Santa’s Super Successful Stocking Sale!

By Tayla, Chelsea and Amy.
On the 2nd of December 2010 St Thomas More Catholic School had a market day to raise money for St Paul’s Catholic School in Christchurch who has been dreadfully affected by the distractive earthquake .Our market stalls was in the tennis courts .Room 6 and Room 7 made different themed Christmas stockings. We were given three weeks to create and complete the successful stockings.

Next we gathered all of our materials for the next two weeks .We were talking about things like what supplies we will need and how wide the stocking will be. The next step is picking a theme the choses were music, animals, arsenal, stemmers, nature, art and of course Christmas. The final week was sewing week. On Monday was cutting day we had five to ten parent helpers helping with getting the right shape for sewing the material. The next day was for hand sewing and gluing on the cut pieces. Wednesday was quite the same but every one finished that day we all pilled them up in the music room. Overnight machine sewing parents sewed them together is soon as we got to school we all rushed into the where we had left them overnight. They were sewn together beautifully with not one single mistake.

In no time we were all lining up for a class stocking photo. Then we started setting up, by arranging tables so that they are in a row to start selling. Don’t forget to choose a reasonable price! Then we placed the stockings on the table and got ready to sell. It was a huge success and everything was sold. We told our teacher we had back up plan. They were bracelets we had been making in the last couple of months. The bracelets sold out in ten minutes so we decided to do requests at the stall there and then.
In total we raised $279 and that was just Room 6 and 7 of the Middle School. All together we raised a whopping 2,500 dollars.
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STM Kiwi Tag Champions Again!

Article by Oliver Rudduck and Max Mclver.

“Hi I’m Oli and I’m going to tell you about the Term 4 Waipuna Park Kiwi Tag Tournament. We played every Tuesday and in the team there was William, Andrew, Kiahi, Jamie, Libby, Alice, Katelin, Daniel, Adam, Nicholas, Taine and me Oliver. In the season there were six games and one rest day.
In the first game we played the Selwyn Ridge Rippers and won five tries to one. The boys who scored the tries were Kiahi who scored two and Andrew, Daniel and I scored one. After our game we watched the seniors play to learn a few tricks and skills from the pros. At the second game we won against Mangatapu 8-1. The people that scored were Kiahi with 4 tries, me with two tries, Andrew and Daniel got one try each. On the third game we played the Tauranga Tigers and again won 8-0, on the fourth game we versed Welcome Bay Titans and won 6-1 and in the semi-final we played a really tricky Otumoetai Eels team but we still won five tries to one.
Eventually we reached the final and found we were playing the Selwyn Ridge Rippers again. Unfortunately we were all asleep from a busy weekend on camp and it was very difficult for us to pass the ball around well. Luckily Daniel scored the first try of the match. Then they scored and caught us up sadly. Then suddenly in the second half I managed to side-step through the defence and score an amazing try and maybe the best in the game? We then managed to keep the Rippers out until the whistle blew. Phew! That was a very close game!
Thanks for reading my recount on Kiwi Tag and I hope it inspires you to watch and play the sport. Go St Thomas More!

Our Great Day Trip to Ngamawahine Camp.

Camp News from Katelin and Carlos.

On the Tuesday the 7th of December Room 6 and 7 went to Ngamawahine Camp for a day trip to visit the senior students who were there. We went on the school bus and it took about 50 minutes to get there.

By the time we got there it was morning tea. We were all starving! After that we had a chance to play games like, Last Man Standing on a great dirt mountain, Follow the Leader on the edge of the playground and Ball Tag around the High Ropes. After that Room 6 and 7 got into activity groups and we decided that our class (Room 7) was going to walk the Loop Track in the bush. We saw lots of trees like Rimu, Puriri, Lancewood and Silver Ferns and tree perchers. These are plants that live in branches of the big trees.

Half an hour later we went back to the camp and we did Low Ropes. It was quite challenging because you had to balance on the wires and it was pretty easy for people to fall off. After that we went to the lunch area and the Kapa Haka group performed for the parents and kids. Then we had to get back on the bus and go back to school. We had an awesome time and can’t wait to go back to camp next year and stay for the whole week!

Awesome All Blacks Autographs!

On Labour weekend my family went to Auckland to stay at the Heritage Hotel for two nights.
When we arrived my mum saw a bus parked outside the hotel foyer. After we had got all of the bags out of the car, my mum went in to check-in. When she was walking in Richie McCaw was walking in too! It was very excited. Most of them were in their room. When we got into our room I kept asking my mum if I could go and get their autographs and she said “Yes you can.”

The next day we went shopping. We went to the big malls in Auckland. I really wanted to go to Whitcoulls to get an autograph book because I didn’t have one. We did a lot of shopping. Then we went back to the hotel. When we got back we went back up to our room to get changed to go out for dinner. We then went down stairs to the bar for a drink. When we got down there the All Blacks were there so I could get them to sign my autograph book. It was very cool. Heaps of people were amazed at all my autographs. I gave them all a photocopy in my class.

Then it was Sunday and Me and my mum went to the church just across the road. There were some awesome stain glass windows there. Then we arrived back at the hotel to get packed up and found that unfortunately the All Blacks had already left so I didn’t get to say goodbye. They were going to Hong Kong to play a match. I hope I get to see the All Blacks again somewhere. And I also hope I can go to one of their games.

Little Girl Stands Out in the Big Wide World.

By Alice Jeffries
Hi my name is Alice from room7 at St Thomas More School and I am a really good dancer. In the holidays I went to Te Awamutu competitions during the first weekend of the holidays.
In the competitions there were two sections ballet and jazz (ballet Saturday, jazz Sunday). These are the Trophies I won from them. The smallest is for my barefoot (Ballet section). The medium is for my modern and the large was for the Impromptu (Jazz section).
If you don’t know what an Impromptu is then I will tell you. An Impromptu is a dance that you make up to a piece of music that the judge has picked out for that group of dancers to perform to.
My barefoot song is walking in the air and my modern jazz song is world cup song from Spain. Barefoot dancers are very slow and my jazz is very fast, but some jazz’s are normal speed.

Skill and Speed Beat Size!

By William Martin.
On Friday the 6th of August the Year 3 and 4 Rippa Rugby team went to Paengaroa Park to play in the Bay Wide for our school Saint Thomas More.

Mr. Horan picked us up at school. Me, Andrew, Oliver, Daniel, Jamie, Taine and Kiahi went with him. When we got there we started setting the tent up swiftly with Mr. Webster and Mr. Horan. After we had finished setting up we trained by running around the field slowly passing the ball up and down. Then we practiced ripping the tags and yelling “Rip” loudly. It really works in a game.

First we played Papamoa School Andrew and I knew three people Stephan, George and Lee. They all play soccer for Papamoa Marlins. We started with the ball and then Kiahi passed the ball to Daniel then we got ripped six times then we had to hand the ball over. After a couple of rips, Stephan scored the first try by a strong run. Then Kiahi passed the ball to Daniel, he then side stepped brilliantly to score our first try for the tournament. About five minutes later somebody in Papamoa School scored a blinding try by running up the line. Then after about four rips Oliver scored a fantastic try for S.T.M School.

The STM Sports asked Daniel what it felt like when you won Bay Wide. Daniel said. “Fantastic because we won the very first time for our School in a tournament.” The Times also asked Daniel what was the most challenging part of the day for you. Daniel replied “Playing Papamoa,running and passing.”

In the Quarter Finals we competed against Otonga. We scored five wonderful trys and they scored 2 trys. We scored five great trys most of them were by running up the line. Later in the semi finals we competed against Malfroy and we won 5-3. Most of our tries were by running up the line. The try scorers were by Oliver, Daniel, Kiahi and Andrew.

Then we had a half an hour break (We didn’t train) we had heaps to eat and drink and we had a huge talk about the final against Fairhaven. Eventually we faced them in the final and we won 4-3. W e scored fabulous trys and we won BayWide for the first time ever for S.T.M.

I really enjoyed the Rippa Rugby Tournament because we came first. Maybe next time we can win against Papamoa. I felt really excited because we won BayWide.

Supportive Nine Year Old Amelia

By Ella Phayer and Alice Jeffries

A student in Room 7 called Amelia has been very supportive to the Tauranga Renal Unit, so she had the opportunity to be in the Bay of Plenty Times.
A fundraising effort to make life more comfortable for dialysis patients has found a little champion in bighearted Amelia Riordan.
Despite having never been able to save more than $10 in her life, the selfless 9-year-old has managed to raise just over $500 towards new TVs, DVD players and headsets for patients at the Tauranga renal unit. With 28 patients on its books, the hospital-based unit is operating at full capacity, providing dialysis for patients three times a week for four to six hours at a time.

NEWS FLASH

Sophie Sandford 3rd at WBOP Cross Country!

Sophie has been training three mornings a week with Mrs Linda Oxenham and two senior school runners Louis Grindrod and Isobel Straffon. They have been running around the Mount at the beginning of school. It certainly paid off! This is a photo out of the Newspaper. Well done Sophie. An awesome effort.

The Rippa Rugby World Cup Competition

Article by reporter Libby Nolan
On the 4th of June 2010 the Year three and four rugby players went to the Rippa Rugby World Cup Competition. There were ten players that went. They were Kiahi, William, Andrew, Jamie, Sophie, Alice, Nicolas, Daniel, Adam and Oliver. There were sixty six schools that entered in to the Rippa Rugby Competition in all of the Bay of Plenty area. The games started at 9.00am and they finished at 2.00pm. The team got given a shirt from organizers to wear and they chose our team to be Italy. At the end of nine games Italy won a second place medal. At the final presentation they heard that the team got into the Bay Wide Championship. They were all really excited.
So now The St Thomas More team will go to the Bay Wide Championship. The rules are a little different because you must have thirteen people in your group and you must have three girls in your team. Here are some comments from the Italian team.
Sophie Sandford said “It was a very complicated game. I had fun. She scored ten tries during the whole thing. I was very happy when we came second over all out of the sixty six schools.”
Kiahi said “Most of the teams we versed cheated. He scored twenty six tries in the whole thing. St Mary’s and Pillions Point were probably the hardest teams. We were under feated except for the last match.’’
William told me “In the final was our hardest game when we versed Fairhaven. There were a lot of teams that cheated. The tournament was really fun. ’’
Alice said “We competed at Blake Park. We played six games plus three games because we got in to the quarter finals plus the semi finals. I was really excited when we got in to the finals.’’
Jamie told me “He scored two tries but I was the first one to score a try. The hardest team was Pillions Point. The easiest team was Samoa. We are in the top four. ’’
Andrew said “He scored three tries the hardest team was St Mary’s. The easiest team was Samoa. It was really fun. I am really proud of what we did. Maybe next time we would win. ’’
Oliver said “He scored seven tries. I think the hardest team was Pillions Point. The easiest team was Samoa. It was a fun day.’’
Daniel said “He scored twenty two tries. The hardest team was Pillions Point. The easiest team was Samoa. It was a fun day. I think we need to do some practice on putting the ball down.”
Adam said “The hardest team was Pillions Point. The easiest team was Samoa. It was a fun day. My favorite thing was beating Samoa because they were supposed to be the hardest team.’’
Nicolas said “The hardest team was Pillions Point. The easiest team was Russia. It was really fun. I would do it all again.

The Fancy Dress Day by Libby Nolan

On the 16th of June our whole school had to dress up for the Book Fair. We had to dress up as a book character or a blizzard which means we had to dress up into something wintery. Everyone looked so awesome. At different times our classes went to the Book Fair in the music room. There were some really interesting books and some really cool books. Some people wanted heaps of them. We all got a wish list to write our books we had wished for. Everyone was so excited. In our class there was a Mad Hatter, Where’s Wally, Harry Potter, Dragons, Unicorns, Willy Wonka, Tin Tin, Dorothy and some All White players. There were heaps of other different characters. We all did Jump Jam in our costumes. Some of their parents were there watching us. Some of us got really hot in our costumes. Mr Webster had dressed up in his snow gear and he must have been really hot. Mrs Dustin was Scooby Doo, Mrs Milne was a Musketeer, Catherine was Cat in the Hat and Mr Mills was Mr Twit. Catherine and Debbie had set up the book fair. They did a really good job.

The Year 3 and 4 Kiwi Tag Team by Andrew McCracken

On the 30thof March the year 3 and 4 Kiwi tag team had their last mach. We all arrived at 4.00pm. We all started playing around with a tennis ball after Mr. Webster came we formed a semi circle around him. He told us to go in a diagonal line behind Kiahi and he started passing the ball down the line. Jamie was at the end and when Jamie got the ball we all dropped back and he started passing the ball back down.
Then the whistle blew and Mr. Webster told us to get into our positions. Then the honker went and we all started playing. Five minutes into the game Kiahi scored a try that put us one step ahead. Then Kiahi took the kick and the ball went under the opposition’s legs and went dead. I got the ball and ran and got tagged so I rolled the ball underneath my legs and Kiahi got the ball, passed it to Daniel and he ran fast and got a try. Then I took the kick off and it went to the left side and the other team caught it but we defended well and tagged them three times. They carried on scored a try. The then the honker went for half time.
Mr. Webster called us over we all went over and he told us what to do we got into our places then the honker went the other team kicked off. Daniel got the ball, ran and got tagged. Kiahi got the ball and passed it to me and I got a second try. This carried on in the second half until we had scored six tries and Te Akau Ki had scored only two. So we won the trophy and it is in the school trophy cabinet now.

The Year 3 and 4 Flippa Ball Team by Noah Van Oudenaaren.

Every Sunday from the 28th of February 2010 forward to March 28th we played in the Year 3 and 4 Flippa Ball competition. Our team was called the Typhoons and the team members were me, Joel, Max, Ella, Nicholas, Conner, Grace, Daniel, Carlos, Madison and also William as he was a replacement since not enough people were there for the last game. When we played on the last day we had 2 games and we tied the first game 5-5 and lost the other 9-7. I was on attack/centre the first game and defense in the second game. We won 1st place out of all the year 3 and year 4 teams in Tauranga. So we lost and tied but we still got to be the top Year 3 and 4 team in the Tauranga area. We only lost about 3 games in the first season of 2010.

Pinocchio by Alice Jeffries

On the 9th, 10th and 11th Susanne Hanger School of Dance is doing a production called Pinocchio at Bay court in Tauranga.
There are several hundred kids doing the production. The main parts are, Pinocchio, Jappetto the maker of Pinocchio, Jiminy Cricket Pinocchio’s Conscience, Cleo the Goldfish, Figaro (Jappetto Kitten).
The story is about Jappetto who made a puppet name Pinocchio. Once when Jappetto woke up he thought Pinocchio was real. A few days later Jappetto got swallowed by a whale and then amazingly Pinocchio gets swallowed by the same whale! A few hours later they get sneezed out of the whale. Then later in the story Pinocchio dies but a few days later Pinocchio actually comes alive for real! Then everyone goes to Jappetto’s house to see the living boy.
I hope lots of people come and enjoy the show. We have all worked so hard in this production. The teachers are Susanne Hanger who is the main teacher, Hannah Lane who is the competition teacher and several other teachers as well.

The Weet-Bix Triathlon by Jessica Thomas

On the 28th of March 2010 the Weet-Bix Triathlon took place at Memorial Park. Alice , Libby , Sophie , Terri , Conner , Jackson , Adam , Zoe , Taylor and I did the Triathlon .
The group I was in was wearing a yellow hat and so were Alice, Libby and Taylor. When the yellow hat’s race was on it was all already 11: 00am because there were a lot of orange hats so they had to split them all up.
Before we got in the pool we had to sit on the side because we had to wait until the boys had finished. When the boy’s race was over we got in the pool and waited for the whistle to blow. Then we where off! Racing up and down the lane five times and then rushing out and onto our bikes.
When we got to our bikes we put our shoes, top and helmet on. Then we started to push our bikes out of the Transition onto the road and so we could get on our bikes and start racing. At first we had to go up a big hill, and then we went down again. I biked down the hill and a boy came and turned at the same time as me and our wheels jammed together. The next hill was okay and when I was going back up the hill I saw Alice. When I was going downhill I was fine.
I reached the Run Transition, got off my bike, took off my helmet and started to run. When I had run a while I spotted Taylor but I ran right past her. After a while she spotted me and started to sprint but I saw the FINISH line and sprinted too and beat Taylor. At the finish we were all awarded a Weetbix gold medal.

THE ST MARY TRIATHALON by Daniel Sheahan

On the 5th of March 2009 St Thomas More went to the St Mary’s Triathlon. We had lunch their then me and my friends watched the year one boys and girls race then the year twos and one of the year two girls where really fast .Harry drank too much sprite and got a stitch I wanted to find my friends and I knew where Andrew and William were.

Then I found my friends Oliver and Joel then played some cricket with some friends then we went to the park with some other friends then it was the year four girls tern I was really nerves and then it was our go now and she shot the gun and we were away and it wasn’t deep at all I was the 9th person out of the water and then we went onto our bikes and the hills were really step and I carpet my spot and I was 9th on the bike ride

Then we went onto the running and I over took 4 people and it was also really steep as well then I finished and i was placed 5th after the race I had 2 hot dogs and one Juicy and then I went home .

Matamata Catholic Schools Swimming Competition

Matamata Catholic Schools Swimming Competition

On Wednesday the 24th of March 2010 Jessica, Alex, Kiahi, Daisy, Sean, Nicky, Meg, Louis, Leon, McKenzie and Me (Sophie) went to the Waikato Catholic Schools Swimming Competition. The event was organised by St Josephs Catholic School in Matamata. We went in car groups and McKenzie and I went with Jessica. When we got there we set up our school’s shade tent. It didn’t take long to set it up. Then the Principal talked to us about the rules and then we said a prayer.
Later the Principal called up year 4 and 5’s to do their Medley swim, which is breaststroke, backstroke and finally freestyle. The swimmers were Leon, Louis, McKenzie, Nicky and Meg. They all did really well with Leon coming second.
For the all the events the starter blew the whistle and we all stood on our diving boards, then she said ‘Take your marks’ and blew the hooter and everyone dived into the water and swam as hard as they could.
In the 25 meter freestyle I got 3rd and Jessica came 4th. Me (Sophie) got to go in the finals. At the end I found out I did it in 24 seconds and my placing was third. Kiahi Horan was the overall fastest eight year old boy and Leon Castle the second fastest nine year old boy. In the prize giving we were told we placed fourth place out of the eleven schools. I would love to be in that same competition next year but do even better! By Sophie Sandford

Flippaball at Baywave with Kiahi Horan.

On Thursday the 4th of March the two Senior St Thomas More Flippa Ball teams the Buccaneers and the Marlins went to Baywave to train for their game against Arataki Primary on Sunday. First we had to get 10 waterpollo balls out of the storage room before we started the training. Then my Dad/Coach numbered us off, and we started swimming with the ball in our groups. I had a race with Leon Castle and we tried to figure out who was the fastest swimmer. After that we had to get into groups of two and and I chose Leon for my partner and we had to swim up and down the pool passing the ball to each other. After that we had to group up in three's and we started passing the ball around and shooting it in to the goal. Then for a reward we were all able to go on the Hydroslide. I really enjoyed training at Baywave but the best part was going on the Hydroslide.

The Senior School Mount Trip.

On the 10th of of February 2010 our class went to Mount Maunganui in Tauranga to see North Rock because its part of our school logo. The Maori name for it is Tirikawa. We started the walk at Pilot Bay and walked around the Mount and then went back to school for lunch.
By Max McIver.
In the picture above is North Rock. On top is the light beacon. It lights the way for the big ships that go to the wharf.

Gidday Room 7

You will see that I have been learning how to put gadgets on our Blog. So now we have some class pets. Please look after them! You can start by feeding them regularly. I think they are very cute. What do you think?