The days of the week

Room 8 have been very lucky to have Mrs Jones in class once a week.  As part of this she has been supporting us with the learning of Te Reo Maori.  Earlier in the term we investigated pepehas and how we introduce ourselves.  Kieren did a super job of this and with the support of his family at home created this masterpiece.




We have also been using the 'Learn-Create-Share' model in class.  We were learning about the names for the days of the week and where these names came from.  Our next step was to use our new skills to create a presentation showing the days of the week.  This was our first real collaborative creation for the year. Once we were buddied we combined our skills to create an engaging presentation.  Now we are using the class blog as a chance to share some of these presentations.





Following this, we are going to learn more about the months of the year to see if we can create a calendar using our new learning and our measurement and time skills too.

Build your Wild Self

So far this term we have been writing to 'describe a point in time'.  This uses all of our senses and we work hard to use our words to paint a picture in the mind of our audience and take them there.  This week we are focusing on creating a narrative.  To do this we go to use the awesome website "build your wild self".  Here we made ourselves, then upgraded or modified ourselves by adding all sorts of combinations of animal body parts.

We then used a y-chart to organise and plan our ideas to describe how our character looks, what they like to do and some of the personality trait's they possess.  This was really helpful for those of us who are working on organising our writing into paragraphs and adding appropriate detail.

Once we had our plans we started to describe our characters, here is a description from Ricky.

Dawson

Dawson was an evolved monster.  Top leaders of the scientific world in labs evolved him from polar bear,shark and cobra they thought he could be the ultimate killing machine but he was not he was kind and friendly. Dawson is not who you would describe social or interactive because he is very fierce so everyone is afraid of him Dawson has a cobra like tongue. His head he also has thin sharp hands that cut through steel like it’s butter his bat wings are very streamlined. His shark fins help him swim through water to catch prey and fluffy white polar bear ears.

Dawson can not go on land he flops around like a fish because there is no liquid for him to swim in he can fly up to hypersonic speeds and can fly through tough terrain thanks to his streamlined specially evolved bat wings he also can break fragile items easily thanks to his sharp thin hands when offended he will either get angry at you or just simply fly off using his wings.

When Dawson Gets mad he can be very aggressive and unpleasant he furiously stomps on the ground making every living creature afraid of him. He also sometimes does’nt share with other people when his favorite foods are involved like chocolate,fettuccine,candy or chips.

His Behavior can be changed instantly like one minute he was happy next minute he was angry so basically his mood can change drastically.

Dawson, a creation by Ricky 

Our next step is to describe settings for these characters, then we will work on the problem and solution that they could face.  Check back for more as we build our narratives.

Week 6 - Cybersmart

We have enjoyed having our weekly cybersmart lessons with James.  All of the content is available here on our class page.  To show how much we know about keeping our devices safe according to the Kawa of Care, we have been creating DLO's (Digital Learning Objects) that we could use to remind people about safe device care.  Here are some of our examples.

Super ideas from Max

Great use of contrast from Ricky 

We talked about sharing positive messages and turning "dont's" into suggestions because people, like use are much more likely to listen to suggested guidelines.  This type of thinking is something we have also used when we created our syndicate treaty.

Week 5 - Cornwallis

On Friday the 4th of March the entire Waikowhai Primary and students ventured out to Cornwallis Beach for the annual community event.  After it had been postponed for two weeks because of less than ideal weather, we were greeted with a stunning day.

We split off into our four house groups "Tui, Ruru, Pukeko and Kea" for a day of swimming, sand sculpture and bonding with other friends and family across the school.  

The following Monday we came together to write about our experiences, here are some of the ideas from Room 8 members.

Dorothy felt 'Excited and crazy because I knew that ,that day would be incredibly fun and chaotic. Relaxed in the nice water with some of my friends.'

Lily described Cornwallis Beach beautifully "Shinny blue water shimmering in the spot light. Black sparkly sand burning my feet .Red,Yellow,Green and Blue taking over the beach.Birds speaking we want your food!"

Ricky had a great time and described his favourite parts as "The best part of the trip was the sand sculpture competition and and swimming because we picked up shells and water fights and we also used a lot of teamwork in the sand sculpture competition."

Overall, The day was a massive success and we are looking forward to visiting again next year.