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What an incredible example of learning through play in action! Lachie and Kahu (Year 6) planned, organised, and ran a full Rippa Rugby tournament. They stepped into the roles of coaches, referees, and organisers, learning on the spot and modelling real leadership and event management skills. The result? A fantastic, inclusive event where some students who don’t usually play got involved, supported by more experienced players who helped develop skills and confidence across the field. Beyond the game, these boys were building real-world skills in leadership, communication, teamwork, problem-solving, inclusion, and sportsmanship, all in a context they were passionate about. Opportunities like this show what happens when students are trusted to lead: learning becomes meaningful, active, and powerful. Student voice from Lachie & Kahu: What did you learn about running a tournament? "We had to communicate and work together to get it going. We had to talk to the teams and get them to line up and listen." What did you notice about those who don't usually play rippa or rugby? "At first the people who did know how to play didn't share. So I stopped the game and highlighted that. It gave others an opportunity to get involved. If they didn't know how to play, they were learning how to play by the end of the tournament."   Kia ora Parents / Caregivers, We are rapidly coming to the close of another term but some very important events before that. Staff Farewell - Jill Robb A heartfelt thank you to our wonderful class teacher, Jill Robb, as she steps down from her full-time teaching role. We are incredibly fortunate that Jill will remain a vital part of our school community providing release teaching. Jill’s passion for teaching and deep love of books inspires our students every single day. Her thoughtfulness, kindness, and steady, friendly presence create a nurturing environment where both children and colleagues feel truly valued. Jill is a natural problem solver who approaches every challenge with well-grounded common sense. Thank you for everything you have given to full-time teaching, Jill, and we look forward to your continued presence in our classrooms! We are delighted that Juliearna Napier will take up the full-time teaching position in Room 2. Juliearna is currently the release teacher in Room 3 and 4 and no stranger to our Junior children. This makes this a very smooth transition for our children. We are very grateful to Jill, Juliearna and Margaret Norton for their continued teaching and expertise in our Junior classrooms. Reporting > Your children’s reports will be sent home on Tuesday 30th June, the last week of term. > If you require reports to be sent to another parent and you have not notified us please let Anneke know in the office. These will usually be emailed. > Parent teacher interviews will be held early next term, Wed 29th & Thursday 30th. These will be very important to discuss your child’s progress so you have a clear understanding of how they are tracking. You will be able to book appointments with your teacher through the School App. We will let you know when the bookings are open. What you need to know about our current reporting? Your child’s progress will be assessed against 5 progress descriptors. They are : Emerging, Developing, Consolidating, Proficient & Exceeding These descriptors are used to grade each individual child’s attainment with their Year level in the New Zealand Curriculum. Children will be assessed on what they have been taught so far this year. The reports reflect approximately 14 weeks teaching and learning so this is a limited amount of the years’ curriculum. Your child’s assessment at this time will mainly be in the developing and consolidating areas as they cannot be proficient in a curriculum they have not covered unless they are clearly working beyond their current year level expectations. It may look like your children’s learning has gone backwards, but really it is because the curriculum at each year level has got harder with greater expectations. The comments are very important because they will tell you what your child is achieving and what their next learning steps are. We are proud of our children’s achievement with so many children making significant progress. The big message is that the goal posts have shifted and it will take time to move our learners closer to them. Enjoy your reports, celebrate your child’s achievement and what they have achieved to date. Cultural Festival We are excited to welcome all families to our Cultural festival on Thursday July 2nd, 5 - 7 pm This is a special celebration where all families come together and we celebrate who we are. Sharing food together is an important part of this. This will be followed by a time to view children’s work and a concert to conclude our evening. Further information will be coming home over the next week so please look out for this.  Uniform Thank you to those of you that send your children to school each day looking fabulous in our correct uniform. However, we have many children wearing all sorts of items that are not our regulation school uniform. This affects how people see us and reflects on the culture of our school. We want to look good and be proud of our presentation and who we are at West Gore School. Please note: > Extra tops for warmth can be worn under the long sleeve t-shirt so they are not seen; > Pants/ shorts must be navy, no flairs, jeans, Canterbury pants and other branded pants ; > Navy socks / tights only; > No jewelry, nail polish, elaborate hair decorations or makeup (except cultural and studs / short earrings); > No Croc footwear, only black or sport shoes. Teachers will check uniforms and inform you via a written slip if required. Let’s work together to get this sorted quickly as this is time consuming and takes time away from learning for our teachers. Please send a change of clothes for playing on the fields please. Our grounds are exceptionally muddy and we want our classrooms to be clean and show respect for our lovely cleaner, Kristine.  Have a wonderful weekend.
Ngā mihi Linda Fraser Principal We had a wonderful day celebrating our students today! We were absolutely delighted to welcome several new tamariki and their families into our school community. We also took the time to celebrate our latest learning milestone. Over the past two weeks, our students have been focusing heavily on Communication. It has been fantastic to see them working hard on their listening and speaking skills, and we are incredibly proud of everyone recognized today. A very warm welcome to our new students, and well done to all our certificate winners!  Last night, we held our Home & School AGM, marking a special time of transition for our committee. We want to say a massive thank you to Kelly and Gina, who are stepping down from their leadership roles after a few years of hard work and incredible dedication. We also want to wish Kelly and her family all the very best with the upcoming new addition to their family—we absolutely cannot wait to meet your new little girl! We then officially welcomed Ruth Chalmers as our new President, Emma Adamson as Vice President, and Kerry-Ellen McKay as Secretary. Thank you to Danielle Duncan, who is staying on as Treasurer. The Home & School is lucky to have you on board again. We are so incredibly grateful for everyone who has stepped up and your dedication and commitment toward West Gore School and its students. We have also restructured the Home & School Committee this year to better respect everyone's busy schedules. As you may have seen, we have set up sub-committees that will run independently, with team leaders reporting back just once a term. We hope this fresh approach means fewer meetings and less time away from your families! You can expect another round of forms to go home or a phone call to those who haven’t signed up yet. As promised, A massive congratulations to our prize winners:
The Home & Garden Tour Committee is already hard at work planning our upcoming West Gore School Home & Garden Tour 2026. 🏡 SAVE THE DATE!
We look forward to a great year ahead.   A huge thank you to Craig and Jamie from the MLT Rugby Ambassador Programme for delivering an engaging and energetic session with our students. Opportunities like these help our tamariki build skills, confidence, teamwork, and a love of sport. We are incredibly grateful to MLT for sponsoring this programme and making experiences like this possible for our students!  Dear Parents / Whanau, We are enjoying the connection with you, our community. Community partnership is at the heart of great education. When you, our parents actively support your children’s learning journey, our children develop confidence, resilience and the skills needed to thrive. We have had several opportunities to connect with you recently which we have loved. Eastern Cross Country was held yesterday where our team performed so well with two children now representing us at Southland next week. Congratulations to Lachie & Ollie. Our Busking was such a fun event with our children believing they were super stars on the street singing their hearts out to a large crowd. Thank you for making our children feel special and donating us $269.00 which we will spend on some musical instruments for next year. Thank you to all who sent back the Home and School sign up sheet. We are hoping this new system will allow more people to be involved in the way that suits your work and family needs. We will make contact later next week with families that are still to respond. Please send back early next week to still be in the Hot Chip and Grocery Voucher draw. We are planning our Cultural Festival for the end of this term. Information will be sent home today. This was an amazing event last year where we all learnt so much about each other. We are excited to share in further activities, kai and culture together. And … I hope you have all seen the brilliant advert for our School App that was posted on Facebook and our app last evening. It was enacted by our clever and creative Miss Prattley, Laya, Issy and Izette. No excuses now to not have this App. Thank you for your support of our Teacher Only day on Tuesday. Teachers had a full day learning the new Maths curriculum while our Support Staff participated in professional development relevant to the work they do. Enjoy your weekend Nga mihi Linda Fraser Principal   Hello Everyone, Over the last weeks there have been so many activities West Gore students have been involved with. We have had the Cross Country, well done to those who placed in their Girls and Boys age groups. Special congratulations to Ollie, Lachie, Harry, Lachlan and Malachai who did a stellar job of representing West Gore School! At the Southland Festival of Dance our fabulous dancers took out First Place in the School’s section! Our dancers achieved recognition in several categories, well done everyone for that hard work and your fantastic efforts on the day. Keep dancing Katelynne, May, Issy, Izette, Willow, Isabella and Aaliyah. Pink shirt day was a valuable and engaging way for our tamariki to learn about and consider the effects and feelings associated with bullying. An ongoing awareness, especially at such a young age can change the lives of so many young people, now and into the future. Our students who participated in the busking last Thursday gave such a joyful performance that was so well received. Many parents came out and the positive vibe on the street that was full of parents watching their particular school groups was so good. To all of the students who took part in all of these activities, you did your school proud. The focus on learning at West Gore goes hand in hand with the collaboration, fellowship and team spirit that these fun activities promote. All of these really cool achievements are reported on our school app, check us out on Facebook too. Of course the success of all these endeavours rests in large part on the staff , community and parent helpers who offered their time, knowledge, experience and encouragement, our grateful thanks to you all. Also last Thursday our school acknowledged and offered thanks to our incredible Support Staff who are a constant and ever present strength not only in our school function but in the day to day experience of your children’s day at school. I was very happy to be there on behalf of the Board and to express our gratitude. At our Board meeting last week Principal Linda Fraser and Deputy Principal Rebekah Prattley updated the Board on the new curriculum reporting that will be coming into effect over the next months. The repeated adjustments to the curriculum over the last two and a half years have brought with them intense ongoing change. The staff have been spending valuable time with curriculum advisors from the Ministry of Education trialing new assessment procedures, identifying issues and preparing early to best serve the needs and requirements for our students. We are fortunate indeed to have such experience in our leadership team to guide staff through a large amount of change and the intense work required. We are in good hands and the Board appreciates this very much indeed. Susan Hasselman Presiding Member   This amazing group of children did West Gore School proud at the Eastern Cross Country yesterday. They all ran hard and gave it their best! Congratulations to Ollie and Lachie who will be going on to represent us at Southland Cross Country on 12th June 2026.  AGM - Thursday 11th June at 7pm in the staffroom Volunteer sign-up sheets went home yesterday. A massive thank you to everyone who has already stepped up to join a sub-committee or offered to be a general helper on event days. We truly appreciate your support! We Need You! If you haven’t sent your form back yet, our friendly office team will give you a quick call soon to check in. Joining a sub-committee is a fantastic way to help because these smaller groups work independently. This means fewer long meetings and more quality time back with your family! Committees to sign up for are: Heat Ups, Breakfast Club, Home and Garden Tour, Pizza Days, Disco, Sport Uniforms and Community Support.  Road Patrol – Supporting Student Safety Did you know that Road Patrol plays an important role in helping keep our students safe when travelling to and from school? We encourage all parents and caregivers to take a few minutes to review our Road Patrol Policy on SchoolDocs to learn more about how crossings are managed, the responsibilities of students and supervisors, and the safety procedures in place. The policy also highlights the important role that parent volunteers play in supporting the operation of Road Patrol. At present, we do not have enough volunteers to safely run the programme, meaning that Road Patrol has had to be scaled back, and not all crossings are always managed. If you are able to assist, even occasionally, we would love to hear from you. Together, we can help create a safer environment for all students travelling to and from school. If you can help with Road Patrol in the mornings at either Robertson or Kitchener Streets, please contact Anneke in the office.  Our talented students have you covered! They created this tutorial for you in just 30 minutes! Watch their hilarious guide and remember, our school app is the main way we share important news, notices, and updates with whanau. See Anneke in the office if you need help downloading and working on it. "How The Birds Got Their Colours" is a traditional, First Nations Dreamtime story from Western Australia that explains how native birds got their vibrant colours and why the crow stayed black. After listening to this story. Room 3 students made colourful birds from a variety of resources and personalised them with their own designs. Ask your Room 3 tamariki to tell you, how the birds got their colours. |
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