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Western Heights School
Our Vision We are … Caring, Creative, Confident, Cognisant, Connecting, Contributing, Collaborative. Our Mission Our children love to learn to lead as they dream, grow, shine and reflect. Love - ourselves - others - our world Learn about - ourselves - others - our world Lead - ourselves - others - in our world |
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Calendar of Events
Whanau Time is every second Friday in our hall, starting at 9:45 am sharp. Everyone is warmly welcomed to join us for these special WHS family occasions. Next Whanau Time - Friday 26 August. Rooms 3, 4 and 11 hosting.
WHS Calendar
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Friday 26/8
Whanau Time - 9:45am. Rooms 3, 4, 11 hosting. All welcome.
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Tuesday 30/8
School Photos. Netball photos from 2:30pm - 3:15pm.
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Wednesday 31/8
School Photos.
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Friday 2/9
Junior School Dads’ morning tea.Netball prize giving.
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Ukulele News Flash
The long-awaited ukulele method books offered to our Ukulele Band members (and all others interested) have finally arrived. They will be distributed to children whose parents have paid for them. Order forms available from music room.
HUGE savings are involved - we are subsidising the original cost of $39.95 taking it down to just $15.
This high quality kid-sized book comes with downloadable play-along tracks and chord charts. Well worth it, order yours now. Below: Room eight performing the Uke Salute. |
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Daffodil Day News Flash - Wear Yellow - Bring a Gold Coin
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This Friday - 26 August - we celebrate Daffodil Day at Western Heights. We are encouraging everyone to wear yellow and to bring along a gold coin if possible. Please don’t go out and buy an outfit - maybe get creative instead with yellow hair chalk or ribbons, yellow lipstick (?) or even yellow Pak 'n Save bags - a cool reason to recycle! Mrs Pasalic will make a coin trail (daffodil themed I’m sure). The following is a message from the New Zealand Cancer Society regarding Daffodil Day and why it is important. Daffodil Day is the Cancer Society's annual flagship event and one of the most important fundraising and awareness campaigns in the country. As well as providing an opportunity to raise awareness of cancer in New Zealand, Daffodil Day is a major funding source for the Cancer Society. The daffodil is one of the first flowers of spring, whose bright yellow blooms remind us of the joys the new season will bring. It represents the hope there is for the 1 in 3 New Zealanders affected by cancer. The donations we receive go towards vital scientific research into the causes and treatment of all types of cancer, as well as providing a wide range of support services, information, health promotion and education programmes to reduce cancer risk, awareness campaigns and programmes for people affected by cancer. Thank you for your support. 
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Reflections on our Western Heights Seven Cs
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Our children need 21st century skills to be able to successfully participate in the global economy. They also need core academic skills - Reading, Writing and Mathematics in particular, but also Technology, Science, Arts, Health and PE, Social Sciences and Languages (including Te Reo Maori).
In addition to the above - in some ways sitting around the curriculum - are our Seven Cs. These are the ‘human’ skills we want our children to develop. They contribute to each child becoming a complete and competent citizen ready to take their place in the world. As a school, we focus on the Seven Cs - developing learners who are: - Caring
- Critical
- Creative
- Confident
- Connecting
- Contributing
- Collaborative
Caring: We work to cultivate children’s concern for others because it’s fundamentally the right thing to do and because when children can empathise with and take responsibility for others, they’re likely to be happier and more successful. They’ll have better relationships their entire lives. Strong relationships are a key ingredient of happiness. In life, success often depends on collaborating effectively with others, and children who are empathic and socially aware - who are caring - are also better collaborators. By finding positive ways to care for others we add value to our own lives, feel more engaged with others and generate a more constructive, healthy, sharing way of living with others. We improve the quality of life for everyone.
Critical = Critical Thinking: Critical thinking comprises a number of different skills that help us learn to make decisions. It is the ability to evaluate information to decide whether it is right or wrong. This requires us to be open-minded and consider alternative ways of looking at solutions. As children grow, their critical thinking skills will help them make judgements independently. To be good at thinking, children must believe that thinking is fun and want to be good at it. Good thinkers practice thinking just as they would practice basketball or chess or dancing. A child’s natural curiosity helps lay the foundation for critical thinking. Critical thinking requires analysis and judgement, and that type of active engagement requires imagination and inquisitiveness. As children take in new information, they fill up a library of sorts within their brain. They have to think about how the new information fits in with what they already know, or if it changes any information they already hold to be true. In this digital age, there is so much information available, but we know that not all of it is true or useful, and we also know some of it is even harmful. Teaching our children to be critical thinkers, critical consumers, and constant questioners, is a great way of helping them to be safe, and to make well-informed decisions.
Creative: Creativity means having the confidence that you will be able to find an answer, whatever the situation might be. Being creative can be fun, relaxing, and profitable, but being creative makes you a problem solver. Creative problem solving is so important because it is impossible to know what situations or opportunities will be presented to our children. We want them to be prepared to creatively handle anything that may come along. According to Sir Ken Robinson, who is an expert in learning and children’s education, ‘imagination is the source of all human achievement‘, thus one of the key components of creativity and innovation. “My contention is that creativity now is as important in education as literacy, and we should treat it with the same status” – Sir Ken Robinson Generally, creativity is the ability to think in unusual ways. It is a type of rational thought called divergent thinking. Divergent thinkers branch off from a linear thought, offering multiple solutions or answers to a problem. There are four components of divergent thinking. A highly creative person has strong capacities in each of these four areas: Fluency: the ability to produce many ideas. Originality: the uniqueness of ideas. Originality is vital for creativity. All creative things, ideas, and solutions must be original. Flexibility: producing ideas that come from different categories of thought. When a person taps into different categories of thought, they are more flexible in their thinking. Elaboration: the continual exploration of a line of thought. Elaboration is when creative people often say they are “on fire” about a particular topic or project – they are unable to focus on or think of anything else. As part of the suite of higher order skills, creativity can help learners not only survive, but to thrive in our fast-changing world. Creativity skills help learners to be: Motivated and ambitious for change Confident in their capabilities and the validity of their own viewpoint Able to transfer their creativity skills to other contexts Able to lead and work well with others Crucially, creativity can be the hook which engages learners, influencing their perseverance and achievement. Creativity skills can help learners to shape their own life opportunities.
Confident: Self-confidence is the ability to believe in yourself. To know that you are as worthy as anybody else, no matter what anyone else may say. We are all different, and we are all basically the same - we all have our strengths and weaknesses. Having self-confidence means we can look in a mirror and like what we see. Confidence is something we develop as we become more comfortable trying things, regardless of if we are good at them or not. Confidence is when we are comfortable being ourselves. Self-confident children are better equipped to deal with peer pressure and responsibility. They are also better able to deal with strong emotions of all kinds, and to cope with challenges and frustrations when they arise. Goal Setting Will Help Build Confidence Goal setting builds confidence because it provides a measurable way of seeing how we're doing, and encourages building on success as we set 'next-step' goals. Achieving these goals, using the skills and knowledge we've accumulated on the way, reinforces and boosts confidence. By having a realistic understanding of what we can do, we set up for success and thus grow greater confidence.
Connecting: Connectedness can be defined as a sense of belonging to a community, a feeling that you matter, that your contributions are valued and others care about you. Feeling that we are accepted within our social group is a basic psychological need so vital to our survival that it counts as one of our basic human needs along with sustenance and shelter. Children in caring, connected classrooms will be much more engaged and motivated. This needs to be coupled with the opportunity for choice and independent learning, where children have the information, resources, support, encouragement, feed-back and feed-forward necessary for them to achieve their desired outcomes. Children who feel more connected at school are less likely to take risks with their health. Connectedness has several dimensions - with family, peers, teacher and teachers, wider school, the community and the world. As children build skills and confidence, they are safely able to extend their connectedness through these levels in positive and affirming ways. As teachers, we must be able to connect with our children at their level, within the contexts of their world, according to their personalities and passions, and their needs and aspirations.
Contributing: All children need opportunities to demonstrate that they are responsible. The act of responsibility involves being trusted, making decisions, and owning our choices. Contributing is more than just asking children for their ideas and views. It’s about listening to them, taking them seriously and turning their ideas and suggestions into reality. Contributing is an end-product of many of the Cs that came before. Children who are caring, critical thinkers, creative, confident, and feel connected, will naturally want to contribute. Children feel a sense of accomplishment when they are responsible for certain tasks and perform them well. Their organisational skills improve when they have the opportunity to contribute. The intrinsic reward of a job well done motivates children to carry out other tasks that contribute to the home or the classroom. Their self-esteem will be heightened by opportunities for success. This supports children to view themselves as trustworthy and reliable, contributing to their sense of identity. Being a contributor helps children feel that they are important. Our children need to have a deep sense of responsibility to be successful, dependable citizens and confident problem solvers in every aspect of their lives.
Collaborating: Vygotsky describes learning as a social contract within a social context. There is a saying, two heads are better than one, and at Western Heights, we say to teach is to learn twice. Children need to work in a collaborative or social setting in order to develop strong communication skills and interpersonal skills. Working as a group is an opportunity to gain respect and acceptance from peers. It is an opportunity to broaden understandings of others - how others think, process information and problem solve. Collaboration supports children to develop crucial life skills such as the ability to compromise, to negotiate, to listen actively, and to explain themselves with clarity.
Conclusion - another C: Children need to feel valued, respected, empowered, cared for, and included. They also need to respect themselves, others, and their environment. Children become positive about themselves and their learning when they feel valued for who they are, and when we promote warm and supportive relationships with them. Expressing themselves creatively and having an opportunity to learn, grow, experiment, make mistakes and experience success, enhances children’s sense of well-being. Life and learning both provide many challenges. Being flexible and having a positive outlook on learning and on life is, therefore, crucial. All these experiences help children to become resilient and resourceful as they cope with change and all of life's challenges and opportunities. |
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Our Seven Cs and Our Four Pou
Our Seven Cs are the ‘human’ skills we want our children to develop. They contribute to each child becoming a complete and competent citizen ready to take their place in the world. Inside our Seven surrounding Cs we have Four Pou - support poles - Whanaungatanga - the culture of familiness, living and learning as contributing family members Turangawaewae - our standing place, where we belong and feel connected Manaakitanga - caring for others Matauranga - learning, growing, questioning, thinking |
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Catch Up Photos
 Top Left and Below: Senior students with their 3D printed designs. The thinking, planning, calculating and designing that went into their completed product was impressive. We are proud of their fine work - as are they. Above Left: Noah with his Glendene Athletics Club medal for winning the 200 metres recently. Top Right: Bella dressed in her awesome Eagle costume for our Olympic Opening Ceremony. Above Right: Zayne with his bracelet presented by his sister on the occasion of Raksha bandhan. Raksha bandhan means "Bond of Protection”. The festival celebrates the love and duty between brothers and sisters. Right: children from room 21 are learning all about fractions with fruit. This is a practical, real world way to learn about fractions, and it has the added benefit of a healthy snack built in after using all that brain power. 
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The Perfect Gift - a Dramady Performance at WHS
“The Perfect Gift”, performed by the HTA Trust, was a drama about some boys trying to find the perfect gift for their mother. In their quest, they ended up falling down a hole and into a whole new world, where they had lots of adventures and faced lots of challenges. Fortunately everyone ended up living happily ever after. The drama was funny, interesting and well acted. This review was by Georgia from room 25. |
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Mark McLay’s Magical Marimba Music
We are so incredibly fortunate to have the teaching talents and musical talents of Mr McLay available to our children at WHS. Mark takes all our children for music regularly - we would love it to be more often, but with 28 classrooms now, there just isn’t enough time to fit any more sessions in. Mark is also a handyman of considerable skill. Over the past few months he has been building this massive and quite magnificent marimba at home. There were a lot of challenges getting the sound just right with each of the pipes, but the end result is amazing. Mark played a tune for us at our Monday morning meeting and the sound of the marimba was rich and full. We are most impressed, and I know our children will love playing it as part of our impressive marimba band. |
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Pay It Forward For Vanuatu - from Lauren Nummy
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Room 1 is Paying It Forward to a small school in Port Vila. After Cyclone Pam hit the Port Vila area in March 2015 many schools in the area have been struggling to rebuild and are very low on supplies. As Lauren is fortunate enough to be visiting Vanuatu in the upcoming school holiday break, it provides an opportunity for her to deliver the supplies and bring back photos to Room 1 so they can see the actual children they have helped. Although it would be wonderful to take loads of supplies, she is limited to the amount she can squeeze in with her own luggage on the plane, so consider weight/size of your donated item. Some ideas: 1. Pencils, colour pencils, sharpeners, felts, pens, boxes of chalk, glue sticks 2. Colouring books, small readers, educational posters 3. Basic First Aid supplies- plasters etc. $2 shop type reading glasses. 4. Deflated balls, ball pump, frisbees, small percussion instruments 5. Puzzles, activity books Items can be dropped off to Room 1 no later than Friday 26 August, in order to allow time for packing and organising. Thanks for your support. Please Note: That is only a two week opportunity to donate |
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A Weekly Series on Ways to Boost Brain Power
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WHS Quiz Night |
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Welcome to our Western Heights Whanau
The warmest of warm Western Heights welcome to... Faatali Cowan-Mati, Lotomalosi Cowan-Mati and Chiloveah Cowan-Mati. We are delighted to have you join our Western Heights whanau and hope and trust you all feel right at home here, are happy, and Loving, Learning and Leading.
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Western Heights School126 Sturges Road Henderson Auckland 0612 P - 09 8361213 M - 021 779 009
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