Kia ora, Hello, Hallo, مرحبًا, নমস্কাৰ!, হ্যালো Hyālō, 你好 Nǐ hǎo, Kamusta, નમસ્તે Namastē, नमस्ते Namaste, こんにちは Kon'nichiwa, ನಮಸ್ಕಾರ Namaskāra, ជំរាបសួរ Chomreabsuor, 안녕하십니까 Annyeonghasibnikka, ഹലോ Halēā, नमस्कार Namaskāra, ꯍꯦꯜꯂꯣ, ဟယ်လို Haallo, Witam, Olá, ਸਤ ਸ੍ਰੀ ਅਕਾਲ Sata srī akāla, Talofa, Malo le lei, Mhoro, ආයුබෝවන් Āyubōvan, வணக்கம் Vaṇakkam, హలో Halō, ہیلو,, Xin chào, السلام عليكم As-salamu alaykum, ¡Hola!, Pẹlẹ

Term 1 is coming to an end next week. It has been a great term of rich learning! It has been great to have your support with learning at home and also in the classroom with the many events and trips that have taken place, including the Year 6 Camp and Year 5 EOTC.

 

This week is our Cultural Celebration Week with our students learning about the many cultures of students in their classes. Our Bi-Lingual kaiako, Wanwan and Pearl, have interviewed and filmed many of our students, teachers and parents representing many cultures. These short interviews have been shared with classes, with questions to think about and discuss after viewing eg. What does culture mean to you? What is important about your culture? How can you relate to this? Classes are also doing a range of other activities.

 

The students are also able to learn about and enjoy some cultural performances. We welcome Winsome again who will teach and perform the Lion Dance for students from Years 1 to Year 3.  Students from Year 4 to Year 6 enjoyed performances from Ethan, Daisy and their mother Jessie who played the Guzgeng, a traditional Chinese stringed instrument.  See Austin who took the opportunity to play too.

Anzac Day falls in the school holidays and Patrick Janes and Taylor Ross will represent Eastern Hutt School. They will lay a wreath at the Cenotaph at the Civic Service at 9.45am. You and your whānau may also like to attend.

 

 

A big thank you to all our kaiako who have dedicated themselves to providing a rich programme of learning for your child(ren) in Term 1.  A big thank you too for all the work they have done in the other curriculum areas across the school. 

 

We will be farewelling Jo Prosser at the end of next week as she takes on a new leadership role at the Central Regional Health School teaching students across a range of ages. Jo arrived from teaching overseas during the Covid teaching times and took on one of the ‘Bubble School’ classes. Following that Jo took on a permanent position and soon showed leadership qualities and was appointed Team Leader of the Year 4s. We thank Jo for all she has done for the tamariki in A1, and all the tamariki Jo has taught over the years. We appreciate all that Jo has contributed to EHS and wish her all the best in the next step in her career.

 

We welcome Sally Velvin who will begin at the start of Term 2 who has extensive experience teaching at this year level both in NZ and overseas. Sally comes highly recommended and will also be able to make a contribution to EHS in the area of PE and Sports. 

 

We also welcome back Jules Hunt to Eastern Hutt to teach our new New Entrant class in C2. We are looking forward to meeting our new tamariki on the first day of Term 2.

 

The gate at the front entrance is held open until 9am and after 3pm so all our children can get through the gate. To ensure the safety of all our students the gate will be closed between 9am and 3pm. If you are late, please do not just drop your child off but go and open the gate for them.

 

If you are passing through the school during the school day, please ensure you close the gates.

As you know there are 2 new Curriculums required to be implemented this year.  The Ministry of Education allocate Facilitators to provide professional learning on the new Mathematics Curriculum, and therefore we are restricted in the dates.  The second Teacher Only Day on Mathematics is yet to be confirmed.  The 2 teacher only Mathematics Curriculum days have been allocated by the Ministry of Education and do not need to be made up. Thank you for your support.

I wish you all the very best for the April holidays and hope you can make time to do the fun family activities that you all enjoy doing together.

Ngā mihi nui 

Julie Henderson
Tumaki (Principal)

Titiro whakamuri, kōkiri whakamua

As part of our ongoing commitment to ensuring the safety and well-being of our students, we feel very strongly about the issue of cybersafety. We take our responsibility of teaching our students to be good digital citizens and to have a positive digital footprint very seriously. Last week we had a hui with all Year 4-6 children and talked about age restrictions for many of the popular social media apps, most of which have a minimum age of 13. You should also be aware that many game platforms have ratings much older than you might realise - Roblox is recommended for 10+, Fortnite is 12+, and Discord is 13+.

 

Whilst we understand that you may face resistance from your child to delete apps they are currently using and to set app limits or “downtime” on their devices, we strongly encourage you to follow the New Zealand age restrictions.

We also are aware that there are students who need to have a phone or smartwatch at school for their before or after school arrangements, however the New Zealand Government policy is that these must not be accessed during school hours. Please ensure your child hands their phone or smartwatch into the school office every morning.

 

If you need further information, please see the Department of Internal Affairs website, particularly these two pages:

 

Thank you for your involvement and support of your child’s online safety - he waka eke noa.

 

 

Last Thursday our Senior Gymnastics Team participated in the HV Gymnastics Schools Festival. They had trained very hard every Monday lunchtime for 6 weeks. There was a certain amount of nervousness as the new school beam had not arrived in time and the only beam practice they had done was on the low beam. The new beat board for the vault had arrived mid-term, so there had only been 3 weeks practice with the new beat board. However, the nervousness soon dissipated as we arrived at the gym and everyone completed their routines to a high standard. We had some outstanding results with 5 tamariki being awarded Gold Certificates and 6 tamariki were awarded Good Sports awards for showing respect, and being supportive of their team mates and the other schools. Ka mau te wehi! We were incredibly proud of all our gymnasts for their dedication and team spirit.

Our Team looked sharp and professional in their new EHS sports jackets, which added to the sense of pride and unity on the day.

We had wonderful weather and were very fortunate to have a class of students from St Bernards College to help with this event.  They gave lots of encouragement to all our runners and supported everyone to cross the finish line.  It was a great day and final results to be notified.

On Tuesday, our awesome student road patrol leaders were out with Constable Tanya for their refresher training. Constable Tanya was super impressed with how hard our tamariki work to keep our crossings safe. Every morning and afternoon, this dedicated group of Kaitiaki Leaders are out there, braving the early, often wet and windy mornings. They’re gearing up for the cold winter months ahead, but we know they’re looking forward to a warm milo in the staff room when it gets close to freezing!

You can help our road patrollers do their job safely by following the parking rules around our school. Double parking or parking on yellow lines makes it incredibly difficult for our patrollers to see clearly and make safe decisions. Our road patrollers also have set markings to help them make calls. Sometimes it takes time for them to make a safe decision, so please be patient with them - they know what they’re doing!  Also, please use the patrolled crossings rather than crossing where it’s closest to your car park - it sets a great example of good road habits and safety for your tamariki!

A big shout-out to our amazing parent supervisors too, who do their best to keep everything running smoothly! Your support is truly appreciated.

To celebrate all the extra movement and fitness we've been doing for 'Moving March' at school, we held a School Skipping Celebration! Dressed in our whānau group colours, we began the event with an energetic chant competition, led by our whānau group leaders. A big congratulations to Rata for their impressive win!

After that, we headed to our skipping areas to showcase our skipping skills using long ropes, short ropes, and hoops.

My favourite was skipping with the long rope to music.

By Elena - Rātā

I enjoyed doing lots of types of skipping with my whānau group.

By Bede - Tōtara

It was fun dancing and skipping at the same time.

By Hirtika - Pōhātukawa

I liked skipping with my whāna group because any kind of skipping is fun.

By Rasul - Kōwhai

 

A few weeks ago, Stella, her sister Willow, and her dad were all walking along Petone Beach when Stella noticed the rubbish that was blowing around. 

This gave Stella an idea of how she could complete her HACK challenge ‘Give to our environment. Take time to visit a beach, river or park near you and pick up any litter you find’. 

Stella decided to organise a beach clean up. She inspired her A1 classmates to join her and also contacted Keeping Hutt Valley Beautiful.

On Sunday 30 March everyone met at Petone Beach and spent some time picking up any rubbish that they could find.  KHVB came to help on the day and also provided all of the clean up equipment needed. They also gave the tamariki some lovely badges and treats for helping to tidy the beach.  Afterwards Stella’s dad put on a yummy sausage sizzle for everyone. 

Well done to Stella and her classmates for taking positive action in helping to care for our environment. 

If your child is going to be ABSENT OR LATE from school please ring the absentee line 566 2734 or text only (we do not answer this phone) on 027-773-7243 before 9.30am and leave a message which includes name, room number and the reason your child is away or  is going to be late.
Late Children – please report to the office so we do not ring your parents.
Remember school starts at 8.55am.

You can still start an automatic payment for Stationery, Camp, EOTC (Education Outside the Classroom) Activity Related Donations and School Donation, please contact Katherine by email at accounts@easternhutt.school.nz or ring the office on 566 0167. This is an easy way to spread the payments throughout the final term.
Direct Credit to our Bank Account.
Account Details:
ASB Lower Hutt
Eastern Hutt School Board 
Account number: 12 3478 0009657 00 

Eastern Hutt School works with SchoolDocs to maintain our SchoolDocs website for our policies and procedures.  Our site is available to our school community.

SchoolDocs updates, modifies, or creates policies in response to change in legislation or Ministry guidelines, significant events, reviews/requests from schools and regular reviewing from the SchoolDocs team.  

Our Board of Trustees, Staff and Parents have the opportunity to view these policies and give feedback.  

 

We will advise you when policies are up for review and how you can take part in the review. 

 

Below are the instructions:

1.        Visit the website http://easternhutt.schooldocs.co.nz/1893.htm

2.        Enter the username (easternhutt) and password (Eastern).

3.        Follow the link to the relevant policy as listed.

4.        Read the policy

5.        Click the Policy Review button at the top right-hand corner of the page

6.        Select the reviewer type “Parent”

7.        Enter your name (optional).

8.        Submit your ratings and comments. 

 There are a number of students who are not being picked up until well after 3.30pm. There is no one supervising these students.  It is very important that you collect your child by 3.15pm as per Eastern Hutt School policy. 

If your child has borrowed some of the school’s clothes, please can they be washed and returned.  We have no small clothes if any students need to be changed.

If you are living in our zone and have a child turning 5 this year or in 2025, please contact the school office for an enrolment pack if you have not already done so. If you have family or friends living in zone who also have a child turning 5 please let them know to contact the school office on 566 0167 as soon as possible.
There will also maybe places for children turning 5 who live out of zone. Our next ballot date is in March 2025.
Enrolling NOW helps us to forward plan.

As we look towards our winter sports season, just a reminder to highlight the importance of fair play.   As a school we take pride in ourselves and have always demonstrated a high level of fair play in all sports.  Keep this up for the winter season.  

We are indeed fortunate to have many kind and generous parents and past students who have put up their hands to coach and/or manage a team this year, a job that is not easy, but always rewarding. Thank you all for taking on these jobs as without your support Eastern Hutt would not be able to field teams.

We would also like to thank those parents, grandparents and whanau members who stand on the sideline week after week, offering support and personal cheer squads. 

We wrapped up Term 1 Netball on Saturday for Years 0-4 children. It was a fun term, where the players learned new skills and enjoyed awesome weather. We would like to thank everyone who contributed to its success. A big pakipaki to our Star Helpers and Managers for running the teams. To our players, we appreciate your commitment, positive attitudes, and teamwork! Go the Black and Gold!

If your child wants to play Netball, the Year 0-4 season will run again in Term 4. Keep an eye out for an email to sign up closer to the time. Year 5 & 6 children play in Terms 2 & 3 on a Monday afternoon, with registrations closing this Friday, 5th April, at 3pm. Any questions please email netball@easternhutt.school.nz

Olivia Harris Netball Coordinator 

 

If your child would like to play in this league, please email sport@easternhutt.school.nz.  You will need a team of 2 (first and surname’s), and a manager.  Payment came be made via our school bank account.  Please ensure you put your child’s name and Badminton.   The cost is $30 per player.  

All games to be played at Hutt Valley Badminton Hall, 25 Vogel Street, Naenae.  Games will be on Tuesdays between 4 pm - 6pm commencing on Tuesday 6th May 2025, running for 7 weeks

Rhys Gaskin competed in the Goldstar Series karting championship in Wellington on Sunday. Kids from the Lower North Island travelled to compete at the event. He won the event overall with 4 wins and a 2nd place.