Respect Pride Participation Self-Management Perseverance

Tena Koutou Whanau.

Welcome to week 5 of Term 1. We have had a very
settled start to the year, despite having a large
number of unexpected new enrolments. This has led
to the existence of some large class sizes which the
Senior Management Team is working hard to reduce
by hiring new staff to relieve the pressure. This is
good news for us all - more students mean more
choice for students and more funding to spend on
them. We will reduce large classes as a priority.
Our school wide activities to enable students to get
together across year levels and whanau groups have
been well attended and much enjoyed by all
attending. Our annual athletics meeting, held last
Wednesday at Kensington Park, was highly enjoyable
and seriously competitive. Despite no records being
broken the students did their very best.

I am delighted to tell you that the hotly contested

seniors vs staff relay freestyle length was won - for
the first time in a while - by the staff.
Photos have been taken, as well as a video by Josh
Burns, our Year 11 student who runs his own
business of aerial photography using a drone. We are
very grateful to Josh for recording this fun filled day
for us - and you all - to enjoy. Photos will be up on
our website and Facebook shortly.
Well done to you all for insisting that your young
person participates in all that the school plans for the
full integration of our students here at Kamo High.
This type of involvement fosters a real sense of
belonging - of turangawaewae - and that means
happy students who know they belong here. That in
turn encourages pride, self-esteem and full
attendance at school.

Congratulations to our Athletics Champions:

Junior Boys: Kaia Barber-Kake - T05
Junior Girls: Savannah Bodman - W01
Intermediate Boys: David Attwood - M04
Intermediate Girls: Savannah Sullivan - W03
Senior Boys: Kyron Vette - W02
Senior Girls: Rachyl Edge - W05
The second whanau activity designed to bond our
students together and break down year group or
social barriers was the annual whanau tabloids and
swimming day, held on Friday. The weather was
fabulously hot, and the students and staff were
dressed up in their whanau colours and eye catching
costumes to compete in fun events on the field and in
the pool. I want to thank you, our whanau, for
ensuring your son or daughter attended this day. We
had a very high attendance rate which makes it so
much more enjoyable for both other students and
the staff.
Congratulations to our Swimming Champions:
Yr 12/13 Boys: Kyron Vette - W02
Yr 12/13 Girls: Rachyl Edge - W05

My thanks also go to you as parents and caregivers

for supporting us over our uniform standards, our
students look well cared for, tidy, clean and proud.
I need to ask you all to be monitor the daily
attendance recorded for your young person. We have
started to record unexplained absences, which clearly
will affect achievement and engagement for every
student who is taking time off school. I do not refer
to the unavoidable absence for dental, medical, or
tangihanga, but for intermittent and unjustified
absences.
Recently we have had requests for students to be on
holiday in term time with their parents. Secondary
school students in this country get approximately 12
weeks off school on holiday a year. The days are well
over when a text book can go home and young
people work through lessons on their own. Our
curriculum is varied and diverse - our teaching style
and delivery methods are the envy of countries
around the world. To think that this time away from
school can be made up - or that work done on
holiday will equal that in actual class time is simply
inaccurate.

There is also the expectation that class teachers will

provide work for students in addition to the work
they are planning for their classes. Clearly this take
away work would have to be of a different nature
than the facilitating that is done in the classroom.
This is an unrealistic expectation on already very busy
teaching staff.
By law all students under the age of 16 years old
must attend school during the prescribed dates of the
term as set down by the Secretary of Education,
Peter Hughes. Only he is able to give permission for
time out of school.
For seniors, taking them out of school when internal
assessments are on is hugely problematic. They have
then missed the assessment for an unjustified reason
- they cannot have another assessment unless every
student sitting that standard has another assessment
opportunity. Time out of school for seniors is a major
problem for them achieving NCEA.
Please plan ahead and put the education of your
young person first - the school dates are set out for
the next year by August of the current year. You will
find these on the MOE website.
Last week you were all posted the instructions on
how to get into our school student management
system to view your young person's daily attendance,
achievement, reports and a variety of other recorded
information. Use this to see if your young person is
actually attending every period, or if they are not.
We will text you if your young person is not in school

- and sometimes we make mistakes and the student

is here - but the largest percentage of the time they
are not. With your help we can improve attendance
and this will automatically improve achievement.
I will be sending a newsletter every fortnight to keep
you up with school happenings, but events and dates
of student activities will appear on our school website
and Kamo High School Facebook page.
Board of Trustees Elections
The triennial election for the Board of Trustees will
take place during May/June this year. Please consider
if you have something you would like to contribute to
the governance of our school. Nominations will be
called for at a later date. A copy of A parents guide
to the role of the board of trustees is available at the
school office and on the NZSTA website:
http://goo.gl/KH9Lhr.
Should you have any issues you wish to discuss please
don't hesitate to contact the school by emailing the
office (admin@kamohigh.school.nz), or by phoning
(09-4351688). To email a staff member directly, you
will find all of the staff emails on our website at
http://goo.gl/oUk1gj.

Nga mihi
Joanne Hutt

Prefects 2016
Congratulations to all of our Prefects who have already presented themselves as strong leaders and are interacting
in the life and activities at KHS.

Front left to right: Emily Hankinson, James Witehira, Fraser Halvorson, Jordana Johnstone-Chappell (Deputy Head
Girl), Su Min Seo (Head Girl), Mrs Hutt, Ezra Sadler (Head Boy), Stephen Scott (Deputy Head Boy), Killarney ONeil,
Shawnee Maddox, Malcolm Finlayson.
Back: Holly Foster, Na Eun Hwang, Kayley Taylor, Ashley Moon, Chloe Bocock, Isaac Edwards, Piki-Maui Stone, Kyron
Vette, Wade Selkirk, Chenae Phillips, Storm Thomasson

Mathematics
After school tutorials are held every Wednesday after
school in D09 for any student needed some extra
help with Maths or needing access to the internet to
complete their work. Juniors and seniors at all levels
are welcome. There is no need to sign up, just drop
in. Stay for 10 minutes or an hour...as long as you
need to get their questions answered.
Entries will be taken soon for the University of
Otago Junior Mathematics competition. This is for
years 9 - 11 only and involves problem solving rather
than multi-choice questions. The competition runs
on May 4th. Entries will need to be in by April
1st. Information is available
at http://www.maths.otago.ac.nz/jmc/JMCdetails.ph
p See future daily notices for entry details. See Mr
Raj in D11 if you have any questions.
TRADES PRIMARY INDUSTRIES WE NEED YOUR
HELP PLEASE
This year we have had a fantastic number of Level 1,
2 and 3 Trades Academy students who have been
fully immersed in the Primary Industries programme,
as well as many more in other Trades subjects.
Looking forward to 2016 we are planning for many
more opportunities for these students and the future
of NZs Primary Industries and the many sectors that
involves.
To ensure that students are able to complete their
practical assessments and be industry competent
they are required to complete a large number of
practical hours in many hands-on facets of the
Primary Industry. Unfortunately we are not able to
offer the facilities for the completion of these
practical hours within the school grounds as they do
need to be farm/land based so we are asking the
wider Kamo High School Community for your help.
The students need to log practical hours in many
aspects of stock handling, driving tractors and quad
bikes, fencing, possum trapping including plucking
and skinning and mustelids for the first time in 2016,
and even milking. They study and prove competency
in a huge number of other topics but many of those
are school based or covered with our other providers.

So if you have a farm/lifestyle block/land that is not

too far from Kamo High School and you would be
willing to provide an opportunity for students to be
able to practice some or all of their skills and log their
required hours then please contact me on 09 435
1688 ext 629 or 021 040 2147 or
sheryl.riceman@kamohigh.school.nz
Time frames, transport, supervision etc will be
discussed on an individual basis and dependent on
the offer provided and the individual student/s. Even
if you can offer an opportunity for just one practical
experience, it all adds up and every offer will be
responded to. Thank you in advance.

Positive Behaviour for Learning

Positive Behaviour for Learning School wide (PB4L SW) is an initiative that Kamo High School has been
implementing since the beginning of 2014. At its
core, PB4L is a research based programme. The
fundamentals are that using data regarding
behaviour allows the school to identify and reinforce
the desired behaviours, thus discouraging
undesirable behaviour. When fully implemented with
fidelity to the years of research, the programme has
shown it can significantly reduce stand downs and
suspensions as all of the school community actively
live the values. It keeps students in school to learn.
Although the school has had five school values
identified for some time, the PB4L framework has
allowed more emphasis to be placed on these core
values, with greater instruction and more explicit
links made from classroom activities and teaching
and learning.
One of the first initiatives was to develop a schoolwide matrix of desired behaviours from all members
of the school in all of the varied settings at school
(classroom, staffroom, office, fields). This matrix was
a collaborative document between classes and staff.
From this collaboration, the matrix that was
developed positively states the expectations for each
of the five school values: Pride, Respect,
Participation, Perseverance and Self-Management. In

addition, living the school values is a phrase that is

now being actively used throughout the campus.
Each fortnight, via assembly and the daily notices, an
area of focus for the values is communicated. This is
followed up in interactions both in and out of the
classroom. Living the values is also recorded in our
student management system, KAMAR, through
positive comments. One of the major changes
regarding the values has been to actively encourage
and reward those people meeting their expectations.
PB4L-SW works alongside Restorative Practice as a
way of continuing to reinforce the desired behaviours
from the school population in all settings. All
behaviours, whether disruptive to learning or not
disruptive are learned responses. The challenge is to
positively re-frame the behaviour.

These include whole-school change initiatives,

targeted group programmes and individual student
support services.
Kamo High School is supported in their PB4L-SW
journey by Lynn Price from the Ministry of Education.

Uniform
If your son is a senior and needs another
shirt we have spare small and medium
sizes going free. Send him along to the
Deans Centre to pick up a free shirt.

Positive Behaviour for Learning is a long-term,

systemic approach to increasing student outcomes.

KHS TeenAg - 1st Place TeenAg Regional Finals

Congratulations to Andrew Martin and Grace Moscrip
who took 1st Place in the 2016 TeenAg Regional Finals
Competition, held recently in Pukekohe.
Congratulations also to Ezra Houltham and Brad
Martin who were nominated as Northern Region
TeenAg of the year.
Competitors were tested on their skills and
knowledge as future agriculture leaders and put
through their paces in the preliminary with 8 practical
modules which contain a variety of different
agriculture activities both on and off a farm.

Andrew Martin & Grace Moscrip

The Top 7 from the preliminaries then moved on to

the Face Off, where the teams raced head to head
against other teams to complete any given task or set
of activities to the best of their ability whilst racing
against the clock.
The Top 3 teams from the day then qualified for the
Grand Final in Timaru where they will compete for
their region to take out the TeenAg Grand Champion
title.

Ezra Houltham & Brad Martin

Surfing Scholastics Cheyne Dowsett

29 Feb/4 Mar
29 Feb/1Mar
1/2Mar

2 Mar
3 Mar
4 Mar

4/6 Mar
5/6 Mar
7/8Mar

Year 9 Camp
Trades Health & Safety
Leaf Cup Cricket
NSS Boys Volleyball
Massey Visit
Rugby League
Kapa Haka Training 4pm-7pm
NSS Girls Volleyball
Dargaville Field Days
L1PRI Group 3 - North
Girls Rugby 7s Open
NSS Team Tri
Kapa Haka Wananga
Relay for Life
Trades 1st Aid
Trades Health & Safety

8/10 Mar
9 Mar

10 Mar

11 Mar

L3 OED Camp
Primary Industries Big Day Out
NSS Boys Futsal
NSS Mountain Biking
Rugby League
Kapa Haka Training 4pm-7pm
Canterbury Uni visit
NSS Girls Futsul
NSS Tennis Open
Rugby 7s U15 Boys
IFPS Surf Trip
Kapa Haka Trip
L1PRI Group 1 North
NSS Bowls
NSS Senior Touch