Kahikatea tree

Yesterday we stood underneath the giant Kahikatea tree in the Pirongia bush.
The one we were standing under was 54m tall.
Today we discovered that 54m was a very long way. With our whole class lying in a straight line we were still way shorter than the Kahikatea tree.
We used metre rulers to measure out 54m on our school field. We left one to mark the start (roots of the tree) and one to mark the end (tip of the tree).
Check out this video to see how short we were of 54m.

We also compared and contrasted the Kahikatea tree with the Skytower.
These were the similarities and differences we came up with using a Venn diagram.
Can you think of any others?

Wrap Free Wednesday

Yay today we had seven wrap free lunchboxes much more than our four last week. Plus we had a few lunchboxes that were very close to being wrap free with only one or two wraps.
I wonder who will have a wrap free lunchbox next Wednesday?
Will we be able to get 10 wrap free lunchboxes next week?

Mother hen and her chicks

We were so lucky today to get four special visitors into our classroom. Gina has been looking after a hen and three baby chicks (that were put under her as eggs so that she could hatch them). Because Gina has been doing such a great job looking after them the rest of our class were able to learn a little bit about where our eggs come from (making the most of those teachable moments).
Some of us were scared at first that we might become hen picked, others were scared they might get scratched while others of us were in our element loving patting and holding these mischievous baby chicks.
Thanks again to Gina, Ursi and Max who brought them in to share with us!


                   

Day Two of Camp: Pirongia

What an adventurous day we had today. It was our second day of camp and we got to explore the native bush of Pirongia by walking the Mangakara Nature Walk. We found lots of interesting things to spot and look at a long the way. Plus we saw lots of places where things were working 'Interdependently.' For example the kereru (otherwise known as the NZ pigeon) likes to spread the seeds of the Miro and Tawa tree. So the kereru is helping spread these trees further into the bush while the tree is making yummy fruit for the bird to snack on. BUT the possums and rats love to eat the kereru and this can interrupt the interdependent cycle because without the bird the Miro and Tawa trees can't grow in other places.
We found a mighty Tawa tree that had fallen over in a storm nearly 13 years ago and we had to decide if it was dead or alive. We stumbled across a big boulder (rock) that we had to decide how it got there and we dipped our toes in the creek. Luckily our toes weren't nibbled on by water spiders or eels living in the creek.
Below are a few highlights from our day.

 1. What does that big black/brown thing look like to you? It looks like something is hiding in the bushes.

2. Who can find the face in the tree?

3. What do you see when you look at the truck of this tree?

Wow we love the comments!

It was so exciting coming to school on Monday to find that we had not one but TWO comments on our blog from other teachers around NZ. Here are a few videos to show our thoughts on the comments we have received.

Yay we got our first puzzle piece

Today we worked well as a whole class, everyone followed instructions, people helped each other, we were resilient when we didn't win challenges which meant everyone could have a great day.
In Room 9 we are working towards collecting puzzle pieces one at a time so that we can complete our puzzle and have a class reward.
Today we collected our first puzzle piece. There are only 12 pieces to the puzzle I wonder how quickly we can collect the other 11 pieces. Will it only take 11 school days?

Camp Week has begun.

Yay! Camp Week has started and what a fun week it is going to be!
We have started off our week with the help of Project Energize learning to work as a team helping each other to complete four different co-operative games.
The night train was difficult to complete moving through the train stations with all of the train blindfolded except for the driver at the back giving directions. We really had to listen and work hard to not sprint off ahead and lose our train. The Polka-dot game we had to remember our number and jump on our dot quickly so that our team could complete the challenge the fastest. The next challenge was very tricky trying to line the different shapes and colours up into four lines of four objects. The challenge was we weren't allowed the same shape or colour in the line (going up or down or across). The last activity was using ski's to transport our team across to the cone. But these were impossible to move if we didn't communicate with our team to lift our feet at the same time.
We certainly had to use our resilience when things became a little challenging and use encouraging words to help our team mates out.
This afternoon we also got into our tent groups and made our tent signs.
Tomorrow it is off to Pirongia for our bush walk to check out all the cool native trees and plants.

Interdependence

We have been introduced to this big word called 'INTERDEPENDENCE.'
We have had a discussion around trying to figure out what this word might mean.
We know that being dependent is when we need others to do things for us that we can't do. We know that being independent is when we can do something for ourselves and we don't need help from others.
So what does it mean to be inTERdependent?
Here's a video to help explain.

Survivor Challenge-Week 4

We are heading to Pirongia on our bush walk but first we need to know a little bit about the layers of a forest.
This weeks Survivor Challenge involved getting the names of the layers and a description of each layer. We had to match the layers to their description and then name the layers on our forest diagrams.
Every team got it right!
Check out what they came out like...

Survivor Challenge-Week 3

Gosh we have discovered that sometimes it is challenging to work together to get a job done!
Last week our challenge was to put the voice to another groups silent video filmed the week before.
This was easier said than done and we have only just finished them.
But for our first attempt it wasn't a bad job.
Have a listen see if you can play the sound and video at the same time. It took us all a few goes to match our voices to what was happening in the video.

Here are the Black Falcons putting the voice to the Golden Tui's video

listen to ‘Black Falcons’ on Audioboo

Here are the Lightening Crystal Countdown putting the voice to the Black Falcons video

Wonderbox

Today we began looking at our new topic for the term ahead.
We started looking at it with the introduction of a 'Wonderbox.'
Mrs Head pulled out some pictures one at a time and we had to write down what the picture was and make our prediction as to what our topic would be about.
Some of us guessed after just a few pictures and some of us activated our prior knowledge of Pirongia and knowing that we are heading there next week put the puzzle pieces together to predict we are looking at Native NZ.
Our bigger theme around Native NZ is looking at a big word called INTERDEPENDENCE.
This word was broken up into parts and muddled up when Mrs Head took it out of the 'Wonderbox.'
We got the word jumbled like DENCE   TER  IN   DEPEN
Some of us quickly made the word dependence and from that it we put the inter in front making INTERDEPENDENCE.
We will be looking more closely at what this word means and finding out some more about the bush before heading out to Pirongia on Tuesday.

Maori Phrase of the Week-Week 4

This week our Maori Phrase is teaching us how to introduce ourselves by asking each other our names.
Ko wai to ingoa?
Means
What is your name?

Ko________taku ingoa.

Means

My name is_______.

Check out Amelia and Ella sharing their new Te Reo skills.

Wrap Free Wednesday

At school we are trying to reduce our waste to look after the environment. On Wednesday's we have to try hard to think of foods to pack in our lunchboxes that don't have wrappers.
We can use snaplock bags if we reuse them so having our sandwiches or fruit in bags is a great way to bring them.
Last week we had seven people with wrap free lunchboxes this week we sadly only had four. So as a class we have set the goal to have eight wrap free lunchboxes for next week.
Well done to Kaylee, Oliver, Kayley and Gina who were wrap free this week.

Happy Valentines Day

Today is Valentines and we were lucky to have a special Valentine treat from Faye. Last night Faye made some heart shaped rasberry treats that taste just like the eskimo people in the Party Mix packet of lollies.
Thanks Faye for sharing some love in Room 9.

Maori Phrase of the Week

Our Maori Phrase of the Week for the first two weeks back was Tena Koe, Tena Korua, Tena Koutou meaning Hello to one, Hello to two, Hello to everyone (when there is a group of people).
Thanks to Tawhiao who has helped us practice this new phrase.

Personality Types

On Friday we learnt about our personalities and how we are all unique and special there is only one of us!
But we discovered that with a whole class of different personalities, getting along together can sometimes be difficult.
First we looked at some different cards there was a red heart for the carer, a green square for the safekeeper (the organiser), a blue triangle for the analysers and a yellow circle for the players (the ones that like surprises and take risks).
THE CARDS WE USED ARE CLICK COLOUR CARDS DEVELOPED BY DAVID KOUTSOUKIS
It was interesting to discover that we have a lot of caring people in our class and a lot that like to make impulsive decisions.
As a class we talked about how different personalities can sometimes annoy others. If a blue analyser was working with  red carer giving feedback on each others work a carer might not want to hurt the analysers feelings and not give very helpful feedback because they want to be nice to the people in their class. But the analyser could become frustrated that they are not giving them honest and helpful feedback to improve their work. Likewise the analyser wouldn't think about the feelings of the carer as much and give them their honest opinion about the carer's work and this could hurt the feelings of the carer if it is not all warm fuzzies.
We also looked at how the safekeepers (the organisers) and the players can often frustrate each other. Safekeepers like there to be an order and to have thought out how things are going to work and often have lists to get jobs done but we could all see how someone who changes decisions at the last minute could annoy the safekeepers.
As a class we had a dicusssion around what the purpose of finding out more about our personalities was and below you can check out what we had to say.

 

                                            

Survivor Challenge-Week 2

Week two of the survivor challenge...
We have been reading the story 'Have you filled a bucket today?' and discussing the message of paying each other compliments and making everyone feel valued and special within the class.
So this weeks challenge was to create a silent movie with the theme of kindness.
Once again we had to work as a team to get the most points.
For this challenge we had to think about a storyline for our movie and we had to think really hard about how we were going to show our expressions and create a story without any dialogue (talking).
Next week the challenge will be to pass one groups film onto another group to add the dialogue to the movie - we will then see how well the first group did at acting to see if their stories match up.
Check out the videos that have been created so far (our silent films).
Well done to the Crystal Lightening Bolt team who worked really hard as a team getting straight into brainstorming their movie idea and being the first to finish filming.

This is the Lightening Crystal Countdown video

This is the Black Hawkes video

This is the Golden Tui's video

This is the Black Falcons video

Swimming

We are enjoying spending time in our school pool having a dip to cool off in the heat! So far we have been put into groups and have begun learning new swimming skills.
Some groups are becoming more confident in putting their heads under and float on our tummies and backs. Some are learning our circle arms painting the sky blue. Some are learning to turn our heads to the side to breath and some are remembering to blow bubbles breathing out so that they can swim a length of the pool.
Check out our photos and individual blogs which will have our own swimming goals shortly.

Survivor Challenge

On Friday we started our Survivor Challenge.
Each week for the rest of this term we are going to complete a challenge that teaches us how to work as a team and get along with our classmates.
Mrs Head put us into four teams and we will work in those four teams for the rest of the term. We are all trying our best to work together and be the winning team at the end of the term.
With each challenge we earn points. Every team that participates gets 5 points, the winning team gets 10 points and the team that works best as a team gets 20 points.
This week being the first week back at school we had to come up with a team name that we agreed on and a team chant/jingle. We then performed our chant/jingle to the rest of the class.
Check them out below.

Well done to The Golden Tui's who won this weeks challenge with 25 points (five for participating and 20 for the best teamwork). They all voted on the team name until they came to one they all agreed on. Creating their jingle everyone was involved including Trinity who was on crutches.
Congratulations Golden Tui's.
To the other teams I wonder what you could do differently next time to win the teamwork points? What did the Golden Tui's do well that you could use with your team?

Welcome Back for 2013

Check out all of the smiling faces that make up Room 9 for 2013. We are looking forward to learning lots and reaching the goals that we set ourselves.