Term 3 Learning Pathways Success!!

Our big question was 'What can we do at morning tea and lunchtimes?'

Room 4 took our ideas and designs to the extreme and created concepts/models for some amazing breakout spaces for children to use at morning tea and lunchtimes!

Check out our ideas below!

 Ava's amazing water park!

 Jackson's fabulous obstacle course!

Abby's awesome bedroom!
 

 Finn G, Finn B and Liam's underground Lego extravaganza!

 Holly's wicked water park!

 Nieve's fancy water park!

 Caleb's cool movie theatre!

 Keira and Owen's awesome pool party arena!

 Lucas's luxurious room!

 Dan's daring football field!

 Layla and Rebecca's cute petting zoo!

Olivia's amazing fun room!

Congratulations to our Poetry Recital Finalists!!

Finn B and Ava did a wonderful job of reciting their poems in front of everyone at the Koru poetry recital last Thursday!

Finn recited a favourite poem of his mum's called 'From a Railway Carriage' by Robert Louis Stevenson; and Ava recited a poem called "Tigger has Breakfast" by AA Milne.

Our two winners receiving their certificates and book prize!

Our Fabulous Colour Writing

Today we did some writing using our senses to describe colours.  All the students wrote some wonderful descriptions - here are just a few snippets to share with you.  We will publish them in full to display in the classroom.

Gold feels like the slinky gold sand between my little toes - Keira

Blue reminds me of when I was little - Finn G

It sounds like beautiful clouds passing by and winds whistling and singing pink songs - Aadil

It feels like a silky, blue, snuggley blanket.  It looks like a calm day at the beach - Abby

My favourite colour is red because it gives me peace and it keeps me healthy - Rayaan

When I think of the colour green it reminds me of sour apples and gooey slime - Lucas

When I think about the colour pink it reminds me of butterflies flying around.  It feels like having freedom and doing what he wants  - Liam

It's the blue feeling I get of the swirling ocean - Rudi

Blue reminds me of a wonderful song - Nieve

MOTAT Trip

We had a super time at MOTAT - the staff at MOTAT and the bus drivers commented on what a wonderful group of children we have at Beachlands School - yay!!

Unfortunately I didn't get any pictures while we were there but luckily some our of wonderful parents did - thank you!

Here are a few snaps from our trip :-)

Learning Pathways - What Makes Night and Day?

Everyone worked so hard on their learning pathways in term 2 (it was a shame our picnic under the stars couldn't go ahead) so here are a few snapshots of our wonderful learning.  We practiced many new skills like making comparisons, working collaboratively, planning ideas and creating models and posters to show what we learned.

Holly and Abby made a poem about what makes night and day.  They drafted it first then they used Microsoft Word to type up their poem and they also searched for a relevant picture that they cut and pasted onto their poem.

Estella, Finn B, Caleb and Ava made a video and a model to explain what makes night and day.  They planned their ideas first and decided as a group who was going to do each job.  They rehearsed it and recorded it on the iPad.

 Nieve, Layla, Olivia and Owen decided to share their learning through a powerpoint presentation.  They planned their ideas and they learned how to open and save a powerpoint document.  They also learned how to add a photo to their presentation.  They shared their powerpoint with the class.

Jackson, Lucas, Keira and Rebecca made posters to show their learning about what makes night and day.  They drafted their posters first and talked about what information their posters needed to have to make sure they were informative and eye catching.

 Isla, Brooklyn, Dan, Finn G and Liam made a model (diorama) to show their learning about what makes night and day.  Dan bought a box and some Lego people from home and together they painted a camping scene to show a night sky and a daytime sky.  They thought carefully about how to show the sun and moon and also about the size of the moon and sun too.

 Javier and Rudi made a poem and added a picture to share their learning about what makes night and day.  They drafted their poems first then typed them up on the computer.  They learned how to open and save a Word document and they also learned how to type and to copy and paste a picture into their document.

As part of our home learning for the last 3 weeks many of the children took on the challenge of making a rocket - here are some of our amazing creations!!  A lot of effort and creativity here!!

SPCA Mufti Day Fun!

Animal Control has been out and about today keeping all the 'wild' animals in line!

But we've all had a lot of fun!

Getting Ready!

The children have all decided on how they would like to present their learning about what makes night and day and they are all busy working on their presentations.  It has been a wonderful learning opportunity for them as they have had a few problems they needed to solve along the way!

Matariki Celebration!

We were lucky to have some of our family join us on Friday to share in our learning about Matariki.  
We had a wonderful time!

As part of our learning we wanted to find out what people do to celebrate Matariki.  We looked at some presentations and read some books about Matariki.  We found out the Matariki is celebrated in many different ways.  One of those ways is making and flying kites so we decided to make our own!

Our Visit to the Stardome!

Despite the rainy weather and that we had to miss out on a walk up One Tree Hill, we still had a super time when we visited the Stardome!

 The feature show was amazing - the children were buzzing afterwards!

 We had a quick lunch when we arrived and were fortunate to have just enough time for a quick play before we went inside.

Even Buddy Bear got to come along too!

Week 2 Koru Assembly Certificate Recipients!

Congratulations to Liam and Estella!

Fairy Bread Fractions!

We are learning about fractions so for motivation to kick start our learning we made fairy bread fractions!

We had a lot of fun learning about halves, quarters and eighths.  We learnt that the pieces need to be shared equally too!

I have made 8 equal pieces.  One piece is one eighth.

 I have cut my fairy bread in half.

 I made quarters!

 I made quarters!

 I have 4 equal pieces.

 I have 4 equal pieces too!

 I have 4 equal pieces.

 We are working together to make fractions.

 I am cutting my half into quarters.

Welcome Back!

Term 2 2016 is here already and in Room 4 we are all set up and ready to get on with our learning this term!

Our Learning Pathways focus this term is Science and we are going to investigate our big question "What makes night and day?"

Already the children are buzzing with ideas and wonderings!

Creating a collaborative environment

One of our shared goals this term has been to create a collaborative classroom. This means that we have been learning how to work and learn alongside different people.  We have been using different collaborative learning structures such as an 'Expert Jigsaw' and 'Numbered Heads Together'.  As our blog is added to you will see photos and explanations of what these structures are all about.

Our goal has been to be able to work together in partnership with each person in our class.  We have had a lot of fun using activities such as 'Inside/Outside Circles', 'Value Lines' and picture cards to help us find our learning buddy.

Below are some examples of how we work together!