Term 3 Newsletter Team 1

1. Team 1 Newsletter
Term 3 2012
Dear parents and caregivers,
Greetings from Team 1. A warm welcome to those families
who are new to Willowbank School.
Who are we?
Jo Thompson -Team Leader & Acting Assistant Principal
jthompson@willowbank.school.nz
Olivia Calder - Room 1 ocalder@willowbank.school.nz
Sally Ross - Room 13 sross@willowbank.school.nz
Michele Tidswell - Room 16 mtidswell@willowbank.school.nz
Bianca Brook - Room 23 bbrook@willowbank.school.nz
Room 13
Sally Ross is currently on leave and is recovering well from recent surgery.
She hopes to rejoin us in the middle of the term. In the meantime we
welcome Mrs. Sona Singh to Room 13. Sona is a regular reliever at
Willowbank School and is very familiar with the way we work.
Communicating with us
Classroom teachers are available between 8.30-8:55am to speak with you if
you have any questions or queries. If you wish to make an appointment with
them please email or contact the school office. Teachers are not available
to talk with you once the 8:55am bell has rung, as this is the start of our
valuable learning time.
Parent helpers
Do you have a spare hour during the week? We always have jobs that you
can assist us with. Perhaps you could make some fresh playdough at home
or test the children in the class on their word-rings. Please let your child’s
teacher know if you can help us out.

2. Uniform Expectations
Thank you for sending your child in correct uniform. It would be fantastic if
you could send your child in correct but also appropriate footwear eg velcro
shoes and sandals that they can manage on their own. Please make sure
sweatshirts are clearly named and that your child is able to recognise their
nametag. The children are expected to be responsible for their own clothes
and shoes. As our classrooms will be heated many children choose to take
their sweatshirts off when they are inside. Please do not put many layers
of clothing under your child’s uniform. The children become very hot and
uncomfortable and often cannot remove these extra items independently.
School newsletters
Our school newsletters are published online every second Monday. If you
are not able to access the school website regularly you may request a
paper copy from the office. There are lots of exciting things happening
this term so it will pay to keep an eye on it.
Our school website is www.willowbankschool.co.nz
What’s on this term?
Olympics opening ceremony at Willowbank Friday 27th July
Olympics closing ceremony at Willowbank Monday 13th
August
Book Fair Pyjama Party Monday 20th August 5-7pm
Book Fair Parade 9:15am Friday 24th August-Come as your favourite book
character.
Scholastic Book Fair at Willowbank School. Come
along and and buy books for your children 16th-21st
August. More information coming soon.
Team 1 leads assembly Friday 24th August 2:15pm
School cross-country Tuesday 28th August
(or Thursday 30th if Tuesday is wet)
NZ shake-up (Earthquake practise) Wednesday 26th September

3. Last day of Term 3 Friday 28th September 3pm
First day of Term 4 Monday 15th October
Our learning this term
We will be learning to write to retell events and
writing invitations and notes. In addition to increasing
our knowledge of numbers we will also be weighing and
measuring things and learning about patterns and time.
Our P.E lessons will include our favourite
exercises to music in our weekly Jump Jam
sessions plus Coach Jeff and the playball team
will be working with us again. We will be training
every day for cross-country (If it’s not raining!)
Your child will not need different clothes but you
may like to send shoes for running each day from
next week. We will also be practising gymnastics
and learning some folkdances.
We are continuing to look at the impact we have
on our environment at school especially the
insects and other mini beasts we can find in our own gardens. Each class
will inquire into different parts of the mini beast world. Keep an eye on our
class wikis to find out where our class learning journeys are going.
We also have activities about the Olympics and the Book Fair is coming to
Willowbank School too. It will be a busy and exciting term, luckily we have
11 weeks to fit it all in.

4. Home learning
We often have families ask us about ways they can support their children’s
learning at home. Some ways to do this are to share their reading with
them every day. This might be the book they bring home in their bookbag.
It might be reading their poetry and published writing with them over the
weekend or choosing books from the library to read and talk about
together.
Some children will have a wordring that they need to read to you. Others
will bring home spelling words to practise writing correctly.
Our school home learning programme for maths is an online website called
Mathletics. There is an annual cost for this. Once you have paid, your child
will receive a password so they can logon at home and complete tasks their
class teacher has set for them. If you would like to sign up for Mathletics
please contact your child’s class teacher or our Acting Assistant Principal
Marissa Bowden as she oversees the administration of this programme.
Her email address is mbowden@willowbank.school.nz
Each class has their own wiki. This is a place your child can safely go to on
your home computer that has lots of games that their teacher has chosen
that will support their learning. Each class has their own wiki address.
Room 1 http://room1wbs.wikispaces.com/
Room 13 switched-onto-learning.wikispaces.com
Room 16 http://16willow.wikispaces.com
Room 23 http://learningwithmrsbrook.wikispaces.com/
If you have any questions or comments please don’t hesitate to come and
see us. We look forward to working with you and your child throughout the
term.
Kind Regards
Jo, Olivia, Sally, Michele and Bianca.