Cross Country Fun Run

Today the children participated in the school Cross Country Fun Run. It was fantastic to see them enjoying the experience. Many of the children told me that they felt proud of themselves after completing the race as it was their first year doing two laps. We have been jogging most days for fitness and learning about the importance of exercise. I also thought it was great to get outside in the sunshine, use our courageous school value and support our Hapu groups. Ka pai Room 8!

The Rubbish Problem

As part of our provocation, today we went for a walk around our school environment. We noticed there was a lot rubbish lying around even though we have rubbish bins in the school. This made us feel disappointed because it isn’t good for our school environment.

Miss  Banks asked us, “how can this problem be solved?”

Here are some of our ideas...

Carlos – We could do what they did in “Lost” (our big book) and make posters.

Willow – If we see rubbish, pick it up.

Eli – If you throw rubbish anywhere, you should pick it up.

Rylie – Stop, think and put it in the rubbish.

Ashton – If you see people throw it on the ground, you go pick it up.

Seth – If you see any rubbish around pick it up.

Mackenzie – If you see anyone chuck rubbish on the ground you could run to them as fast as your can and tell them to pick it up and put it in the bin.

Lukas RW – Don’t bring rubbish or food out to the playground, otherwise that’s how it will be lying around.

Korbin – Don’t bring any  food outside then worms come.

Mana – Make our school have rubbish bins in each corner so if you’re playing in the corner you wouldn’t be bothered to go all the way from the corner.

Carlos – We could make some fake dollars and whoever picks up a piece of rubbish gets a fake dollar.

Lilly – Make a sign, do not leave your rubbish around.

Lucas N – Make Ariki the rubbish police so if someone tells them they put rubbish on the ground they might get a reflection.

Marc – Could make this big as hoover thing and hoover thing and hoover all the rubbish up.

Ashton – If they don’t put their rubbish in the bin this class before they go, they can stay in.

Kaylee – This thing kinda relates to Carlos’ one. If you pick up rubbish you could get money. Then Friday you could go to the shop and spend your money.

Marc – We could get like this gun and you could hoover stuff up and if they see rubbish you could just pick it up with that.

Korbin – We could have some people that go outside and they have like this hoover and a shovel and then if they see someone drop rubbish they could hoover it up and put it in the rubbish.

Mana – Make some signs saying please be a tidy kiwi by not throwing your rubbish on the ground and by putting it in the bins.

Lucas RW – Put rubbish bins where they usually throw the rubbish.

Rylie – I think I know what caused this…I thin that everyone filled up the bins and rubbish comes flying out of the bins.

Lucas N – We could make like little robots that when they see rubbish they like turn into one of those robot vacuum cleaners and they pick it up then they go to the office and they press a little button which makes a little hole appear and they just drop it down there.

Carlos – You need some wood for this one. Make a rubbish maze and if you find a rubbish bin in the hall, that’s when you have won and you put it in the bin.

Ryder – Inspire other people not to throw rubbish on the ground and inspire them to care for everyone environment.

Tasks

Every week the children in Room 8 get given different independent tasks to complete. Here's what they did this week...

We followed the instructions from last weeks big book and made a Pom-pom.

We created our own COURAGEOUS characters. These are going to help us with our writing next week.

We replaced the boring verbs in these sentences with exciting verbs.

We used the Explain Everything app on the ipad to show what a verb is and how to use it in writing to make the writing more detailed. 

We tried out visuwords.com. We put in new words we had discovered in our reading books. It made a web of other words like that word.

Space Station Tour

We watched this clip today in class and many of the children requested that it be added to our blog to share with family.

Moon Art

As you know Room 8's Reggio inspired provocation has been focusing on observing the Sun, Moon and the Stars. This week the children used visual art to show what they know about the colour, texture and shape of the Moon.

They used pastel, paint, glue, glitter and tin foil. Here they are in action...

And here are some of the finished pieces of art. They look fantastic on our wall. Be sure to come in and check them out!

Malcolm the Astronomer

Today Room 8 had a very special visitor. Malcolm Locke from the astronomy society came to talk to us about the Moon, the Sun and the stars. We contacted Malcolm through the astronomy society so that we could learn more for our class provocation. We sent him an email and we were very excited when we received a reply from him.

Firstly some of us shared what we had learned so far. A few of us read our descriptions about the Sun and the Moon. Malcolm was impressed.

Malcolm told us some amazing things. He told us that the Moon is made of volcanic rock and that the planet Jupiter has 63 Moons! How amazing would that look at night time?

Then we did an activity that showed us how big the Moon is in comparison to the Earth. For this Malcolm had a soccer ball that represented the Earth and a tennis ball that represented the Moon. This showed us that the Moon is a lot smaller than the Earth.

Today is also Matariki! What a shame it is cloudy because we wont be able to see the stars out tonight. The stars of Matariki will be shining brightly right up until April so we will be able to search for them another night. Maybe you could help your child find them in the night sky.

How to find Matariki

Matariki is found low on the horizon in the north east of the sky. Try looking here between 5.30 a.m. and 6.30 a.m.

The pot

1. First find the pot (the bottom three stars of the pot are also called Tautoru, or Orion’s Belt). To find Puanga (Rigel) look above the pot until you see the bright star. To find Matariki, keep going.

2. To the left of the pot, find the bright orange star, Taumata-kuku (Alderbaran).

3. Follow an imaginary line from Tautoru (the bottom three stars of the pot), across to Taumata-kuku and keep going until you hit a cluster of stars.

4. That cluster is Matariki. If you have good eyes you should be able to pick out individual stars. If it looks fuzzy, look just above or just below and the stars will be clearer.

Matariki in the night sky

Matariki

Thursday, June 18th is Matariki. A time that shows the beginning of Maori New Year and 7 beautiful, bright stars appear in the sky. Matariki is celebrated in many ways. Below are some freeze frame mimes of Room 8 showing their understanding of the different types of celebrations. The children really enjoyed incorporating drama into their learning this week.

This group is showing that Matariki is a time for sharing family stories and learning about how people used the stars in the past.

This group is showing that Matariki is a time for making things. It is a time to learn how to weave and carve.

This group is showing that Matariki is a time for making and flying kites.

This group is showing that Matariki is a time for planting trees and winter crops.

This group is showing that Matariki is a time to fish and gather kaimoana.

Well done Room 8! You have fantastic drama skills.