Go For It!

We are so lucky to have a Go For It lesson once a week.  Every Monday morning we get to play a wide variety of new games which encourage new physical and co-operative skills for everyone in Room 1.  Ask your child what has been one of their favourite activities.  There is always lots of smiling and laughter during the Go For It lessons.

We are learning how to write explanations.  Room 1 has learnt that explanations need to start with a how or why question.

Here are two explanations we all wrote together

How do bees make honey?

People love to eat honey but bees do not make honey for people they make it for themselves.

First, bees have to go out and suck up the nectar from the flowers.  Next, the bees go back to the hive and vomit out nectar into the honeycomb.  Then the worker bees stir the nectar with their proboscis and lots of other bees fan the nectar with their wings.  The water evaporates from the nectar and leaves some sticky syrup called honey.

Bees have to work hard to make honey for feeding their babies and themselves during winter.

How do plants make seeds?

It is important that plants make seeds so we can eat lots of fruit and vegetables.

First, a plant needs to grow a flower.  Once it has a flower, this flower needs to be visited by a bee.  Next, the pollen gets stuck to the hair on the bee.  A bee flies away and takes pollen from one flower to another flower.  Then the pollen falls off the bee and travels down the pistil of the flower.  After that the pollen joins together with an egg and the plant grows a seed.  Finally, the flower dies and the wind blows the seeds away to a new place.  Later another seed grows into a plant.

This is the plants life cycle.

Room 1 teach your family all about why these are good explanations.

Spring Festival

Last Friday Room 1 with the other three yr 1/2 classes celebrated Spring.  We made some vegetable novelties at home and then created a floral sand saucer at school.  Everyone in Room 1 was excited to sing their songs for all the visitors.  The Kapahaka performance was fantastic and they all looked very good in their uniforms.  It was really fun to get back in the class and share all our Spring creations with our visitors.  Our day all ended with a picnic together.  Take a look at the Spring creations Room 1 made.

Skipping Crazy!

Room 1 is crazy about skipping.  When we first started only a few children could do one or two skips now we are becoming skipping experts.  We love to skip at fitness time, before school, playtime and lunchtime.

Ask your child to share some of their new skipping skills at home.  These are the questions we are asking ourselves about skipping.

Can I do a running skip?

Can I do a double bounce skip?

Can I do tens skips in a row?

Can I skip backwards?

Can I do some skipping tricks?

Can I skip on a long rope?

Friday Fun

It is our library day on Friday.  Here are all the Room 1's fun hat creations.  Thanks Mrs Atkinson for organising such a fun week.

Book Week Parade

Here we all are on Thursday all dressed up as our favourite book characters.  What an awesome effort you all made!!!

Aunty Bea

Book week has started, yahoo!!!  We are very excited about reading in room 1.  Today we got to listen to Aunty Bea.  She shared two of her books and we got to sing some songs with her. Check out John, Corbyn and Allan. Aunty Bea chose them to be Maori chiefs.

Visiting Ihenga's Marae

Today we visited Ihenga's Marae to do our activities. Yesterday we participated in the pohiri with the middle school. Today we got to walk straight onto the Marae and we got busy learning about the wharenui, harekeke and some new waiata.

Here we are sketching some of the ancestors in the wharenui

We learnt a new waiata (song) and the girls had a turn with the poi.

In our last activity we learnt about how harekeke is like a family. There is a baby, its parents and it's grandparents.  We went searching for these families in the harekeke.

Mickey has moved out......

This term there will be new posts on Room 1's blog to share with you all the exciting learning that is happening by all the talented Room 1 students.  Check in regularly to see the new posts.

Holidays

I hope you are having a restful holiday, having fun with your family.  I am learning how to post on the blog so expect some changes soon.

Farewell

Farewell Otonga School...I will miss you all.

Look after your amazing school and eachother.

Mrs. F.

Our New Teacher

Mrs. Fowler is leaving our school.

 Mrs. Elvidge will be our new teacher...she is just awesome! 

We will continue to have a great time in Room 1 and always do our very best!

Week 11

This is the last week of Term 1...where have the weeks gone!!

We will be focussing on sentence structure in writing, plays in Reading and place value in Maths.

We will also have a visit from Bruce Moody, a Maths specialist, this week and look forward to his advice.

A special Thank You to Mrs.McEntee who has been coming in to support our Maths Programme recently.

With holidays fast approaching please check for any school books at home and return them before the Term comes to a close.

Thank You so much for your continued support.

Maths homework...we love it!

Happy Monday everyone.

This week I would like you all to go to our Maths link, then choose the "Magic Maths Frog". When you are there choose Basic Facts and select your level to work on.  If you like, start at Stage 2 and work your way up.

Remember if we learn the Basic Facts all the other Maths we do will be so much easier! 

See how quick you can be.

 

 

Have Fun!

Party Food

We had a yummy lunch today. Thanks to all the Mum's and Dad's for making all the

food.

Autumn

Party!

Fractions and Sand Cakes!

Today we practiced what we have learnt about fractions by making...

A Sand Cake!

We had to measure carefully to make our cake.

1/2 cup of flour

1/4 cup of milk

1 whole teaspoon of baking powder

1/2 a tablespoon of sugar

Check out the photos below.

Our Assembly

We were stars on the stage today.

Mrs.Woon asked us to do an assembly about our school logo...it was hard work but our teachers were very proud of us!

Water Safety

Today we went to water safety at the Aquatic Centre. We had a great time in the nice warm water learning water safety skills.

A special Thank You to all the Mum's and Dad's who came to help!

Maths

Learning about fractions is so much fun! We will be able to read recipes now and put the correct amount of sugar in...1/2 cup means I need to put in one half of a cup.

Our New Teacher

We love sharing a big book. Mrs. Bolton is sharing a book called "Something Scary" with us. We are learning about making predictions and thinking about what might happen next. We also learned about the punctuation in the story. Look at how well we are listening!

Our New Teacher

We are really lucky to have Mrs. Bolton in our class for five weeks. Mrs. F. is still here too so... we have two teachers!

Next week Mrs. Bolton will be teaching us all day. We will be learning about Fractions in Maths, Descriptions in writing, and practising for our school assembly item. We also hope to complete our Inquiry projects about the Cook Islands, and go swimming next Wednesday and Thursday.

WOW! what a busy time at school. We will need to eat well and get lots of sleep so we can do our very best in all our learning.

Wow! The weeks are flying by. We are well settled in to our routine now and are well on our way on our learning journey.

Our topic this Term is The Pacific Islands and we are doing an enquiry about the Cook Islands. We are in groups to enquire about different aspects of life in the Cook Islands.  One group is finding out about the food and we all enjoyed a taste of coconut last week and learned how the islanders use every part of the coconut.

Mrs. F is very pleased with the way all children are working and how families are helping at home...what a great team we make!

Next week we are learning how to take photos so keep checking our page for some samples.

First Day in Room 1

Hi Everyone,

The first day of a new year is always exciting and sometimes a little worrying. Make sure you come in plenty of time and follow the Morning Routines on the board inside the door.
It will be hot so don't forget your hat...it's a good idea to keep one at school so you don't forget!
A big bottle of cool water will also be a good idea. It will be kept in the classroom for easy access.

See you on Monday!