Tree planting!

Just a reminder that next Monday (Monday 6 August) is Room 3's day for tree planting. At 11am we'll be leaving Birchwood School (via Durham St, so that we can cross furthest from the bridge) and walking down Songer St (towards Monaco). We'll then duck off to the left (after the bridge and before the Honest Lawyer) to our tree planting site where we'll meet with our experts.

Tree planting is quite heavy work (and the spades were quite big last year :)), and we would love it if you could come along to help us! We are very happy for you to walk with us (and keep us safe from passing traffic :)), in which case please meet us at Room 3 at 11am. Alternatively, you could meet us there (it will most likely be at least 11.15am before we arrive - we have little legs and take a while to cover the distance ...).

Mrs Thiart will be supervising us on Monday, however if you have any questions Miss Driver can answer them in the next few days. No special clothing or footwear is required, however please make sure that your child has their fleece (or other warm coat) with them on the day to stay cosy outdoors :)

Poormans Stream - postponed after all ...

Hi again

Thank you for your patience with the weather - after getting all ready to head out to Poormans Stream today, a few showers in the afternoon kept us at school!

We are now looking forward to going (weather still permitting!) THIS FRIDAY at 1.30pm. This means that we will miss assembly, arriving back at school at 3pm :)

Please join us for a super afternoon in the stream :)

Miss Driver and the Room 3 Team

Poormans Stream - on TODAY

Hi all

Apologies for the late notice, but Mel has just confirmed that we ARE going to Poormans Stream this afternoon after all ...

If you would like to join us - and we would LOVE you to join us! - please come along and meet us at Room 3 at 1.30pm :)

See you soon!

Miss Driver and the Room 3 Team

Term 3, Week 3

Let’s start with another big thanks to children and families for a wonderful two weeks swimming at the ASB Aquatic Centre :) We had a fantastic time and made so much progress – please help us to maintain our new water confidence by taking us to the pools (or to the beach, river …) regularly :)

This week we look forward to our library day (Monday this week, due to courses in the library on Wednesday), to our Poormans Stream visit on Tuesday afternoon (yes, please come along!), and to the recycling circus show on Wednesday ($2 please, if you have not already paid). We will also continue with reading, writing, maths (we are beginning to think about length) and Bible in Schools. We’ll be working on our Poormans Stream mural (the stream and rocks are made from our moon/bubble prints!), typing our own labels on Thursday and working on some recycled art on Friday. We’re also going to be revising our use of te reo, and we’ll start looking at some Maori myths and legends.

Poormans Stream visit – please remember boots (tramping or gumboots, not fashion boots!) and a change of old clothes for Tuesday. Parents, we’d love you to come along! If it is too wet, the visit will be postponed as the stream would be unsafe. No postponement date has been confirmed as yet, but if that happens I will let you know as soon as possible :)

Poormans Stream briefing

Room 3 was lucky last week to attend a briefing by Mel McColgan about stream ecology and management. This was to prepare us for our visit to Poormans Stream, and we enjoyed hearing about healthy freshwater streams (which must be cold, clear and flowing) and about our local wildlife. We are excited about having a look for ourselves this Tuesday afternoon! We are very interested in eels and in slippery rocks!

Hanley polar fleece

A polar fleece with the name "Hanley" on the tag went missing during last week's swimming lessons. It was not left at the pool and has probably made its way home with someone. Please could you check your uniform items tonight to see if it might be with you :)

Term 3, Week 2

First of all, thanks to all children and families for a great first week of swimming. We are all loving the programme at the ASB Aquatic Centre and learning so much so quickly! We are very excited but rather tired, though we are doing an awesome job of looking after our own clothing and managing change times (thank you parent helpers)! Once again, please also check your child’s clothing when they come home each night and return any swapped clothing to school :)

A further thanks to those families who came and watched our assembly presentation last Friday. We had a great time creating our dance video, and we enjoyed sharing it with you. Well done to all children on the huge effort put in, and a further congratulations to those brave students who read in assembly. Ka pai to mahi Room 3 :)

This week we continue with swimming each afternoon, as well as reading, writing, maths and Bible in Schools. We’ll also do a little art on Friday morning, making moon (bubble) prints to match our moon story. Please remember that interviews are this Thursday afternoon and evening (times can be made online, please refer to the school newsletter for details) and a computer is usually available in the office for this purpose. I look forward to seeing you all then :)

Enjoy the final week of the swimming programme and make sure that you are getting plenty of rest and plenty of nutritious food to keep your energy levels up :)

Swimming

We are really enjoying our swimming programme in Room 3. We learn so much from the amazing instructors at the ASB Aquatic Centre and are making great progress in our water skills and confidence. We love the wave pool - especially the raft! Please come and read our swimming stories and check out our individual photos displayed in Room 3 ...

A visit from Daisy

We were so lucky in Room 3 to have a visit from Daisy. Daisy is a Bichon Frise puppy belonging to Kaitlyn from Room 2. Kaitlyn and her mum brought Daisy along to Room 3 and told us about how old Daisy was, where she came from, what she liked and how to look after her. We LOVED Daisy and would all have liked to take her home!

Term 3, Week 1

Welcome back to a new term in Room 3! I hope that you all had a wonderful break over the holidays and continued your learning at home and abroad :) 

We are beginning the new term with two very intense weeks where our focus will be on learning new water safety and swimming skills at the ASB Aquatic Centre. As advised last term, Room 3 children will leave Birchwood School by bus at 12.10pm to be in the water at the pools at 12.30pm. We will begin with a half hour session in the wave pool (while Room 1 and 2 children have their lessons), followed by a half hour lesson in the training pool. Parents are very welcome to meet us at the pools and to watch us in the water. We also appreciate your help when getting changed afterwards (especially when managing our identical uniform or thermal items!). A further reminder to families, please ensure that all clothing items are very clearly named, and please remind your child to keep all items in their named swim bag. Please also check your child’s clothing when they come home each night and return any swapped clothing to school J These two weeks are a real test of the children’s independent motor and organisational skills, and while it is essential that all children take personal responsibility for their own property, regular home checks for “lost” property keep uniform costs low for everybody.

Please note also that Room 3 will be sharing in Assembly this week (Friday at 2.30pm). You are very welcome to come along and watch us star in our K-Pop dance music video!

Wishing you all a fabulous first week back in Room 3. Please remember to bring your book bag and homework book to school each day, as our reading, writing and maths (and homework!) programmes will continue alongside our busy swimming regime :) 

Decoupage stones and two new class members!

To wrap up the end of Term 2, Room 3 made decoupage rocks with our fabulous helper Sarah. Aren't they beautiful? Thanks to Che and Sarah who brought along the rocks for us to work with :)

We also had a visit from Miss Driver's teacher friend Miss Nell (Miss Nell visited us earlier in the term for a story reading!). Miss Nell has sadly had to leave teaching, but she brought along two new friends for our classroom. Nelly and Spot used to live in Miss Nell's classroom down in Christchurch, and now it is our job to make sure that they feel very welcome in Room 3! Welcome to our two cute new class members!

Futusal

We had a great time practising our ball skills as part of the futusal programme and are looking forward to using these skills later in Term 3 as we focus on a few more cooperative games :)

Olympic gymnasts!

A big thanks to Sarah our super helper who made all (and I do mean ALL!) of us an Olympic gold medal for our fantastic performance during gymnastics this term, and a gorgeous Olympic torch for Room 3. We are looking forward to learning more about the Olympics after our - very intense! - swimming programme draws to a close in week 3 :) We'll be able to bring our experience of both gymnastics and swimming (among other things!) to our new learning!

Junior Assembly - Sharing our Art

We all enjoyed sharing our mixed media Spring Art in Junior Assembly during Term 2. If you would like to see our gorgeous pictures of spring flowers they are on display in the library and office foyers :) 

Zero waste lunchboxes

In term 2 Sarah Langhi visited our school again to teach us about zero waste lunch boxes. Sarah showed us photo boxes of six different lunchboxes and we had to sort and stack them in the order of most to least waste (Jasmine and Summer got to help out here!).

Sarah showed us how easy it is to minimise our waste by buying food in bulk (so much cheaper than multi-packs!) or cooking/baking our own snacks at home (even cheaper!) and then storing it in containers or in lunchboxes with built in compartments. She even showed us a washable cloth lunch bag/wrap. What super ideas!

We have thought a lot about this in Room 3 - please keep up the awesome effort into the new term :)!!