Goofing around with bread!

Yesterday we made our plan for our tin can art - our can plan!  Some of Room 12 picked up on the fact that can and plan rhymed....so we started to make up some limericks!  We had a ball.  We goofed around with some limericks about some people in Room 12....we laughed and laughed making these up.  What do you think?

There once was a boy called Kaci

He was pretty racey!

He was always so fast

He never came last

Not like that kid called Stacey!

There once was a girl called Katie

Who was always pretty matey

She loved coming to school

because it is cool

She was never very latey!

There once was a boy called Joel

Who lived in a bowl

He is pretty tall

He likes to kick the ball

Right into the soccer goal!

Today Couplands surprised us with a gift!  Every single child was lucky enough to be given a loaf of lovely fresh bread to take home.  Thanks Couplands!

Beautifying Wairakei School

You will have noticed that the Wairere Team were busy last term creating beautiful spaces around the school.  This term it is Otakaro's turn!

Rooms 10 and 12 are currently planning a garden for the back entrance of the school (from Saffron Street) with Miss Gray.  It will look awesome!  Another project that Room 12 is working on is some durable artwork to place in one of our gardens.  We have been learning about aboriginal art and will be making some 'totem poles'.  Part of this project has been learning about what 'durable' means (see earlier blog post).  Over the last couple of weeks we have been observing what happens to certain materials when left outside.  We've established that paper, tissue, a leaf, fabric and a toilet roll is NOT durable.  We have a tin can and wood left...they seem to be durable.

We've chosen to use a tin can for our totem poles.  Hopefully they will look these ones!

This is the general idea.  Now just imagine them with aboriginal art on them.

Today we started to plan our art for our tin can.

Last week one of our writing groups published their colour poems.  They were even published in the school newsletter.  Here they are:

iPads

Today I taught Room 12 how to use a new mathematics app on the iPads.  This app requires them to think outside the square.  In the middle of the screen is a maths problem and it needs to be solved by finding the answer within the coloured circles.  However, the answer is never in the coloured circle...instead they need to hold down two or more circles to get the answer.  

Confused?

Example:  3 + 4 = ?

The coloured circles have the numbers 5, 10, 1 and 2 on them.  So the children need to figure out how to make the number 7 out of 5, 10, 1 and 2.  Can you figure it out?

Alexis and Harlow trying to solve 2 + 2 = ?

Sophia and Levi trying to solve 3 + 3 = ?

One of Room 12's writing groups have been writing poems about colour this week.  These poems will be ready for publishing on Thursday.  After writing today this group used Pic Collage to create a background for their published poem.  These are our newest writers in Room 12 and you'll be amazed at their colour poems - I'm so proud of them!

Clockwise from top left: Toby, Zephy, Levi's leg, Harlow and Alexis

Another writing group are halfway through their 'I wish' poems too - another group I am proud of!  They wrote so much today!

Monday

Joel, Oliver and Kaci have started their second limerick this morning.  Joel is writing his about spiderman, Oliver is writing his limerick about a pirate, and Kaci is writing his about a shark.  Can't wait to see their finished poem!

Look at that concentration!

Harlow and Levi putting the alphabet together.

Alexis and Toby working so well together to piece the ABC puzzle together.

 This afternoon at Discovery Time I had a couple of brand new activities to do.  One of them was 'imaginary face painting'.  This proved to be a HIT with everyone.  They loved pretending to face paint, and I think most of them loved the sensation of the brush on their face.

The purpose of the next activity is to develop our fine motor skills.  The children had to balance marbles on top of the duplo creations.

Limericks

This week Oliver, Kaci and Joel having been learning about limericks.

They have been learning that limericks usually:
1.  Start with 'There once was...".
2.  Have 5 lines.
3.  have a rhyming pattern of AABBA.  This means that lines 1, 2 and 5 rhyme, and lines 3 and 4 rhyme.

We have been using some rhyming books to help us find words to use in our limericks.

Here are their very first limericks.  What do you think?

Today all of Room 12 have taken home 2 notices.  One of them is an order form to purchase calendars, diaries, cards and notepads.  These are perfect for gifts.  Your child has created their own artwork to be published on each item.  The other notice is asking you to fill out as much information regarding your child's ability in the water.  We use this as a rough guideline to create swimming groups for our first lesson.  After this initial lesson the swimming tutors may move children into more appropriate ability groups.

Reading Chair

Today there was some spare time at the end of the day and I found Room 12 outside listening to Miss Gray reading them a story.  She was sitting the the reading chair!

What does 'durable' mean?

This term Room 12 will be creating some artwork for display around the school...outside!  So it needs to be durable.  We are learning about what durable means.  We already know that it means 'to last a long time'.  We also know that our artwork will need to last on sunny days, rainy days and windy days.



We have found 8 things we might use to make our artwork and we are testing them to see how 'durable' they are.  We've chosen: a toilet roll, plastic, tin can, paper, tissue, a leaf, fabric and some wood.  We've placed these outside for a few days to watch what happens to them over time.

Today we guessed which item would be the best to use.  Have a look at Room 12's predictions.

If you click on this image it will be clearer to see everybody's name.

At the end of the week we will have some 'limericks' to share!  

Oliver, Kaci and Joel have been learning all about limericks.

Beautiful Day!

My goodness!  It's been almost 6 weeks since the last post!  I'm so sorry!  Now that my morning sickness is gradually getting better (and I'm not wanting to go to bed at 7pm anymore) I will be much better at updating the classroom blog.

Today was a gorgeous day!

This afternoon we had Discovery Time - what fun!

Discovery Time (13.10.14) on PhotoPeach