We are on the countdown to the end of the year now with our senior’s on study leave and only a month to go to Prize Giving. With that in mind we would encourage all parents, grandparents & supporters of the school to come to this final event of the year.  This is to be held at the Timaru new school on Thursday 6th December and is also an excellent opportunity for those of us in the south to see for ourselves a new modern school.  Please mark this date in your calendar.

Last week the CA South Team join CA’s from throughout the country at the Manawatu Campus to discuss ideas, and plan towards a brilliant 2019.  This was an inspirational day that included the OneSchool Global brand launch, global updates, recent advice and strategy workshops.  One piece of top advice we received that I thought would be timely for this time of the year was on Student Motivation and how we want all our students to be able to say “I’m a finisher”  We would urge all students to complete the year with a strong finish, and to our senior’s starting their exams next week, stay focused and give it your all, remembering this is your final chance to exceed your goals.   All the best.

Kind Regards,
Phillip Clare, on behalf of the CA Team

Cherry Rountree - Cherry is an extremely motivated and enthusiastic student. She is keen to learn and thrives with a challenge. She works well with others and has excellent management skills. Her work is always completed on time and to a high standard. Cherry has all the skills needed to be a successful Year 9 student in the Learning Centre in 2019. Keep up the great work Cherry!

Harmony Suckling - Harmony has been very diligent and working hard on her science internal, and spent the past week writing and completing it. She is positive role model and she is great person to have in the LC. Harmony always is involved in lunch and morning tea time games and brings a great competitive spirit to every game. Keep up the great work Harmony!

Graffiti Meets Decollage by the Invercargill 7/8s

We have had a blast during the first four weeks of Term 4 learning about graffiti art, exploring art materials and making lots of projects! We started off the term learning how to write the name “Jack” using graffiti art, and then moved on to writing our own names in the same style. We are now using these skills and our creative energies to produce a decollage, which is the opposite of collage. Instead of an image being built up of all or parts of existing images, a decollage is created by cutting, tearing away pieces of an original image, or comics, in our case. We are working hard on the placement of the comic strips which will enhance our work. Here are a few examples of where we are currently!

• OneSchool is using an assessment tool called MAP (Measure of Academic Progress) across all OneSchool regions.  This tool helps identify areas of strength and areas of development for all our students.  MAP Growth is an internationally recognised assessment used in over 147 countries.  We will be doing these assessments three times per year.  This provides us with a great way to track student progress, set improvement goals with students and assists teachers adjust their teaching to meet the needs of students.
• MAP Growth is a computer adaptive test so the questions students answer get harder as they answer more correctly, or easier as they find them more challenging, and are unique to them.  It is not possible to get all the questions correct, this is the beauty of this assessment as it allows us to precisely identify student’s strengths and where there may be gaps.  This is different to many tests our students normally do and for some of our very capable students MAP Growth is a more challenging assessment and supports identifying where students may need extending.  For those students who find learning difficult focusing on the assessment enables accurate data which teachers can use to support their learning. 
• Starting next week all year 3-10 students will be sitting MAP Growth assessments in Reading, Language Usage and Maths.  We encourage all parents to emphasise the importance of  these MAP Growth assessments to ensure the information provided can be used to inform learning goals and support our students in their journey to be life ready students who know how to learn.

Years 9 and 10

Wed 14^th Nov – Maths – Periods 3 and 4

Thursday 15^th Nov – Reading Periods 1 and 2

Thursday 22^nd Nov – Language Periods 1 and 2

Years 3-8

Please don’t hesitate to contact our MAP Growth coaches who would be happy to talk to you more about this important tool.

“Ability is what you're capable of doing. Motivation determines what you do. Attitude determines how well you do it.”

Lou Holtz