This year Room 4 are using iPads in their learning everyday.
We have started creating our Kawa of Care which helps us to use our iPads safely and efficiently.
Can you think of anything else we need in our Kawa of Care?
This week we have been remembering Parihaka.
One hundred and fifty years ago there was a village in Taranaki called Parihaka. It lay between the Taranaki coast and Taranaki mountain.
This village was special because people from many different Māori tribes had come to live there. Many had had their land confiscated and needed a safe place to live – to grow their food and raise their families. Parihaka was also a special place because it was a place of peace.
The leaders of the village were Te Whiti o Rongomai and Tohu Kākahi. They didn’t believe in fighting. They had heard the words of Jesus in the bible which said, “If anyone hits you on the right cheek, offer him the other as well”. They told the people to put away their weapons. They told them that if government soldiers came to take their land, they should greet them with gifts.
One early morning in Parihaka an important event occurred. The people were just beginning to move around the village when a large albatross came down to land on Tohu’s marae and left a feather there. The people believed that the albatross was a chiefly bird with much mana. By landing on Tohu’s marae, the albatross was indicating that Tohu was a great chief and the people should listen to him. The people began to follow the ways that Tohu taught them. And the albatross feather (or raukura) became an important sign for the people of Parihaka.
The children of Parihaka were called tātarakihi which means ‘cicadas’. The older people said they sounded like cicadas because they chattered so much. The children had jobs to do at Parihaka. They helped to
feed the hens and the pigs, and they helped to grow food in the gardens. They also played together and learned to dance and sing.
One day Tohu and Te Whiti called the people to the marae, and told them:
“Kua rere mai te kōrero ki ō mātou tāringa, āpōpō ka tae mai ngā hōia ki konei ki te raupatu i ō tātou whenua. Me noho tātou ki konei, ki runga i te marae ātea, tatari ai ki a rātou. Ka tunu ngā wāhine i te parāoa mā rātou , ka waiata hoki ngā tamariki ki te ope hōia.”
“We have heard that the soldiers are coming tomorrow to try to make us leave our land. We will sit here on the marae and wait for them. The women will bake bread for them and the children will sing and dance.”
So, late into the night the people of Parihaka prepared for the soldiers to come. Just before the sun rose the children went out onto the road leading into the village. When the soldiers arrived with their guns they saw the children of Parihaka singing and dancing in the road with albatross feathers in their hair.
The children couldn’t stop the soldiers from entering the village and taking the men to prison, but they made the soldiers ashamed of their swords and their guns. No-one was killed in Parihaka that day because the people refused to fight the soldiers with weapons. Instead they stood up to them with courage and mana. Sometimes the descendants of the people of Parihaka wear albatross feathers to remember the dignity of their tūpuna and how they resisted giving up their land without using violence.
(from the Caritas resource)
We made raukura using our Google Tools. Check our individual blogs to see them.
We have spent the last week of term trying to survive a zombie apocalypse! When we arrived at school on Monday, there was Crime Scene tape around our classroom, our classroom had been trashed and the desks and chairs had been tipped upside down, and there was zombie slime EVERYWHERE! Then our teacher gave us a scenario to work from:
The world has been infected by a deadly venom. The source of the venom is unknown, but what is known is that 92% of the world’s population is now dead. An unexpected side effect of the venom is that it has caused those who have fallen, to rise again with an insatiable hunger for the flesh of the living.
How would we survive?
Each day we were given a new piece of the story and a new set of parameters that were added to the list of existing rules. We had to brainstorm "Things to consider," and then adapt to these parameters in order to survive. We learnt how to purify water, make forts, search for food in the wild, and make a bow and arrow. Great survival skills for any situation.
It's the end of another month so it is time for us to reflect on our learning and there has been a lot to reflect on. We have been reading Megamonster by David Walliams which we are all enjoying. We have also been writing persuasive texts and presented our speeches to the class. Then some of us got into the semi finals and then the finals. We have created our Calendar Art and painted pictures of Frida Kahlo, a famous Mexican painter. Our class is also in the middle of a Zombie Apocalypse. We have to work out ways to survive and each day something new happens that we have to consider and change what we are doing to survive. It has been another busy month.
Here's Fynley's reflection:
At the end of last week, we read Mrs Naden's persuasive text on Goldilocks is Guilty! She thinks Goldilocks is a criminal and should be charged with breaking and entering (Goldilocks entered the bears cottage without permission when they were not home), theft (she ate their porridge) and criminal damage to property (she broke Baby Bear's chair).
This week we had to come up with reasons why and why not Mr Wolf is guilty of first degree murder. After that, we chose which side we were on and wrote persuasive texts. We are learning to structure and had to think carefully about our paragraphs. We are getting ready for our speech competition next week.
Here's Leyla's speech on why Mr Wolf is NOT guilty.
Is Mr Wolf Guilty of First Degree Murder?
I firmly believe that Mr Wolf is not guilty of first degree murder. Throughout this piece of writing, I will outline three reasons why I think that.
Firstly, he did not actually kill grandma- the wood-cutter chopped her out fully intact and alive. She was not harmed in any way, and neither was Little Red Riding Hood. They were both un-marked and just a little shocked.
Secondly, he is a wolf. It is their nature to attack enemies, and hunt for their food. There is no way that he would have been able to survive without food. All of the other animals had known by then that he was hunting, and so the only way he could sustain his hunger would be to hunt the little girl and her grandmother.
Thirdly, there are no animals in jail, because they cannot commit humane crimes, and only attack if threatened, or hungry. Mr Wolf was actually killed by the wood-cutter, so he cannot be sent to jail and accused of murder.
In the reasons outlined above, I have explained why I think Mr Wolf is not guilty of murder. In fact, the wood-cutter should be sent to jail, because he murdered the wolf. Thank you for listening to my speech.
Here's Camille's speech on why Mr Wolf IS guilty.
I firmly believe that Mr Wolf is guilty of 1st degree murder. Throughout this piece of writing, I will outline four arguments on why I think Mr Wolf is guilty.
Firstly, Mr Wolf broke into Grandma’s house without her consent and permission. This is classified as breaking and entering. This should give him a sentence in prison up to 1 year.
Secondly, he was holding against grandma’s will. He had locked grandma up in a closet. This is known as kidnapping, and this should serve him a sentence in prison for up to 20 years.
Thirdly, he impersonated grandma by putting on her nightgown, her wig and her glasses. He tried to kill red by impersonating grandma. Impersonating a person would serve up to 1 year in prison.
Lastly, I believe Mr Wolf is guilty because he attempted murder. He ate grandma and after that he attempted to eat red next. Attempting murder should serve Mr Wolf up to 10 years in prison.
For all the reasons I have outlined above, I strongly believe Mr Wolf is guilty of first degree murder!
Who do you think is right? Why do you think that?
This week is Tongan Language Week. Our challenge was to create a series of slides teaching people to speak simple words and phrases in Tongan. We used Mote so our readers could hear the correct pronunciation.
Here is our online (distance) learning slide:
As always, it's difficult to choose just one person when lots of people have been doing such great learning. But this week's SHOUT OUT goes to someone who has been blogging their fantastic learning, writing extra blogs, commenting on lots of other people's blogs and when they get stuck on Maths Buddy, they go and ask their dad for help.
This week's SHOUT OUT goes to.....drum roll please....
At the end of every month, we reflect on our learning. It's a great time to sit back and think about all the learning we have done, reset goals, and take a moment to be proud of our achievements. This is only one of the tasks we have done this week during Lockdown. We have also broken out of an Escape Room, completed Episode 2 of The Amazing Race, made animations about the critters we were learning about and many other things. Some students have even blogged other things they have been doing during Lockdown.
Here's a wrap-up of some of our tasks and activities...
Jame's Saint Vincent de Paul Animation
While we are learning from home, our Whole School Assemblies are on a Google Meet. Each teacher chooses one student from their class who has stood out during the week. As you can imagine, it is a difficult task only choosing one person as everyone is doing such an amazing job during Lockdown.
When you're doing your learning tasks during Lockdown, sometimes you get stuck. You turn around and put your hand up because you need the teacher...
and she's not there!
So what do you do?
Well, this SHOUT OUT goes to someone who paused their own learning to help out their brother who was having problems with his blogging tasks. He then got straight back into his own learning and blogging.
This SHOUT OUT goes to (drum roll please...)
Ka mau te wehi, Michael!
We are into our second week of online learning (some people call it distance learning) because of the COVID-19 Delta outbreak.
Each day we have a Google Meet. We start with students leading a karakia and then move on to talking about the days learning. We have heaps of different tasks - there's report writing tasks, science experiments, an Amazing Race Challenge, nature art and heaps more.
What have you been doing during Lockdown?
Here's a snapshot of some of the online learning that has been posted on our individual blogs...
Luke's R.E. (Religious Education) Word Cloud
James' Amazing Race - the last challenge
Last week for reading we read about Māori healing plants. Then we found out which of these plants were in our native gardens at school. After, everybody chose one and we researched some more information. Then we summarised the main ideas onto a sign. (You can see our designs on our individual blogs.) Then we painted our signs and hammered them onto a stake. Hammering was probably the trickiest part of all! Now they are ready to be dug into the ground next to the native tree it tells you about.
Have you ever used a plant to heal yourself?
In reading we have been learning to skim and scan. We read the articles first and then practised skimming and scanning. Skimming is reading quickly in order to get a general overview of the material. Scanning is reading quickly in order to find specific facts. The facts we needed to find were about the Olympic Games. We found some very interesting facts. Did you know that there is actually a fourth medal?
Read Jakob A's fact file. Just click on the picture and it will take you to some facts, then click on the picture of the house and it will take you back 'home' so you can click on another button.
We have also been creating our own Olympic mascots. We looked at the current mascots and mascots of the past and decided to create one just in case the Olympics ever came to New Zealand. We used a new google tool called Chrome Canvas. For most of us, it was the first time we have used it.
Have you ever used Chrome Canvas? What did you create?
Here's Camille's NZ Olympic Mascot.
For the past couple of weeks we have turbo-charged our coding and really challenged ourselves into programming our own games using Gamefroot. We have been posting our progress on our blogs to get feedback to work on before going on to the next segment or challenge. It was interesting to read as some people said some of the games were too challenging - that led to a great discussion about if they were too easy would you play them? Some of us decided we wanted our games to be challenging to teach people about perseverance. They did this by choosing not to act on some of the advice about offering 'lives' - if you failed the attempt, you just have to start again.
Our task was to make sure our 'player' stayed on the screen and did not fall off. We also had to make our 'player' move forwards, backwards, up and down. Some people extended themselves by adding immovable objects, levels and sound. You can read about how we did this by reading our individual blogs.
Check out these games and leave some positive feedback for the learner.
This month has been very busy. What have we been up to and what are we proud of? You can read the answers on our individul blogs. We will be sharing our learning with our whānau during next weeks Student-Led Conferences.
What have you been learning about in June?
Callum from GetWi$e ASB came and spoke to us about Financial Literacy. That's when you are being smart (or wise) with your money.
These are some of the things he talked about:
He compared it to being an All Black - you need to practice.
Like rugby, what do you need? In rugby you need a ball. In Financial Literacy you need money! But HOW do we get it? Well, we earn it.
How can we earn it?
We can do chores (He called these “Da rules” = do your chores = free time). So how do we earn money if we don't get money from doing chores for our parents? We can do someone else's chores for money (extra chores). It means we have less free time but the flip side is we are earning!
These are the thing we can do to earn money:
Setting a goal
All Blacks - what is their goal? To win!
If they had no idea why they were playing in the first place, would they play as hard? Having a goal is about motivation.
Cash Goal - on a piece of paper we wrote:
C
A
S
H
C = Clear - Imagine the All Blacks Coach told his players they had to pass the ball through a hoop. The players have to practice their accuracy. If the coach said, “Throw the ball,” players could throw the ball anywhere. The instructions were not specific.
If he said, “Throw the ball into the hoop,” everyone could throw it at the same time.
If he said, “One at a time, throw the ball through the hoop," then he is being specific. We need to be specific with our goals.
What do you want to buy? Is it realistic?
A = Action Imagine the All Blacks again. What if the first player waits and does nothing. This achieves nothing.
We can do chores, neighbourhood jobs, run a business, sell stuff. We wrote what we are willing to do.
S = Save - how much money can you save in a week? $15 per week is the national average for children our age. Don’t get distracted and buy something else. If you see something you really want to buy you need to consider - Save or buy? Shout it! SAVE OR BUY? That’s what your brain does. It argues - 'If I buy the shiny object I will have less money. But I REALLY want it!'
H = How long? - How far away is your goal? (How far away is the hoop?)
If someone wants to buy a Lamborghini, it could cost $200,000. $200,000 divided by $15 is 13,334 weeks - that's 256 years. That’s an unrealistic cash goal. It's a bit like if the All Black coach said, "Throw the ball through the hoop?" Where's the hoop? In Peru?? We could also think, 'I could win the lottery.' Chances are 1 in 36,000,000. Tickets cost about $15. Try multiplying that by 36,000,000! (And you can’t drive anyway.)
If we wanted to buy a phone for $200, at $15 per week it would take 14 weeks to save. Now that's realistic!
How to run your own business
Is it - Product or Service?
On a piece of paper, we wrote:
S
S
S
Service - e.g. mowing lawns - $20 per lawn earns $60-$80 per weekend.
S - strengths - What product/service would people pay money for? What can I do? What am I good at? What do I enjoy doing?
We decided one thing we are good at e.g. good with animals, mowing lawns, gardening, baking
S - Solve - Product or service? Which one will I choose? We chose one of the things we are good at.
S - Start - We wrote down the small steps we need to do to start our business. What are the things I need to do to start my business? Where? When? What do I need? I will get supplies from...I will get some starting money from...
Shark Tank
After we had devised our plan, we presented it to The Shark Tank! A Shark Tank is when a person who has an idea for a business would approach the panel and present their business idea. They received constructive criticism from the panel who picked apart bits of the business and put it together in a workable format.
We stood in front of the class, presented our plan and then people asked us questions. It was really helpful as we hadn't thought of some of the things.
Read how Olivia S wrote her plan.
We have been studying Chicago artist, Tom Fedro. He creates art with zing and boundless humour. His art is innovative, creative and playful. He combines pop art collage and whimsical portraiture that has a rhythm all of its own. Bright colours, big features and bold lines that seem to be electrically charged represent an exciting way of seeing and experiencing the world through his eyes.
Our Learning Intention: WALT use painting techniques.
Success Criteria:
We have used:
Long brush strokes
Both sides of the paint brush
Bright colours
Bold lines
Tints and shades to show light direction
Have you ever used paints using success criteria like this?
We have continued learning about what makes a good explanation. Some people were learning how to use a diagram that had labels and an explanation. This helps the reader to understand what we are explaining. Other people were working on complex sentences. A complex sentence is when you put a phrase in a sentence, but you can move the phrase. You need to make sure it still makes sense though. Here is an example:
After I finished baking, I shared the cookies with my family.
I shared the cookies with my family, after I finished baking.
This makes our writing more interesting for the reader because we are using a variety of sentence types.
Here's a snapshot of some interesting explanantions. Did they achieve their learning intention and success criteria?
This week for reading we have been learning to infer. Inferring is when the author has not stated a fact, but has left clues. We had to look for the clues. For example, the author did not say Māui was mean but we thought he was because he deliberately put out everyone's fires and the people were very cold. We made character descriptions saying which character trait the Gods and Demigods had and why we thought that. Then we had to see the similarities and differences between Māori Gods or Demigods to Greek Gods. Prometheus is a Titan and not a God but we found a story about him and compared him to Māui.
Then we created our own God and gave him or her personality traits.
What kind of traits do you think Gods have? Why do you think that?
