Welcome to 2005! This is where we record the events that are going on around the school!
2.2.005
Greetings.
A hot, hot , week. Kids in the pool three times a day! Thank goodness for the school pool!
All classes have started very purposely. Our first unit is based around our schools learning stars.
Welcome to Miss Turner, in Room 2. Kelly has been working over the holidays getting her room all ready...
looks good too! Welcome also to our new children from Stanley School. Four children have come to Toko due to the closure of Stanley,and wonderful children they are: Alex, Regan, Corban and Dylan. A big welcome to you and your families. Please don't hesitate to come and see us at school!

Both Room 4 and 5 have been redecorated over the holidays. They are finished and the kids really like them.

20.2.05
What's been happening?
We had Jonathan Harper at school for a great afternoon of music. Well worth it. There was a lot of children involved in the afternoon and they all raved over their part! Thanks Jonathon.
Heather has finished her three weeks in Room 5 and the children have some wonderful art on display. Their art and science unit on the separation of lavender has produced some striking displays in Room 5!

The teachers in Rooms 3 4 5 have been involved in cross groupings for mathematics and reading. It has gone well and made sure that we have all had a chance to meet new children as well as work within areas of strength.

Richard is working in Room 3 each morning between 9am and 10.40,taking written language, spelling and swimming! This has also been progressing well.
During the next three weeks while I am in Room 5, Claire H will be completing the same role. I start in Room 5 for my three weeks as of February 21st. The focus will be "What is Special About Taranaki!"

Claire, Heather, Megan and Kelly have started their Infolink Course. They are working with 26 teachers completing the action learning course, run through the Auckland College of Education! It is all about developing children's information literacy skills. They attended the introduction on Friday evening and then an all day Saturday meeting to get it all under way.

Richard attended a three day "thinking conference" in Rotorua along with 6 other Central Taranaki teachers. The focus was on successful integration of IT into the curriculum. The focus was on using thinking skills and new technologies to enhance children's learning. Attending the conference "Learning@school" where many new schools to the ICTPD clusters from throughout the country. We presented a breakout session on the Thursday focusing on what we had done over the first year. It proved valuable to the attendees!

Friday the 25th Feb
Trip up the mountain.Room's 3 and 5 headed up to Dawson Falls today! We walked to Dawson Falls themselves. Dawson falls is the end of a lava flow. A 30 m flow of water creates quite a rush of wind and sound! We then headed to Wilkies Pools. It was a really good day. Some kids even went into the "pool", a chilly 9 degrees!
Very worthwhile and fitting our Taranaki unit. Great parent helpers too. Thanks everyone.

Boys Day!
Back at school there was a cool event.... A boys and girls day! All the boys went to one classroom and all the girls went to another! Girls had a great day learning and making poi with Mrs Heazlewood and the boys made paper planes and learned about flight with Rachel, our relieving teacher this day.It was a neat idea and really went well with loads of enthusiasm! We will be doing it again in a month.....
On the same day Kelly went to a PD day at Douglas School meeting the RTLB's and the Resource teacher for literacy.
All in all a pretty good day at Toko School, if I say so myself!

Friday March the 4th
Teacher Only Day. 72 teachers descended on Stratford Primary for an awesome day of PD. Motivational speakers developed the theme of cooperative learning and focusing on getting children thinking in their classrooms.This was organised by the ICTPD facilitation team. Speakers included Karen Boyes, Robin ................and Chris Rowan.A very powerful day!

Monday the 7th of March
Toko School has won the Turnball Cup! We entered two teams and in the final we were placed first and second.
Congratulations to the team which included: Laura, Izaak Martin and Marie. A great effort. A special mention to Clare who coached the team and organised to practices. Thanks.

Wednesday the 9th of March
Today we had our first combined sporting event with Ngaere, Pembroke Midhirst and Rawhitiroa Schools'. The swimming sports went well. Clearly it being our first event some review of the day will be held...Things went well. Thanks to Ngaere for organising it. But I think we can improve aspects to finish the day a little later.

Thursday the 10th of March
Our second trip up the mountain for Rooms 3 and 5. We had 44 children and 19 adults! What a neat day. Thanks to Rachel J from the ICTPD contract for coming along as well. We walked to the Waiongonoro Hut. The Year 8 kids got to cross the suspension bridge! A full day for all. Lots of neat photos available on the IntrAnet. Follow up activity will be a plant identification guide.
Teachers also attended their infolink course this afternoon from 4.30 to 7pm.

Friday the 11th March
A neat assembly today. Thanks to Room 3 and Room 1! Cathy put together a neat video of our mountain trip the day before. Room One kids did a neat assembly item.Room 5 showed off their awesome new mountain safety posters!
Today endiths my three weeks in the classroom. It has been busy. I have completed a feedback sheet, even though we had five days out with: Manual, Swimming Sports, two mountain visits and a teacher only day!
Pool closed today too.
Welcome Heather back to school after her three weeks away!

Friday the 18th of March
I attended the Regional meeting of the ICTPD central cluster on Friday! A really valuable day actually!Its been a great opportunity to go to these meetings. Another small thing really.... figured out how to use pdf files on this site. So have been experimenting with it. Check out the pdf files from the staff room!!!!!
Plus here are key documents that have been changed to PDF format for ease of download.
Charter
Procedures
Strategy Plan
Annual Plans 2005

Thursday the 23rd of March
We had parents and kids games after a shared assembly today. We played the games we are learning for the upcoming Tabloid Sports. Great to see a fair few parents at school to join in with the kids for this mini event and attending the assembly. We are wanting more parents at our fortnightly assemblies. Pity the rain came in early today today before the games were finished.
Later in the afternoon Toko School hosted the Infolink course. Twenty odd teachers (excuse the pun) at school for the course between 4 and 6pm. A reminder that the ICTPD cluster "Bardwired" , is footing the bill for the Infolink course. Infolink is all about teachers developing information skills with their class in meaningful contexts.

9th of April
Ok , the hard drive of my laptop failed about a week ago! So there have been no updates lately! Here's another reminder to back up your hardrives on a regular basis! Not much went west! The big news I guess is ERO are arriving at Toko School on Monday ... We have sent off the required documentation and discussed the visit at all levels!
I think we are doing a fine job and this is the attitude to take into the review. They may provide us with some valuable review.
After the last visit in 2002 we started to develop our new assessment system. It is Toko grown. Not a package from another school, or a a software package... just a simple but effective method of sharing learning information with key groups.

I have some reservations about the benefit of the many software packages designed for schools. Key is the impact on learning! From what I have seen, I have not seen an improvement in learning. Software packages certainly offer some cool functions, but the improvement in learning really relies on teachers knowing their children well. With a challenging curriculum teaching and reflecting and observing and created focus, add professional development, and plans are developed to improve learning for groups of children. Where does the software package come in? Basically after this process. It is used to present data on learning. We have developed and alternative method.

School Charter
The Ministry sent back our school charter the other day. We sent it in November 2004, for the first time. It "passed".
The school charter will be forwarded annually to the Ministry after the annual report to the community in May. The annual plans and the learning targets are changed annually.

14th of April
ERO are with us this week. The focus of the visit is reading... along with the "Information Landscape" and of course Maori Achievement. You can imagine that I was very confident with the Information Landscape, with all the work that has gone on in this area over the last few years. It has been a big and ongoing focus. The Information landscape refers to the school library as well as the ICT infrastructure.. but also involves the PD for teachers, vision and strategy. These are clearly areas that we have focused on.
Reading... well the end of 2004 review indicated that 90% of the children at Toko School (Years 2 to 8) were reading at their chronological age. So improvement in this area is still clearly possible, but these figures are pretty darn good, so ERO's views on improvements in this area will be interesting. As far as Maori Achievement goes we again could show that Maori children perform as well if not better than their 'pakeha' peers. However, I again expressed the belief that heir is no benefit separating children's achievement based on culture.Our vision is Quality Learning for all in a caring Community

17th of April
The fundraising Committee organised an excellent trail bike ride today! What an excellent and organised and hard working group they are. Over 200 bikes arrived! I would like to acknowledge the hard work, time and organsiation required to make an event like this work so well. Many thanks to the whole team and the many volunteers that arrived and did their bit to add to the overall success of the day. An awesome effort.... Quality Learning for all in a Caring Community. This is clearly an indication of the Caring Community that makes up Toko School.

It seems like we are losing Noela from our staff, with the loss of the Takerei family. Nola has been an awesome member of staff. Nothing has ever been too much trouble, in a very demanding position. You will be sadly missed Noela, and many thanks for the work you have done and the difference you have made to the children you have worked with.

Term 2