Jarad's Jargon - a half year wrap up for our Community Newsletter

Wow, what a year so far.  To say this has been a busy two terms would be an understatement.  The school is looking forward to the mid-year holidays to take a deep breath and brace ourselves for the last half of the year!

The students have been busy in the classrooms.  We have tried to send students out and about on authentic experiences outside the school to help support their learning in the classroom.  Classes have gone to the Patea Museum and Puke Ariki to look at some great resources and to hear from some very knowledgable experts.  We have also take classes up the mountain to get a look at what our big hill has to offer.  Lucky for us everyone managed to stay pretty dry.  With the combination of our high speed internet and our recent iPad purchases, students can also access a wealth of knowledge to help them get a deeper understanding of the world around them.

We have had some great sport results so far this year.  A number of records fell in our swimming sports, though unfortunately our athletics day was washed away in the rain.  The year 5/6 students have been ultra busy with the Crowley Cup and Chittenden Trophy.  The rugby team made the Crowley Cup semi finals, having only lost one pool game and the girls contest for the Chittenden Trophy this Friday in the final, having being undefeated this term.  The girls also completed a clean sweep at the Hawera Winter Tournament, winning the Wilson Cup.  We have also had our year 5/6 rippa rugby team compete in the Champion of Champions trophy at Yarrows Stadium, where we were only a few tries from the final.  Next term we are lining up the year 7/8 McLeod Shield and Hurlstone Trophy competitions for rugby and netball.

It has been great to welcome a number of new families to the school and it's always a pleasure to see new faces running around the playground.  All our new students have joined in well and we are extremely lucky to have such a great group of students at our school.  A big thanks to all those parents who have helped out, from the SPA to sports coaches to parent help in the classrooms.  You are what makes this school such a supportive and great place to be.

Have a great holiday,
MrC

Jarad's Jargon

The results are in!  Last week we competed in the Champion of Champions rippa rugby tournament and performed exceedingly well.  With a couple of catches here and there, we may have turned a couple of results and even challenged for the title!
Here are our results...
Win 5 - 4 vs St Joesephs Stratford
Win 6 - 3 vs Egmont Village
Loss 5 - 7 vs West End Primary
Loss 4 - 6 vs Waitara East
Loss 8 - 10 vs Normanby
Yesterday we also competed in the annual Kissick Eraio touch rugby/netball tournament held in Kaponga.  Congratulations to our year 5/6 netball team who defended their title.  Our other teams also were very competitive.
Year 5/6 touch rugby - third
Year 7/8 touch rugby - third
Year 5/6 netball - first
Year 7/8 netball - runners up
Next week our year 5/6 rugby and netball teams will be competing in the Bhana cup at Hawera Primary and our Year 7/8s are playing at Yarrows Stadium in their rippa rugby tournament, so come down and support our teams if you can!

Don't forget our Bingo night is on next Friday in the Hall.  Come down and bring the family for a fun night with our community.  We are hoping we get a good night where the sky isn't falling down!

Go the AB's this weekend, hoping that they can close out the series and best of luck to our Bhana Cup and rippa teams next week.

MrC

Rippa Rugby Champion of Champions Tournament

Last Friday we took our year 5/6 rippa rugby team to Yarrows Stadium for the Champion of Champions tournament.  There were ten of the best Y5/6 rippa rugby teams in the province and we were playing off for a chance to represent Taranaki in the national tournament in Wellington.

We started the day by going into overtime against St Josephs Stratford after the score was 4-4 in regulation time.  After a couple of sets, we managed to score the winning try.  This set the tone for what was going to be a nervous day for the spectators!

Results:
Win 5 - 4 vs St Joesephs Stratford
Win 6 - 3 vs Egmont Village
Loss 5 - 7 vs West End Primary
Loss 4 - 6 vs Waitara East
Loss 8 - 10 vs Normanby

Despite losing the last few games our team was in the hunt throughout every game, with only one or two drop balls or a runaway try being the difference in most of the games.  Despite only having a couple of subs for the day our students were still running up and down the pitch with great enthusiasm!  Our game against Waitara East, who were the eventual winners, could have gone either way with a runaway try near the end of the game by Waitara being the difference between the two teams.

Great effort everyone and a big thanks to the supporters who travelled with the team.

Jarad's Jargon

The next couple of weeks are going to be hectic with sports activities!!!  Today we are taking our Year 5/6 rippa team to Yarrows Stadium to play in the Champion of Champions tournament to decide who represent Taranaki in the Wellington Tournament.  Best of luck to that team!

Next week we have a school trip for the senior classrooms to Puke Ariki to support our topic of Mt Taranaki this term.  We also have a lot of sports happening again.  The Kissick Eriao touch rugby/netball tournament is next Thursday, and Sport Taranaki are coming in on Wednesday to train our year 7/8s up for the rippa tournament in two weeks.  In the same week we are competing in semi-finals for rugby and netball in the Crowley Cup and on the 25th the year 5/6 rugby/netball teams are competing in the Bhana Cup.

To keep up to date, check in at http://www.matapu.school.nz/p/calendar.html on our website.

It's going to be a really busy couple of weeks with reports also coming out before the end of the term.

Have a great weekend everyone.  Great effort to the Black Caps in toppling a Windies team in the West Indies for only the second time and here's hoping the AB's step up this weekend!
MrC

Jarad's Jargon

A big thanks to those who have brought cans and bottles the last couple of weeks.  At the moment Blue House has a significant lead, though there is still a chance to catch them up.  Next week we are gathering in children's toys in the form of little knick knacks that might have been purchased at the $2 shop.  If you had forgotten to bring in cans and bottles, we are still taking in those as well.
Reminder - Friday the 27th of June for BINGO night.

Reminder that Anderson Pie Orders are due back at school by next Tuesday, the 10th of June.

Congratulations to our year 5/6 netball and rugby teams.  The final pool round took place yesterday and both teams have made it to the semi finals to be played in a couple of weeks.  The netball team go through as top qualifiers having won all their pool games and the rugby team has won two out of their three games.  Best of luck for the semis!!!

Have a great weekend everyone, and go the AB's this weekend against England!!!
MrC

Virtual Reality visits Matapu...

Yesterday we had a visitor who brought their virtual reality headsets to our school.  The whole school managed to experience a roller-coaster without leaving the library!!!  It was quite amazing how the kits worked and it even made MrC a little sick.