Week 5 Update...

Congratulations to Sabine Grey who has won the Year 9 Music Scholarship at Cashmere High School for 2014.

Ski Day: Thanks to all who have filled in the form about ski experience and gear (clothing). Half the team have done this, we need the rest ASAP. If you haven't filled in this form, please do it today. There are a lot of people who need to borrow ski pants and goggles (remember sunglasses are fine). We will be able to match some people up with gear, but not all.

McEwings, 200 Yalhurst Rd Christchurch, do special rental deals for schools:

• Ski jacket $10
• Ski pants $10
• Ski goggles $5

If you are able to hire gear from here please let me know and we will take you off the 'need to borrow' list.

We have heard back from Mt Hutt. Children with own gear, pay the same as those who need to rent. The good news is that helmets are included in ski rental.

Dunedin Camp Fundraising: 

• Thanks to those who supported Room 17s cupcake sale last week. A few children still owe Tracy money.
• This coming week Room 19 are selling jelly and ice-cream on Wednesday for $2. Purchase tickets before school. This is for Year 5 -8, we will do Year 1-4 the following week. 
• Cookies are selling really well! With the cookie fundraiser, what you sell goes directly to your own camp fee. Once you have sold your first bag and handed the money into the office (in a named envelope labelled with 'cookies'), you can get more bags to sell. Come to Room 19 before or after school to restock. Every bag sold is $8 towards your camp fee.

Speeches: our team speech competition is on Friday Sept 6th. There will be two Year 7 and two Year 8 speeches from each class in the final. Children have one week to finish writing and practising their speeches. Support from home would be appreciated.

Good luck to our Year 7 & 8 rugby team who will be competing at the Canterbury Winter Tournament on Thursday.

Learning Conferences are coming up soon on September 4th and 5th.

Week 4 Update

What a week we have had. Success at Cantamath and a great Showcase evening on Thursday night.

Arts Academies: We are underway with the creation of Ali Baba, Beckenham style. For the rest of the term the children will be immersed in drama, dance and visual art / props making every Tuesday afternoon. We are always keen to have extra adult guidance in the props group. If you are free on a Tuesday afternoon and would like to help out, please let Bruce Rodger or Nicky Dunlop know.

2014 Dunedin Camp Fundraising: Cookie selling is underway. Children need adult permission to sell cookies. Notices will be home on Monday, or you may already have them. This permission can also be given via email to class teachers. Collect cookies from Room 19.

Spring Fair request-for-table forms should be in by now. Children need to see Miss D on Monday if they forgot!

Erin Simpson Show: Our fabulous team of chefs were on the Erin Simpson Show today. If you missed them, check out TV-on-demand.

Winter Sport: Just two more weeks of competition left.

Cantamath Success

What a fabulous afternoon we have had a Cantamath. Congratulations to our problem solving teams for a superb effort in very distracting conditions! Special congratulations to the Year 8 team who scored 65 / 100, finishing in the top 25%.

Our results in the display competition were most impressive. Of the 20 items we sent along, 13 received awards.

Huge congratulations to 'Excellence' winners:

• Jack Ryan for his origami owl model
• Nathan Balmer for his fishy tessellation
• Room 19 for their app icon design on i-phone. They received 2 excellence awards, one for class project and one for theme.

A big well done to the 'Highly Commended':

• Melanie law for her calculator project and construction
• Julia Siddall for her origami model
• Tahlia Ward for her origami model
• Beth Bennet for her origami sphere model
• Georgia Grey for her 3D shape model
• Dom Budgen for his written project of maths and technology in music
• Flynn Moore for his divisibility rules game
• Niamh Menzies for her rotation photography project
• Justine Bennett for her maths in nature photography project

and finally thanks to Sabine Grey for her superb banner, it looked fabulous... (we thought it was the best!)

Friday action in the Intermediate Team

Friday was a busy day in our team.

The staff were blown away by the standard of work in the Cantamath entries. The Year 5 & 6s who came to see were very impressed too! We have selected over 10 pieces to represent our school at Cantamath this coming week.

Te whanau and a group from the band went to Somerfield School to promote our Intermediate Team. Both groups performed superbly and the media team movie was very well received.

Those who did not go to Somerfield did a great job of planting the new plots around Rooms 21 and 22.

Youth Market at Pallet Pavillion

If you are interested in this opportunity, please contact the email below...

(We) are running a Youth Market on the 31st of August from 2pm until 8pm, at the Pallet Pavilion, and we need many more stalls to be held. Every stall will be run by young people, and any profits made can be kept by the seller. The stalls can sell anything - crafts, food, clothes, or anything else that creative minds can put together. We do ask that every stall idea is run past the Youth Council, so we can make sure we can accommodate it, as well as create a good stall layout in the Pallet Pavilion. There are limited stall numbers though, as the Pavilion is not the largest of spaces, so we recommend people get in quickly, before it's too late. There is for the moment a $25 fee for hot food vendors, as we have to pay for all the power we use throughout the market. However, we are in the process of finding a way to avoid this cost. We will keep you updated with this and any other details!

The other invitation for the market is for any talented musicians. As the market runs, we will have young musicians perform, which is a great way for people to promote themselves. There will also be a concert in the Pavilion after the market, and I wish to extend the invitation for this too. We haven't sorted yet how long each musician will play for - that will depend on how many people wish to perform. We ask that each musician sends us an MP3 file of their work so that we can put together a performance order and establish whether it is appropriate music. To get in contact with me, please email me at: martin.roberts@oyc.co.nz before the 20th of August.

Week 3 Update

We have started term 2 with a hiss and a roar! Here's what's been happening in the Intermediate Team over the past two weeks:

Winter Sports Tournament: Well done to all students who competed, superb behaviour and attitude was displayed by all. A special congratulations to the rugby team who qualified for the Canterbury Winter Tournament, to be held on Thursday August 29th.
Those who stayed back at school spent the morning immersed in wisdom and creativity. Watch out for our owl art and motivational quotes which will be popping up around the school soon.

Room 19 maths class students working on their giant i-phone.

Cantamath: We had an exciting Becamath competition last Thursday. Well done to the Room 17 Year 8 team and Room 19 Year 7 team who won their competitions. Our top problem solvers have been practising hard and yesterday we announced the Beckenham Cantamath teams who will compete at the CSB Arena on Wednesday August 14.

• Year 7: Melanie, Dom, Beth and Oscar
• Year 8: Briana, Jack R, Jamie and Jimmy

The standard of the work the children have been producing at home for Cantamath display competitions has generally been very impressive. Today we will select work to go through to the competition next week. Many thanks to the parents who helped with ideas and advice on these projects.

Fitness: We are meeting three times a week as a team to exercise with Jump Jam. Again we have been impressed with the effort and attitude being shown. Remember a change of shirt and some roll on deodorant.

Choice: Our health topic, which looks at making wise choices around drugs, is in full swing. Classes have all had their first session with Constable Sam, as well as a number of sessions with their teacher. 

Coming up:

• Showcase Evening on Thursday August 15th: this involves the drama group, te whanau mahi tahi, the senior chorale and 10 members of the band. The evening starts at 6:30.
• Spring Fair: Year 7s who would like to have a table at the Spring Fair, please get your booking sheet filled in and posted into the box in Room 19. Money raised will go towards next year's Dunedin camp.
• Cantamath: Good luck to our teams competing with the best mathematical brains in Canterbury on Wednesday afternoon.
• Speech writing: Students are about to start working on speeches in class. Please be talking about possible topics at home.Our library blog is a great place to visit for ideas.
• Ski trip: we now have enough parent helpers.