News from Awakeri School in 2010

Awakeri School

Here was the News in 2010

23 December A few extra fancy dress photos have been added to the page. Merry Christmas!

16th December OMG HI! (for the last time ever *tear tear*) Last night was the senior social which was heaps of fun! And well done to the yr 7 social committee who did a great job decorating room 13 and making it look AWESOME! Today is the last day of school for 2010 for the middle and junior school and we are having our super fun waterfight! And the weather is a tad sucky so its gunna be COLD! but fun! It is also the last day of Primary school EVER for the year 8's who are moving off to high school next year. Well...this is Aroha Leighton saying BYE! I love you Awakeri School!!!
Fancy dress pics are here. Thanks very much to the amazing Aroha and Bryce for doing an awesome job being our news reporters all year. Also thanks to all our great web site monitors who kept the class pages up to date and entertaining. Mr H

13 December This week is our LAST week of school for 2010! And for the yr 8's it's their last week of Primary school...ever! Tomorrow night is our super awesome Fancy Dress where we dress up in crazy costumes, do dances and sing pirate songs (in the juniors case anyway). It is also the send off for the departing year 8's and some of the girls (and boys!) get a tad over emotional. Well a lot actually. Also the other day were the junior and middle school picnics where they had lots of yum as food and played fun games with their classmates. Check out room 14's page if you want to know how many grains of sand there are in the sand pit!!

3 December Today the Minister of Education Anne Tolley came to visit our school and congratulate us on a good ERO report. Hamish and Luisa showed her around the school. Hamish was such a good salesman! Selling what exactly!? Yeah I don't know either. Mr Hawkes writes some weird stuff. Anyway...Mr Hawkes forgot to mention their awesome stalker, me (AROHA in case you've forgotten) who took some brilliant photos.

2 December Recently, the whole school has been preparing for Fancy Dress, which is an event at the end of the year like a prizegiving, except you come in a costume. Today while the middle syndicate was doing folk-dancing, Mrs. Gordon (the boss of midddle school) was trying to blow the whistle while she was standing on the railing. She lost her balance and fell backwards into the bushes behind her! Everyone laughed heaps, and we think Mrs. Gordon will get teased by all the teachers. She is a very great teacher but will sadly be retiring at the end of this term.

29 November Last week the year 7&8's had a brilliant time at their intensive! The year eights had two fun days away from school (YUSS) and the year sevens spent their second day at a farm doing leadership activities. My favourite part was when the year 8's were doing mock wars at the pa site and Mr Hawkes yells out "ATTACK" and starts running up the hill. The rest of room 14 just looked at each other and started walking towards the hill! Mr Hawkes was just like "Oh come on!" And I must say room 12 totally took out that game even though we didn't have all our fast as people (well our one fast person anyway, Toby somehow managed to injure himself at the pools. Smart right!?). We also had had a few of the year eights go to play golf which I'm sure was very entertaining. Click here to see some cool photos of the intensives.
OH and the other day the senior school watched room 12's movies which we have been working on all year long. They were REALLY funny or as Shjara thinks...SHAME(she played wolfy in Luisa's movie).

23 November Today Mrs Parker took 15 of our students in to record them singing a Christmas Carol at Radio 1XX. They sang When A Child Is Born, four verses sung and one spoken (by Nikki).
What was it like in the recording studio Tayla and Nikki?
"Scary! There were five computer screens and a little teeney weeney room, with one microphone at the end of it. The walls were covered with really heavy curtains. When they closed the door you couldn't hear anything. We did it eight times! Like... Georgia started singing the wrong verse. On the 7th time we got it, but it didn't sound as good as it should have. So we sang it again and we got it! It was really cool!"

19 November Today is quite a sad day with Miss Geerlings leaving from Rm 11 and Rozi Tu and her son Elias are also leaving us to go back to Singapore. I interviewed Kenehia Neupane and Paige Sharpe (Two room 11 students) about Miss Geerlings leaving. Here is what they about her leaving, Kenehia said "I think it is sad because she was a good teacher." Paige said "I think we are going to miss her heaps." Then I asked what are you going to miss heaps, Kenehia said " I'm going to miss the fun games that she played with us and the free reading time." Paige said, " I going to miss her wonderful singing, guitar playing skills and cool art activities." Rozi has been at our school for about two month going around the school into all the classes and is going to be missed by a lot of people at our school too.

18 November If you're still wondering why we visit the marae (I'm sure you're not, but...) we have copied this from Room 13's page....
What the Marae has taught me.
The thing I like about the marae is that the culture and mannerisms are so different to, say, classroom etiquette, for example. It makes you more likely to ask questions, more likely to take risks and more likely to have a go and do things miles out of your comfort zone. Of course, the teachers still tell you to behave, but the hongi and karakia are not like anything I would normally do, either at school or at home. Doing the karanga was another unique experience. I tend to think of Maori as a type of religion, but no other religion has "coming on" to safe havens(marae), or anything like that. It seems almost alien to a NZ European with no Maori background. The marae has also taught me to respect sacred things. Normally, I wouldn't think twice about sitting on my pillow, but then again, if your head is tapu, well, I guess it makes sense. Now that I have been to the marae, all this "strange" stuff has suddenly become obvious, and I'm really enjoying it. I want to continue learning about the protocol, carvings, and how they relate to other things. The marae stay opened up heaps of new paths to do with Te Reo that were once invisible. I am earnestly looking forward to learning more.
Katy White.

15th November Click here to see some cool photos of the marae stay. We had a great week at Wairaka Marae last week. Rooms 14, 9 and 8 were lucky enough to be at the official powhiri. Afterwards Mr Jaram and Mr Hudson gave us an awesome talk about history of the marae and the area. Room 14 stayed the night, then they welcomed rooms 13, 11 and 10. Room 13 stayed that night then they welcomed rooms 12, 7 and 6. Room 13 were great teachers to rooms 6 & 7. Finally room 12 stayed the last night, then they welcomed all the junior junior rooms (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 23). Room 12, plus some lucky room 14 people, were the juniors' teachers for the day and did a great job. All through the week Siri and Andrea did a fantastic job getting us organised. Tino pai rawa atu!! Don't forget to look at the photos!!

7th November On Thursday the sprints went off with a blast! Literally. We had two records broken by the very speedy Tiaan Brownless. Tiaan beat the 200m time which had been held by NZ volleyball rep Mark Petersen since the year 2000. Well done to the winner of the house relays...RIMU!!! Yeah, and they were only one second off the record which sucked! Everyone had so much fun and had a great day. Oh and I must mention that Rata was coming first for a short while!! When those little peoples grow up we are going to be the speediest house! YA!

3rd November The juniors have got a hot day today for their sports. On Monday Holly Davis broke a long jump record that Yvonne Roia set in 1999 - a record from last century!! Check out all our athletics records here.

2nd November Yesterday the middle and seniors had their athletics field events day. We had quite a few records broken, with two broken in the high jump. Tiaan Brownless broke the 11 year old boys record which was 135 cm but he broke the record by jumping 136 cm. Nikoli Christensen broke the 12 year old boys record which was 142 cm and broke it by jumping 143 cm. 3rd place for the 1500 race was Lauren Hall who worked that stuff and came close to Nikki Turpie who came in second place, but in the end Holly Davis won the the 1500m race. Toby Kirkpatrick tore up the track and came first place in the open boys 1500 race beating Tiaan Brownless who came in second and third was Jordan Fretwell in an exciting finish to the ribbon. Check out these photos of the field events.
Today it is the BP technology challenge which is a team of five making stuff out of newspaper and other equipment. We have entered two teams. Next week we have the marae stay.

26th October What a brilliant long weekend!!! It was actually a veery long weekend since Friday was teacher only day! Well except for those kids who accidently turned up at school. Sucky! Today some people from ERO came and listened to a small presentation done by some kids in the school. Well done to them especially Ben White who did a brilliant speech on his portfolio. I'm sure they will enjoy their visit at our brilliant school!!

22 October Here are some photos from Ag Day on Friday.
Enjoy your teacher only day everyone! Well done those room 8 kids who chose to come to school and be part of the teacher only day.

18 October OK, is it just me or can you still hear the thudding of the Djembes that we have just finished playing and man it was awesome. Today Rhythm Interactive (Chewy and Anton) came to Awakeri School (lucky them), and showed us how to play the Djembes. I bet they think they were so smart when they started asking questions about the drums, luckily there was a genius like me in this school so I could answer most of the questions, lol. To put it simply it was really cool and I'm sure everyone had heaps of fun!!!

13 October School's back. Yay! As if. Anyway Ag Day is on Friday which is always fun. There'll be lots of kids, with kids, lambs, calves, dogs, pets, indoor show things, cooking. You name it! It's going to be a busy term, with the marae stay a special highlight. We also have a brand new sandpit! YUSS finally! We've needed one ever since they decided to replace the old one with a classroom...Sad. I've been told to write about the world record amount of people on the sandpit, yet its been so rainy that not that many people have been in it anyway. What are you on about Mr Hawkes? Well hopefully we get some sunshine soon enough ESPECIALLY on Friday! Its just like a sad rule that it rains on Ag Day. Well fingers crossed!

23 September Today was Year fours' production, Town v Country and it was really cool! Lots of parents turned up to see their little stars in it too. Then we had the final of the school talent quest. There were some awesome acts. The winner was Luisa Williams, who sang like an angel and played guitar, second was Tommy Rosewarne, juggling his rhythm sticks, and third were Nikki Turpie and Tayla Brittliff who danced Evolution of Dance. Congratulations!!
Last night of Conundrum tonight. It's going to be massive. Check out these cool photos from Monday in the theatre.

22 September We have just had our second awesome show this morning. Last night we had our opening night which we did quite well with me (Bryce) just missing one sound effect. Some funny things from the show last night was one guard slipping over when he held up his shield in the song, when the great book was supposed to be brought in, but the person who should have taken on stage didn't have because it was on the wrong side of the stage! Today's show was a little bit better than last night but I got all the sound effects done yay. Some funny things happening today were Robert Coulter when he came up in the song his shield fell off, The pie fight that happened in the kitchen, Nikki saying (in her little baby girl's voice) 'why not put some good crackers in the jokes' when she was meant to say 'why not put some good jokes in the crackers!' Luckily, the audience didn't notice anything, and come to think of it, I don't think anyone on stage did either apart from Holly who pointed it out. And what are we going to do with Mr Fitz. He went down to the stage at the end of the show before saying the stars of the show. He must be really tired. Either that or it's just old age. It went so fast and now tomorrow night is the last show, which has sold out, so hopefully we do awesomely well. Also the Bad Joke Monster is the one, the only, the best teacher ever..................... MRS CRONIN. Good luck for tomorrow night. One last show and it's time for a holiday I think.

20 September Today was supposed to be a good day. The type of day when we don't do any work, play games and laugh quietly at the person who gets carried away with all this fun and gets yelled at. To put it simply we should've be in the Little Theatre in town practising our production. But we got there we found out there was problems with the lights so people had to go to the theatre to fix it. And they seemed to think we would get in the way(and yeah we probably would have). Mr Fitz was hoping they would finish quickly so we could get a rehearsal in but they were taking too long, so after we mucked around for a while he sent us back to school. We have now got a rehearsal tomorrow instead which means that Rm 14 & 13 can't go to tech. CRY CRY! And it was supposed top be their last tech EVER at Awakeri school (for the year 8's) so they are extra sulky. Wouldn't like to be their teacher this afternoon....

17 September From 26 acts, we are now down to 7 grand finalists for the talent quest and wow the decision must have been hard. I'm glad I'm not a judge. Over the last week, people from year 5 and up to year 8, have been auditioning for this and they have finally been put out of some of their misery and the judges have just announced who is the grand finalist's. For all those people that haven't heard yet or just want to see there name so they know its not a dream, the grand finalists are Nikki Turpie and Tayla Brittliff doing their entertaining evolution of dance, Luisa Williams, Paige and Gemma, Jessie and Georgia, The lovely ladies are doing a dance to California Girls, Tommy.R, and Michael Jones. The finals are on Thursday next week. Congratulations to everyone who entered the talent quest, and good luck to those ones who got into the Grand finals (and I probably shouldn't say this, but go everyone from room 14 who are in there!!!)

14 September Yesterday we had a dress rehearsal in the hall. We all looked great in our costumes but they will look even better when we get into the theatre with lights. Check out these cool photos. Some funny things happened, like the oven falling apart when the cooks tried to put some food into it. Georgia sang well, Hamish acted well, Lance was a loud guard... When Reilly Young was getting changed he was in a place where people walking past could see him! We have got a lot of tickets to sell but we have got a bit of money from the ones we have sold so far.

7 September Tickets for the production went on sale today, $8 adults, $4 children. Some have been snapped up at the school office already.
The indoor programme for this year's Ag Day is online. Follow the link to the left. Those people who have entered an animal in Ag Day have been given their instructions. Make sure you got yours!
Year eights need to bring a note if they are attending any of the high schools' open days. A change to Trident's open day, because of the secondary teachers' strike, their day is now Thursday 16th. Good luck to Elise, Nikoli, Luisa, Katy and Jenna, who are going in the interschool speech contest on that day too. We know they're good!

3 September For ages the Kapa Haka have been practising and on Monday and Wednesday we had our two days of intensive which is two whole days of practising. We even had Chinese for dinner at school which seems absolutely ridiculous to me. I mean we are learning Maori but we are eating Chinese food. Holly has a very interesting suggestion: why don't we have a hangi??? Pfft, yeah whatever. We performed absolutely brilliantly on Wednesday night (well according to Mrs Cronin's heartwarming speech) and there are some photos from the night on Mr Fitz's window. Check out these cool photos from it. Also the year 8's got their info booklet things about Whakatane High School today.

30th August This week we have Kapa Haka intensive. It is on today and Wednesday. Also our production is going very well. The year 8 have got open days for high schools coming up in a few weeks time. We are also getting information packs about the different high schools soon.

27th August We have had a great Maths week. Today Miss Robb gave out prizes to our top 9 mathletes. Finn Spod was the overall winner, and Room 10 was the best class. Well done!
We are now working hard out on the production Conundrum. The orchestra are sounding quite good. Mr Fitz has everyone learning their moves for scene one. The kapa haka have their intensive next week, so Siri and Andrea will get them all ready to perform.

24th August What's been happening in our awesome school? Well, school's just the same as always (not that awesome) but there is always one part of the day that's cool (drum roll please)...LUNCHTIME! Yay for lunchtime. Now in our school there is always a bunch of crazy girls (not me or anything *cough cough*) squealing at the lambs at the back of the field. Then there's this massive group of guys kicking soccer balls into goal over and over and over and I start to wonder, "How do they never get bored?!"And of course there are people fighting over whose turn it is on the flying fox, juniors building sandcastles in the long jump pit (yeah we don't even have a sandpit, slack eh?) and at the end of lunchtime there are a million cries of "saved by bell!"
Oh and I forgot to mention the inter-school soccer day has been cancelled! *cry cry *.

17th August Postponed!! Thursday's soccer hockey day is postponed to next Thursday!
Watch out, the high schools are starting to try and enrol our lovely year eights soon! Parents will be getting a notice about it later this week.

16th August Today in Rm14 we watched a video that Sam McPherson was in on the NZ Herald website. So if you want to see Sam talking about the floods in Whakatane go on the Herald website. He spoke really well, describing what it was like. Hockey and soccer day might be cancelled because the fields are soggy as. I hope it is not cancelled because it so much better than sitting in a class room all day!

13th August Next Thursday we have inter-school hockey and soccer day. The soccer is at Awakeri School and the hockey is at Edgecumbe. The seniors have had only two practices. The wonderful description of the speech finals below was written by Aroha Ridley not the other Aroha or me.

11th August Wow, it seems like forever ago that room 12, 13, 14 had their speech semifinals and last night we had the most stand out speeches competing for the shield. Every one was very nervous, (you could see it in their faces), as we sat and fiddled with things. The first speaker was Luisa William's who gave her speech on how sports affect the mood of our nation. She made it into a news report to make it special and some parts were very touching. Next up was Nikoli Christensen who gave his amazing speech on his dad, a healthy role model. His speech was very amusing as he told what his dad used to do when he was little like playing soccer until he retired. The judges thought his humor was awesome and it was. Then we come to Sophie Howard was up next and she touched everyone's hearts (including the judges) with her poem written by Robert Young. There was so many facts in there in seemed like my head was going to explode. Second hand smoke is what Elise Howe sang about in her gobsmaking song about twisted fariy-tales and wowed the judges. Up next was the the one, the only, Holly Davis who told us what to do and what not to do when on the Internet to avoid being cyber-bullyed. The judges loooved her humour in her speech and I'm sure everyone else did too. Sam Holani pulled number 6 out of the hat and gave a very... different speech about Bear Grylls, his healthy role model. He taught us how to drink our pee and survive in the wild, something im sure all of us will need to know. Then we worked it out with the very jumpy Shjara Dakin who blew everyone away with her enthusiasm about her speech on keeping body systems healthy. And lastly Aroha Ridley who finished the night off with bang about keeping cyber-bullies at bay. The judges liked the poem she started out with and ended with and was surprised to find she wrote them herself. Then we can to the end of our night. Lusia came 3rd with her fantastic speech, 2nd was Elise Howe with her twisted fairy tale speech and Nikoli Christensen got a well deserved 1st place. Well done to all the speakers and a big congratulations to the senior school for another year of amazing speeches. But I think they'll all agree when I say, ' I'm so glad their over!!! '
Click here to see some photos of the night.

9th August We are getting started on production practices this week. This year we are doing Conundrum. Check out our history page for all the past productions way back 23 years. This is our 24th production!!
We hope the leads have been learning their lines. Some great acting will be needed, e.g. Nikki has to play Jo, "a sad case, a kid with no sense of humour"; Hamish plays Governor Gag "the chairman of the Bored, er Board"; Sam M speaks only in Limericks!

6th August Yesterday we had a very interesting speech semi final. Did you know that there are 4 sections in the heart? We learned that from Hamish's dramatic speech. The semi finalists gave us lots of laughs, entertainment and things to think and learn about. Nikoli was brave, saying smart things about the judges! Elise got the audience singing by playing guitar with her speech, Luisa changing into other people and other accents . . .
8 semifinalist got though to the final. Yes, they have to say them again but it is in front of parents and classmates. The finalists are: Luisa Williams, Holly Davis, Sam Holani, Elise Howe, Nikoli Christensen, Shjara Dakin, Sophie Howard and Aroha Ridley. The interesting topics were Does international sports affect the mood of the nation?, Second hand smoke, Cyber bullying, How to keep body systems healthy and a Healthy role model. Did you know that there are two type of cyber bullying? Holly told us about bullying by proxy and direct attacks. The finals are on Tuesday the 10th at 7 pm in the staff room.
We also had two of the top year six speeches. Jenna Wilson and Katy White did really well talking about careers. Evil architects, heh heh heh eh Katy!

2nd August Schools pretty much its same self. Ooh except for lunchtime when we play some veeerry competitive dodge ball games. Spring is coming! YAY! I'm so sick of the rain! Also the senior school has been doing speeches. GO US because it takes a lot of guts to get up in front of the WHOLE class. The semi-finals are on Thursday and people are getting excited. It's been a cool term so far:)

29th July At lunch time we have games that we play in our houses. We have a different games every term. This term it is king dodge ball. It is fun.

29th July There were lots of people at the EBOP Science Fair prize giving last night. We are proud of Aroha Leighton and Holly Davis who got a silver award for their Break It Down Now entry and Sam Holani who got silver for his Buster Booster. Nikoli Christensen got highly commended and the Sports entry award, and Josh Klein Ovink and Jordan Fretwell got highly commendeds too. Josh had to do Jordan's interview for him, 'cause Jordan is sick. He must have done it well!

28th July Yesterday the people who got into the Eastern bay went into town to be judged. It all went really well and today we found out that 5 of us have gotten prizes in the fair. We're not sure what they are yet though!!! Tonight is the prize giving at 5:30. WOOH! Can't wait!

22nd July Although, sadly, the Rangitaiki Cultural Festival is not on this year, we have put together a page of our history at it. Hopefully we can participate in it in the future. Here it is. The kapa haka is working hard to be ready to perform at the school production any way.

21st July Coming up is the inter-school soccer and hockey day. All of the middle school has been super busy practising while the seniors, um haven't practised at all actually but hopefully we'll still do fine. It always makes me smile when I hear people (accidentally) calling it sockey and hocker day. It happens every year!

19th July ¡Hola! Today it is the start of a new term. YAY!!!!! Only two more terms to go till we have a 6 week summer holidays. This term is a really busy one because of production. We are showing it in the last week of term 3. Also next week we have some senior students going off to the Eastern Bay Science fair. They are the people that got highly commended or a place at our science fair last term. Good luck to them and hopefully they do very well.

2nd July Today it is national pajamas day and our other news reporter Aroha and her friends are wearing their pajamas. Also today it is the last day of school YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We survived 11 weeks of school, well most people did. Today it is also parent interviews. Hopefully the teachers are saying nice things about us, probably not.
At least we had a fun start to the day. You see, Shjara was waiting in her pajamas for the rest of her friends to arrive, and they finally did, wearing their pajamas, and Shjara rushed down the ramp to give them a hug and....... (in front of Mrs Merry and Mr Hawkes and other random people).... her feet shot out from underneath her on the frosty ramp and she fell flat amongst her friends. Thank you Shjara for giving all a laugh to start the last day of term. Check out the pajama photos on Room 12's page.

1st July Yesterday was the Manawahe cross country and it was awesome (well except for the whole running thing). Everybody did great, especially these people...

Junior Boys
Reece Hendl-Cox=1st
Korben Wilson=3rd
Team A=1st
Team B=2nd

Junior Girls
Mikayla Binney-Cox=3rd
Team A=1st
Team B=3rd

Intermediate Boys
Quest Tipping=1st
Fletcher Forsyth=2nd
Team A=1st
Team B=2nd

Intermediate Girls
Team B=3rd

Senior Boys
Jordan Fretwell=3rd
Team A=1st
Team B=3rd

Senior Girls
Holly Davis=1st
Nikki Turpie=2nd
Aroha Leighton=3rd (thats me YEAH)
Team A=1st
Team B=3rd

If you were brave enough to read all that, you will know that sooooooo many people got places, which was GREAT! In the prize giving no one really clapped for us at the end, because I'm guessing they were kind of sick of our name being called out! But we didn't care because we were all cheering so loudly we didn't really notice anyways! Check out these cool photos from Manawahe!!

30th June Today it is inter-school X- country. We have got heaps of people going to that. It is the last year it is been held at Manawahe because the school is closing down. Also tomorrow and Friday are half days because of parent-teacher interviews. Parents you have to bring your child's mid year report to your interview. Also on Friday it is the last day of school. Next term we have a big thing coming up, yes it is the production! The year 5 - 8 are involved in it. We find out what parts we get tomorrow. Also there is the hockey and soccer day next term. Also there is Eastern Bay Science Fair in the second week back.

29th June Check out these photos of the Science Fair!

25th June Congrats!!! We have just got our science and technology fair results in and everyone did great, but some did better then others! For science: 1st Holly Davis and Aroha Leighton, 2nd Luisa Williams and 3rd Toby Kirkpatrick. Some people also got highly commended: Brianna Goodman and Nikoli Christensen. For commended:Shjara Dakin and Aroha Ridley, Taylah Wakefield, Abbey Coventry, Daniel Gow, Jaydon and Hamish Inwood and Jordan Andrew. Well done science people!! For technology: 1st Edgar Smits, 2nd Sam Holani, 3rd Ezra Brabant- Weitkamp. Here are some other people who got highly commended in technology: Jordan Fretwell, Joshua Klein Ovink and Mikayla Duffy. Also for commended: Rico Luca. For the projects, science: 1st Tiaan Brownless, 2nd Georgia Barraclough, 3rd Karaitiana Taipeti. Highly commended: Logynn Andrew Bishop. For technology: 1st Shane Hope and 2nd Ravneet Kaur. Highly commended: Vincent Salmon. Congratulations to everyone who did the science and technology fair!!

22nd June Today after school we can bring our science fair displays in between 4:00 and 4:30. We can also bring them in tomorrow before school. On Thursday we have judging and then we can see the displays at 5:00 till 6:30. Then on Friday we at 12:00 we have prize giving and parents are invited to come to it if they want.
A lot of people at the school are supporting the soccer world cup and the All Whites. Mr Hawkes is a huge fan of the All Whites and has so far watched the two game they have played and will probably watch the last one when they play Paraguay. Yes that means Mr Hawkes has been waking up at 2 am to watch them and at school he is a bit grumpy sometimes.

18th June Today the school has been over run by CRAZY HAIR PEOPLE. A lot of people had crazy hair today. We raised $400.80 for the the people that got flooded Whakatane. Well done to Mikayla Duffy for organising the day.
Next week it is science fair. We can bring our stuff in on Tuesday at 4:00 to 4:30 or on Wednesday before school. On Thursday we have judging and then we can see the displays at night time. Instead of assembly we have prize giving on Friday.

17th June Everybody in the school has been looking forward to the one, the only...CRAZY HAIR DAY. Sounds ridiculous doesn't it?! The day is actually to fundraise money for the peoples who's houses got majorly flooded in Whakatane(sucks to be them). Everybody has been asked to please bring in a gold coin donation. I really don't see how they brought flooded houses and crazy hair together but anyways...

15 June A photo of Shadz of Red. Here are Elise, Georgia, Ashleigh and Alicia.

11th June This week the seniors had a very special visitor...Harold the giraffe! Shirley from life education taught us about how we make decisions and how our body works. She's an awesome speaker (and she has to be if she's entertaining judgemental kids for over an hour) and Harold the giraffe had VERY funny jokes. Oh and I'd probably better mention how a couple of police offiers visited the school. For nothing bad of course! They were talking to the juniors about 'Keeping ourselves safe'. Sounds...Safe?
P.S Yes Harold IS a real giraffe
At assembly three classes presented things about the Football World Cup which starts tonight. Room 14 told a few facts about each country, and asked the questions, "Which countries at the World Cup have the most and least people?" Someone guessed New Zealand for both questions! Wrong and wrong! We're only the third smallest nation, and the USA has the biggest population.
Tonight Shadz of Red and Courtney Van der Horst are performing at the Rising Starlets concert at the Intermediate School. Go Elise, Georgia, Ashleigh and Alicia, and Courtney!

6 June We had a great cross country on Friday. Two records were broken, well done Holly Davis and Samantha Looney. Here are the photos and the results.

3 June Today's the big day CROSS COUNTRY! All the year 7 and 8s have been trying to make sure that everyone will have fun today. People are trying to wear as much of their house colour as they can. Like Sophie Howard and Aroha Leighton have been making paper hats while they run and Aroha Ridley has gotten people from Kowhai to sign her yellow top. At lunch time some of the seniors will be putting face paint on. Everyone is getting excited and can't wait to run. I hope the house captains will make sure everyone gets to their race. I hope Mrs Merry gets the fields set up in time for cross country. This is Sophie, reporting for Bryce!

2 June Rugby and netball day was cancelled, after the floods yesterday. Cross country is still on tomorrow. Yay! Welcome to the new families that have come to Awakeri with the farm change overs. Remember, teacher only day on Friday. One of our news reporters, Bryce, has been dragged away from school on a Pacific cruise. Poor Bryce, how will he survive the warm temperatures? Hopefully we'll keep the news flowing without him!

28th May Today at assembly we had the Awakeri Idol finalists sing for the whole school. The three finalists were Jessie Rosewarne, Georgia Barraclough and Courtney Van Der Horst. Mrs Parker and some other teachers had to decide on the three finalist from 30 something people. That must have been really hard. The winner was .......... Courtney Van Der Horst. She did very well, and she was the youngest finalist as well.
Next week we have interschool rugby and netball day for some of us on Wednesday. Also cross country is on Thursday.

26th May Four square is the 'in game' at school this week. Well, not four square, maybe 20 square! The alliances people make up to try and stay in are pretty amazing! Trust no one is Mr H's motto!
This week a lot of classes have started using their pedometers in the My Greatest Feat challenge. Check it out here. The aim is for your class to walk the distance that the NZ. All Whites have to travel in South Africa to play their games, about 1600km. So far Room 14 have done 166 km in two days, so they're on their way! We have three weeks to do the challenge.
The interschool rugby and netball day has been postponed from today till next Wednesday. Just before our cross country on the Thursday.

20th May The school science fair is coming up! "Yay"says the brainy peoples. "NOOO" screams everyone else. The school science fair is compulsory for all the year eights and optional for all the year 7's. Those year 7's who do not do sci-fair have to do a project that will prepare them for big fair next year.

19th May Rooms 12 and 13 have returned! We had a whole of fun jumping off giant poles, biking up muddy tracks and slipping into lakes of water (in Toby's case anyway). To say it plainly we were absolutely FREEZING!!! Trust the weather to suck when we go on camp. But it was heaps of fun and the rain made it more...exciting? Kind of. We all looked like zombies because we were so super duper tired when we got back. What an awesome camp!!! Also check out room 12's page for some awesome diary entries from the one, the only, ZACK! Here are photos of the camp too.

13 May Great news, last night a group of four students represented the school at the Waikato BOP Kids Literature competition. There were 55 schools in Hamilton, answering 100 questions about literature, and Awakeri came 4th!!! Well done Hamish, Katy, Luisa and Jessi, and of course Mrs Petersen! If you want to look at the international Kids Lit Quiz website, it's here. Maybe next year we'll get to the NZ finals, as two of our team are only year 6s!!
Quite a few Awakeri rooms have signed up for the mygreatestfeat challenge. It starts on May 24. Students are seeing if we can walk / run the distance that the NZ All Whites have to travel in the football Wold Cup finals in South Africa in June. We have three weeks to do it. The pedometers have just arrived, so that will be exciting too. That website is here.
Soom cool photos of Room 9's and 10's camps last week are here and here. Hopefully there will be some more great pics from Rooms 12 and 13's camps soon!

10th May Tomorrow the awesome Room 12 and 13 are going on camp!! We are going to be doing a whole lot of interesting activities like abseiling, high ropes, mountain biking, archery and a huge flying fox which looks so fun. I can't wait to go! Also last Friday the Lean Green Enviro Team painted a checkers board because Miss Robb got a chess and checkers set.

3rd May Room 9 has gone on camp. YES they're finally gone! (jokes) Hopefully they have fun and have some cool stories to tell us when they get back! On Wednesday Room 10 goes to join them at Papamoa, and Room 9 come back to school.

30 April Today instead of the normal assembly, we had people showing what they can do for gymnastics. Some people did backflips and they fell off the fat mat because the trampoline was too close to the mat! There were some awesome skills. The seniors did their floor routines too.

27 April On Thursday evening the Police are having a meeting for parents to discuss the Keeping Ourselves Safe unit that is going to be taught in the junior and middle school rooms. All welcome in the staff room 7.30pm.
Gymnastics has been going really well throughout the school. There is a sharing assembly this Friday at 11.45 in the Events Centre.

23rd April RIMU is officially the best house ever at longball. But I am so completely sure the referees are on their side because RATA so deserved to win the house championship thingy. But RATA will so win next year. Probably. Maybe. Possibly. Okay probably not, but still. Awakeri is also doing gymnastics which counts as fitness, so it's fine with me. AWAKERI IDOL brings stars from all over the school to room 6 for the auditions today. Mrs. Parker is the judge for over 30 kids, even from room 3. Awakeri Idol seems like it's going to be HUGE!!

21st April There is a new thing that is hot at Awakeri School, apart from the weather, and that is the hot radishes that Mr Hawkes gave Michael to plant. We planted them last term and they are ready now. Lots of people enjoyed eating Michael's radishes! They were hot!

19th April The holidays have just finished and we are eager to get to work. Well not eager but you know, eager enough! A number of rooms are very excited about camps coming up, like rooms 9 & 10 and rooms 12 & 13.

1st April Today is not the last day of school ... April fools! if you thought that this wasn't the last day of school which it is. No more school for two weeks Yay!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I hope you have a good holiday break and be ready for gymnastics when we come back, so no breaking bones! Adios

31st March At our school we play inter-house games at lunchtime like longball, dodgeball and soccer. This term we played longball and it was awesome. Today it was Kowhai vs. Rata and me and my fellow rata people are so kind and let them win (tear tear).

30th March This week is our last week of school. We finish on Thursday at 3.00 pm. Today we had a great day with the interschool touch tournament held here. The games were played in excellent spirit, and a lot of seniors also did a wonderful job refereeing the junior games. Thanks to everyone who helped out.
Last Friday we had our senior fun(d)raiser. We had heaps of fun running our stores and making all the money to pay for our camps, well some of our camp fees any way. Check out these photos of the day.

26th March We have a grand total of (drum roll) $1511.00 yes $1511.00 in one hour. That is a lot of MONEY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Well done to all our 17 groups.

26th March Today is fun(d)raiser!!! Gypsies and mummies from all over the country have come to do fortune telling and haunted houses and a whole lot of other random stuff. WE WISH! Instead we're stuck with a group of year 7&8's in lousy costumes. How are we supposed to raise money?! So I suppose you're wondering why we have fundraiser in the first place? Well it's so we can afford to go to our very awesome and well earned camps! 3 whole learning-in-the-outdoor days !!!

24th March Here are some cool photos of our Top School team and cheerleaders in action.

22nd March Top School is over for another year. Yesterday was Top School, our school's biggest fundraiser that we have every year to get cool new stuff to spend on our school. A few of the things that we have because of Top School: our new 30 computer computer suite and AV room, this is on top of the astro turf and all this other stuff which makes our school cool. At Top School there was a chair-o-plane, paint ball and other gala games. There was also the mega garage sale, the usual the food tent and the best hangi ever. Our Top School team got 8th in their section and there were ten in their section. In our minds we won! The overall winner was Kawerau South School. Our cheerleaders won the largest group of cheerleaders but Thornton won the cheerleading competition. Also last Friday Room 12 & 13 put on skits to advertise their businesses for fun(d)raiser. Check in Room 12's page for some pics of that.

19th March This weekend is Top School on Sunday and if you want to knew the team for Awakeri school scroll down the page. Next week on Friday, at lunchtime is the senior Fun(d)raiser. There will be food stores and activities. We are doing it to get money to pay for our camps.

17th March Even though I have been told repeatedly by Mr Hawkes to never, ever write in colour (because apparently people don't care what colour its in they just want interesting writing) I have decided to break the rules for a not really that special day of the year. St.Patricks day!!! Our school very sadly has only two people who have decided to celebrate St.Patricks day which I think is quite sad. So come on people make a sign or something (like me)!!!So have a very happy Irish day and do what ever you're supposed to do on St. Patrick's day (I really have no idea what ).

16th March The internets stops working for the last week or so, so I guess it must look like we've done nothing (well except for yesterday). So anyway last week we had our school swimming sports and also our inter-school swimming sports. Our swimmers made us proud. The week before that room 9 went to Whakatane for a field trip to learn about tourism. The Top School team have also been practising hard out for Top School which is this weekend. We have done SO MANY laps of the field!!! We're also starting to be kicked off our awesome school field so they can set up the games and things for Top School.

15 March On Friday Rm 14 came back from camp. We had a fun camp and I will get a photo page on here as soon as I can it probably will be Wednesday or Thursday.

10 March Parents interviews are over! YUSS!!! Also last Monday the year 4's and up went to our school's swimming sports which was at Edgecumbe College. The four houses (Rata, Rimu Tawa and Kowhai) had lots of fun cheering for their swimmers. We all did so well and I'm sure our teachers are very proud of us *cough cough*. Yesterday Room 14 went to Blair Lodge near Katikati for their very awesome camp. They're so lucky, I'm still stuck at school!

3rd March In class everyone (except for the goody goods) is sweating over parent interviews. They are tomorrow (4th March) and on Friday (5th March). On these days we are having half days. I don't know if the idea of a half day is actually that good. Sure, we get half the day off school, but imagine the amount of dishes to be done after our terrible interviews! Adios! (we've been learning Spanish:)

1st March Hi! The Enviro team has had their team photo taken, so here it is. Next week on Monday there is our school swimming sports at Edgecumbe college pool. Also on Tuesday next week Rm 14 is going to camp at Blair Lodge at Katikati.

26th February Hi Guys, coming up we have Top School which is held here every year. It is a fun (and extremely competitive, since Mr Fitz doesn't like to lose) day full of food, games, fun activities and did I mention the food?! Mr Hawkes and Mrs Merry have chosen this year's year 7&8 Top School team. It is Holly Davis, Nikki Turpie, Shjara Dakin, Aroha Leighton (me, yah!), Luisa Williams, Elise Howe, Jordan Fretwell, Toby Kirkpatrick, Dylan Hoefsloot, Ezra Brabant, Tiaan Brownless and last but not least Ben Murphy. Sadly two of these people will get to be the best people on the team, reserves. There will be kicking, screaming and crying when we find out who is the reserve, but I don't have to worry about that, as long as I'll suck up to the teachers for the next couple of weeks!

25th February On Monday the 8th of March we have got swimming sport at the Edgecumbe college pool. Parent interview are on the 4th and 5th of March. We have half days on those day so we finish at 12:30 the buses will be going at 12:30 on those days.

22nd February On Wednesday Rm 11 last week Rm11 came back from camp and Rm 8 went to camp. It was really bad weather for Rm 11 but they still had fun. Sorry Miss Robb has not down loaded the photos yet but I will get then on ASAP when they get loaded. Also the Envio team did a good job with painting. They painted a four square, Hop scotch and the numbers for the Monday assembly. They also tided up their garden.

15th February Hello today Rm 11 went to camp at Ohiwa and on Wednesday it is Rm 8 that go on camp to Ohiwa. On Friday the seniors had fun at Otarawairere. We studied the high tide and low tide rock pools then we went for a nice swim. Moko the dolphin wasn't there, but he was at West end. Check out these awesome photos of us at Otarawairere.

11th February The website monitors have been selected.... so have the house captains!
The Kowhai house leaders are Ben Murphy, Jordan van der Gulik, Holly Davis and Brianna Goodman. Tawa is led by Zac Nabakewa, Ollie Richmond, Nikki Turpie and Taylah Wakefield. Rimu has Shjara Dakin, Cam Morrison and Sam Holani, Rata's leaders are Aroha Leighton, Sophie Howard, Hamish Inwood and Joshua Klein Ovink.
The web site monitors are: Hannah van der Horst (Rm 1); Kyla Kirkpatrick (Rm 3), Abbey Coventry (Rm 4), Maiya Rangiaho (Rm5), Hamish Inwood (Rm 6), Mekaela Learmond (Rm 7), Taylah Wakefield (Rm 8), Aroha Leighton (Rm 9), Amelia Howe and Elana Spod (Rm10), Shjara Dakin (Rm 12), Maiya Rangiaho (Rm 13), Bryce Coulter (Rm 14), Hamish Inwood (Rm 15) and News: Aroha Leighton and Bryce Coulter.

9th February News Flash!! The seniors' science field trip to Otarawairere has been postponed to Friday, a notice explaining this is being given out today.
Mrs Holani has been helping classes with their swimming, she'll be teaching swimming for the next few weeks, Mondays and Tuesdays.
Mrs Cronin's library monitors are keen and doing a good job.
The first Top School team trials are tomorrow lunch time. We have 30 keen year 7s and 8s trying to get into the ten person team. Good luck guys!!

3rd February Application forms to be web site monitors are being handed out today. Next week, we hope that the monitors will be given their classrooms to look after, then the class pages will start to be updated.
Family soccer starts again on Monday 8th.

2nd February 2010 Today is the first day of school in 2010...
We cannot believe that the holidays are over and we are finally back to the usual routines again.
Now that we have settled in everyone is happy and enjoying the first and fun days back at Awakeri School.
We hope everybody has had safe and fun holidays...

27th January 2010 Only a few days left till school starts back, enjoy it! The staff are back at work getting prepared. Some of them (eight) went on a visit to Singapore in the holidays to learn about their successful teaching methods and to see what could be adapted to our school. Shuqun Primary School were wonderful hosts, showing the Awakeri people around Singapore, the school, the tasty food, the friendliness... Click here for a few photos. A big thank you to Gary, Selve, Rozi, Sim Sim, Samuel, Ronald, Edward and the team.

Old News Do you want to look at the news from last year and before that? It is reeeeaaallllly cool. Click here to find that interesting old news from 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005, 2004, 2003 or even 2002 and before.