The Great Brighton Skip

This month we have been Jumping into June as we build to our big jump day. We went into the community and took advantage of some of the cool places New Brighton has. Team Tahi got to jump at the playground which gave us lots of different things we could jump on. Our jumping has improved and we are feeling fitter. The next big adventure is on Thursday afternoon where the school will spend the afternoon jumping for our Jump Rope day.

 

Learning about life in the time of Jesus

This term we are learning about who Jesus was.

We have learned about the clothing that people wore in the time Jesus was in Israel. 

We also learned about the geography of Israel compared to New Zealand.

This week we learned about Herod's Temple in Jerusalem.

We talked about how the temple was similar and different to our church St Mary's.

Some people then created their own temple in Minecraft and others made a cardboard and paper version. We are still working on these, but here are some progress photos:

Year 5s Chat with Google!

Last Friday while the Year 6s were at Dancing Like the Stars the Year 5s had a virtual visit with staff from Google.

Steve, Lauren and Paola introduced themselves to us and talked about how they came to work for Google. What they studied at school and university and what their jobs involve now. We watched a video of what the offices are like at Google in Australia and what a day might look like for staff who work there. 

It was really interesting to hear about how you could include your interests like art and music with technology to create new things that people all over the world can use. 

The week before our visit we learned about Artificial Intelligence (AI) and how we can "teach" our devices to "look" at pictures and then "know" what they are. We taught our chromebooks to tell the difference between a flower and a hamburger!

The last part of the Google Meet was our turn to ask questions. We were very interested in whether children can work at Google, who owns Google, if you can create things like food with technology, 

The best advice that we got was to give everything a go and to explore things as much as we can. Be curious and try new things. 

There might be a few more of us now that have been inspired by the possibilities of working with technology to create new and exciting jobs and opportunities in our futures!

Edited to add: We had a parcel arrive from Google! They sent us stickers, magazines and cool green sunglasses. How lucky were we??!!

Music through the Years

 The 60's 

This term we have been learning about music and how it has changed through the years. Here is Tristan's work on cds.

Here Tristan is working on 

the positives negatives and some facts about cds. cds were really popular in the early 2000s.

He has some at home and sometimes listens to them on a CD player. He is a fan of rock, and his brother makes him listen to Linkin Park.

What way do you listen to music?

Term 2 Happenings

Kia ora Whānau, 

Check out our class newsletter for Term 2!

This is where we can see what is coming up in the new term.  

Click this link to read all about it. 

Ground control to Mr Gray

 This week we started to look at space with some rocket research...

The experiment by Mr Gray was a bit of a fail which allowed us to think of ways we could improve!

We were given a template and could use it or not to create a rocket that would fly using straw power.

The three groups that pushed the limits were:

Monty, Jacob and Liam took third place. They were pipped at the post by Aleigha and Laylah who took out second place.

The team of Jamie and Jack had the furtherest flyer.

Reid went home and showed how it should be done!

"New Bay" and "The Waters Edge"

This term our inquiry topic is 'Our Communities'. We have been learning about what makes up a community and how they run.

The class split into two groups and each group worked together to create their own ‘dream’ community. It included at least one thing they love and everything a community needs to run efficiently.

Below you will see the maps of these communities they created. These were called ‘New Bay’ and ‘The Waters Edge.’ Each student created a character with a job, to live in their community. Through drama, we acted out different scenarios and stayed in role for multiple lessons. The students thoroughly enjoyed this!

We also learnt about freeze frames – enjoy seeing these through pretend newspaper articles below.

To finish this unit of work the students are using Minecraft as another platform to consolidate their learning of the important features a community requires to run efficiently. It is great to see the enthusiasm within this unit, with each student contributing their ideas and working well within their groups. 

Saving the Dunes

On Friday 18th March Room 1 walked down to New Brighton Beach to meet up with Chris from the Christchurch City Council so he could teach us about the importance of the sand dunes in our environment and for our community.

We learned about how dunes are formed and that they provide a habitat for many plants and insects. Chris told us about how some people don't like the dunes because they spoil their view of the ocean, however they also give those houses protection from the sand and potential floods that come from the beach.

We built our own dunes on the beach and did experiments on them that showed what happens when the sand blows on to them and when humans walk and run over them. We added paths and fences to our dunes to show how we are protecting them. 

It was a great lesson and we learned lots about a special part of our community that we usually don't think about.

Kia Ora from Miss Johns!

Kia Ora,

 

My name is Sophie, I am currently in my fifth term of the postgraduate diploma in Primary Teaching at the New Zealand Graduate School of Education. My degree is in Physical Education, Health and Wellness. I enjoy playing and coaching different sports, the beach, biking, and anything outdoors.

 

I have really enjoyed getting to know your children and working with them so far this term. I am keen to post some of the work we are completing for you to see and enjoy. Please leave comments or questions if you wish!  

 

While our year 6’s were at camp our Year 5s completed a Polynesian inspired Tapa Cloth. We learned about some of the history and background to Tapa and we learned about using positive and negative space in our designs.

 

We are reading the Novel Wonder as a class at the moment. Last week we completed a visual response. Students wrote sentences about themselves/words that described them. The idea was (as the book suggests) to not judge people by their looks but by what makes them unique.

 

Nga mihi,

Sophie Johns 

 

Spread Assembly

This week we had our first assembly with a twist

We all stayed in our own classes and used Google Meet to check in and celebrate.

It was still the same with prayers, Duffy books, birthdays and the wheel. 

The intermediates even had some notices about things they are leading in the school.

Our Duffy book went to Brody because of his awesome writing!

What is the strangest online meet you have had?

 

Year 6 Camp

Last Wednesday the Year 6s with Mrs Hamilton, Miss Reedy and the amazing group of parent helpers, Hazel, Debs, Andrew, Scott, Rad and Mark headed over to Living Springs. We did a big walk from Governors Bay around the coast with our leader Joseph and then headed up the big hill to Don's Hut. It was exhausting!

At Don's Hut we did some indoor climbing, there were some awesome Spider Boys and Girls. Everyone gave it a go and it was lots of fun. Later on we jumped back in the cars and finally made our way to our campsite. We put up our own tents and moved our stuff in for our stay. We had a great time exploring our campsite and some of us tested out the fence (ask us about it). Dinner was a yummy curry, we each had turns in our groups being the washing up team and then we kept playing outside and competed in Speed Charades with Miss Reedy before it was time for bed. It had been such a big day and lots of us were ready for sleep, others took a little convincing!

Day Two saw us up and ready early. The first thing we did was go for a swim! We loved doing manus into the pool. Rad had us practicing swimming under water (Londyn swam the whole length) and the whole group made a whirlpool. After our swim we learned how to do archery. It was quite tricky at first but after a while, we got really good. We had target practice, first into a bucket and then against each other! At the end the adults had a turn against each other. After lunch (Nachos!) we had Orienteering where we had to run all over camp collecting stamps. Scott and his team won in a Living Springs record time. NBC were awesome because all the teams got back before Joseph had to do the siren. After Orienteering we played Animal Survivial which was a really cool chasing game. As you can see we were go, go, go all day. Did we have enough energy for the monorail after dinner (Burgers and Chips)? WE SURE DID!!

Our last day at camp came around so quickly. In the morning we had to pack up and clean up camp, putting all our gear into cars. We went back to Don's shed for morning tea then headed down into the forest for "Initiatives". These were great team building tasks where we had to help each other, use our brains and communication to achieve our goals. It was challenging and fun. After we finished there we got in our cars and went down to the Farmyard where we got to feed the animals, ride in the trailer behind the tractor and meet Evie the cow. We fed some of the calves milk, they were really bossy! We had lunch and then reflected together about our favourite things on camp. Then it was time to pile into our vehicles and head back home. What an amazing time!