Wedding photo invite

Merry Christmas Everyone,

I hope that you are all enjoying your holidays so far and that Santa has come to visit your house too!

On January the 24th I will be getting married. I know that many of you have received home the invitation to come and meet me at Matakana School for a group photo with all the kids, but just to double check that everyone has received this note I wanted to put it up on here also.

Hope that you can make it!

Kind Regards,
Joy Kraan

Home Learning Challenges

Hi Everyone,

The deadline for the home learning challenges was last week and so far the children whose booklets I have received and noted down to receive a medal are:

• Joel
• Harry
• Zachary
• Poppy
• Beau
• Eva
• Logan
• Jane
• Louis
• Ruby 
• Frankie
• Luka
• Matai
• Shay 
• Bekele

If your child's name isn't on this list and they have completed 6 home learning challenges I have simply not seen their booklet to sign them off and put them on the list. 

If this applies to your child, please e-mail me before Friday as that is the deadline for teachers to give the names to Mel Bentley and I will pop their names on.

Kind Regards, 

Joy Kraan

Friday Assembly

Hi Everyone,

Please remember to bring a colourful t-shirt and dark coloured shorts/tights for our assembly on Friday.

If these could come to school in a named plastic bag before Friday then we know we are organised for assembly.

Ben, Bekele and Rudi will need to have a dark coloured t-shirt and dark coloured shorts because they are the pests in our play.

I also need 7 more buckets, so anyone that has a spare bucket they could bring in please do otherwise those children who don't have buckets won't be able to join in.

The following children still need to bring in buckets, Poppy, Jade, Bekele, Beau, Ben and Ollie.

Cheers,
Joy

Little yellow digger show

On Wednesday the 24th of September, the junior syndicate are very lucky to be going to the little yellow digger show! What a treat!

There are 4 slots allocated for parent helpers to come along to that with us. We currently have only one parent helper. If we could have 3 more from Room 3 that would be great!

You can let Pam, Kate or myself know whether you are interested!

Cheers,
Joy

Room 3 Assembly Week 9

Hi Everyone,

Today I am sending home the scripts for those children who need to practise what they are saying at assembly next week.

The children that will be getting home a script are:

• Ben
• Rudi
• Ollie
• Poppy
• Tawera
• Jade
• Zachary
• Eva
• Bekele
• Logan

Please encourage them to read it through a couple of time this weekend. We will be having a practise every day next week in preparation for Friday.

The children are very excited to perform, so we look forward to you coming along on Friday.

Costumes for the play

The pests (Bekele, Ben and Rudi)
Please could they bring a dark coloured top and shorts.

The native birds
Please could they bring bright coloured t-shirts and bright tights/shorts.

Next week we have a guest speaker coming to talk to the children about his job as a park ranger and he will also give our park ranger (Logan some things to wear/use for his costume).

Cheers,
Joy

t-shirt reminder for Wednesday

Hi Everyone,

For the purpose of filming our flight sequence on Wednesday, please remember to bring a dark t-shirt (black or navy blue) to school.

The bird costumes are looking awesome!!! The children are going to have a lot of fun with this assembly!

Thanks to Vicky and all the parents for the amazing help in making and organising all of this!

Kind Regards,
Joy Kraan

Getting rid of ads on YouTube videos

Hi Everyone,

A few of you asked me to put this useful website onto the blog to share with everyone.

If you too are annoyed by ads on YouTube both before and after video clips and you would also like to get rid of YouTube's suggestions for video clips this website gets rid of it all.

The website is called http://safeshare.tv/

This is how you create a safe link...

1. Copy the YouTube's URL (the address in your search bar, looks something like this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7GjIJqKsI4I)

2. Go to http://safeshare.tv/

3. Paste the youtube link into the bar and click on "create safe link"

4. It will then take you to your YouTube video free from any ads!

Happy viewing!

Highlights from week 7

Hats for term 4

Hi Everyone,

With the first days of Spring upon us already, we need to start thinking about hats again. As of Term 4, children need to be wearing their hats again during playtime, lunchtime and outdoor activities.

However, hats are to go home and come back to school each day. During the day, the hats will be stored in their chair bags.

Kind Regards,
Joy Kraan

Homework Week 7

During theme week there will be no homework sent home. The children should all have received a template for decorating their feathers for the bird costumes for our assembly in week 9. This can be their homework for the week.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Cheers,
Joy

Theme week reminder

Hi Everyone,

Just a reminder that theme week is coming up next week and it is looking like a fun filled foodie week!

On Tuesday the 2nd of September, the children will have a whole school shared lunch in the hall and on Friday the 5th of September, we have a whole school creative food competition.

The children have been sent home with a letter that outlines all the categories that the children can enter, should they wish to.

Please send any slips stating what your child is entering into back to school. The last day for submitting these is coming Monday the 1st of September.

Room 1, 2 and 3 will also be making their own pizza's on Thursday from 11am-12:25pm. Could we please have 2 parent helpers from Room 3 to assist in making these?

The notices outlining the finer details for these events have already gone out to the children this week should you need more information about the activities for theme week.

Enjoy the weekend and I look forward to a fun week with the kids next week.

Kind Regards,
Joy Kraan

Classroom Open Day

Hi Everyone,

Next Wednesday the 3rd of September from 3-5pm, there will be a classroom open day for the year 1's. This will be a time for you to come and have a look in the classroom and let your child show you around and tell you about what they do in class. 

This is not a time to discuss your child's progress, rather to come and look around at what the kids have been doing.

Look forward to seeing you there!

Cheers, 

Joy Kraan  

Futures education presentation

Hi Everyone, 

As you are all aware, I have been in the process of gaining my master's degree this year. The focus of the course that I am doing looks at out education system, where is came from, what the purpose of education is and we have been discussing what it should be in light the trends we observe today that have a direct impact on the future of our children.

There is an interesting presentation being offered to anyone who is interested in this topic and would like to hear more. I will be going to this too. 

I have attached the document here for you to look at. If you would like to attend, please do RSVP to the contact on the sheet. 

Kind Regards, 

Joy Kraan 

Homework Week 5

Hi Everyone,

Just letting you know that this week we are having a Studyladder homework week.

I have put specific activities for the different reading and maths groups.

Because Studyladder doesn't yet have the function where you can assign specific activities to specific students, you will have to find which activity your child is supposed to do.

Below is the list...

Reading activities
Spring: Sight words List 2 (Yellow tag)
Summer: Sight words List 1 (Red tag)
Autumn: Sight Word 2 (Orange tag)
Winter: Sight words List 1 (Blue tag)


Math's activities
Circles: Adding multiples of 10
Squares: using the number line
Triangles: Place value teens
Hexagons: addition of numbers less than 5

Cheers,
Joy

100 day party

Homework

Hi Everyone,

Just a reminder to please have your child bring their homework for the week by Thursday. I mark and glue in the homework for the following week on Thursdays. When the homework book comes in after Thursday, it is very difficult for me to find the time for these catch ups and may mean that your child doesn't have homework for the following week.

This week I have 9 homework books back today out of 23 that were sent out on Monday.

Regards,
Joy

Welcome back to Term 3

Hi Everyone,

Despite the terrible weather we have had, I hope that everyone is enjoying the holidays so far!
This is my only real holiday this year before the summer holidays due to my university studies. I have received my results back from my first semester and I passed both my papers with distinction, which I am very pleased about!

This Term coming up is going to be a very busy one, so I will be keeping you posted through this blog.

Below I will outline some things I want to implement in the program, change or events that are coming up.

Please feel free to comment below if there are any questions or comments or just to let me know that you have read this.

Cheers,
Joy

100 day party
Date: 1st August 2014
Time: 10am-11am

As the children have probably already shown you during the PPPs, we have been counting the number of days that we have been at school. Friday of Week 2, which is falls on the 1st if August we are going to have a 100 day party!

During this time I have also told the students that they are allowed to bring their pets from home into the classroom with them to show and tell, provided that their parents are there with them while the pet is in the classroom.

We will also be having a 100 day party themed shared morning tea, so if everyone could please bring a plate that would be fantastic.

On that note, there are still a couple of plates from our farewell morning tea that haven't yet been collected.

We also made these celebration hats with the help of the parents there and the children absolutely loved it!

Reading
In the reading program I have added in a couple of new features, that would be useful for you to know.

High frequency words: As you have probably seen, I have made and sent home packs of words, specific to the level of books that your child is reading, i.e those reading books at yellow are given yellow words home.

These have taken a very very long time to make, so please look after them! There is a list in there of what words are in the pack and I would appreciate it if you check before sending the words back to school whether there are the same number in your child's pack.

These words can stay at home until I have checked them off throughout the term that your children instantly recognises these, they cannot be sounding these words out.

Winter reading group: The winter group will be getting only one book home per day because we are going to start looking at books in more detail and zoom in on comprehending the text by developing a series or comprehension strategies.

Therefore homework is going to be a bit different. I am going to send home one book that the students keep for the week along with an exercise in their homework book that helps practice the comprehension strategy. Please send the homework book and the reading book back to school at the end of the week.

The schedule for developing reading comprehension strategies will be as follows:
Week 2/3: Activating prior knowledge
Week 4/5: Self monitoring
Week 6/7: Predicting
Week 8/9: Questioning

So there will only be one piece of reading homework but it will be an activity to help students practice each comprehension strategy taught in class.

Maths
The first two terms has been a whole class focus in class to build up mathematical knowledge. This Term I am implementing group work for maths to push students onto the next strategy stage.

For homework, I would like to focus on the area that students lack in most, basic facts.

Like in reading, children need fast words to help free up cognitive space to work out more complex problems, this also goes for maths.

I would like to set up a basic facts sticker chart so that this becomes the focus in class as well as at home.


News 
On Mondays and Fridays the children have a slot of time for news. I would like to make this news time a toy-free time this term and for it to become a talk time where children can share interesting news items they have found, interesting things from nature (pictures are fine), holiday stories, favourite books or artefacts from home.

In order to manage this time-wise and have enough time to discuss the news in detail, 2 students are chosen for each Monday and Friday to bring something to share.

Below is the schedule for Term 3.

Week	Monday	Friday
2	Beau & Luke	Logan & Jane
3	Bekele & Ollie & Jade	Sam & Shay
4	Rudi & Poppy	Harry & Bella
5	Luka & Tawera	Ruby & Frankie
6	Joel & Eva	Ben & Zachary
7	Matai & Louis	Dev & Beau
8	Logan, Jane, Bekele & Ollie	Sam, Shay, Rudi & Poppy
9	Harry, Bella, Luka & Tawera	Ruby, Frankie, Joel & Eva
10	Ben, Zachary, Matai, Dev & Louis

Integrated studies
This term starts off with kitchen chemistry. We are working towards a day where we make our own pizzas! Watch this space!

If you have any question or comments, please let me know! 

Enjoy the rest of the holidays!

Kind Regards, 
Joy Kraan 

Homework week 8/9

Hi Everyone,

The last two weeks of Term 2 we will be spending time on getting ready for PPP's in week 9.
Therefore, the homework book will resume in Term 3. For the next two weeks I have assigned some tasks on Studyladder to do with Geometry, which is something we are focusing on in mathematics at the moment.

There are activities that go from very basic to more challenging, so the children who would like to challenge themselves can work on the activities that are more challenging (coded orange), the easier activities are coded white.

Kind Regards,
Joy Kraan

PMP

Hi Everyone,

Just want to let you know that there will be no PMP this week due to class photos and house assembly.
So, if you are a parent helper for PMP you don't need to come Wednesday or Thursday.

Cheers,
Joy

Week 5 and 6

Just letting you know of the happenings these next 2 weeks.

Week 4, I will be on a BT course on Tuesday and on Wednesday it is my last day this semester where I have to go to university for  a day (I have to complete a 30 minute presentation for an assessment!). Tracey Stanley-Hunt will be taking the class at this time.

On Thursday, we will be having a shared morning tea for Mia, who is leaving us.

Week 6: I am going on a Google conference from the 8th-13th of June. This conference will show us what 5 different schools are doing in Australia and will give us some great new ideas to try in the classroom. Looking forward to seeing what they have to offer.

For that week Jo Forsyth will be taking the children. The program will be as normal and you are still able to contact me via e-mail.

Kind Regards,
Joy Kraan

Marae visit

Hi Everyone,

Just a quick reminder that we are going on a Marae trip this coming Friday the 6th of June. Please make sure that both the permission slip and money have been handed into the office or sent to school in book bags by Thursday the 5th of June.

Cheers,
Joy Kraan

Sunshine Classics

Hi Everyone,

Hopefully the children are enjoying the term so far. It is going to go very very quick!

I have explored some e-books that are accompanied with relevant activities.

I will assign each child with readers appropriate to their reading level and e-mail you all their passwords to enter the sunshine classics.

You don't have to do this everyday, just once a week. It means that reading for homework is done through a variety of different mediums.

Look forward to what they think about it from the children. I will start this next week and e-mail through the passwords before then.

Click on the link below to access the student log in page
http://bookshelf.sunshineclassics.com.au/students/login

Kind Regards,
Joy

Welcome to term 2

Hi Everyone,

Welcome back to Term 2!
We have already had our first week of term 2 and it certainly kept us on our feet. We would like to send out a warm welcome to Luke who has joined room 3 this term!

This term the children have a number of interesting things that they have the opportunity to experience. In our integrated studies unit, we are looking at whakapapa and what it means. The children will have the opportunity to visit a marae this term, which they are really looking forward to.

PPPs: PPPs are another feature of term 2. PPPs are part of our reporting cycle to parents where we have 10 minutes with you to discuss your children progress and achievements. The children will also be able to show you the things they are proud of, enjoy doing in the class, art work they are proud of and poems or rhymes they can read independently. You will receive a notice about this at some point during the term.

A few reminders...

Studyladder: I have removed the activities from term 1 off studyladder so that it is easier for the children to see what activity they are supposed to tackle. Each week I will put up the reading, writing and mathematics activities for their homework and remove the old ones. I will still be sending home their homework books. Please make sure that your child can have access to a computer even if it is for 10 minutes every day after school. These activities support their learning and are interactive learning methods are known to be a feature of childrens' learning. I have noticed that some children have not yet accessed studyladder, which concerns me.

Bookbags: There are too many children not coming to school with their bookbags. Please make sure that your child comes to school with their bookbag! I only have a couple of spare bookbags and they are used everyday. While it is the child's responsibility, please could you support them and remind them before coming to school each day.

Again, please don't hesitate to e-mail me or if there are any issues come and talk to me in class. This term I have a duty so it is really hard to catch me after school as I will be rushing off to get to the walkers line. E-mail is usually the best way to contact me and otherwise make a time after school and I will arrange for my duty to be covered.

Kind Regards,
Joy Kraan

Holidays

Happy Easter everyone!

We are one day away from a well deserved break! We have been looking at the amount of work we have already done and the achievements we have made, all the children should be very proud of themselves.

I know I certainly will be looking forward to taking a a break. Just bought a house so Aaron and I will be busy renovating, amongst the study. Haha

I will be sending 7 readers home with the children for those who would like to keep the momentum with reading over the holidays. I will also be putting some more maths activities on Study ladder.

Thank you very much for all the wonderful support! I am so privileged to have another great bunch of parents who are giving me a hand. I know that I cannot do my job effectively without all your help! So, thank you very much!

Enjoy the Easter festivities!

Cheers,
Joy Kraan

No homework Week 10

Hi Everyone,

Just letting you know that I will not be sending the homework books home next week. Students will be receiving their reading books home and they can do the activities assigned to them on Studyladder.

Almost the end of the term!

Kind Regards,
Joy Kraan

Assembly confusion

Hi Everyone,

I have been informed that there was a hick up with the assembly. Room 3's assembly is not next week, its next term.

However, this has its positives as it gives us a bit more time to practice with our buckets and we will also be less tired.

Thank you to all those who have brought in their buckets already! We will be having a few practices next week with everyone.

Kind Regards,
Joy Kraan

Week 9

Hi Everyone,

Just thought I would update you on the happenings of this week.
This is another week where I am out of class a few days for various things (BT courses and uni)

Today I am at a beginning teacher course in Albany.
Tomorrow I will be in Manukau visiting a range of schools and having a look at their digital learning resources for my course at university.

Tracey and Jill will be in the class this week and I will be back in class on Thursday.

I am still checking my e-mails and am happy to respond to any questions you may have about anything.

Just a question, I have been notified of limited access to studyladder. Could anyone who is also having problems or who has notices this e-mail me so I can sort this out. It may be that I have to look into purchasing the unlimited version of studyladder for the class so that everyone has unlimited access.

Kind Regards,
Joy Kraan

Lost property in the classroom

I have got a pile of jumpers that either don't have names or the names have faded to the point they are hard to decipher. If you know that your child is missing a jumper, you are welcome to come and check these jumpers.

I am going to leave them in a box in the classroom until the end of this term and then they are going to the lost property. This is located on the old hall deck.

Kind Regards,
Joy Kraan

No readers

We didn't get around to completing out reading today, so some children may have not brought home reading books. My apologies! Time ran away on us and I totally forgot that we hadn't finished reading.

Books to come tomorrow!

Cheers,
Joy

Homework on Length

Please encourage your child to complete the activities about length on Studyladder.

These will really support what the children have started learning about in class.

Cheers,
Joy

Assembly in week 10

Hi Everyone,

Room 3 has an assembly coming up before the end of term 1. One of the items the children would really like to show the school involves plastic buckets and 2 of our rhymes (Hickory, Dickory, Dock and Humptey Dumptey).

So, could children please bring their bucket to school. The bucket should be around the size as shown in the picture so that they will be able to tap the top of the bucket.

Room 2 and 3's shared assembly will be on Friday of week 10. Please could we aim to get the children's buckets into class by the end of week 9 so that we can have a couple of practices with the buckets before assembly in week 10.

Kind Regards,
Joy Kraan

Jandal Day

This friday is Jandal day!!

Children are welcome to wear their decorated jandals to school and encourage them to bring a gold coin donation towards our local surf life saving club.

House leaders will be hosting a variety of jandal-themed games at lunchtime.

Look forward to seeing everyone in their flip-flops on Friday!

    

Homework for week 7

For week 7's mathematics homework I have set the children a couple of tasks around length for their mathematics on studyladder. I won't be glueing any mathematics homework onto their books.

Cheers,
Joy

Missing pants

Hi Everyone,

On Monday, Room 3 went swimming and it appears that these has been an accidental swap around of pants.

One of the boys has taken a size 8 pair of shorts home with the name Harrison Watts in them. If anyone has noticed their boy coming home with a slightly over-sized pair of shorts would you please be able to check for a name inside the shorts or their size?

If anyone finds it, could you please return it to school and I will pass it onto the boy in Room 9 that went home in a pair 6 shorts and retrieve the size 6 shorts in return.

Kind Regards,
Joy Kraan

Parent help privacy form

Hi Everyone,

Just letting you know that those of you who have volunteered to come into the class to do parent help are going to be given a school privacy agreement home today.

This is just a form that needs to be signed stating that whatever you see and do in the class with regards to the children's learning, progress and achievement remains confidential.

This is in compliance with the Privacy Act 1933.

Please sign and return these to school in book bags.

Kind Regards,
Joy Kraan

High Frequency word cards

Hi Everyone,

Some children came home with word cards yesterday. It is really important that these are practiced everyday, both the reading and writing of them.

Eventually, I will be taking off the easier words and replacing these with harder ones, so please make sure that the word cards do get sent back to school with the kids, especially on Thursdays and Fridays.

In the back of their homework books are the words that your child knows instantly. Some of the words children may sound out, however, these words need to be instant knowledge for them to help them learn to read.

If you have any questions, please e-mail me or come and see me before or after class.

Kind Regards,
Joy Kraan

Studyladder

Hi Everyone,

Hope that you are all enjoying your week so far!
Next week is theme week so the children can look forward to the life education bus coming to Matakana Primary school.

After theme week, we are going to start a mathematics unit on length. Studyladder is a great interactive website designed for children to practice skills in a variety of different areas of learning. I have set up each child with their own log in and password so that they can access their own account.

I would like to use this interactive learning webtool for homework in week 7. I will send home a notice with the children tomorrow (Friday the 7th of March) so that you can read more about studyladder and have all the access codes that you need.

If you have any questions please let me know.

Kind Regards,
Joy Kraan

Parent help

Parent help timetable

Hi everyone, sorry that it has taken so long for me to get this parent help timetable sorted. I have made 2 timetables one for odd school weeks and one for even school weeks (This coming week is week 5). Should there be a clash with your personal schedules you may be able to arrange a swap with each other.

Also, when you come in for parent help, there is a privacy policy that parent helpers have to sign. I will have these ready in week 6 and give you each a copy.

Below are some of the listed activities on each of the days. Please note sometimes this may change.

Monday

·      Glue in literacy activities for the week

·      Sharpen pencils

·      Read with children sent to you

Tuesday

·      Helping with the writing program in the class (Middle block)

·      Typing up children’s writing into their publishing templates (Afternoon)

·      Help to finish making mathematics games for the classroom (Middle and afternoon)

Wednesday

·      Helping with writing program.

·      Mounting art work, cleaning the classroom etc

Thursday

·      Putting books away into the book room

Friday

·      Gluing in homework for following week.

·      Putting remaining books into book room

·      Clean the classroom/tidy trays/clean art area etc

Odd weeks

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday
Kate Hassan (Morning)	Rachel O’Malley (Afternoon)	Jo Forsyth (Middle block)	Jo Benson (Afternoon)	Pam Boss (Morning)

Even weeks

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday
Nicole Gibson (Morning)	Ingrid Le Prou (Middle) Nicole Inger (Afternoon)	Vicki fanning (Middle)	Dellyse Gibson (Morning)	Punam Darji (Morning)

Many many thanks for everyone who offered to help!!! I really really appreciate it!

Kind Regards, 

Joy Kraan