.

Lesson 1 - We all have choices in life. What do I know about drugs?
Lesson 2 – Cyber Safety and the Law.
Lesson 3 – Vaping, alcohol, and drugs.
Lesson 4 – Saying ‘No’ and being assertive.

Winter Tournament Thursday 22 and Friday 23 August

Trials are well underway for our upcoming winter tournament, with some sports already having selected their representative teams and are practicing. This is a wonderful opportunity for students who have a strength in a particular sport to shine and compete against the other intermediate aged students across our region.

Whānau Connect Week – Curriculum – Tuesday 3 September 6 pm

Following on from a successful Term 2 evening that focused on our cultural opportunities at WIS, we would like to invite any interested parents to join us on Tuesday 3 September at 6 pm for our second Whānau Connect Evening. The evening will involve sharing information about our current core curriculum programmes, sharing some Kai, and hearing the ideas you might have for us as a school to strengthen our curriculum programmes and opportunities. Please join us and even if you think you might not have ideas, come, and listen to other people’s ideas and see if there is something you might like to help with. Watch out for more details and registration sheet in future newsletters and communications.

Otago Problem Solving/Mathletics

Students have enjoyed participating in this terms Otago Problem Solving challenges. Not all students participate in this challenge, only those who are either nominated by the teacher or have a desire to do so. Tomorrow and Friday, our Mathletics representatives participate in the regional competition. We wish them all the very best.

New Zealand Mathematics Curriculum

You will be aware that mathematics hit the media over the weekend with the government announcing changes to the New Zealand Mathematics Curriculum. I thought that this is a great time to share, once again, our mathematics achievement data from 2023, even though it has been shared previously. We are pleased to share that although the media reported only 22% of Year 8 students nationally were at or above the expected year end achievement level that 75% of our WIS Year 8 students were achieving at or above the expected level at the end of 2023 and over 55% of them are already achieving at or above the end of year expectation. As previously stated, we have been focusing on providing our teachers with professional development in the teaching of reading for the past three years, with a view to changing this focus to mathematics in 2025. We are pleased to hear that this focus is shared with the government, and we look forward to receiving the new resources that are going to be offered to schools to support these changes. You might like to visit the MOE website for more information linked HERE.

School driveway safety and closure to non-authorised vehicles As many of you will have noticed our school driveway is not a two-way driveway. There is only space for one car travelling in one direction during peak times (before and after school). When the driveway was built it was intended that only staff and Maitai School community use our driveway. For cars to pass in opposite directions one car must move onto the pathway and this, of course, places our students and Henley School students using the walkway at risk. Therefore, the only traffic using the driveway during these peak times will be restricted to vehicles of staff and students who attend Matai Satellite School. The Tasman District Council worked with us and other local schools to identify safe drop off areas. This map has been included as a PDF at the end of this article. Thank you to the parents who have started using this provision.

Scooters and Bike Safety

We strongly encourage students who bring scooters and bikes to school to bring along a lock.  

Wishing everyone a happy fortnight.

Ngā manaakitanga,

Justine McDonald