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week 6 term 1 thursday 10 march 2011 www.isleworth.school.nz kia ora koutou e huri to kanohi ki te ra ko te atarangi kei muri i a koe turn your face to the sun and the shadows fall behind you i am sure you will all agree it is nice to have all the children back at school and returning to normality it has been a difficult time for everybody and we are all aware that the children will react in different ways and all of these ways are normal experts tell us the pathway to recovery is to return to normal routines with adults they can trust ­ this provides them with security and reassurance this is what we are doing at school we have put extra support in place by increasing teacher aide hours to support children in the classrooms and by employing some of our regular relievers whom the children know very well to be in the school to help out if necessary we are ensuring that we break the day up with some fun activities just to ease the pressure modelling a positive way to react to the situation and talking about a positive future are also strategies to be used at home and school we will carefully monitor our children and look for signs that might indicate that they need additional support please give your children a couple of weeks to settle back into school and then if you have any concerns come and see me the ministry of education is able to suggest counselling services to assist i am very proud of the children and the staff for the way in which they coped during the earthquake and our subsequent evacuation we are also pleased that the text message system worked in most cases immediately to assure you of their safety unfortunately after that the network failed and the next message to tell you school was closed the next day did not get through if we have any further quakes and need to evacuate we will try to text you all again but please don t take the lack of a message as cause for concern ­ it will probably be that our message did not get through if you come to school to check on or get your child please make sure that you wait until we release the children to you ­ we do have to know where every child is and if you take a child without us knowing we could endanger lives as someone searches for them many of you were kind enough on the day to offer to take the children of your friends and neighbours our protocols does not allow us to release children to another person in an emergency unless that has been notified to us by the primary caregiver we will stay at school as long as necessary to care for any children we know there will be the normal after shocks which some of us are all getting used to ­ in this case we will do our normal earthquake drills in the classroom and then carry on as usual parent meeting ­ friday 2.20pm if you would like a little more information about how to help your child cope our procedures etc there is a parent meeting in the hall tomorrow friday at 2.20pm swimming demonstration day tuesday 15 march 2011 as we missed our swimming sports and it is very unlikely that there will be zone swimming sports due to the closure of city council pools we are inviting you to school on tuesday 15 march to watch your children in a normal class swimming session ­ the timetable is attached if you cannot make it on this particular day please speak to the class teacher and arrange an alternative day which suits you touch tournament thursday 17 march 1.30 we have had a number of touch teams playing in the competition at nunweek park unfortunately they have missed the end of the season as well we have planned a small tournament at school next thursday 17 march the teams will play each other and maybe some of the teachers might put together a team as well the rest of the school will be supporting the players and we would love to see you there as well if you can make it assembly assembly will be held as usual this friday 9.10am noho ora mai principal

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isleworth school swimming presentation time 9:00-9:30 9:30-10:00 10:00-10:30 10:50-11:30 11:30-12:00 tuesday room 6 room 1 room 8 room 11/13 room 7 room 3 room 10 room 9 room 2 12:30-1:00 1:00-1:30 2:00-2:30 2:30-3:00 wanted old cell phones for the starship school swap isleworth school is collecting old cell phones as part of a fundraising for our school as well as helping starship hospital with much needed funds to continue with starship s air ambulance service there is a collection box in the school office foyer where you can bring in your old cell phones.

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