Appreciation from Afghanistan

Here is a lovely email received recently which we've shared with the children...

Hello Mr Clarke,

I am the Commanding Officer of the New Zealand Defence contingent serving in Bamian, Afghanistan. 

A few days ago we received xmas cards that had been made by students from your school.  Unfortunately these were significantly delayed through the mail system. 

The cards are fanastic.  So much effort has obviously gone into them by the students.  It was a wonderful and much appreciated gesture that you, your staff and the children made.  Please accept our gratitude and pass on our thanks to all concerned;  the staff and children.  We were humbled by such thoughtfulness.

All the very best to your school for 2012.

Kind regards 

Brett Wellington 
Lieutenant Colonel 
NZ PRT 
BAMIAN
AFGHANISTAN

Keeping Ourselves Safe Parent Seminar 10 Nov

Dear whānau,

On Thursday we had 13 parents attend the seminar about our Keeping Ourselves Safe programme. This is a national programme run in conjunction wth schools and NZ Police. We hope you found it useful and interesting in your role of supporting the staff to help our children learn to be more safe as they learn and grow. Here is the presentation for those who were unable to make it:

Thanks to Chris Thurlow for supporting this important topic for our parents and children. Meg Moynihan, our community constable, begins the programme today.

EXPO of Learning Photos

We had a fantastic turn out to our annual EXPO of Learning last week - nearly double than last year! Thank you whanau for supporting us in the growth of your child's learning.

Halloween Party Saturday 29 Oct

Teens Halloween Party

Saturday, October 29, 8.30 pm to 11 pm

Burnham Community Centre,  Entry Fee $3

Entry to Military teens and their invited friends only!

 Kids Halloween Party

Saturday, October 29,

4.30 pm to 7.00 pm

Burnham Community Centre

Entry Fee $2 

Limited to 150 tickets

Download/print invite flyer

Keeping Ourselves Safe Parent Seminar - Thursday 10 Nov 2-3pm

This is one of the booklets
that teachers work with.

We are running a seminar for parents to give an overview of this important topic which the entire school is focussed on from week 3. 

KOS is a personal safety programme and we will share what it is, why it is important and what is taught. We require minimum 10 parents to run this seminar because we run this in conjunction with NZ Police. More information about KOS in next weeks newsletter or www.police.govt.nz

RSVP via www.burnham.school.nz/facebook or admin@burnham.school.nz or 347 6851

Web Safety Seminar

Next Thursday we are holding our first ever Web Safety seminar just for parents and caregivers. This evening seminar starts at 7pm in the hall and will go until approximately 8pm, with tea and coffee provided.

We have an internet safety specialist, Dean Stewart, from Web Safety NZ, facilitate the session which is free. To RSVP to this event please go to:

www.burnham.school.nz/rsvp

Policy Review - Achievement of Māori

We are in the process of reviewing the policy for the achievement of Māori students. This is an important part of our cycle of review and we want to encourage as many families as possible to give us feedback on the wording of the policy, but also the implementation of it.

Follow these steps to log in and review our policy:

1. Click this link to go to the policy called 'Improve Educational Outcomes for Māori Students'
2. This will take you to the policy under review on our schooldocs site, then have a read of the policy.
3. Once you've read the policy, click the button at the top right called 'Policy Review' (like the picture to the right) and a window will pop up.
4. Choose parent/caregiver, put your name and password 'pin'. 
5. Rate the policy and write any comments to give us feedback on both the wording and how well you think it implemented.

Expo 2009

Last Thursday I had the pleasure of joining the community for the annual Burnham School Expo. It was wonderful to see the partnership that we have at Burnham School in action during this evening. The Wearable Arts Challenge this year involved families dressing up using recycled materials, culminating in a parade to show off the creations. Below are photos of many of the families having fun dressing up.

Here is the video of the junior dance performance and below are some photos from the evening.