Taiari Times of Thames

Mower donated by Les Bloor of Bloor's Mechanical Services. Thanks Les! What's up in term three at Moanataiari The phrase ‘Wsup’ is one that we hear a lot of from some of our younger students. It simply means “What’s up?”. For older people, this can be translated as “How are you going?” or ‘What’s going on?’ Mrs Saunders and I like to think we know what’s going on. Last term, one of our students raced past the classroom we were in and yelled ‘Wsup’. We looked at one another, eyes bulging, thinking that this child had just sworn at us. We poked our head out the door and said “Hey, what did you just say?” And the child, repeated, “You know - ‘Wsup’”. So what is up this term - with people Mrs Leach Well, we begin this week with Mrs Saunders and Mrs Leach teaching in Room seven. Mrs Saunders takes on the primary role of teacher, and Mrs Leach provides the additional release. We welcome back Mrs Leach, who was previously deputy principal at our school and also in 2016 acted as princi...

Isla as an Egyptian. More photos from lockdown Here is the Morgan-Bevan's celebration of ANZAC Day during the lockdown. Indeed a unique experience with man people standing by their letterboxes because they couldn't go to the services. Oscar catching eels. Pretty slimy, eh Oscar. I think that you can only hold eels with two hands. Good fishing Zuri but did you cook them? Zuri caught these from a kayak. This was staff 'Happy Hour' on a Friday after school. Mr Howes organised the team to get together when school was over for a catch up on Zoom. We had to reset the invitations because we all talked too much. Whenever we get together the staff say it is me who talks too much. Can you believe that! I think it's probably Mr Donaldson or Mrs Kruger. This is Mrs Bain sitting in front of her computer all alone waiting for her students to contact her. It was unfortunate that she had no company on this day. This was terribly sad but I think Mrs Bain is very happy to be back at ...

Yes, Jacinda tells us we are 'normal' A newsletter this evening from the MOE has been sent to schools from the secretary of Education which indicates that we are officially safe. It does mean that unjustified absences will now be considered as truancy. However, these were not her points. Iona Holsted wrote: The key changes for schools at Alert Level 1 are : Physical distancing is not a requirement  but where possible or practicable  is encouraged when you are around people you don’t know. There are no specific public health requirements. There are no restrictions on personal movement so all students, children and staff continue to be safe to go to school, and all students must attend school. You are no longer required to keep a contact tracing register but will continue with the usual practice of having a visitor and an attendance register (and will need to work with local health authorities to identify close contacts, should there be a case connected with the school). There a...

1. The Corbett family locking their children in the bathroom ... great idea! We need to talk to the MOE about redesigning school for this sort of opportunity. I'm just worried that we would be arrested. And the lockdown winning photos are .... --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2. The Darwalls all trying to learn at the same time around the kitchen table. Simon must be doing a Zoom lesson. Excellent work. I think we are all glad that's over. Mum and Dad need a bigger table for the next lockdown. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3. Blaze and Caspian doing exciting science experiments. Caspian is yet to give an explanation. If he can give it to me in less than four sentences, I'll add it to the blog. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 4. This was a cunning plan by the Whytes. They managed to snea...

Climb, ascend, persevere Recognise these stairs? The picture depicts aspects of our 'Community of Learning' | Kahui ako. At present, our Kahui ako, which consists of all Thames schools, is rethinking its future direction. We are inviting all of our community to have a say. For your information, our Kahui ako has been named (in consultation with kaumatua Wati Ngamane): Kaueranga . Kaueranga is a name which is inclusive of all the schools in our geographic area. This consultation is being carried out in conjunction with a consultant. If you wish to take part and have a say we invite you to follow the link: https://forms.gle/ 1CvRzUaUk7ued6Ju5 We need you to respond as soon as possible if you intend to. The survey will take about twenty minutes. It will help inform us. This survey will close on June 14th so that data can be collated before a meeting scheduled for June 16th .

A eureka moment ... on local curriculum caused by covid-19 According to Wikipedia, 'Eureka!' is attributed to the ancient Greek scholar Archimedes. He reportedly proclaimed "Eureka! Eureka!" after he had stepped into a bath and noticed that the water level rose, after that he suddenly understood that the volume of water displaced must be equal to the amount of the part of his body he had submerged. After which he ran down the road naked because he was so excited and wanted to share his idea. Okay perhaps it's not that exciting but I thought about this while mowing lawns At the beginning of the year, the staff worked on developing aspects of our local curriculum. The last time we did any extensive work on this was 2009-2010. At that time we decided that our mission statement: 'Learning and growing together' was the right direction for us to take and for that time, I think it was.  'Learning and growing together'  epitomises: collegiality, distribute...

Judging has been so hard ..... and I'm still waiting for a supermarket queuing photo! You should see what's coming!