Sprouting Kumara

 Just before the school holidays, Mrs McLellan showed us how to sprout kumara in our online meeting. 

1. Poke 4 toothpicks into the side of a kumara and balance it in a jar or container. 

2. Add water to the jar so that the bottom of the kumara is covered with water. 

3. Place the jar in a sunny spot for a few weeks and wait for the roots and leaves to grow.

Just before we could come back to school in our bubbles, Mrs McLellan carefully pulled off the shoots (with their roots)  and put them in another jar to bring to school. Here's a video of her explaining how.

In the afternoon of Bubble 7's first day back at school, we went to our school garden to plant the kumara shoots. First we had to clear away lots of weeds and overgrown vegetables. We left some parsley, curly kale and a cabbage growing. We harvested a handful of tiny potatoes and a spring onion (which we gave to the two gardening group students in the senior block). 

   

 

  

On a sunny afternoon, it was hard, hot work with our masks on! We filled up the compost bin, and worked together to drag the rest of the weeds to top up Dave's compost bin by the pool too. We were visited by a chirpy piwakawaka and were surprised by a spider, as we disturbed its resting place. We'll try to identify it in our bubble class this coming week.

 

When the garden was cleared, we worked in pairs to plant the kumara shoots. We put the roots in a hole, laid the shoot sideways towards the east (where the sun rises) and covered part of the stems. This is supposed to help the plant make more roots and grow more kumara. Then we watered our plants and headed back to the classroom for a well-deserved rest! Our bodies were certainly feeling the effort and satisfaction that goes into providing healthy food. 

  

Blog Ponder: World Car Free Day

 

Today is World Car Free Day. It is a day set aside to highlight the environmental pollution made by cars and encourage people to consider (and try) other options for transport like walking, bus, train, cycling, scootering, and so on.  As well as environmental benefits, the day can encourage our physical wellbeing (for example, getting exercise) and give us experiences of other ways of travelling around our communities. You can learn more about the way this day started and is celebrated here.

While we have been in Alert Level 4, many of us have not used our cars as much - or at all! The requirement to stay local has meant more people have gone for a walk or bike ride, or only used their car for short trips. At the end of the first Level 4 lockdown in 2020, a science project to monitor carbon emissions (one type of pollution from cars) studied grass clippings collected by volunteers at regular times over 12 weeks. The results showed that, in some places, the emissions were 80% lower in Level 4 than in Level 1!

Today, think about the way a car is used in your family in ordinary life (when we can travel freely at other alert levels). Below are three examples of opinions about this topic. Can you think of habits or ways you could change easily to rely less on cars? Do you think World Car Free Day is an effective idea?

Example 1: "My mum drives me to school. Then she drives my big brother to his school. We need a car."

Example 2: "I can use my scooter to get to school every morning. It will take me the same amount of time since we won't get stuck in traffic."

Example 3: "We live 4 kilometres away. There's no way I could walk or cycle to school."

In the comments below, add your ideas or respectfully respond to one of these situations, saying whether or not you agree and why. 

Nature Frames

 Kia Ora Bloggers,

Level 4 lockdown in Auckland has meant we have had to get very creative. One of our activities has been to create these Nature Frames.  We created a frame from cardboard, then took our frames out into nature to create these wonderful photos.

Here are the instructions if you would like to have a go at this activity yourself.

Our creations are below.  We would love some positive, thoughtful and helpful feedback on what you notice and see.

    

Blog Ponder

 Last week was Maths Week.  We enjoyed working on the activities from the site.  We have also been reading and thinking about Maths.  The books that we have looked at have some type of Maths in them.  One of our Reading activities this week is our blog ponder.  Please add your answer to this question in the comments below. Remember to be thoughtful and to use punctuation in the right places.

Vas the Magician!

On Monday 9th August, we had a special guest come to Waikōwhai Primary. The show was Be Bright, Eat Right and he wove together magic with a few reasons to eat healthy. It was so much fun to watch. We even had some guest appearances from Te Ana Ako! 

We learned lots of new things about eating healthy. We learned that you shouldn't eat too many sugary things or else your teeth will get cavities and become rotten. If you stay healthy it will help you get strong. Dairy is good for your health and your bones.

In Mokoroa, one of our favourite magic tricks was when the bunny came out of the hat. Another magic trick we liked was when the book got lit up with fire and then the fire stopped and a bird flew out of the book.

We enjoyed the performance a lot! We even figured out how he did a few of his magic tricks when we saw the feather of the bird sticking out of the box and a mirror in the bucket.

We might even try out a few of these magic tricks later. Are there any magic tricks you know? Have you seen a performance? If so, what was your favourite? Thank you for visiting our blog. We look forward to hearing from you. 

Blog you later,

Mokoroa

Which Sport is the Best?

With the Olympics well underway we have been looking at what sports or activities we think are the best. We planned and wrote some persuasive arguments to try to convince the reader to think about our favourites. 

One of our goals was to use capital letters correctly and to end sentences with a range of punctuation (full stops, question marks and exclamation marks). When we had finished, we highlighted the capitals in blue and punctuation marks in yellow

Have a read of these few and let us know what you think. Were some good arguments made? Were you convinced to try a new sport? 

Krish (Year 3)

Honor (Year 4)

Christopher (Year 3)

Toni (Year 4)

Jodece (Year 4)

Matariki acrostic Poems

 Kia Ora Bloggers,

We have been focusing on Matariki for the last couple of weeks. This has meant that we have read lots about this special celebration. Last week, we also had a special Matariki day where we joined our buddy classes for different activities.

This week, we have been working on sharing our new knowledge in acrostic poems. To start, we shared what we already know and then used these to craft sentences using the letters of the word Matariki.  Have a read of our creations below.

We would love some of your positive, thoughtful and helpful feedback. 

Olympic Ambassador Visit

This week we had a very special guest star at our school, Richie Patterson. 

He was INSPIRING!

He spoke about his journey from a young age to becoming a New Zealand representative in weightlifting. He talked about the the Olympic ideas of Friendship, Respect and Excellence. He also told us how resilience played a big part in his success. 

Growing up, he became interested in may different sports. He represented school in rugby, cricket and athletics (in Year 8). 

In high school his sporting interests grew and he was involved in rugby, cricket, hockey, squash, athletics, touch rugby. He began weightlifting at age 14 and was selected to represent NZ as an Under 16 Weightlifter.

From 2006-2016 Competed in the Commonwealth Games and the Olympic Games. Placings include a silver medal at the New Delhi Commonwealth Games in 2010 and a gold medal at the Glasgow Commonwealth Games in 2014.

Currently holds all the New Zealand records in three weight categories – 77kgs, 85kgs, and 94kgs. He is only the second New Zealand weightlifter to compete at three Olympic Games.

Now Richie runs his own gym and coaches other weightlifters. He is heading to the Olympic games in Tokyo in a few weeks in the role of coach for the weightlifting team. Watch to see if you can spot him (and see if he runs his finger along his eyebrow - that's his secret way of saying 'hello' to New Zealand).

What are some of the things you are passionate about and would like to achieve? Maybe you could let us know in the comments.

Measurement in Te Ana Ako

 Mālō bloggers, 

Over the last two weeks, the Middle Syndicate has been investigating measurement. At first, we estimated (guessed) how big things were in our classes. We used popsicle sticks and blocks to measure a range of things and objects in our learning spaces.

After that, we created our own measuring tools as we learnt more about centimetres and unit measurement. 

We started to measure things again, this time with our rulers. From handspan, to leg length, to the distance around our head. We even measures the size of our feet and compared to the rest of the people in our class. 

Finally, we did our own experiments seeing how big different creatures are around the world and how their sizes compare to each other. We even measured how big a blue whale is and used the corridor of our classrooms. Can you guess how big a blue whale is? 

(Waving to show the size of a blue whale)  

Thanks for reading, 

Philippa Werry - a special guest for the middle syndicate

 Talofa Lava Bloggers,

This week we were very lucky to have the New Zealand author Philippa Werry visit our syndicate via video call.  She has written lots of books, including picture books, novels and some of the readers we use at school including stories in the school journal. She was really interesting and humorous, giving us lots of great advice and information.  One interesting fact was that her first story was published in the newspaper when she was 6 years old. It was still saved and glued into a scrapbook that she showed us, very precious!  

One important message that she shared with us was how important it is to edit our writing. Taking the time to do this before you publish is really important! We got to ask lots of questions to find out about her job and some of the connections that she has to other New Zealand authors.

Finally, she read us the start of one of her stories. It is called, "The best skateboarder in school" and you can find it in School Journal Part 1 Number 3 2003. We really enjoyed this and we are looking forward to exploring more of her stories. A special thank you to Mr Hing-Windsor for organising this for us. 

Have you had a visit from a school author? Do you have a question or comment? We'd love some feedback below.

Tofa soifua

Student Led Tookits

This week we had the pleasure of learning about different apps and technologies from students in the senior school.  Workshops were run throughout the day with students choosing three to learn about. 

There was something for everyone, including:

• Google Maps
• Google Slide Animation
• Word Art
• Piskel
• Drones
• Sphero
• Makey-makey
• Brainbox
• Webcam Toy
• Music Lab
• Book Creator
• Incredibox

The presenters did an amazing job of showing students how these apps and technologies worked and then helped out as students then gave them a go. 

What an awesome day!

What are some apps that you find fun and helpful? Perhaps you could recommend some that we could check out in the comments below.

Cameron Pools Swimming

 Kia ora bloggers,

Over the first half of Term 2, the Middle School have been going down to the local swimming pool to learn how to be water safe. 

 

 We have done a lot of different activities, from floating with milk bottles to using lifejackets when our lifeboat gets flipped in the pool. We have loved learning more skills to stay safe in water and the using equipment in the pool. 

 

 We have improved a lot over the sessions and have become more confident in our swimming and being in water. 

Have you learned any water safety skills? Did you learn them in your pool or a local swimming area? We would love to hear your ideas in our comment section below.

Middle School Zoofari Trip

 Talofa lava bloggers,

On Monday the 24th of Monday, the middle syndicate was lucky enough to visit the Auckland Zoo to participate in the Zoofari experience.  The first exciting highlight of the day was a trip to the Zoo on a double decker bus!

When we arrived, we were greeted by Lizzy who gave us lots of information during our briefing and set us up for our class guided tours along the African Safari track.  Our Zoo educators were amazing, they had lots of interesting things to share with us and things that we could feel while we were learning.  

Then, under the guidance of our awesome parent helpers, we explored the zoo, ticking off the different animals that we visited on our map.  It was really interesting to have the chance to find the animals that we like and have a look at their habitats and how they can be adapted to them.

The final main event for the day was a second educator session. During this time we watched a feeding session for the spider monkeys. We also found out that we can do our bit for conservation by making sure that we buy paper with this special logo so that spider monkey habitats are kept safe.

Have you been to the Zoo before? Do you do something to protect animals?  We would love to hear what you do in our comment section below.