Rāmere, te 4 o te Noema 2022
Competition – Each week we will have a competition. One lucky winner will receive a $20 Millie’s Coffee voucher! It’s simple, just email your answer to kahuiako@orewacollege.nz
Congratulations to Hayley Campbell this week’s winner!
This week’s Question: What is our new Kāhui Ako whakatauākī/proverb, Orewarewa whenua, puāwai māhuri,
referring to?
Have something to share? Get in contact with one of our Across School Leaders – we would love to hear from you!
markralston@silverdaleprimary.school.nz Te ao Māori
l.evans@orewacollege.nz Hauora
jackieboyd@silverdaleprimary.school.nz Future Ready
bodea-bayes@orewaprimary.school.nz 21st Century Pathways
Digital Learning Hub – Te Pātaka Matihiko
Over the last year, the Future Ready group have been working on unpacking the Digital Curriculum in order to support kaiako integration into everyday practice. The last newsletter introduced the Kāhui Ako ki Orewa Digital Learning Progressions.
Computational Thinking Digital Progressions
Designing and Developing Digital Outcomes Digital Progressions
This week we would like to introduce the Digital Learning Hub. A place where kaiako can find various resources linked to the progressions. Check it out and if you would like to contribute please email jackieboyd@silverdaleprimary.school.nz or alternatively, talk to your Within School Leader.
Is your school cyber secure? Test your students cyber security skills in this free* online competition.
Cyber Comp is an online competition to test your students’ cyber security skills.
The competition is open for 2 weeks from October 27, 2022 and is designed to take around 45 minutes.
*Cyber Comp is free for all Aotearoa New Zealand students in years 6-13.
Whakatauākī for Kāhui Ako
Orewarewa whenua, puāwai māhuri
On the fertile ground of Orewa, the sapling grows
In term 3, leaders from across our Kāhui Ako kura, worked with Kereama Nathan from Te Herenga Waka o Orewa Marae to create a whakaatauākī (Proverbial saying) for our Kāhui.
For those of you wondering what the difference is between a whakataukī and a whakatauākī, a whakataukī is written by unknown ancestors/tīpuna whereas a whakatauākī has known author/s and a story behind it’s creation.
What can you do with our whakatauākī?
Teach it to your tamariki. Own it. It’s all of ours and tells a story of this place, at this time which for some of us is our tūrangawaewae, the place where we stand.
Our whakatauākī is a metaphor that draws the comparison between a well-nourished sapling thriving and growing here in Orewa and our ākonga thriving and growing in our kura.
Orewarewa = An old name for Orewa (doubling the rewa adds extra emphasis)
Whenua = Land
Puāwai = Bloom/Blossom
Māhuri = Sapling/Young tree
Whakatauākī contributors: Kereama Nathan, Mark Ralston, Cameron Lockie, Whaea Leeanne Wade, William Albertsma, Gillian Bray, Jason Irvine, Katherine Pascoe, Debbie Waller, Simon Koziarski, Amy-Lee Gould, Katie Hills, Wendy Sandifer and Nick Edwards.
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It’s Gumboot Friday!!! Gumboot Friday is part of the I Am Hope Foundation
Click on this LINK to watch a short video.
You can also donate on the Gumboot Friday website LINK
You can access a free counsellor here (students)
Whakatauākī o Te Wiki (Idiom)
Orewarewa whenua, puāwai māhuri
On the fertile ground of Orewa, the sapling grows
The Science of Reading and Structured Literacy
by Claire Taylor
Twin Coast Cluster RTLB: Cluster 3
Resource Teacher Learning & Behaviour
The Science of Reading and Structured Literacy has been in the news a lot recently and we thought you might like to know a bit more about it and about our focus as regards literacy at Orewa Primary School.
Did you know that approximately 43% of adult New Zealanders are functionally illiterate, they lack the literacy skills to fully participate in everyday life? Within our prison population, 60% have less than NCEA level 1 in literacy and numeracy.
As Tracy Karanui-Golf, a Māori Speech Language Therapist guiding rangitahi through the justice system says,
‘Literacy shouldn’t be a point of privilege. Evidence based literacy intervention can work for mokopuna Māori – they must have access. Language and literacy don’t just increase skills and ability…they are central to mana, rangatiratanga and mana motuhake!’
There is also a direct link between high levels of literacy and better mental health and economic prosperity.
The Science of Reading is not a programme, it is a huge body of research from the disciplines of education, cognitive psychology, neuroscience and linguistics which inform us on the most effective and efficient way to teach all of our students to read. This research is making its way into our classrooms and as we better understand how the brain works, our practice is improving. Now we have the knowledge to achieve better outcomes for all students, reducing disparities and raising achievement of Māori and Pacifica.
The research informs us that all brains learn to read the same way, even our dyslexic students – the evidence (high tech brain-imaging studies) shows this clearly.
We know there are 5 essential components of reading:
Structured Literacy Instruction is the umbrella term used by the International Dyslexia Association to describe evidence-based programmes and approaches that are effective for students with dyslexia. Structured Literacy must incorporate the Five Components of Reading and the four principles – Explicit, Systematic, Cumulative and Diagnostic teaching. Structured literacy is not a programme, it is an approach that begins with teaching the foundational skills of reading. It is quite simply the gold standard for our dyslexic students and it works for 95% of our students who should be reading at least at grade level.
Post two years of disruptive covid teaching, this is even more important. Structured Literacy provides a more even playing field for our neurotypical children, our dyslexic children, our children with limited experiences and our ESOL children.
Humans have the neural pathways to speak. Our brains have evolved so we just need to be exposed to language to learn to speak. However reading and writing are only approximately 5000 years old so we have to build those neural pathways. The best way to do this is using a Structured Literacy approach.
At Orewa Primary, we have started to work with Liz Kanes ‘The Code’ which follows the principles of Structured Literacy . ‘The Code’ is not just a spelling programme (around 60% of our secondary students said they found spelling to be the most difficult) we teach encoding (spelling) and decoding (reading) together. ‘The Code’ has a scope and sequence for students in Yr 1-8 and by implementing this we have a really consistent schoolwide approach.
We are also using Heggerty to promote phonemic awareness with our junior students. Phonemic Awareness, one of the components of reading, is the specific ability to focus on and manipulate individual sounds (phonemes) in spoken words, a phoneme being the smallest unit of sound.
Orewa Primary School has a range of Sunshine Decodable readers and we are also using the Little Learners Love Literacy decodable readers for our younger mokopuna. We are currently investing in age appropriate decodable readers for our older students who need additional support (The Magic Belt series).
We at Orewa Primary are very much at the start of this journey so welcome collaboration with other schools in our Kāhui Ako community.
Kāhui Ako Hui Dates – Term Four 2022
10th November – Orewa Primary 10.35am – ASL
17th November – Wainui 10.10am – ASL and WSL
24th November – Silverdale 11am – ASL
1st December – Orewa Beach 11am – ASL and WSL
8th December – No Hui
15th December – No Hui
Kāhui Ako ki Orewa 
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