In today’s newsletter we have the following:
● Senior Leadership
● Student Achievement
● Staff
● Upcoming Events
● ANI Community
Dear ANI Community,
The second half of Term 3 is always the busiest time in a school’s life, and this year was no exception. From a learning perspective, our classrooms are a hive of activity, with our Year 8s focused on Exhibition and our Year 7s focusing on their science projects.
Our sports teams have had a huge term competing in Central Zone, Auckland Champs, and the NCEA AIMS Games competition. Our arts groups have been competing in Bandquest/Rockquest and Kids Sing, while our kapa haka rōpū has been performing on the paepae for many visiting groups, as well as participating in the newly formed kapa haka festival celebrating Auckland through Ngāti Whātua Ōrākei.
One of the challenges around having such a busy school is ensuring our tauira (students) are managing their time and effort effectively. A few questions you can ask your child include:
- How much energy do you have at the moment?
- What are you spending the most time on?
- What is your main priority right now?
Asking these will help you support the very important kōrero required to ensure they are focusing on what both you and they agree is most important.
Yesterday, we held a special assembly to recognise the breadth of successes we have enjoyed so far this year. Some standout outcomes included:
- Tournament of Minds: Our team won the National Title and is now off to the International Final in Darwin!
- Kids Sing: Our choir achieved a Silver Medal.
- AIMS Games: Our Boys Futsal team secured a Silver Medal.
There were another 20+ tauira recognised for winning regional, national, or international placings across a variety of pursuits. We are immensely proud of all of them. During the assembly, I asked our tauira to reflect on what creates these successes—specifically to question the things you don’t see: the unseen effort, commitment, resilience, and time that drive those achievements.
Upcoming Events & Highlights
- Year 8 Exhibition: Next week is the annual celebration of learning for our Year 8 Exhibition. This is an essential part of the IB Primary Years Programme, bringing together all the learning behaviours and skills required for a successful learning environment. Anyone is welcome to head along on Wednesday night to view the projects. Like me, I am sure you will be blown away by the depth of knowledge and understanding on display.
- Moon Festival: This week, we celebrated an important date in the Chinese calendar, the Moon Festival (Mid-Autumn Festival). It was wonderful to bring together members of our Chinese community to celebrate and discuss what authentic cultural inclusion looks like at our school. We look forward to continuing this mahi (work) alongside all our cultural groups so everyone feels a strong sense of belonging.
- Community Survey: You would have seen a Hero post from me earlier in the week regarding our annual community survey. We truly value your feedback to ensure we keep improving the school experience for our tauira. Please take a few minutes to complete the survey here: Community Survey Link.
As we approach the end of the term, please continue engaging with your children around their day-to-day learning. A few great prompts to use at home:
- What do you enjoy about school, and why?
- What do you wish you learned more about at school?
- What are you finding difficult at school right now?
Thank you for your ongoing support across a vibrant and memorable term.
Ngā mihi nui,
Jason Pocock
Tumuaki
Kia ora e te whānau,
At our school, we believe that every single day of learning counts. Presence is the foundation of progress; when our tamariki are here, they build strong connections, boost their self-confidence, and unlock their potential.
Currently, our regular attendance rate stands at 68.93% (students missing fewer than five days per term). While we celebrate those who are attending consistently, we know that as a whānau, we can reach higher together.
We understand that winter bugs and health concerns can make morning decisions tricky. To support you, Health New Zealand has provided clear, practical guidance on knowing when your child is well enough to attend school, when to rest at home, and when to seek medical advice.
Guidance Resource: You can access the official advice on the Health NZ Website.
Thank you for partnering with us to prioritise regular attendance. By showing up each day, our learners are laying the groundwork for a bright future.
A calm, punctual start to the morning helps our learners feel connected, confident, and ready for a great day of mahi. Lately, we have seen an increase in students arriving late, and we need your support to rebuild these positive habits.
Key Times to Remember:
- Morning Start (8:45 AM | Wednesdays 9:00 AM): Arriving on time reflects Rangatiratanga (taking ownership) and ensures students don’t miss key announcements or morning connection time.
- After Lunch (1:25 PM Warning Bell): Lunch ends at 1:30 PM. The warning bell gives students 5 minutes to pack away gear and settle into class ready to learn.
Why Every Minute Counts:
Missing just 10 minutes a day adds up to more than a full week of lost learning over the school year. You can track your child’s punctuality in real-time through the Hero app.
Supporting Consistent Punctuality
To ensure every student stays on track, we follow a supportive follow-up process for unexcused lateness:
- 10 Days of Lateness: An automated notification email to keep you informed.
- 15 Days of Lateness: A direct email from the Deputy Principal requesting a hui (meeting) to plan support together, accompanied by catch-up reflection sessions.
Thank you for helping our tamariki arrive on time, ready to thrive!
Parenting in the digital age brings unique challenges, especially when balancing screen time and gaming. If you’ve ever found yourself worrying about gaming hours, online safety, or managing screen-time transitions, you are certainly not alone!
Video games can foster creativity and problem-solving, but finding a healthy balance is key. Our Pastoral and Counselling team recommends checking out Triple P’s latest guidance: “Level up: How to raise a healthy video gamer and avoid gaming addiction.”
This resource offers practical strategies to reduce friction around tech, set clear boundaries, and keep your child safe online. Additionally, Triple P’s comprehensive online courses are currently free for New Zealand families.
We encourage you to take a look at their tools to help bring calm and confidence to your home’s screen-time routines.
Dillon Rungan
Deputy Principal
Dear Parents and Whānau,
Last year, we held our 80th Jubilee Raffle, and it was a fantastic success. Thank you to everyone who supported it by selling tickets and buying tickets from our students.
Following that success, we have decided that the ANI Raffle will now become an annual school fundraiser, replacing the chocolate fundraiser we have run in previous years.
This year, our raffle has an important goal — raising funds to upgrade and improve our school playground. Our playground is in much-needed attention, and we want to create a space that is safe and enjoyable for our students and the wider community.
🎟️
ONE BOOK FOR EVERY STUDENT
In the first week of Term 4,your child will receive one book containing 12 raffle tickets to sell.
$5.00 for one ticket $12.00 for three tickets = $48.00 a book
We would love every family to get behind the raffle and encourage your child to sell as many tickets as possible. Tickets can be sold to family, friends, neighbours, workmates and members of our wider community.
🏆 THE MORE YOU SELL, THE MORE YOU CAN WIN!
We have some fantastic incentives for students who go above and beyond.
🚲 TOP PRIZE – A BRAND-NEW BIKE! Any student who sells more than 20 books will go into the draw to win the bike. With approximately one in every 20 qualifying students having the opportunity to win, this is a fantastic incentive to keep selling!
There are also cash prizes and other exciting rewards for students who reach different selling milestones. Plus a Movie afternoon for the year that sells the most books and Pizza lunch for the class that sells the most books.
So don’t stop at your first book — the more books your child sells, the more chances they have to earn rewards!
Every ticket sold will help us get closer to giving our students the playground they deserve.
We know that our ANI families always get behind our fundraising efforts, and we hope this year’s raffle will be another huge success.
Thank you for your support — together, we can make a real difference to our school and our students.
Scott Boniface
Deputy Principal
Nurturing Whanaungatanga in the Digital World
As we move through the term, our focus centres on a key message: how we act and connect in the digital world has a direct impact on our wellbeing and relationships.
At the heart of our community is Whanaungatanga—building genuine connection, celebrating our shared sense of belonging, and honouring every student’s unique identity. In an era where so much of our interaction extends into online spaces, representing ourselves with integrity both in person and online is essential. Whether students are collaborating on group projects or engaging in wellbeing discussions, fostering positive habits online ensures our school culture remains supportive, respectful, and empowering.
We encourage families to continue these conversations at home, discussing how everyday digital choices reflect our values and strengthen our connections.
Thank you for your ongoing partnership as we support our young people in navigating their physical and digital environments with purpose and care.
Ngā mihi,
The Dean’s Teams
Just a reminder that events such as sports, arts, chess and any other competitive activities will be reported on the ANI Facebook page linked here.
Please check out the wonderful achievements of our exceptional students.
- STEM Challenge: Bright and early at 8:00 AM at Dio, team “Smarties (not M&Ms)”—Vrisha, Declan, Ari, Sophie, Shanela, and Dhanya—delivered a brilliant solution to their long-term STEM challenge.
- Arts Challenge Champions: In the afternoon, the “Insert Name Here” team—Lucy, Noa, Nina, Dhriti, Saathvika, Grace, and Oreana—showcased their combined talents in the Arts category, placing 1st overall!
We can’t believe it, ANI team “Insert Name Here” won the Tournament of Minds Nationals in “The Arts” in Wellington last Saturday! We are so incredibly proud of the girls; it is well deserved.
The competition was tough, but our tamariki convinced the judges with their incredible teamwork, really showing the spirit of TOM. They were positive, excited and showed a great attitude throughout the whole tournament.
The pressure was on: 3h 10min to prepare a creative solution to an artsy problem. And not only that – they had a spontaneous challenge thrown at them in the middle of their preparation… And on top of that, they had to present in front of all the other teams, whānau, teachers and judges in a university lecture theatre!
We heard the great news on the way to the airport, as we unfortunately had to miss prize-giving due to our flight schedule.
Thank you, Nina, for representing your team and accepting the award for ANI.
We couldn’t be any prouder of all of you – Lucy, Grace, Saathvika, Noa, Oreana, Dhriti, Nina.
Next step: The Internationals in Darwin, Australia.
Selina Striebich and Stuart Nicol
Teachers In Charge of TOM
Kia ora e te whānau
I had the pleasure of taking 9 of our students to this year’s Science Fair at Michael Park School. It was a great opportunity to take a closer look at how science can improve efficiency and offer solutions for tomorrow. It was so encouraging to see our Year 7 and 8 students stepping up, showing real interest and concern for the environment and the world around us. Being surrounded by such enthusiastic minds ready to come up with creative solutions was truly inspiring.
A big thank you to Mr Rungan and Mr Pocock for transporting us, our parents for their support throughout the process, and most importantly, our tauira for their amazing effort and commitment.
Their hard work paid off as 3 out of our 4 entries received a judgement of “highly commended”, and Kayla Simmons received a special prize for her project on “Light and shadows on the moon.”
I am extremely proud of all 9 participants and excited to see them perform even better next year.
Ngā mihi nui from a proud science teacher,
Mrs. Rampersad
Our first round of MasterChef is now complete, with some amazing dishes presented to the judges. Dishes are judged on presentation, taste and how well the group organised themselves, which includes cleaning up after the presentation.
Congratulations to the following winning groups who will go through to the next round once the remaining classes have their turn next term.
Room 1: Ahnay, Aadeesh & Ankush – Butter Chicken
Room 2: Tishya, Sophie & Naureen – Halloumi Flatbread
Room 3: Sanvi, Justin & Naoki – Mango Cheesecake
Room 13: Ellie, Elena T, Dinulya – Pad Thai
Room 14: Sophie, Vanessa & Kayley – Chocolate Lava Cake
Room 15: Abeera, Ivana, Dede & Isra – Dubai Slice
Brooke Tuialii
Soft Tech Teacher
This afternoon, our wonderful Sustainability Club harvested some of our delicious beetroot and put it to good use by baking beetroot brownies! They were a big hit and a great way to enjoy produce straight from our school garden.
The garden is doing really well, and we are already getting ready to plant our kumara for next year’s Matariki celebrations and lots of other exciting spring vegetables. We can’t wait to see everything grow and enjoy another bumper harvest next year.
We also have some very exciting news to share! We successfully secured a grant for a Carbon Cycle Compost system. This will be an exciting addition to our sustainability programme and will help us make even better use of our food waste while enriching our garden.
There is more exciting news to come about this project… watch this space!
Nicola Redshaw and Bry Minton
Teachers in Charge of Sustainability
Mālō ‘aupito,
Thank you to everyone for making the day so special.
Selaima thank you for your time and patience in teaching our kids the dance, running our coconut challenge and sharing Tongan culture with ANI. You are a gem.
Thank you to Aleva for your support at practices and encouraging Jack to speak on stage. He did so well. Mr Helu for teaching us the Hymn. Our parents for getting us ready in the morning. All the families that came to support our performance, and to the staff who bravely said yes when I asked them to jump on stage for our coconut challenge. It was fun!
To our kids who either represented their Pacific Island heritage or who were interested in learning about Tongan culture and joined us to share that with your peers. You were amazing. Term 3 is busy, but you made time to learn the items, and you were great onstage. I am so proud of you all.
Brooke Tuiali’i
What an amazing Lunchtime Showcase today!
It was so lovely to see the talent and confidence of our students on display. Stephen was amazing on the drums. Irene played an excellent piano piece. Cordics did a fantastic cover of Should I Stay or Should I Go. Holly gave an amazing dance performance and the Pink Group absolutely wowed us with their optical illusion dance.
It was so great to see our students getting up in front of their peers and having the confidence to share their talents. There was such a positive atmosphere throughout the whole showcase and it was a real celebration of what our students can do.
The cherry on top was that the event also helped us collect food for such a worthy cause. A huge thank you to everyone who supported the students and helped make the showcase happen.
What an amazing show!
Below is a photo of the can collection for T’oa, Dayton and Adharsh’s exhibition project.
Ngā mihi,
Natasha McMillan
Parenting is both rewarding and challenging, especially as our tamariki move into adolescence and experience changes in their emotions, friendships, independence and sense of identity. If you’re looking for some practical ideas, information or support, these websites are a good place to start.
- Parenting Place – Practical parenting tips, tools and resources for children and teenagers, including support with behaviour, emotions, anxiety, technology and communication.
- KidsHealth NZ – Reliable information for parents and whānau about children and young people’s health, wellbeing and development.
- Skylight – Resources and support for families experiencing grief, change, anxiety, trauma or other challenging times.
- Triple P Parenting – Practical strategies and online programmes to help with parenting, behaviour, emotions and family relationships.
- Netsafe – Aotearoa’s online safety organisation, with a dedicated parents and caregivers hub covering screen time, social media, gaming and having tricky online safety conversations.
You can also reach out to the school or our counselling team if you have any questions or concerns about your young person. You don’t need to have all the answers or wait until something becomes a major concern. We are happy to listen and work alongside you and your whānau. If you have any questions or concerns, or would like to know more about our counselling service, contact Anna – counsellor@ani.school.nz
Anna | Counsellor
+20 4053 3249
River and Anna’s Working days: Monday, Wednesday, Friday.
I work elsewhere on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so I will reply on my next working day.
If you need support, you can contact:
- Youthline – 0800 376 633 | text 234 | talk@youthline.co.nz | online chat
- The Lowdown – thelowdown.co.nz | team@thelowdown.co.nz | text 5626
- SPARX – sparx.org.nz (free online tool from the University of Auckland for managing stress, low mood, and anxiety)
- Kidsline – 0800 543 754 (4pm–9pm weekdays)
- What’s Up – 0800 942 8787 (Mon–Fri 1pm–10pm, weekends 3pm–10pm) | online chat 7pm–10pm daily
- 1737 Need to Talk – free call or text 1737, 24/7, any time, any reason
- Netsafe – 0508 638 723 | netsafe.org.nz (for online bullying, harmful content, or anything that’s happened online)
Fidget to Focus
As a SENCo, I often get asked about fidgets and sensory tools. Used well, they can be incredibly helpful for some children, supporting regulation, concentration and engagement with learning.
But there is an important distinction I like to make with students and families: Fidgets are tools, not toys.
Our brains are constantly processing sensory information—from background noise and movement around us to the feel of our clothes, lights and other things happening in our environment. For some children, this sensory information can become overwhelming, distracting or difficult to filter out.
A well-chosen sensory tool can provide predictable, calming input that helps a child feel more settled and ready to learn.
So, what makes a good fidget?
The best fidget isn’t necessarily the most colourful, exciting or popular one. It is the one that provides the right sensory input for that particular child.
When choosing a fidget, consider whether it is:
- Quiet – so it doesn’t distract the child or those around them.
- Durable – it should be able to withstand regular use.
- Tactile – it provides a satisfying sensation through texture, movement, pressure or resistance.
- Grounding – some children respond particularly well to something with weight or resistance that feels substantial in their hands.
- Discreet – ideally, it can be used without becoming the focus of attention.
- Purposeful – most importantly, it should actually help the child regulate, concentrate or participate.
For some children, a heavier object can provide grounding through the hands. For others, repetitive movement, squeezing, stretching, or a particular texture may be what helps their nervous system settle.
There is no one-size-fits-all answer.
Check out 5senses.nz for a NZ company sourcing fidgets based on real-life experiences.
But what about Ooshies and Squishies?
Popular items like Squishies, Ooshies, and trading trinkets are fun for home and play, but they rarely function well as educational tools. Because these items are bright, collectable, and visually engaging, they often shift a child’s attention away from the teacher and into play or social sharing.
When evaluating a fidget with your child, it helps to ask: “Does this help your brain focus on your work, or is it taking your attention away from learning?”
How We Support Tool Use at School
A sensory tool should give the child something predictable to focus on. For some children, this might help interrupt an escalating feeling, provide calming repetitive input, or give their hands something purposeful to do while their brain focuses on listening, writing or participating.
In the classroom, we guide students on how to use sensory items responsibly. We teach a simple distinction: If it helps you learn, it is a tool. If it distracts you or others, it is a toy—and it is time to put it away.
If a fidget isn’t working, we can try something different. We want students to develop the ability to notice what helps their bodies and brains and make good choices. Some students may benefit from a fidget during independent work. Others might need one in a busy environment such as an assembly. Some may find that movement, a brain break, drawing, chewing or a quiet space works better than a fidget at all.
Building a sensory kete
Fidgets are just one strategy in a much bigger sensory kete. The goal isn’t for every child to have a pocket full of fidgets. The goal is to help children discover what works for them — and build the confidence to choose the right tool for the right moment.
Ngā mihi,
Whaea Candice
SENCO
Just a quick reminder that lost property is kept at reception for any students who may have misplaced items. Please encourage your child to check regularly, as the lost property is cleared out at the end of each term.
Thanks for your support!
Ngā mihi,
Kate and Gabi
You may already be aware that Biosecurity New Zealand has work underway in your area to get rid of yellow-legged hornets.
These invasive pests kill honeybees and also have a nasty sting.
As the weather warms up, our eradication response is entering a new phase, and we need your community’s help.
Since November last year, 77 queen hornets and 133 nests have been located and destroyed, and there have been no confirmed sightings since April.
If any managed to survive our operation, they’ll have been hibernating over winter and may begin emerging in the coming weeks to build new nests and establish new colonies.
Our staff are monitoring an extended trap network in the area and working with beekeepers. However, reports from the public are one of the most effective ways to help us find and remove hornets.
What to look for:
Please keep an eye out for yellow-legged hornets and their nests.
You can find photos, identification information and updates at: www.mpi.govt.nz/yellow-legged-hornet-2025
How to report a sighting:
If you see a hornet or hornet nest, please report it:
- Call the Exotic Pest and Disease Hotline on 0800 80 99 66
- Email info@mpi.govt.nz
- Report online at mpi.govt.nz (select ‘suspected yellow-legged hornet’ from the dropdown menu.
When making a report, please include the location, and, if safe to do so, take a photo.
Interested in helping?
If you’d like to set up a hornet trap in your garden and register it with us, instructions are here.
Important – do not approach or try to remove hornets or nests:
Public support is vital to this response, but please do not touch, disturb, or try to remove any suspected hornet or nest. Take a photo if possible and report it, along with the location, via the hotline or online.
Thank you for helping protect our communities and honeybees.
The yellow-legged hornet response team, Biosecurity New Zealand
Neil Rowarth | Vespa Velutina 2025 | Operations
Ministry for Primary Industries
021 280 2119