Indigenous artists' visit

We were very lucky to be the only school in Kaikohe to host some indigenous artists. Most of Room 3 worked with Frank Buffalo Hyde. He is from Santa Fe, New Mexico and he does stencil art. He helped us create our own masterpieces:

Stop Motion

We have been practising making stop motion movies. Here is one that Nesta and Lee-Ayla made together:

Sentence length

We have been learning to change the type and length of our sentences so our writing is more interesting to read. Lee-Ayla produced a wonderful example of this:

Copper reactions and poetry

We have been learning to make careful observations in Science. This week we investigated copper reactions. We found out that if you want your 10 cent coins to be shiny the fastest way is to put them in vinegar and salt! You should try it.

We also illustrated a very sophisticate poem called 'Bird in the Classroom" by Colin Thiele. There were some great illustrations but Tailah's really captured the mood of the poem:

Halloween prizes and recycled T-shirts

We learned how to make recycled bags from old T-shirts. Gill from Wastewise came into our class to help us.  Here are some of our creations:

We had more winners from Room 3! This time it was a Halloween colouring in competion. Jayden, Ibanez and Calaise each received a big bag of fabulous prizes:

Gardening with Pappy

Room 3 have been getting gardening tips from our caretaker, Pappy. He helped us plant a peach tree in the carpark garden and we collected some puriri seeds and planted them.

Tamati carried our tree to its new home.

Pappy cut a hole in the weed mat for us.

Ashleigh helped dig the hole.

How long will it be until we can eat some peaches?

What would happen if you didn't have a skull?

This week we have been learning about how important our skull is. Just for fun, we each made a paper skull with a cranium and mandible. Boo!

Dragon competition winners!

Last term we finished our dragon descriptions and shared them with our NZ Read Aloud friends. James Russell, the author of the Dragon Defender books, judged the competition and chose Jayden's dragon for third place! And Shaniadawn's entry was highly commended. Here is the video announcing the winners:

Climate change

We have been learning about climate change this week. Here is a video we would like to share with you:

Dragon competition

As part of #NZReadAloud we have been designing dragons for a dragon competition. The winning dragon might feature in James Russell's fifth book in the Dragon Defender's series! Next week we need to write some information about the dragons we created.

The Little House - a play

Two reading groups spent this week making masks and a house for our play. They performed it for the rest of the class on Friday.

Squawk Squad Rangers - Marine Week

This week as part of our sustainability unit we have been learning about the terrible consequences of plastic entering our oceans. Our challenge this week was to find one piece of plastic each day and create a sculpture on Friday.
We were role models for our school value "Ngatahi ai te mahi". Here is our video:

Maker space and measuring trees

We have a new Maker space in our classroom where we can let our creativity run wild. Here are some of our first creations:

Monique and Tailah made a house.

Yozarna made a handbag for the teacher.

Patungahere made beautiful patterns.

Eklypze made Flynn from our Dragon Defenders read aloud.

Thanks to Squawk Squad, we learned how to measure really tall trees with just a pencil and a metre rule. It was nice to get outside in the beautiful end of winter weather.

Waiata concert practice

We were shivering. We couldn't feel our feet. The icy wind froze our ears and noses. It felt like we had been waiting for 100 years. When will it be our turn? 
Finally, we lined up next to the stage with butterflies doing somersaults in our stomachs. Our waiata was spectacular. Everybody cheered!

Compliments, Food for Life and sketch notes

We have been learning to give compliments that are strengths based and not about how people look. We are using the Compliments sheets from School Kit to help us.

Food for Life came to school on Monday and we had yummy potatoes and rice for lunch followed by some delicious custard. This week the school paid for all students ($2 each). Next week students are asked to give a $1 koha for their meal.

Waiting patiently for our yummy kai

We have started reading Dragon Defenders 4 All is Lost as part of #NZReadAloud. We did some sketch notes while listening to Mrs Bingham read.

NZ Birds, Squawk Squad and VR

We have been learning about birds that are endemic to New Zealand. First we read the book New Zealand Birds. Then we each wrote about our favourite bird using the information we found. Here is Ahzaria-Lee's mahi:

We are also learning to be kaitiaki for Aotearoa with Squawk Squad. They sent us some VR headsets to follow Squawk's Journey. Here is Teaaoterangi trying them out:

Virtual Reality is awesome!

Dragon Brothers

Room 3 has been reading books about dragons. Some of the books are written by James Russell. He is a New Zealand author who writes books about dragons. He has written a series of books called Dragon Brothers. He has picture books called Dragon Brothers Trilogy and a chapter book series called Dragon Defenders. We are reading Book 4, All is Lost as part of #NZReadAloud.
Mrs Bingham's friend, Whaea Kaye, won all 7 Dragon Brothers books, a T-shirt, a tote bag and a display stand. She gave them to our class!

STEM winners

We had an exciting start to Term 3 when 4 massive parcels of STEM equipment arrived in the office. Genesis Energy sent it to us after Room 3 (us) and Room 11 won it for Kaikohe West School. 
Our prize included: a Makey Makey STEM Pack, Meet Edison Education School STEM Bundle, Sphero Bolts, Makeblock Robot Kit, Makeblock Ranger Robot Kit and Makeblock Neuron. We even got some T-shirts!

We won by playing a game called Crunchtime. It is a quiz game to test energy and science knowledge and it is heaps of fun.

Click on the picture to play the game

We are really looking forward to the equipment arriving in our room.

Matariki and Mystery Skype

This week has been all about Matariki. It was fabulous to see our whanau come in and celebrate our learning with us. Here are some of the things we created:

We also Skyped a mystery school as part of the Moostery Challenge from Schoolkit. We had a fabulous time talking to Wanaka Primary School.

Fire Brigade Cup

On Wednesday we all walked down to Lindvart Park to compete against other schools in the Fire Brigade Cup. We could choose to play netball, hockey, Rippa rugby or soccer and we have been practising every week this term. We all had a fantastic day even though we didn't always win. When we got back to school we were exhausted and our feet were sore. It was a long day!

KWS 1 vs KWS 2 - our last game of the day for Rippa Rugby

Our first game was KWS1 vs Ohaeawai School.

Room 3 Players of the Day!