Talofa lava! This year the theme is “Tautua i le alofa, manuia le lumana’i”. This means to “Serve in love, for a blessed future”. Every year here at Weymouth Primary School, everyone has a job to do. Check out our movie to see what we do in Room 18. Manuia!
We were very lucky to have Junky Monkey at our school again this year. Here are some videos of us having so much fun!
Last Thursday (Week 1) was an exciting afternoon for Weymouth and Leabank Primary School as they faced off in a rugby pre-match game held at Leabank School. The game was a big hit with students and families from both schools coming out to support their teams.
It was amazing to see so many people excited about inter-school sports! Both teams gave it their all and showed great sportsmanship throughout the game. A few girls played alongside the boys which was an awesome sign for growing the game of rugby.
This rugby match was a fantastic example of how sports can bring people together and teach important values like teamwork and respect. In the end, both teams showed that they’re not just great at rugby, but also to give 100% in everything you do and to be part of a team.
Hopefully, there will be more matches like this in the future, where everyone can come together, have fun playing rugby and cheering each other on.
Fa’afetai Mrs Vienna and Mr Ekepati Park from Leabank Park for allowing us to play at your school. Fakaaue lahi to Jacob Unuia (Jayveous and Dillon’s dad) who has been helping to coach/ train the boys.
Shout out to Mrs McLaughlin for your support and helping with transport. Nga mihi nui to Miss Cash-Tatana, Whaea Dana and all our whānau for coming out to support and cheer us on from the sideline.
Yesterday we had Dylan Schmidt NZ Olympic Ambassador come to visit our school. Dylan is the first New Zealand athlete to gain a medal in trampoline. He spoke to us about resilience, participation and what it took for him to get to the Olympics. Dylan told us that there were times when he performed terribly in competitions but he kept training and never gave up. He also handed out his Olympic medals for us to look closely at while he spoke. We were all inspired by his journey and wish him and all our New Zealand Olympic team, all the best in the Paris Olympics later this year. Check out a few pictures and a video from his time at our school.
Term 2 has started. Every first day of each term our school has a Powhiri. This is to welcome all the new children and staff to our school. It starts with a karanga (only done by females) and the visitors (new kids and staff) walk in and sit down. While this is happening our school is saying a chant. Matua Reg opens with karakia and we all sing a hymn. Once Matua Reg finishes welcoming the visitors, a man sitting with the visitors will say his reply. This is all said in te reo Maori. Whaea Moana (our acting tumuaki) will also say a small speech and greet everyone. Once this is complete, only the front row of visitors will come and shake hands or hongi with Matua Reg and our senior leadership team. Following our Powhiri, we also had a short ceremony for ANZAC day which was last week.
Here are a few videos of our powhiri:
As part of our Weymouth Way kaupapa here at school, we held a cultural celebrations day. We encouraged all children of all cultural and ethnic background to dress up in their heritage clothing. For those that couldn’t we emphasised that wearing our school uniform is part of our school culture and were welcome to wear that too (which some did). Our school gathered under the large white sunshade and had performances from our Kapa Haka roopu and our Pasifika group. Every class got a chance to stand and walk around the rest of the school waving their flags. Two students from each class introduced the ethnic makeup of their class. Here are a few photos and videos from our celebration on Tuesday!
Last week on Friday a group of 20 Year 6 children were involved in a leadership conference. It was run by the GRIP leadership organisation. When we arrived we found our seats and there were four sessions throughout the day. During and between each session students participated in: loud task games that involved lots of screaming. Other activities included: short skits that involved games and there were times throughout the day students had to get up and go and talk to students from other schools. Some of the things that we learned are: leadership involves sacrifice and helping others. We also had to think about ideas that are working well at our school and some things that need improving and our ideas to improve them. All of us came back feeling really encouraged about leadership and how we can help our school to be even better than before. Here are a few pics and videos from the day.
On Wednesday it was our first after school Y5s and 6 boys rugby league training. First we ran some fitness drills which meant lots of running on the field every minute on the minute for five minutes. After a little rest, we had our ball handling skills of passing and catching. This also meant the boys had to run with the ball and pass the ball to the person behind us. The next drill was a defensive session. The boys had to try and stop the person running with the ball. It was a light run and practice. The last part of training was playing a game of stop the defender. Two boys had to run with the ball to try and score and the other two boys were the defenders. Their job was to stop the attacking team from scoring. We all had lots of fun and are looking forward to our next training session.
We’ve been reading Dawn Raids by Pauline Vaeluaga as our Chapter Chat study for the term. In the book we read about Mr Parker teaching Sofia’s class the rakau stick game to E Papa Waiari. We thought what better way than to interact with the book is to give the rakau game a go. Watch our videos here and you should give it a go too!
This week we have been learning some Maths Warm Up games. One is called Bowl a Fact and the other Blast Off! Bowl a Fact helps us with our basic addition and subtraction facts using two dice. You can click here to find out more about how to play. For the game Blast Off, you use two dice and draw up a rocket that has 7 squares vertically with a triangle at the top. In the bottom square, write 10 and in the triangle write 67. First player rolls the two dice and if you roll a 5 and 6 then you can choose 56 or 65 to write in one of the squares in your rocket and then it’s the next person’s turn. You can only write one number per roll. The main focus of this game is place value. The first person to fill in all their squares in sequential order from 10 to 67 yells “Blast Off” and is the winner. Here are some pics of the children playing Bowl a Fact or Blast Off! It was lots of fun.
