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Celia Seagull and the Plastic Sea
A School wide Production
In Term 1 2022, we were granted a Creatives in Schools Grant to engage with a local creative to produce a school wide production. Hillary Austin of Foundation Gallery and Arts Hub was engaged as our lead creative and so the creative process commenced. Nadia Francis took on the role of Lead Teacher and worked tirelessly to make the production a huge success.
Twenty weeks later, and with our entire creative community engaged in the project, our first Matinee was performed. The production was based on the story of Celia Seagull and the Plastic Sea, written by Nicole Miller and illustrated by Lily Uivel.
We created a timeline of the creative process which can be viewed and enjoyed here. Click on the links within the document to delve further into the creative process.
Te Wiki Ako, Term 4
Our Term 4 Te Wiki Ako was centred around our learning about bees which was generated from our involvement in the ‘Big Buzz Project’, run by Grass Esposti. The Big Buzz Project’s vision is for young people to develop knowledge to secure a sustainable environmental future for Aotearoa and competencies that will enable them to be actively connected to the living world. Grass has certainly inspired this connection for our students and bees are being well looked after within our school!
To celebrate our learning, we held a Te Wiki Ako open day which wove our community together for a series of special events. The day started with a Pollinators and Petals parade, followed by a shared morning tea with our VIP guests, and then a wander through our classrooms to look at the wonderful and creative exhibits of student learning.
We also held a Scholastic Book Fair to encourage a love of literacy within our community, and to generate some much needed fundraising for our school library. As a result of Mrs Vikstrand’s passion for literacy and meticulous planning, the week was filled with an array of rich literacy experiences. Monday started off with a Poem in my Pocket and it was lovely to see the students sharing poems with each other and doing so, so eloquently. This special week drew to a close with a shared lunch in the Leigh Library garden and a special story read by Tracy Lawton.
Te Kai – a student led inquiry project comes to life.
The students of Te Moana have been working on a community food stall which now sits proudly at the front entrance of our school. The food stall is the result of their Student Volunteer Army project and its’ purpose is for everyone within our community to share, swap and/or sell locally grown produce. Community members have already donated homemade preserves and homegrown produce, and students have grown a range of plants from seed. Any money raised from the stall will go towards improving and extending our school gardens. The students would like to especially thank Mike (aka Koro) and Gareth (aka dad) for their help in conceptualising and building their vision for this project, and also the parents who joined our workshop afternoons to prepare for its opening. We now encourage our community to interact with Te Kai and enjoy the connections and benefits it might offer.
Te Wiki o Te Reo Māori Language Week.
During Te Wiki o Te Reo Māori Language Week tamariki were involved in many different activities all celebrating Māori language. We were lucky to have local artist Arapeta Ashton come to school to teach the tamariki how to make Kākahu (Māori Cloak). The tamariki also created kowhaiwhai art, played kemu and hākinakina (games and sports). We also challenged our whānau to a kahoot quiz, along with introducing lots of new te reo words and phrases. To conclude the week we came together to celebrate Te Wiki o Te Reo Māori with a hāngī.
We thank Arapeta for giving up his time to support our tamariki in creating a beautiful taonga that we will gift to Ngati Manuhuri, to Lili and Melissa for running and supporting workshops and to Lili, Matt, Theresa and Isaac for all your mahi preparing and cooking the hāngī.
Swimming Sports, 2020
On the 18th of February, we hosted our annual Swimming Sports event which was organised by Miss Waata and Mrs Edwards. We had a fantastic turnout of parents and helpers and every student participated. Prior to this event, we reshuffled our House System. Points were awarded to every student who participated in each race and 1st, 2nd, 3rd place winners. The winning House of the day was the Sharks who collected a whooping 139 points. Inter-school Swimming will take place on Wed 11th March, followed by HBC Swimming Sports which will be held on Thurs 26th March. We wish our swimmers every success.
Lax Lights 2019
Leigh School Newsletter
We no longer produce fortnightly newsletters. Regular school notifications and celebrations are shared through Hero (our student management system) and Facebook. To download any of our archived school newsletters (PDF) click the appropriate date below.
Special Announcement – return to school
Covid-19 update
Life Education Bus
Have a Go Sailing
Tabloid Sports
Leigh School at the Goat Island Discovery Centre
Welcome to Kerrin Jamieson our new principal
at Leigh School
Athletics Day at Leigh School
Auckland Transport Travelwise Programme
Pet Day at Leigh School 2019
We also had a visit from Shawn Bishop from The Animal Sanctuary in Matakana. She gave a great talk to the children about what they do and how to help injured birds.
Thank you very much to our judges: Delwyn from the Leigh General Store, Brenda from the Leigh Pre-school, Tine & Stone from Goat Island Dive & Snorkel, George (Liz Jones partner), Gemma & Liz (our awesome teacher aides) and Ian (Fay’s husband). Thank you also to Wiri, Keria, Maite and Awa who organised the BBQ and baking at lunch time on Pet Day!
Climate Change Strike in Leigh!
Tennis
Grandparents Day
Te wiki o te reo Maori
Tennis
Hockey
NZ Playhouse
Auckland Art Gallery
Cross Country
Warkworth Museum
New Zealand Geographic
Matariki Feast
Sharing Our Learning for Term 2
Matariki Feast Preparation
Support Staff Assembly
The children present them with gifts to show our appreciation!
Penguin Boxes
Huge thank you to the Leigh Marine Laboratory
Leigh School in the media
Thank you
Leigh School Swimming Sports 2019
We had great weather and great swimming this Wednesday for our annual Swimming Sports. Thank you to all the parents and grandparents who came to watch our children. Great participation and the hi-light was Mrs Fox’s fun relay race! Special thank you to Nick for helping me with the placings and Kate for these wonderful photos.
Inter School Swimming Sports
A small number of Leigh School children went to the Inter School Swimming at Mahurangi College this Wednesday. They all made us proud! Gigi, Poppy Douglas, Freya and Kalani all made it to finals which is fantastic. Poppy, Gigi, Douglas and Joe also came 3rd in the Year 5 Freestyle relay!! Thank you very much to all the parents who helped out for the day.
Snorkelling at the Goat Island Marine Reserve
What a great experience we had last Friday snorkelling at the Goat Island Marine Reserve! Thank you very much to all the parents who helped with transport and swimming with the children.
Goat Island Discovery Centre
Today all the children at Leigh School visited the Goat Island Discovery Centre. As you will know this is part of a research/inquiry project about Salps: The Ocean Vacuum cleaner: Salp bloom effects on the carbon cycle and marine food web. We are working Moira (NIWA), Claudio (AUT), Tim (Goat Island Discover Centre and Tine (Goat Island Dive & Snorkel). We are very lucky to be a part of this project. Today was our second visit to the Discovery Centre were we caught up with Moria after her to research trip to the Chatham Rise. Check out the NIWA website for more info https://www.niwa.co.nz/…/voyag…/tan1810-ocean-vacuum-cleaner
The children had a great time and we are so looking forward to our snorkelling trip which is planned for next Monday were we should see and be able to take photos of Salps. Then the year 5 & 6 children will be working with Claudio and the App his team have designed. Exciting!
Snorkelling in the pool
There was great excitement this Monday as Tine Roland and her crew from Goat Island Dive & Snorkel came to Leigh School to help our kids practice snorkelling. This is in preparation for our Salps snorkelling trip next Monday. The year 5 & 6 children also learnt how to use underwater cameras thanks to Tim (The Goat Island Discovery Centre) and Claudio (Auckland University of Technology). Very cool!
