Disco This Friday

It's disco time. Gotcha groovy dance moves sorted?
See you this Friday in the hall.

Tough Kids

Today was the Tough Kid Challenge held at Mt Biggs School.
Some of us took part in this fun day. There were obstacles to climb over and under, push ups to do, running up and down hills, and of course sliding down the slippery slide!

Here are some photos of our day...

Wheels Day

Today was our last wheels day for the year!

We had lots of fun zooming around the school on our wheels.

We had to keep our eye out for the sneaky principal, who sprayed us with the water gun!

Room 5 Camp

Here are some photos from our camp last week ...

We had lots of fun learning about erosion and flooding at Te Manawa. We had lots of fun at the Lido, zooming down the hydroslides. Then after a night spent at school we were off tramping the Tawa Loop Track at the Manawatu Gorge.
To top the end of camp off, we had lots of fun playing on the playground at Ashhurst Domain.

Thanks so much to all the wonderful parents for your help with camp.

Wheels Day coming up

Buddy Class

Today Room 5 and Room 2 got together to have BUDDY CLASS FUN!
We introduced Room 2 kids to Swiss Ball Tag! Instead of having tagger who tag you, they roll at swiss ball to get you out.

Then we shared some of our published stories with our little buddies, and they read one of their readers.

Here are some photos ...

Gender Roles

Today as part of our Sexuality Education topic, we were learning about the meaning of Gender Roles.
We read a book about a determined princess and another book about a strong, skilled female superhero.

We talked got together into groups and discussed what activities boy and girls could do. It was really interesting because we had a lot of disagreements in our group and interesting discussions came from this.
Can boys do ballet?
Can girls play rugby in New Zealand and get paid?
Is weaving just for girls?
Do men stay at home and look after the baby?

We came to the agreement that just because someone is a boy or a girl, it doesn't really matter what activity they are involved in. It doesn't matter that most girls do ballet - boys can do it too, and be really good at it!

Cross Country

Today was a beautiful day - perfect for school cross country.
This year some of us were disappointed that there wasn't any water in the creek, but at least our shoes didn't get stuck in the bog.

I am so proud of our Room 5 children. You put lots of effort into your run today. I was certainly challenging getting up the steep hills!

Here are some photos ...

Manaakitanga

Today Room 5 started our Health topic of Sexuality Education. We've been learning what Manaakitanga means. (If you don't know - check out the picture below).
We got into groups and put scenario cards on a continuum of what we thought showed NO manaakitanga, through to what showed a lot of manakitanga.

It was interesting that most of the groups had similar ideas - even though there was no 'right or wrong' answers.

Cross Country Training

Cross Country is next Friday and Room 5 students have been out on the road training. We've set training goals and are working towards achieving these over the next week and a bit!

Cinderella Show

So, this isn't technically a Room 3 post, but I wanted to show some of the photos from the Cinderella show last week. My wonderful drama group put on a spectacular performance and I wanted to show them off.  Here are some pics ...

Dance

Room 3 and 4 have been getting together to learn groovy dance moves and practice moving in time to music. We've been learning The Electric Slide (which works well with the music Achy Breaky Heart), some Jump Jam moves, a dance to Staying Alive and a groovy little folk dance called The Jiffy Mixer.

Parents - ask us to demonstrate these cool moves at home!

Learning About Simple Machines

Today we started learning about simple machines and how they help us to do jubs more easily.

Today we focused on  LEVERS. We identified different household levers and learnt about the words fulcrum, load and force.  We identified these parts on different levers.

It was fun making a simple catapult with a spoon, blocks and a ping pong ball. (Ooops - one flew off into who-knows-where).

We experimented using a lever, and changed the position of the fulcrum. We worked out that the closer the load is to the fulcrum, the stronger the force was which meant it was easier to lift.

Check out these pics...

Exploring air resistance

On Tuesday, we had fun learning about how air resistance affects the movement of falling objects.
In groups of three, we each had a piece of paper that we had to modify to make it fall as SLOW as possible. We carefully drew our designs and labelled the changes. (eg; ripped the edges, folds, holes, cellotape, etc)

Then we dropped all 3 at the SAME time from the SAME height (to make sure it was a FAIR TEST).
We did this several times, because good scientists need to check that their testing is accurate. When we were happy that we had worked out the SLOWEST piece of paper to fall, we formed conclusions as to WHY this design worked better than the others.

After listening to all of the groups share their results and show us their best design - we came to the conclusion that the better designs were the ones that had a LARGER SURFACE AREA because this created MORE AIR RESISTANCE which slowed the falling paper.

(We also discovered, to our surprise, that it's good to put a hole in the centre of the paper - as this steadies the paper so it doesn't cut across the air and dive to the floor on an angle).

Did you know .... all parachutes have a hole in the top so it prevents the poor parachutist from swaying too much!?

Tough Kids Challenge

Today heaps of Room 3 kids took part in the Tough Kid Challenge at Linton Army Camp.
We had lots of fun wading through the stinky bog, crawling through the dark, creepy tunnels, scrambling over loads of logs and jumping through high 'windows' in the obstacle course.

We got thoroughly soaking wet and muddy! But it was heaps of fun! Here are some photos ...

Maths Is Fun

Today in Maths, as part of our Geometry topic, we have been practising giving and following instructions using the words 'left, right, 1/2 and 1/4 turns and clockwise and anticlockwise'.

We practised giving a set of instructions to our 'robot' buddies to get them through an obstacle course. Our buddies had to listen carefully and follow these instructions. Some of us found this really challenging!

We also had to use a map and follow instructions. We are looking forward to making our OWN treasure maps for a buddy to follow ...

Welcome To Term 3

It's a new term, and that means a new Science topic!
This term our topic is FORCE and MOTION. Today we were given a challenge.
How to make Jade's boot move without touching the boot.
Ben tried blowing. It moved the top of her boot, but the boot didn't move along the table.
Maggie lifted the table, but the boot didn't slide.
Juan used Maggie's idea. He lifted the table, then jiggled the table. The boot moved along!
Caleb used a piece of string and pulled the boot so it moved down the table.

All of the words in bold are different types of FORCES. We came up with the idea that forces are movements (pushes or pulls) that move objects.

We learnt that GRAVITY is a force. Gravity is an invisible force that PULLS objects down.

In groups, we brainstormed as many different forces that we could think of.

Lifting, pulling, pushing, hitting, kicking, rolling, twisting, turning, dragging, bouncing, shaking, squeezing were just some of the clever ideas we came up with.
(Someone even suggested telepathy!)  Hmmm. Not sure about that one!

We are going to have lots of fun experimenting with simple machines and learning about force and it's affect on movement.

Buddy Class Reading

Today was our last day of Buddy Class with Room 8. We shared some of our published stories and they read one of their readers to us. We read a poem together and then Maggie, Cooper and Ollie performed a play they had practiced in reading time.

We are looking forward to doing fun activities with our new buddy class, Room 7 next term.

Netball Skills

Today as part of our large ball skills, we practised Netball skills with Miss Main.

We practised passing, catching and shooting. Thanks Miss Main for teaching us.

Disco On Friday!

GOTCHA TICKETS YET?

Buddy Class Dance

Today our buddy class, Room 8, came and did a dance for us. It was about body parts. We joined in with them and moved and grooved to the music.    By Juan

Jump Jam

It's been a wet day again today, and we didn't get to do our large ball activities outside. So for some fun exercise, Room 3 joined in with R4 and R5 to do JUMP JAM!

It was fun moving to music. Thanks so much to our wonderful Jump Jam team who lead us in the routines. We can't wait for Friday's assembly so we can see what you will be doing for your Jump Jam competition in Palmerston North next Tuesday. 
Good luck! Give it heaps!

Trip To Te Manawa

Today Room 3 went to Te Manawa as part of our learning about Pollution. We learnt about water quality and what pollutants can affect our waterways.

We tested samples of water from the Manawatu River and the lagoon and compared them. The temperature of the water from the river was about 2 degrees colder than the lagoon water.

The lagoon water was more acidic than the river water. Do you know why? Because lots of ducks wee in the water, which creates more acid. This is not good for fish and plants.

We learnt that only 3 percent of all the water in the world is drinkable. That's incredible! We need to save our fresh drinking water and not waste it.

After that, we went to the Esplanade for a play. Then we did a litter collection alongside the river walkway. We filled up 2 large blue bags of litter. A lot of it was in the bushes. We found bottles, plastic bags, wrappers and even a shoe! We're glad we prevented this from entering the river.

Here are some photos ...

Thanks to all our awesome parents who provided transport and helped out with our trip.

Wheels Day

Today is Wheels Day! In between the rain showers, we've had a chance to ride around the school on our wheels!
And at lunchtime, some of us bought lollies (which is a wheely special treat!)

Here are some photos ...