Welcome to The Minister of Education

Today we await the arrival of the Minister of Education who is visiting us as part of the consultation process for the Greater Chirstchurch Education Renewal Plan. We continue to be bewildered as to why we have been included within the scope of this plan given our growing roll, our location on the West of Christchurch and the subdivisions in close proximity to our school. We serve the families of the children who choose to come to us very well and would like to continue the good work we do.

Welcome To Term 4 2012

How wonderful it is to be back for Term 4 2012! Due to roll growth we welcome Mrs Sharon Spragg as our Room 1 New Entrants Teacher. It is great to be a growing school and to be able to offer a fantastic start for our new entrants.

We have a very busy term ahead including athletics, camps and Pet Day. Of course we will also be providing top quality literacy and numeracy programme across the school along with a caring learning culture.

We are are Sun Smart School so please remember that we all ned to be wearing our sun hats for this term!

Winter Fun Day an Icy and Snowy Success!

Whether our students were at Alpine Skating Centre or Mt Hutt Ski Resort they had a fabulous time yesterday. The weather and conditions on Mt Hutt were close to perfect and many of our students had progressed by lunchtime to riding the Quad Chairlift. Others had a great day learning the basics on the Magic Carpet Beginners Slope.

Likewise our students had great fun at the Alpine Ice Skating Rink. For many of our students it was their first time on skates and they did very well.

Today the school is buzzing with stories of fast skating and super skiing. It is always great to have a change of learning environment.

Thank you to all parents/caregivers for your wonderful support.

We Are Going To Mt Hutt

It is early in the morning as I write this. It is Winter Fun Day at YMS. Mt Hutt is open so please be at school by 7.00 as the bus leaves at 7.15. There is new snow. A great day coming up!

Winter Fun Day Wednesday 22 August

In the middle of a long, sometimes wet and cold term, it is fun to participate in our Winter Fun Day activities. Our students have the opportunity to go to either ice skating at the Alpine Skating Rink or skiing/snowboarding at Mt Hutt. The Mt Hutt deal is a great opportunity to be introduced to skiing/snowboarding.

Now we wait to see if the weather is in our favour. Warm clothes, plenty of healthy food and a drink bottle. We are looking forward to a great day.

YMS Olympics Day Friday 27 July 2012

The YMS Olympics were a great success. The Olympic flag, the Olympic flame and the Olympic procession were lavish affairs. Unfortunately we did not have James Bond and Queen Elizabeth II but we did have over 120 children competing in a range of Olympic style events. The atmosphere was great and the competition was fierce.

Now we look forward to following the other Olympics to see if they can meet our high standards.

Term 3 is Go!

Student Learning Conferences, Weedons/Yaldhurst Cup Challenges, Olympic Football Tournament plus Reading, Writing and Maths all in the first couple of weeks. No resting on our laurels.

The cold mornings are making us buzz at the start of the day. It is great to see everyone back happy and healthy ready to learn and contribute to our school community. As always the support of our school families is greatly appreciated. Term 3 2012 will be the greatest term yet!

Wigram Air Force Museum Visit

Thank you to everyone for pulling in behind our visit to Wigram Air Force Museum today and yesterday. A great time was had by everyone attending.

Thank you to Chris and Charlotte at the museum for being giving us all and informative and fun-filled time. We have all learned a great deal about flight. It is great to have the Wigram Air Force Museum open to the public.

YMS closed Friday 8 June 2012

Hi Everyone - due to Yaldhurst still not having any power we are unfortunately unable to open today. The electrician is currently on site and making repairs. We will be open on Monday. Have a safe weekend and we look forward to seeing everyone on Monday.

Friday opening on hold

A power surge has damaged the school wiring. An electrician is coming to repair it tomorrow morning. I will let people know when school is opening as soon as possible.

YMS closed Thursday 7 June

Due to school having no power YMS will be closed today, Thursday 7 June. The roads are extremely treacherous so please do take care today if you are out and about. Stay warm and we look forward to hearing about all of your snow adventures tomorrow!

School is CLOSED due to snow.

Wednesday 6 June 2012. SCHOOL IS CLOSED because of the snow. Falling heavier by the minute. Please keep an eye on the website and text alerts. Thank you. Allan Robertson

Well done Room 6!

It was great to see so many of our Room 6 students participating in the 20/40 hour famine. Thank you to Mr and Mrs Mitchell who stayed with the students from 6pm on Saturday night through to 9am on Sunday morning. It is always fun to see the children being children, playing board games, reading books and staying hungry for a good cause.

Just for fun -  the alarm went off in the middle of the night to keep everyone on their toes.

Well done Room 6!

Term 2 2012 has begun!

What a great start to Term 2 at Yaldhurst Model School. We welcomed new students in Years 1, 7 and 8 and it was great to see the friendly welcomes they received. We have all buckled down to our work and already I have seen some great maths, reading and writing around the school.

This term we have some great science and technology challenges happening around the school. We are also introducing our TREES Inquiry Learning Model. And if that wasn't enough; We are gearing up for Winter Sport at Hagley Park each Friday. Plus did I mention chess, French, guitar and choir. Maybe sleeping will be optional this term.

Term 1 was brilliant!

Time really does fly when you are having fun. It has been a brilliant term at Yaldhurst Model School (YMS). Busy classes and a happy friendly playground. El Gregoe, Life Education, Swimming Lessons, Duathlon and Easter Fun Day kept us busy along with reading, writing and mathematics.

Next term will be just as busy and just as much fun. Stay tuned!

On behalf of all the staff we hope you stay safe over the holidays and that you will have some fun but obviously not as much as we have at school!

A Super Duathlon

Every child at Yaldhurst Model School took part in our duathlon. It was to be a triathlon but the cold weather of late has meant that we closed the school pool. Changing from three to two events simply meant that everyone was able to put even more effort into running and cycling. The looks of determination showed that everyone was giving 100% + effort!

It was very pleasing to have great family support. Our duathlon was a great success and we hope that next year we are back to having a triathlon.

A Superb Effort at Zone Swimming

Well done to our students that competed in the Zone Swimming Sports at Burnham Pool on Tuesday. It has not been an ideal season for swimming yet our students put their best flippers forward and competed well. Look out in this week's newsletter for some great photos and the names of our representatives.

Given the weather we have finished swimming for the 2011/2012 season. As always we appreciate the help we have had with the pool. We are now moving our focus to the Duathlon to be held at school on Thursday 15 March for the Senior and Junior students. We look forward to seeing everyone on the day.

Where Is The Sun?

We are so excited about our swimming lessons; the children are prepared, the pool is prepared and the swimming instructors are prepared. Just one problem - the sun is not shining.

It is great to have such a wonderful swimming pool at school but we need the warm weather to make swimming fun. thanks to everyone who is so organised every day for swimming. All we can do is look forward to a super spell of warm weather starting now.

As well as our school swimming lessons we have Beach Education on Monday and Tuesday of next week. We take safety in and around the water very seriously. So where is the sun?

Week 2 Over Already

Time really does fly. It has been wonderful to see all of our new students settling into school routines so quickly. If only we can have some more sunny weather so that we can make the most of our swimming lessons for the next two weeks. Swimming is so important and we are very fortunate to have our own swimming pool.

There have been many highlights this week including a visit from El Gregoe the magician with his You've Got The Power anti-bullying show. The children were amazed, entertained and educated. Another highlight has been seeing all of our new entrants arriving at school bright and bushy tailed every day.

I hope everyone is enjoying sharing the library books that our students borrow from our library. Thanks to Mrs Janet Noonan for all of her hard work making sure that we have a beautiful library.

The Last Day of The Holidays

The December/January holidays are always a great time for school staff (myself included) to recharge the batteries and set goals for the year ahead. I have had a great holiday with family and friends with one highlight being a walk on a portion of the Queen Charlotte Track. It has been great to see so many people swimming in the school pool over the holidays.

I know all of the staff at YMS have exciting things planned for the year ahead. The YMS staff met for two days last week to plan the year ahead. We start tomorrow morning with a powhiri to welcome our new teachers and students.

2012 is going to be a great year for Yaldhurst Model School! And so the journey begins...well after a good nights sleep and a healthy breakfast.