Monday 20th April, 2026
Paemoana happily settling into Term 2.
Kia ora koutou
Welcome back to term 2. We are all refreshed and ready for the term. We have an exciting term, with a Science Fair, cross country, and at the end of the term we will be casting for our production in term 3. We will send out more info for the production later this term. A reminder that all dates are on our school calendar.
Mrs Stackhouse is away this week, so Mrs Maddren and myself will be teaching in Paemoana.
Thanks to everyone for making a conscious effort for your child’s attendance for term 1. We realise there is sickness and special things that pop up every now and again, but we appreciate you taking your child’s attendance seriously.
It is a parent’s responsibility to get their child to school, and it is the school’s responsibility to follow it up. Please see the statistics below for our huge improvement for term 1. We had 85% of our students with regular attendance, that means 34 of our students had over 90% attendance for term 1. This makes a huge difference to their learning, and to their social interactions at school.
Ngā mihi
Maree Lucas
Tumuaki/Principal
principal@omihi.school.nz
School Notices
ANZAC Service
On Saturday 25th April there will be our annual Omihi ANZAC service, across the road from school. It starts at 9am, and we would love to have some school families there. We will ask the children there to lay a wreath on behalf of the school. Thanks to Anna for picking this up.
Children are to please wear school uniform to the service. We ask families to bring something small to share for morning tea (it could be a packet of ANZAC biscuits) and we will have tea, coffee and morning tea available afterwards, if you would like to join us. Thanks to Yo and Hugh for organising this.
National Young Leaders Day (NYLD)
Each year we pay for our Year 8 leaders to attend this. This year it is on Tuesday 9th June at the Christchurch Town Hall. More details are here. It is $54 for children to go, and we open this up to all year 5-7 students as an optional event. If you would like your child to attend, please let Maree know by this Friday, and Bryleigh will then invoice you for the ticket.
Teacher only day
We have a teacher only day on Friday 8th May to work on the new Maths curriculum.
Litter free lunchboxes
As an Enviroschool, from term 2 we ask that children please have litter free lunchboxes. After often finding lots of rubbish around the school, the students have come up with some ideas on how we can reduce this:
Take wrappers off muesli bars, chips etc at home.
Use beeswax wraps, containers or compartments in lunchboxes, instead of glad wrap.
Buy bulk and have a little bit each day - such as chips, popcorn etc, instead of lots of little bags.
Science Inquiry
This term we have a whole school science inquiry, and will be participating in a Science Fair with our other local schools. This will be held at the Omihi Hall on Wednesday 24th June. We will be investigating how materials' matter change, through the process of scientific experiments. Year 0-3 will complete an investigation as a group, and years 4-8 will be in groups of 2-3. We will have our own mini science fair, where the investigations will be judged, and the top four will go across to the Science Fair at the hall. We will invite parents to both of these events, and give you more details nearer the time.
Debating
This week Tūpari is learning about debating. We will be entering a year 5/6 team and year 7/8 team into the North Canterbury Debating Competition. The first debate is in week 2, so Maree will be working with these children, and will be in touch with the parents to support at home as well.
Term 2 Events
ASB Getwi$e - 21st April
Omihi ANZAC service - 25th April
ANZAC day (recognised, school closed) - 27th April
Firewise - 1st May
Teacher only day - 8th May
Pink Shirt Day - 15th May (gold coin donation, or donation into the school account)
Whole School Small Schools Cross Country at Broomfield - 19th May
Year 4-8 Kowai Cross Country - 26th May
Life Education - 10th June
NZ Playhouse Theatre at Omihi Hall - 12th June
Science Fair at Omihi Hall - 24th June
Ikura | Manaakitia te whare tangata - period products in schools initiative
We have opted in to the Ikura | Manaakitia te whare tangata - period products in schools initiative. Through this initiative, the Ministry of Education is providing period products (pads, tampons and liners) to support students in managing their ikura (period). The initiative also has resources available for young people to learn about ikura and help reduce the stigma around it. You are welcome to place an order via this Google form. Bryleigh will then let you know when the items are able to be collected from the school office.
