9 June

Dear Parents

School Mass – Sunday 19^th June – please mark your calendar

We were fortunate today to have Verdon College students present parts of their recent production of “Joseph” to our senior pupils. It was especially pleasing to see a big number of our ex-pupils taking part. Congratulations to all involved.

The count down is now on till our own school production. Lunch time practices will begin shortly as we build towards the 6^th & 7^th July at Centrestage.

Welcome to Abby Johnstone who started in Room 2 yesterday.

Prayers – this week our thoughts and prayers are with the Bennett, Biggar and Boniface families.

Good luck to Ashleigh Baker, Abby Humm, Damian Mitchell, Eli Winders, Sam Downing, Sam Thornbury, Alex Armstrong, Rohan McKenzie & Erik Cahill who are representing the All Saints Zone at the Southland Cross Country tomorrow.

Building Help Required

With the new veranda in place we need to move some of the poles used for the shade sails. If you have the expertise to do this or know someone who could, please contact me.

School Charter & Parent Consultation

This year we have re-designed our school charter to cater for new requirements from the Ministry of Education. Part of this requirement is further consultation with our parent community including Maori parents.

I am looking for a representative group to read the charter to see if:

a) It makes sense (parent friendly)

b) The learning goals are adequate and achievable

c) The wishes of our community are covered

If you are able to help, please contact me on 0274918694 or principal@shsinv.school.nz

Warwick Pascoe Presentation

On the 15 June, the children will experience a presentation about the "The Making of a Masterpiece" by Warwick Pascoe. This is the third time we have hosted a visit from Warwick and look forward to the experience this presentation offers us. There will be 3 sessions for the children: Rooms 1 – 3, Rooms 5 – 7 and Room 8 – 9. This will allow Warwick to tailor the presentation to suit the age level of the children. If you would like to find out more about this you can look on http://www.masterpiece.org.nz/ or contact Mrs Buxton.

School Survey

We would appreciate the parents taking part in the school survey, to return these tomorrow please. Thank you.

Acheivements

Congratulations to Corbyn Shuttleworth who got player of the day for his Rugby Club, Blues when they played Marist a fortnight ago. In last week’s game against Pirates/Old Boys he scored 5 tries. Well Done Corbyn.

Also to Rylee Hewitt who was awarded the Price Progressive Trophy for the swimmer who has made the most progress over the season. This was awarded at the Murihiku Swimming Club prize giving held recently.

JUST FOR TODAY,

....smile at a stranger

....listen to someone's heart

....drop a coin where a child can find it

....learn something new, then teach it to someone

....tell someone you're thinking of them

....hug a loved one

....don't hold a grudge

....don't be afraid to say "I'm sorry"

....look a child in the eye and tell them how great they are

....look beyond the face of a person into their heart

....make a promise, and keep it

....call someone, for no other reason than to just say "hi"

....show kindness to an animal

....stand up for what you believe in

....smell the rain, feel the breeze, listen to the wind

....use all your senses to their fullest

....cherish all your TODAYS

PTA

Next Meeting ~ Monday 13^th 7.30 pm in the staffroom.

Oyster Raffle ~ Thanks to all families for the wonderful response to the oyster raffle. This will be drawn today and the winners will be phoned re collection of oysters – prize list will be in next week’s newsletter.

Sunday 19^th June School Mass

PICNIC LUNCH (Inside the hall) KIDS LOLLY SCRAMBLE BBQ Sausage’s - Camp fundraiser

The PTA would like to invite you to stay after the school mass and enjoy a picnic lunch with the school and church community. The Year 6 students and parents are holding a sausage sizzle fundraiser and will have BBQ sausages in bread for sale. Or you can bring a picnic lunch to share with your family inside the hall after mass. Hot tea and coffee will be available. After lunch there will be a lolly scramble for all the children. Please come, bring your family and enjoy some time with the school and parish community.

PTA Parents Night

The PTA is organising a bowling night for parents – mark your calendars for Saturday 25^th June and book in your babysitters. This will be a fun night and a chance for parents to meet others from the school. Put the date in your diary and talk to other parents from your class to organise a group to come and enjoy yourselves.

Details to follow in the next few weeks.

Note: Anyone needing babysitters names, feel free to contact Liza Adams 2159995 or Susanne Brown 2158883 as we have a number of very good ex Sacred Heart pupils we can recommend.

Altar Servers

Saturday 11 Jun 7pm Rory Horn

Sunday 12 Jun 10.30am Cameron Roulston

Children’s Liturgy Cecelia Russell

Closure of St Patrick’s School South Dunedin

Ex-Pupils, Staff, Boards of Trustees, PTA, Parents and friends of the school are invited to a special Mass to celebrate133 years of St Patrick’s School on Sunday 24^th July at 11am

in St Patrick’s Basilica, Macandrew Road, South Dunedin followed by a ‘potluck’ lunch in the Parish Centre. Please bring a plate of food to contribute to the lunch.

Tea, coffee and cold drinks will be provided.

We look forward to sharing this day with you.

Room 9 Class Happenings

It is hard to believe it is only week 6 of the Term and easy to understand why we are a bit tired when we look at what we have already done in the last 5 weeks.

The first week began with the arrival of Natalie Kerr from Germany and then a visit from her dad who works for the Space Station.

Did you know? Astronauts are amazing and skilled people, their jobs are very difficult and it takes a heap of talent to be one. They have water in their suits to keep them warm when they aren’t facing the sun and cool when they are. The suits are VERY expensive, they cost round about 5,000,000 dollars EACH!

We have been working on and have written Narratives. We have enjoyed discussing these with one another. We have helped each improve our writing by asking questions and giving each other feedback.

Here is part of Bree’s narrative.

As I walked along the gravel path I could hear birds sweetly singing, frogs croaking and the pattering of a fawn’s hoofs .As I stepped off the path my bare feet sunk into the swampy marsh, I dipped my hand into the icy water. I felt the trickling water run across my hand and the spray of a water-fall crashing onto my face.

Last week we had the privilege of visiting the Kakapo chicks. Before our visit we looked at lots of websites as part of our reading programme. We discovered that not everything on the internet is true. You need to check: how old the website is, who wrote it, if there are contact details and links to other sites. Patrice wrote this: Kakapo are an amazing bird, they are super special birds as they are flightless and nocturnal just like our Kiwi! They are the largest parrots in the world and are very clever. When they are born they are white fluffy things, then they turn grey and finally they turn green. Their eggs are just a bit smaller than a chicken’s and very precious. People from the Kakapo Recovery Program have to check the eggs. They use different size sieves on the end of a pole to get the eggs out of the nest.

We have participated in the School Cross Country and sent 26 students to the Zone Cross Country. Ten of them qualified for the Southland Cross Country!

We have begun working on our part in the Production. We have designed our costumes and begun to make some of them. Becky Lieshout( Verdon College) came on Friday to help us finish our choreography of our dance. Don’t forget to help us with our survey on our blogsite http://room9shsinv.blogspot.com/ it is under links and called survey pirate.

This week we were introduced to the Taiaha by Matua Kereama and Whaea Michelle. We discovered we had to concentrate hard and have good hand eye coordination to just pass the rakau. It was lots of fun!