Global connections - why are we here?

Today with James (our cybersmart teacher), we continued our work with google maps.  Below you will see an embedded map that shows where each of the students (and teachers) in our senior syndicate were born.  This was our starting point for some discussion questions and some of the tools in Google Maps.




You will find the discussion questions here on our class cybersmart page.  We then discussed our thoughts and feelings about these on our individual blogs (see the sidebar for more).

Following this James really challenged our thinking with the following video.
The Lie from Untitled Productions on Vimeo.

We watched, we absorbed, then we posted our thoughts about this.  Be sure to check these on our individual blogs.  We would love it if you posted a positive, thoughtful and helpful comment below.  How does this make you feel?  Is your class or workplace similar to our classroom?

Google map - connections

Today James introduced us to Google Maps as part of our cybersmart learning. We collaborated to create a shared doc that showed all the different places that we were born. As a class we are originally from some amazing places and it is pretty special that we have all come together as Room 8. Below you will see the map of the different places we are from. While creating this map it was really important for us to apply our cybersmart learning so that we did not share too much information. Next time we meet we will further explore our connections in cybersmart. We would love it if you could take the time to comment on our learning. You may even have a connection with some of the wonderful learners from Room 8.

Week 8 - Chinese Language Week

Ni Hao,

As well as our usual learning we have acknowledged Chinese language week this week.  We have had a go at some different greetings and words that we could use each day.  There are six posters that have words we can used and you will see these displayed below with our Chinese Lanterns.

For reading, we followed a procedural text to create these Chinese Lantern with Miss McGrath.  You can find the instructions here if you would like to have a go at these too.

Week 7 - Tongan Language Week

Malo e lelei,

Week 7 was Tongan Language week and we celebrated this in a number of ways at school.  As part of our oral language work we got together in buddies and had a go at using some of the following phrases.

Ko hai ho Hingoa? What is your name?

Ko hoku hingoa ko...  My name is...

Fefe hake? How are you?

E meiaki au.. I am fine, thank you...

We also developed some tapa cloth designs to hang in our class using symbols, patterns and some aspects of Math and symmetry.

Finally, we had a small celebration on Friday afternoon before lunch where some boys from the senior syndicate joined in with dance and also shared a special song with us.  It was great to see the teachers dressed by some of our Tongan Mums on this day too.

Monday Maths Madness

Our week started with a mathematical bang!  We spent our morning block immersed in a range of different math problems.  We split into groups across the senior syndicate and got our brains into gear while we tried to solve a variety of different problems.  Best of all we had loads of equipment to use to investigate and work out these problems.  Here are a few of the action shots from the day.

Graphic scores and musical storytelling

This afternoon Room 8 were very lucky to have Miss McGrath in to help with music.  The focus of the lesson was on sequencing and retelling a common story.  In small groups students designed a graphic score to help represent the sounds that they created with music.  This is shown below in the photo.

With the help of a conductor they then retold the story.  You can watch it in the video below.  Be sure to leave us some positive, thoughtful and helpful feedback.

Ako Hiko - student led toolkits

The second annual Ako Hiko student led toolkits were held today at Hay Park School.  12 eager students from our Year 5/6 syndicate joined representatives from the other 7 Ako Hiko schools for a day of fun, learning and collaboration.

Students had the chance to sign up to three different sessions last week to experience some of the amazing skills, hits, tips and tricks other students were willing to share. From Tinker-Cad to Makey-makeys to coding to storybird to google drawings there was something for everyone! Our students thoroughly enjoyed their new learning as well as connecting with other students in the cluster.
Ricky and Lily from Room 8 presented "Code studio in the class Room" in the first round of toolkits, then Safa from Room 8 and Izzy from Room 9 shared "Creating shared books and yearbooks using google drawings". The third and final session was a chance for all 12 participants to enjoy some more learning.  We had an amazing day and had the chance to learn lots of new things and about ourselves as well.  Thank you to Hay Park School, Mrs Archer and everybody else involved in the organisation of this day!

Sharing our Sharing

Week Four was an exciting and extremely busy week for Room 8!

 On Monday we had our normal cybersmart session with James, then joined up with the senior syndicate for the different aspects of production rehearsal in the afternoon.  Tuesday saw a selection of us out representing Waikowhai at tackle and ripper rugby.  On Wednesday we rotated our way around the hall in Gymnastics.  Some Year 6's investigated the Waikowhai Intermediate Day while some Year 5s helped out with the Spark Volunteer day by pitching in to beautify our school.  Finally on Friday we had students participate in our local community panel.

On top of these activities we managed to compile and share our learning at our assembly on Friday.  You will see the wonderful things we have working on embedded in our Google slide. Check out what we have been doing and please leave us a comment if you want to find out about anything we have shared or any of the activities above.  We love your feedback!

What is a quality blog comment?

Room 8 were extremely excited to see James again for our regular cybersmart session.  Today we were working on creating a quality blog comment within the Learn-Create-Share cycle.  This skill is extremely valuable as we continue to grow our online presence and digital footprints.

Our first task was to 'create' by contributing to the padlet embedded below.  James challenged us to describe all the things that we might see in a quality blog comment.

Created with Padlet

We then focused on "Learn". By reading examples of quality blog comments and viewing two relevant videos we were even more knowledge about commenting.  If you would like to find out more these resources are available on our cybersmart page in the first "smart relationships" section. With new knowledge on board we revisited and reflected upon our padlet contribution to make any changes. We say proudly that we had lots of great ideas in our first attempt and only had to make minor adjustments.

Then it was time to "Share", our favourite part.  We were challenged to use the quality blog post rubric to describe and share our learning. While we are getting better at sharing, the next learning step for many of us is to give more detail on our individual blogs so our audience can gain plenty of information, enough for them to leave us a quality comment. 

If you would like to find out more about Room 8's individual thoughts please check out our individual blogs.  We love positive, thoughtful and helpful comments and feedback and we are working hard to respond to you too!

Tuhi Mai, Tuhi Atu introduction, Round Two

This term we have joined a new Tuhi Mai, Tuhi Atu blog group. We are looking forward to using these blogs in our reading and writing programmes.  It means we will have a greater audience to share our learning and creations.   We are really working on positive, thoughtful and helpful comments and will use other class blogs to do this.

 You will find the links to our three buddy class blogs on the right hand side of our page in a blog list.

Below is a thinglink that has a small poster introducing each of the fabulous learners in Room 8. If you want to find out more about these awesome people, or connect with them, please check out their blogs at the side of the page too.  We love comments and feedback!

Experimenting with Electricity

Waikowhai Primary Senior Syndicate welcomed in the new term with an afternoon of fun and learning.  We have continued to focus on electricity within the context of integrity and spent the first afternoon of the term collaborating with others from different classes using the "Brain Box" circuit kits. We collaborated, concentrated, did some learning and created some circuits from the book as well as our own special creations.  We have taken and filed photos to create a DLO to then share out our learning using our individual blogs.  Please check these out to see what we have found out so far.