Tuesday, August 27, 2013

Bountiful Bread Inquiry

This week we have been learning more about bread.  Yesterday we learnt about the grain cycle - how we get the flour to make bread.  William created this clear cycle to share with you.

Today we compared different breads that the baker has prepared.  We used our knowledge from learning about the grain cycle and then looked, felt and tasted different breads.  


We compared wheatmeal, white and multigrain bread.  It was definitely a yummy afternoon.  The most popular bread was white bread.  The multigrain bread had lots of different seeds in it.  We learnt that multi- means many.

We shared our learning using a venn diagram.  Here is Hannah's venn diagram.

You might have to click on it to read it more clearly :)



Friday, August 23, 2013

Our Digestive System Projects


Room VH have been working hard on our science projects to show how our digestive system works inside our bodies.  Today we shared all our research and learning to each other and the syndicate in our projects.

Ruby learnt that it takes between 2 and 12 hours to digest food.

Zyah learnt that our small intestine is about 7 metres long.  She even cut a piece of rope to show us how long that was - almost as long as our classroom.

Chester learnt that the oesophagus never stops moving.  It keeps shifting our food down our digestive system.

Emma learnt that our teeth crunch up all the food we eat into little pieces so that it can go down our oesophagus.

Charlie learnt that it takes between 1-6 hours for our food to go through our stomach.

Grace learnt that when food goes into our stomach it turns the leftover food into chime.

William learnt that the digestive system helps get energy for our bodies.

Celestine learnt that the large intestine takes the last of the nutrients from our food.

It was fantastic to see all the kids share their projects and learning with each other.








Maths Week


Here is some of the fun we had in Maths Week.

Thursday, August 22, 2013

Gymnastics

This week we have started Gymnastics with Abe from Big Air and boy are we getting some big air!

Our focus this week is warming our bodies safely, jumping and landings.   Check out some of our adventurous gymnasts - brave and strong.



Friday, August 16, 2013

School Assembly

Last Friday we had three great hosts for our school assembly.  Hannah, Tom and Ruby spoke really well helping to showcase what Resolution Syndicate have been learning at school.  They wore our new school sports tops.  Well done guys!

Mrs Jennings handed out achievement certificates to great learners and workers.

Our hosts got to choose Trump Cards from out of the box.  

The whole of Resolution Syndicate performed a special haka they learnt during Maori Language Week.  It taught us lots of local place names in Te Reo.  It was amazing.


It was such a great assembly showing that Resolution and VH Class really does rock!

Fruit Kebabs Yummy Yummy

Fruit Salad Yummy Yummy on PhotoPeach

What great fun last week when we made fruit kebabs together.  They were definitely yum!  Such a great way to get healthy food into our diet and help our bodies digest our food.

We have learnt a lot from Harold at Life Education.



Thursday, August 1, 2013

A Busy First Week to Term 3

We have had a really busy start to Term 3.   On Monday after our Powhiri the kids had 'Getwise' with ASB.  

Vani came in and taught the kids all about money, ATM cards and gave some really useful ideas on what to do with pocket money.  It was heaps of fun!

We also participated in the 'Fly Me Up To Where You Are' with Pataka Museum.  We created Tibetan Flags based on the art of Tiffany Singh.  We thought about our hopes and dreams for our future and created icons to represent our ideas.  

The flags are going to be put together and displayed at an installation at Pataka during the 2014 International Arts Festival.


This week we have also begun the 2013 Chapter Book Challenge.  It is so great to see the kids motivated to read read read!

So as you can see we have had a few busy days already.  

Tuesday, July 9, 2013

Our Places Haka

Today we did the special places haka we learnt last week in Maori Language Week.   Enjoy!


Have a super holiday everyone!  I'll see you in two weeks.

Sunday, July 7, 2013

Maori Language Week

Kia ora, it was Maori Language Week this week.  All of VH class had lots of fun practicing and learning place names from throughout Aotearoa.

On Wednesday we did rotations around the syndicate.  In Mrs Moeke's class we learnt a place names haka.  It was really cool.
Have a go again - here are the words.

In Mrs Braddock's class we learnt about the legend of Wellington Harbour and the taniwha Ngake and Whaitaitai.

In Miss Dockerty's class we created really cool clay taonga.  We learnt about the different Maori symbols and what they mean.

Back in VH we learnt about place names and what they mean. 


We played on the Mimio trying to match the city with the place names.  

On Friday we had the Syndicate Te Reo Spelling Bee.  Twelve fantastic competitors squared off head-to-head in spelling place names.  They all worked really hard in learning these words.  Congratulations to them and our three winners (two from VH - yes!!!!)
Mrs H was very proud of you all!!!!



Tuesday, July 2, 2013

Let's Make Music

Room VH made some noise yesterday with some untuned percussion.  We are learning to create and follow a beat.

This was our first venture into making music.  We used the words 'tea' and 'coffee' to explore the concept of one beat and double beat.   See if you can clap the following patterns.

  

Later in the week we are going to learn about crotchets and quavers - to follow and create our own rhythms.










Thursday, June 27, 2013

Science Fair

What an amazing day.  We had mums, dads, sisters, brothers even a couple of grandparents come and see our amazing science fair.

It was so fantastic to have so many visitors to share our learning with.  Big big thanks to everyone who came in.


The kids practiced and practiced to share their learning and I must say I was so very proud of all their hard work and learning.



And for a bit of fun and celebration....  Meet the mad scientists themselves.


Mad Mad Scientists on PhotoPeach

Wednesday, June 26, 2013

Year 3 Cross Country Success

Year 3 Cross Country on PhotoPeach


Friday, June 21, 2013

When the Storm Came to Town

What a storm!  We only had 13 kids at school today after the massive storm that hit Wellington and Whitby last night.  The wind did astounding damage to our community but I'm glad to report that everyone is safe and sound.

Here is an amazing story Hannah wrote today about last night's memorable storm.


Hannah your writing has  a refreshing sense of voice, description and style -  Mrs H


Photos of Spinnaker Drive, 21 June 2013


Tuesday, June 18, 2013

Sunday, June 16, 2013

Our Beautiful School Korowai

On Friday we held a special assembly to see our beautiful new taonga that we all created together in celebration of Matariki 2013.  

Last Friday the whole school got together with their buddies to create beautiful feathers in preparation for our korowai.  Over the weekend the Whanau Group put together and created this special cloak.  

The Whanau Group presented it to the school and our Kapo Kapo group who are part of the upcoming Matariki Festival in Porirua.  We are very proud of our new taonga.  It is ataahua or beautiful!






More Great Readers!

Well done to everyone who has achieved their next sticker in their Read-It!  It is fantastic that you read everyday.

WOO HOO!  100 NIGHTS! 

Well done!  75 Nights

Great reading - 50 Nights!

TOP 10 REASONS TO READ (FOR KIDS AND ADULTS!)

1.       Kids who read often and widely get better at it. This is pretty much just common sense. After all, practice makes perfect in almost everything we humans do and reading is no different.

2.       Reading exercises our brains. Reading is a much more complex task for the human brain than, say, watching TV is. Reading strengthens brain connections and actually builds new connections.

3.       Reading improves concentration. Again, this is a bit of a no-brainer. Children have to sit still and quietly so they can focus on the story when they’re reading. If they read regularly as they grow up, they develop the ability to do this for longer and longer periods.

4.       Reading teaches children about the world around them. Through reading, they learn about people, places and events outside their own experience. They are exposed to ways of life, ideas and beliefs about the world that may be different from those which surround them. This learning is important for its own sake however it also builds a store of background knowledge that helps younger children learn to read confidently and well.


5.       Reading improves a child’s vocabulary, leads to more highly-developed language skills and improves the child's ability to write well. This is because children learn new words as they read but also because they unconsciously absorb information as they read about things like how to structure sentences and how to use words and language effectively.

6.       Reading develops a child’s imagination. This is because when we read our brains translate the descriptions we read of people, places and things into pictures. When we’re engaged in a story, we’re also imagining how the characters are feeling. We use our own experiences to imagine how we would feel in the same situation.

7.       Reading helps kids develop empathy because they learn about characters and how they feel and relate to situations.

8.       Because reading does all the things I’ve mentioned above, children who read do better at school. And they don’t just do better at subjects like reading and English. They do better at all subjects and they do better all the way through school.

9.          Reading is a great form of entertainment! You can read while waiting in a queue, while waiting for a friend who’s running late or in the car.

10.         Reading relaxes the body and calms the mind. This is an important point because these days we seem to have forgotten how to relax and especially how to be silent.  The constant movement, flashing lights and noise that bombard our senses when we’re watching TV, looking at a computer or playing an electronic game are actually quite stressful for our brains. When we read, we read in silence and the black print on a white page is much less stressful for our eyes and brains.



So there you have it – the Top 10 benefits of reading!

Friday, June 7, 2013

Korowai and Buddies

Today we had a very special assembly to learn about korowai or maori cloaks.  The whole school was involved in making special feathers for a school kororwai .    Mrs Tibble brought in her whanau korowai.  Some were lucky enough to try on this beautiful taonga.



This weekend Discovery School Whanau Group will be putting together all our feathers to create our beautiful school korowai.  We look forward to showing you next week.

Big congrats to Noah and Olivia W for receiving a Principal's Award at today's special school assembly.

Ginger Beer Bugs

Here we are with our finished products!




One group is missing as it was taken on the other camera.  Will post as soon as I find the adapter!

Also this week we finished our very cool ginger beer bugs.  We constructed these today.  Enjoy our movie!


Thursday, June 6, 2013

Making Our Ginger Beer

Here is our recipe for the ginger beer.  

After feeding our ginger beer bug for 7 days, yesterday we made our ginger beer.  We had fun dissolving, mixing and bottling our beer.

 Dissolving the sugar

The bugs awaiting 

 Squeezing the lemons

 Mixing it all together

Bottling the ginger beer

Now we wait a few days for everything to settle and bubble up some more before we have our tasting test.