Kia ora whānau,

What a fantastic and busy term we’ve had in Te Pūawai! Since our last update, we have been diving deep into our learning about Our Oceans, exploring Healthy Oceans, Our Moana in Aotearoa, Kaitiakitanga, and Making a Difference. Through this inquiry, we have learned about marine reserves, sea creatures, marine food webs and chains, seaweed species, and—most importantly—the impact and influence we, as humans, have on our moana.

As we move into the final two weeks of the term, our focus will shift to ANZAC Day , ensuring our tamariki understand the significance of this important commemoration, which takes place during the upcoming school holidays.

In Writing, we recently reviewed our school gala, reflecting on the highlights of this exciting event. To extend our digital skills, we explored Canva to publish snippets of our reviews, which we have shared on our individual blogs.

Looking ahead to Term 2, we hope to begin our mahinga kai learning —provided Ranginui blesses us with some much-needed rain to end our current drought!

Reading Reminder: Please encourage your tamariki to read every night to build their reading mileage! They have access to ReadWorks and ReadTheory, which offer a range of passages and articles to help expand their general knowledge and strengthen their comprehension strategies.

Mathematics Focus: We will continue with a strong number focus next term. So far, our Year 4⃣ students have been working with three-digit numbers for addition and subtraction, while our Year 5⃣ students have extended their learning to numbers up to 10,000. We have also covered identifying, reading, writing, ordering, and comparing numbers, along with estimating sums and differences and using addition and subtraction strategies with and without regrouping.

Sports Update: This term has been packed with sporting events, including football festivals and rippa rugby tournaments . Our students have demonstrated outstanding determination and sportsmanship at these events—ka mau te wehi!

Te Reo me Tikanga Māori: We have been exploring pūrākau connected to our school pou . Over the holidays, we encourage students to continue working on their pepeha/tātai rangatira , as we will be focusing on presenting these in Term 2 to our class and syndicate.

Food for Thought Nutrition Programme

This term, we were lucky to take part in the Food for Thought nutrition programme, which ran over three sessions with Whaea Melissa. Our tamariki learned how to read nutrition labels, explored the different food groups, discovered how much sugar is hidden in our drinks, and discussed ways to make healthy choices about what we consume. To wrap up our learning, we were fortunate to receive a gift card to organise our own class morning tea —a delicious way to celebrate the end of a busy term!

Whānau Welcome! As always, whānau are welcome to visit our class at any time. Thank you for your ongoing support—we look forward to another exciting term of learning ahead!

Ngā mihi,
Te Pūawai

Kia ora whānau,

What a fantastic and busy term we’ve had in Te Pūawai! Since our last update, we have been diving deep into our learning about Our Oceans, exploring Healthy Oceans, Our Moana in Aotearoa, Kaitiakitanga, and Making a Difference. Through this inquiry, we have learned about marine reserves, sea creatures, marine food webs and chains, seaweed species, and—most importantly—the impact and influence we, as humans, have on our moana.

As we move into the final two weeks of the term, our focus will shift to ANZAC Day , ensuring our tamariki understand the significance of this important commemoration, which takes place during the upcoming school holidays.

In Writing, we recently reviewed our school gala, reflecting on the highlights of this exciting event. To extend our digital skills, we explored Canva to publish snippets of our reviews, which we have shared on our individual blogs.

Looking ahead to Term 2, we hope to begin our mahinga kai learning —provided Ranginui blesses us with some much-needed rain to end our current drought!

Reading Reminder: Please encourage your tamariki to read every night to build their reading mileage! They have access to ReadWorks and ReadTheory, which offer a range of passages and articles to help expand their general knowledge and strengthen their comprehension strategies.

Mathematics Focus: We will continue with a strong number focus next term. So far, our Year 4⃣ students have been working with three-digit numbers for addition and subtraction, while our Year 5⃣ students have extended their learning to numbers up to 10,000. We have also covered identifying, reading, writing, ordering, and comparing numbers, along with estimating sums and differences and using addition and subtraction strategies with and without regrouping.

Sports Update: This term has been packed with sporting events, including football festivals and rippa rugby tournaments . Our students have demonstrated outstanding determination and sportsmanship at these events—ka mau te wehi!

Te Reo me Tikanga Māori: We have been exploring pūrākau connected to our school pou . Over the holidays, we encourage students to continue working on their pepeha/tātai rangatira , as we will be focusing on presenting these in Term 2 to our class and syndicate.

Food for Thought Nutrition Programme

This term, we were lucky to take part in the Food for Thought nutrition programme, which ran over three sessions with Whaea Melissa. Our tamariki learned how to read nutrition labels, explored the different food groups, discovered how much sugar is hidden in our drinks, and discussed ways to make healthy choices about what we consume. To wrap up our learning, we were fortunate to receive a gift card to organise our own class morning tea —a delicious way to celebrate the end of a busy term!

Whānau Welcome! As always, whānau are welcome to visit our class at any time. Thank you for your ongoing support—we look forward to another exciting term of learning ahead!

Ngā mihi,
Te Pūawai

Kia ora whānau,

What a fantastic and busy term we’ve had in Te Pūawai! Since our last update, we have been diving deep into our learning about Our Oceans, exploring Healthy Oceans, Our Moana in Aotearoa, Kaitiakitanga, and Making a Difference. Through this inquiry, we have learned about marine reserves, sea creatures, marine food webs and chains, seaweed species, and—most importantly—the impact and influence we, as humans, have on our moana.

As we move into the final two weeks of the term, our focus will shift to ANZAC Day , ensuring our tamariki understand the significance of this important commemoration, which takes place during the upcoming school holidays.

In Writing, we recently reviewed our school gala, reflecting on the highlights of this exciting event. To extend our digital skills, we explored Canva to publish snippets of our reviews, which we have shared on our individual blogs.

Looking ahead to Term 2, we hope to begin our mahinga kai learning —provided Ranginui blesses us with some much-needed rain to end our current drought!

Reading Reminder: Please encourage your tamariki to read every night to build their reading mileage! They have access to ReadWorks and ReadTheory, which offer a range of passages and articles to help expand their general knowledge and strengthen their comprehension strategies.

Mathematics Focus: We will continue with a strong number focus next term. So far, our Year 4⃣ students have been working with three-digit numbers for addition and subtraction, while our Year 5⃣ students have extended their learning to numbers up to 10,000. We have also covered identifying, reading, writing, ordering, and comparing numbers, along with estimating sums and differences and using addition and subtraction strategies with and without regrouping.

Sports Update: This term has been packed with sporting events, including football festivals and rippa rugby tournaments . Our students have demonstrated outstanding determination and sportsmanship at these events—ka mau te wehi!

Te Reo me Tikanga Māori: We have been exploring pūrākau connected to our school pou . Over the holidays, we encourage students to continue working on their pepeha/tātai rangatira , as we will be focusing on presenting these in Term 2 to our class and syndicate.

Food for Thought Nutrition Programme

This term, we were lucky to take part in the Food for Thought nutrition programme, which ran over three sessions with Whaea Melissa. Our tamariki learned how to read nutrition labels, explored the different food groups, discovered how much sugar is hidden in our drinks, and discussed ways to make healthy choices about what we consume. To wrap up our learning, we were fortunate to receive a gift card to organise our own class morning tea —a delicious way to celebrate the end of a busy term!

Whānau Welcome! As always, whānau are welcome to visit our class at any time. Thank you for your ongoing support—we look forward to another exciting term of learning ahead!

Ngā mihi,
Te Pūawai

Kia ora whānau,

What a fantastic and busy term we’ve had in Te Pūawai! Since our last update, we have been diving deep into our learning about Our Oceans, exploring Healthy Oceans, Our Moana in Aotearoa, Kaitiakitanga, and Making a Difference. Through this inquiry, we have learned about marine reserves, sea creatures, marine food webs and chains, seaweed species, and—most importantly—the impact and influence we, as humans, have on our moana.

As we move into the final two weeks of the term, our focus will shift to ANZAC Day , ensuring our tamariki understand the significance of this important commemoration, which takes place during the upcoming school holidays.

In Writing, we recently reviewed our school gala, reflecting on the highlights of this exciting event. To extend our digital skills, we explored Canva to publish snippets of our reviews, which we have shared on our individual blogs.

Looking ahead to Term 2, we hope to begin our mahinga kai learning —provided Ranginui blesses us with some much-needed rain to end our current drought!

Reading Reminder: Please encourage your tamariki to read every night to build their reading mileage! They have access to ReadWorks and ReadTheory, which offer a range of passages and articles to help expand their general knowledge and strengthen their comprehension strategies.

Mathematics Focus: We will continue with a strong number focus next term. So far, our Year 4⃣ students have been working with three-digit numbers for addition and subtraction, while our Year 5⃣ students have extended their learning to numbers up to 10,000. We have also covered identifying, reading, writing, ordering, and comparing numbers, along with estimating sums and differences and using addition and subtraction strategies with and without regrouping.

Sports Update: This term has been packed with sporting events, including football festivals and rippa rugby tournaments . Our students have demonstrated outstanding determination and sportsmanship at these events—ka mau te wehi!

Te Reo me Tikanga Māori: We have been exploring pūrākau connected to our school pou . Over the holidays, we encourage students to continue working on their pepeha/tātai rangatira , as we will be focusing on presenting these in Term 2 to our class and syndicate.

Food for Thought Nutrition Programme

This term, we were lucky to take part in the Food for Thought nutrition programme, which ran over three sessions with Whaea Melissa. Our tamariki learned how to read nutrition labels, explored the different food groups, discovered how much sugar is hidden in our drinks, and discussed ways to make healthy choices about what we consume. To wrap up our learning, we were fortunate to receive a gift card to organise our own class morning tea —a delicious way to celebrate the end of a busy term!

Whānau Welcome! As always, whānau are welcome to visit our class at any time. Thank you for your ongoing support—we look forward to another exciting term of learning ahead!

Ngā mihi,
Te Pūawai

Te Waipuna class took some photos around the school, infront of the hall, infront of our school pepeha, and on our playground.

I am the teacher of Totara 2025. This is my class.

First we cracked the eggs into a bowl.  Then we added some salt.  We mixed the egg up.  Then we put it in the microwave and pressed the one to make the microwave start. Next we had to stir it and put it back in the microwave.  Shona and Akerama made the toast. We put a piece of toast on a plate then we put the eggs on the toast. We ate it all up. Finally the last thing we did was wash and dry our plates.

By Waiatakinarani

Mikayla turned 8 today!!! She shared delicious cupcakes and goody bags for her birthday. Ngā mihi nui to Mikayla and her whānau for the special sweet treats.

St. Patrick’s Day is always a blast, especially when we get to dress up and have some fun! It’s a day when we can all wear our brightest greens, maybe add a cheeky shamrock or two, and even pop on a leprechaun hat if we’re feeling extra festive. Our class enjoyed the dress up and learning about St. Patrick’s Day through our Kahoot quiz! It was awesome to see everyone so engaged and eager to learn using Kahoot.

Our outfits are certainly a lot greener than our grass at the moment!

Today Te Roto, Te Puna and Te Waipuna helped each other to weed the sandpit.  It was hard work!

This week we read the story “Marmaduke Duck and the Marmalade Jam” by Juliette MacIver.  We unpacked some words and learned what they mean – flock, haste, kaukau, jostle, plunge and awa. On Friday we made marmalade jam sandwiches and got a chance to taste marmalade just like the animals from our story.

Tuponotia says “Marmalade sandwiches are good, I have never tasted marmalade before!”

Tamanui says “Marmalade is yummy.”

Shona says “I like marmalade so much I want marmalade all over the place.”

Waiata says “Marmalade is yum because it tastes like orange jam.”

Tamatoa says “It was so yummy, I wanted more!”

Joshua says “I didn’t like the marmalade so I took my sandwich home for my Mum.”

Ailaah-Rose turned 8 today and brought in her delicious cupcakes to share the the class! We loved them!!! Ngā mihi nui to Ailaah-Rose and her whānau for sharing them with us!

The students had an amazing day last Thursday as the Tractor Trek came to school with Cat Levine and the Think and Be Me Show.

First up, the Tractor Trek. Our tamariki were wide-eyed with wonder as a convoy of  tractors of all shapes and sizes rumbled onto the field. The tamariki loved getting up close to the machines and even getting a chance to sit in the driver’s seat. A huge thank you to the Tractor Trek organisers and the generous tractor owners for sharing their passion with us! Ngā mihi nui to Leahana (Josiah’s mum) for taking such cool photo’s of our class.

The students were then treated to the Think and Be Me Show which included participation by lots of our own students and Whaea Jade too. This interactive and engaging show delivered powerful messages about resilience, self-belief, and celebrating our unique qualities. We are using Think and Be Me strategies to help us notice how we feel and strategies to help us manage our feelings. The characters Worry Watchdog, Angry Dragon and Cool Cat have been wonderful in helping learn the strategies. (Click on the link above to visit our class site)

Te Puāwai – Term 1 Highlights!

Kia ora whānau,

It’s been a busy and exciting term for Te Puāwai, and we’re excited to share some of the awesome learning and activities we’ve been part of so far!

Te Tiriti o Waitangi Learning & Class Trip
In Week 2, we had an amazing trip to Te Ahu Museum and Library as part of our learning about Te Tiriti o Waitangi. This year, we have been focusing on the history of Te Tiriti in our own local area. We’ve explored who was involved in writing, translating, and signing Te Tiriti, as well as the different perspectives of those who supported or opposed it. It’s been great to dive deep into this important part of our history!

Water Safety Programme
Our class has just completed the Top Energy Water Safety Programme, where our tamariki gained some essential skills to stay safe in and around water. This was a fantastic opportunity to grow confidence and awareness while having fun!

Toi Oho – Creative Learning
Our Toi Oho sessions are in full swing! Some students have been working with Whaea B and Matua Anaru, while others have been with Whaea Deb and Whaea Jade, supporting Te Manga as tuakana. It’s been wonderful seeing our students embrace their creativity and leadership in these sessions.

Creative Storytelling in Writing
This term, our writing focus has shifted from explanation writing to narratives. The students have been getting creative, learning about the structure of a good story, developing characters, and describing settings in detail. We can’t wait to share some of their amazing stories soon!

Mahinga Kai & Sustainability
Our mahi in the mahinga kai has been on hold due to the hot summer sun—it’s just been too warm to work outside! But we’re looking forward to preparing our garden beds and getting back into planting in early Term 2. In Week 3, Whaea Kathy from CBEC visited us to teach us about composting and worm farming, so we’re now ready to create our own right here at kura!

Rippa Rugby Skills
We’ve also been getting active with Timara from Northland Rugby, who has run two Rippa Rugby skills sessions with our class. This has helped us get tournament-ready for the upcoming games at the end of the term!

It’s been an incredible term so far, and there’s still plenty more to come. Keep an eye out for photos of our adventures!

Ngā mihi,
Te Puāwai

Te Manga had a fantastic time taking part in the Northland Rugby Rippa Skills and Drills session with Te Tinana and Tamara! They were working on their passing, running, and teamwork while having loads of fun. The tamariki will look forward to two more skills and drills sessions leading up the Year 3 and 4 Rippa Rugby Festival on Tuesday 1st April at the Kaitaia Rugby Club.

Mana Ake is an initiative from Te Whatu Ora that is about providing additional support to students and teaching staff across te Taitokerau to uplift the mental health and well-being of our tamariki. The Toi Oho approach is to create moments of joy through kemu Māori, uplifting the mana and mauri of tamariki through easy access to te reo and creativity to empower them to be self driven in their own hauora, identity and happiness. Tier One began in 2024 with Te Manga and Te Puawai.

Tier Two of Toi Oho (Mana Ake) is being delivered to 24 Year 5 and Year 6 students. The focus will be on upskilling the tamariki around emotional resilience and dealing with some of the big things that life throws at them. The Toi Oho kaiako; Whaea B, Matua Anaru and Matua Hori, also deliver a 20 minute activation sessionto our class to whakawhānaungatanga and familiarise the tamariki with the Toi Oho kaupapa. Our class then take part in a Toi Oho session with Te Puawai and Te Kauru which is being delivered by Whaea Jade, Whaea Kiran and Whaea Deb.

The students have been playing kemu Māori; Raupuhi, rautaka, Poi Toa and Maui Matau in mixed groups and have been having a heap of fun!

The tamariki have had a fantastic time during their Water Safety Lessons with Matua Tony as they learn to build confidence and essential skills in the pool. The class have practiced safe entry and exits, floating, treading water, and propelling themselves for the length of the pool without stoping or touching the bottom. Matua Tony has been fantastic and has kept everyone engaged with fun activities whilst reinforcing key safety techniques. Ngā mihi to Matua Tony and Top Energy for providing this opportunity!

Our class had an amazing trip to Te Ahu Museum and Te Ahu Library in Kaitaia with Te Puawai, to learn about the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi. At the library, the tamariki explored the library and took part in a fun scavenger hunt set up by Whaea Aria. They had to find the locations of the nine copies of the treaty documents taken around the country. Janie, Lexi and Ailaah-Rose found all 9 before we had to go.

In the museum, Whaea Kelly, a former Paparore School student, talked to the class about the signing of the treaty in Kaitaia and sent the students off on a museum scavenger hunt then the students worked on our own class treaty. Both classes then enjoyed morning tea and a play at the Kaitaia Playground before we came back to listen to a korero about the pou in the atrium by Whaea Nicola.

We finished the experience with a short drive up Church Road to point out where the treaty was signed and the significance of the area around Kaitaia Primary before we headed back to school.

It was such a wonderful learning experience and the students represented our class and kura with pride. We are incredibly grateful to all the whānau who came to support us on the day, ngā mihi nui!