Camps - A Resounding Success

Every year a great deal of planning goes into making our camps a challenging and satisfying experience for all involved. Our Year 3 children had a wonderful time staying in tents overnight on the school grounds. Our Year 4 - 6 children experienced three days in Hamner.

I had the pleasure of taking our Year 7 and 8 students to Arthur's Pass where we stayed in the Arthur's Pass Outdoor Education Centre. This was a wonderful facility located in the heart of Arthur's Pass Township. Each day was action packed with activities such as: visiting Flock Hill Station - where we saw sheep dogs in action. We also learnt about wool sorting and just how important wool is to our economy. We also walked Bealey Spur, crossed the Waimakariri River, and participated in orienteering and stretcher making.

The parents at camp saw the children having so much fun on the 'blind trail' that the parents asked the children to blindfold them and lead them through it. Great fun was had by everyone.

We were very lucky with the weather. In fact one day we walked in sunshine and ended up having a snowball fight at our destination.

Education Outside The Classroom takes a lot of organising but the rewards are well worth it.

Thank you to all of our parents who supported our camps.

A Small Communities Generosity for Earthquake Victims

Donation gratefully accepted.

The Linwood Salvation Army were very appreciative of the cheque for $100 and the assorted foodstuffs that our community raised to help with earthquake relief.

It was great to see our community getting behind this fundraising effort.

Our thoughts go out to those people who have to rebuild their lives.

Art, Sport and Hats

All of the children and staff learnt a great deal about art this week when we were visited by Wendy Duggan. The lessons were a great success.

Our 149th annual athletics day was also a great success. Many children achieved personal bests and it was great to see parents joining in on the relay race. We are looking forward to taking a team to zones next Friday.

It is time for everyone to be wearing a sunhat. We have them for sale in the office. Please name them once purchased.

Term 4 Is Up and Away

Great to see sunhats!

Back to school and we have hit the ground running - literally. Children are all practising for athletics. Running, jumping and throwing can be things we take for granted but the skills need to learnt. We are looking forward to a wonderful athletics day next Wednesday.

If memory serves me well the weather today is a duplicate of when we had the Golf Tournament last year. Still I am sure the weather will not dampen the spirits of the competitors. Thank you so much to the PTA for running this wonderful fundraiser for our school.

Back to School Work.

Please take the time to fill in the Parent/Caregiver Survey on the website. The information you give us helps us make our school better and better and better.

What A Great Week

A World Class Author

Thank you to everyone in the community who has made this week a great success. All of the children have settled back to learning and playing with their friends.

There has been great work in each class and it is great to see our students striving to give 100% to their learning.

I have really enjoyed reading the writing from Room 5 this week. The standard of authorship is very high and many Room 5 writers may be looking to choose writing as a career.

Another World Class Author

Please note that more information is being added to our school website all of the time. Each class now has a web presence and we are aiming to use the internet as an up-to-date communication medium for happenings all around the school.

A Great Start Back

The aim today was to keep make sure we all knew how to be safe while carrying on with our usual daily routines. All of our classes calmly practised the "Earthquake Drop."

Thank you to all of our community who calmly carried on with business as usual.

It is great to be back!

Looking Forward To Monday

The staff have been working very hard at school to prepare for Monday. We will be glad to see everyone!

We are going to stick to our normal routines. Business As Usual

Please follow your normal morning routine. Although I know that adults will have lots they would like to talk about the staff very much want to concentrate on the children. 

Please rest assured that we will be practicing emergency procedures early this morning. 

Please note I have included some links at the bottom of the 'Welcome Page' of the school website that have good advice relating to the website. 

Also please note that we have postponed school photos. 

It is important that you inform the school if your child is not able to attend. It is also important that you inform us if your contact details have changed.

YMS Not Open until Monday 13 September 2010

YMS will not be open until Monday. At this moment I cannot guarantee safe water and after recent aftershocks we have buildings that need to be checked.

Please stay safe and we look forward to seeing everyone on Monday.

YMS Earthquake Update Not Opening until Monday 13 September 2010

Please take note of the following message below from the Ministry of Education. 
Canterbury Earthquake information

Last updated: Tuesday 7 September at 3:30pm

Important situation update 7 September at 3:30pm

Schools and early childhood services should be closed to students and children until Monday 13 September, and open to staff before that, subject to a structural clearance.

The Ministry position is that more time is needed to check schools and early childhood services buildings. This is due to the extent of initial damage and to aftershock damage occurring to buildings already checked.

Schools and early childhood services who have clearance will also need time to prepare for students returning. There are significant issues relating to water quality, especially for younger students.

Ministry advice is that Boards need to be confident that their school is structurally sound, that any damage to buildings or grounds has been assessed and isolated, equipment checked, and that plans are in place to deal with provision of water and pastoral care of students. We will make a further decision on Thursday afternoon.

YMS Earthquake Update

We have been very lucky at YMS as the school has sustained almost no damage. A builder and plumber have already been on site and an electrician is due to come tomorrow to repair 2 damaged lights in Room 4.

A representative from School Support Property Division will be inspecting the school tomorrow in preparation for opening on Wednesday as planned. We have water, power, sewerage and communications all up and running.

As you can see from the photos below, we had very little mess. It has all been cleared away now and I am looking forward to seeing everyone on Wednesday.

My thoughts go out to those in our community who have not been so fortunate.

Yaldhurst School Closed

Important update: School closures, Monday 6 September

Schools and early childhood centres in Christchurch, Waimakariri, and Selwyn districts will be closed until at least Wednesday 8 September in response to the earthquake.

This follows the Chief Medical Officer of Health advising all public buildings are to remain closed until Wednesday.

Please see Ministry of Education website for more information.

Skiing and The Weather

I have my fingers crossed that we will be skiing tomorrow at Mount Hutt. At this moment the prospects are not looking good. I will be at school from 6.30am tomorrow answering queries about whether we are going or not. I will err on the side of caution as I do not want anyone to be cold on the day. If we do not go we will all have a great time ice skating.

Skiing and The Weather

We all have our fingers crossed that our ski trip to Mount Hutt will happen tomorrow. Unfortunately the weather is looking against us at this point. I will be manning the phones from 6.35 tomorrow morning to let everyone know what our plan is. If we do not go skiing we will all be skating instead.

Assessment and Reporting Survey

Thank you to all parents and caregivers who attended our interviews last week. I am very keen to know how successful these interviews were and whether the portfolios are delivering the information you want about your child. Please take the time to fill in the Assessment and Reporting Survey (See link in the Web menu) as this will give me valuable information as we remodel our reporting system to accommodate National Standards.

Portfolios and Assessment

Teachers and students alike have been working hard to prepare portfolios. Portfolios were reinstated at YMS as a way to keep a record of student achievement. The landscape has changed over the last two years in respect to assessment and reporting. At a recent principal's meeting I saw a range of reports and there simply is no two schools that report in the same way.

It is becoming clear that technology will have a positive impact on reporting to the point that over time paper reporting may become replaced by e-portfolios. Whatever the system it must be meaningful and manageable. In the light of this and the mandated requirement for National Standards reporting I think it is time that we began to review our portfolio reporting system. This is not to signal an immediate change but instead to indicate we are beginning to look at what reporting works for all of our community.

Look out next week for an online survey in respect to portfolios and interviews.

Cantamaths

A brilliant effort by our Year 7 and Year 8 teams at the Cantamath Competition in the Christchurch Town Hall last night. When you see this competition you would think that it should be an Olympic Sport. Great to have the parent support and wonderful to see our students working together to problem solve in such a pressure cooker environment. We already have the questions from last night and are beginning to think about next year.

School Interviews.com

A great response to booking online for our upcoming interviews. Well done to our school's executive officer (Mrs Penman) for arranging this pain free way to book your interview times. If you are having difficulty then please see Jane in the office and she will gladly enter your interview time.

Oh the mud

It is great to see our students playing winter sports. For many of the children this means that they are playing on the fields. We have a red flag that signals when the fields cannot be used. Our students are great at finding alternative spaces for playing outdoor games when the fields cannot be used.

At this time of year when we are on the fields there is no shortage of mud. We encourage the children to bring a spare set of clothes so they keep their uniform clean. We also expect dirty shoes to be kept out of the class. I believe that we have some students who can magnetically attract mud on to their bodies. I guess that when your child comes home with mud attached you know that they have had a good time.

ICT

To reflect the world that we live in Yaldhurst Model School is revamping its policy and procedures in respect to information and communication technologies. It is great to see students using cellphones, computers, cameras and the various applications available with all of these tools. There is no doubt that the internet is a binary forest full of wonderful information and tools for contributing to our world of knowledge. There is also no doubt that cellphones and cameras are great social networking tools.

There are three elements that work together so that we have safe and happy communication technology users.

1. Every student signs a Netsafe user agreement after discussion with parents and caregivers at home.

2. We take every reasonable step to filter and block out malicious content.

3. Through education at school we teach our students Netsafe practices. Included in these practices are the expectation that students will know what to do if they discover something inappropriate. - Report it immediately!