Island Bay Marine Visit

What an amazing day! Today we visited the Island Bay Marine Centre. The whole class had a real fun time exploring, collecting and creating sandcastles before actually heading to the Marine Centre where we learnt and touched snake starfish, sea cucumbers and kina. We even saw octopus' and their eggs. Enjoy some of the highlights of our day.

We Remember Christchurch!

Today we wore red and black to school to support and remember the people that died in the Christchurch Earthquake. We watched a little video which was really sad of all the buildings and people after the earthquake. Then we watched our 2011 Discovery School Red and Black Day video.

We hope all the people of Christchurch get better soon.

We are thinking of you and love you Christchurch.

Parent Info Evening

Thanks to everyone who was able to come tonight to our Adventure Syndicate Information Evening. It was great to catch up and share what we do in our Junior School. One parent suggested I post our class timetable so that they can talk at the end of each day with their child about what has happened at school. Great idea!

If you were unable to join us and you have some questions please don't hesitate to contact me. Also I am keen to put together a phone tree for you. Please let me know your current phone number and I will add you to it.

Thanks

Vicki Howarth (aka Mrs H)

Growing Seeds

This week two reading groups have been learning all about seeds. Today the whole class got to plant some snow peas all ready for winter.

The reading groups have learnt that seeds need soil, water and light to grow. We are going to see how long it takes for our seeds to start growing.

Swimming - What a Blast!

What a fantastic afternoon at Ally Todd. Today the children got observed to be put into appropriate swimming groups.

For the next few weeks our swimming days are....

Tuesday: 1.45pm

Wednesday: 11.15am

Thursday: 11.15am

What a Fantastic Week One!

Welcome to 2012! We have had a fantastic week in Room VH. Lots of fun, meeting new friends and birthdays too.

Room VH is a great class of 23 Year 2 students. This week the class has been learning all new routines and games. We have had fun learning to throw the shot put. Today we finished some fantastic posters all about ourselves so come into the classroom and have a read.

Today we meet our big buddies from Room SHA. They are Year 5 and 6 students. We had lots of fun together playing inside and outside together.

Welcome to 2012

Hello and Welcome to 2012 and the new Room VH students and their families.

This will be an exciting year with lots of fun learning. Over the coming weeks I look forward to getting to know you.

Keep up to date with all the latest goings on in Room VH by regularly visiting our class blog. Add us as a favourite to your toolbar.

So let this new year begin.

Catch up soon.

Mrs H

Merry Christmas Room VH 2011

I hope you have a magical and fun Christmas day!

Thinking of you.

Wow! Can't Believe it is our Last Week

2011 has flown by. We are down to only a couple of days left before heading off on a break and then into the big wide world of being a Year 3.

It has been a busy and fun year with lots and lots of learning.

Tomorrow everyone is heading off to meet their new teacher. This will be great.

A couple of things - all library books need to be returned asap. If you have any of the general readers please return these also.

Wednesday we have Grasshopper Tennis and on Thursday we are having our secret santa, so send in those little gifts to put under our Christmas tree.

We are having a final assembly at noon - to farewell our Year 8s. School will then finish at 12.30.

Blown away by the Kapa Haka Showcase

What a magnificent night! I hope you all enjoyed it as much as the kids and I did. The kids are very proud of their efforts.

"Extreme" Dancers

Hayley (Winter Blossum), Brooke(Autumn Leaf), Nicola (Sunflower), Meg(ET) and Jessica (Cowgirl) all performed last weekend on stage at the Southwards Car Museum in the Extreme Dance "Explode" Concert! They were all super confident on stage and fabulous!

You girls look absolutely fab! What a fun time you would have had after all your hard work! I wish I could've been there to watch you all. Mrs H

Jandal Day Big Success

The kids have had lots of fun today not only wearing their jandals and raising money for the Titahi Bay Life Saving Club but the best part was throwing sponges at the teachers.

Here is Zyah having a really good shot!

Porirua Library Holiday Programme

This exciting holiday programme has come to my attention. Bookings open tomorrow and will fill up quickly. There are some fantastic presenters and activities planned to keep your kids amazed by books and writers.

Character Day!

Wow! What a successful end to a fantastic Book Week!

We have had such an exciting day with all the costumes! Here are some snaps.

Huge, huge thanks to all the magnificent Mystery Book Readers! We loved every minute of all the stories you shared.

Thanks, Thanks, Thanks!

Fun Fun Fun

Another fun book day today. We had four mystery readers which were alot of fun. Taine read us his book Marmaduke Duck and Bernadette Bear. What a great rhyming story.

Today we also designed some pretty amazing witch's brooms after reading Julia Donaldson's 'Room on a Broom.'

Tomorrow is Character Day. Lots of fun and laughter is planned tomorrow. So get your costumes ready!

Storyline Online

Yesterday we enjoyed Sean Astin reading us 'A Bad Case of Stripes' on Storyline Online. This is a great website where kids can enjoy picture books read aloud.

There are lots of stories and books to enjoy like Stellaluna, Harry the Dirty Dog and so many more.

Check it out at http://www.storylineonline.net/

Mystery Readers Galore

We've had so much fun listening to all our amazing mystery book readers. Over the past two days we've had Mr Enoka, Mrs Molen, Mrs Nicholls-Cox from our school office, Mrs Webb, Mr Davey and Mrs Leadbeater. We've even had Mr Kell, our school caretaker.

This afternoon even Mackenzie read us one of her favourite books.

We can't wait for the next two days to find out who else is going to come in and read to us.

This afternoon we had fun in the library choosing books and looking around the Book Fair. There are so many fantastic books.

Ze Bong Storyteller

This morning we met a storyteller called Ze Bong. He told us lots of stories about his family. He had a big big quilt that he helped us choose stories. Ze Bong told us four stories. He chose people from adventure syndicate to be part of the story. John, Kerre and Zyah were part of one of the stories. Mrs H was even a silly, silly grandma in one of the stories. Ze Bong made us laugh so much he made some of us cry. It was hilarious. Some of the stories were real but some were made up.

s We all loved listening to Ze Bong.

Book Week Has Begun!

What a great start to Book Week. Room VH had a fun day reading, making and creating things based on fun picture books. Lots of people brought in their favourite books. Here are some photos.
Here we are with our Gruffalo masks. We enjoyed watching The Gruffalo and The Gruffalo's Child by Julia Donaldson. The rhyming makes these books fun to read and listen to.

We went to the ICT suite this morning to create some colourful Elmer elephants. Elmer is such a great character to teach us that it's ok to be special, unique and different.

This afternoon we had our first books quiz. Each day each table group will work together to solve puzzles based on books. It was pretty close scoring today.

Hunter read his book 'Dragon Stew.' He did a great job. Dragon Stew is about a group of Vikings that are a little bored so decide to hunt for a dragon to make Dragon Stew. They really do end up in a pickle.

Hopefully tomorrow another class mate will read their story.

We were lucky today, Room VH had 3 mystery readers. Thank you to Jill Reti, Esme Knoetze and Mr Jennings for reading to us today. We can't wait to find out who our next mystery readers will be tomorrow.

So despite the weather and not being able to visit Whitby Library we had a great first day of Book Week.

Art Workshop

On Wednesday we had an art workshop with Graham Braddock Art. Our teacher was Jane Lloyd. We drew a Kea. Drawing is really fun. We followed the steps and created some colourful kea. Come into our cloakroom to see our Cheeky Kea.

From this we extended our writing focus this week of writing similes. The kids wrote some really cool similes to describe the kea.

The kea's feathers are as soft as moss.

The kea's beak is sharp like a sword swinging in the air.

The kea is as clever as a scientist.

The kea's claws are as pointy as a witch's nose.

Also this week we wrote some great simile poems to describe koru. We've made these into a book for sharing.

Today was the last day Mrs McKee was with us. She has been a great teacher in our classroom and we will miss her but we know she will make a top teacher when she graduates.

Thanks for all the help this week, especially Helena, who was an amazing weaving teacher.

Next week we have Book Week. I have lots of fun book experiences planned for the kids and I know they are really looking forward to the book fun.

Please remind your little one to bring along their Porirua Library Card for our visit on Monday to Whitby Library and their favourite book for sharing.

Have a great weekend.

Mrs H