Reading

We have been looking at lots of traditional tales this week in reading. Some of the reading groups performed the stories as plays, and we have all learned 'The Little Red Hen' together. Click on the green button below to listen to Room 5 retelling the story, and look at some of our story maps! Can you remember the story to tell at home?

Keep reading over the Easter break!

African drumming

Yesterday we had a visit from Eddie Quansah, a musician from Ghana. He played the drums, the xylophone, the trumpet, sang some African songs, and explained how important drumming is in Africa. He played several members of the 'drum family' and the Gyil- an African xylophone made with gourds.

Several students from across the school went up to play instruments with him and we all clapped along and got into the rhythm. Eddie has played with Bob Marley and bands like Split Enz, and his visit was truly a fantastic experience for the whole school.

Shifting Shapes

For the last few weeks in Maths we have been looking at 2D and 3D shapes, and we can now describe them by the number of edges, faces and corners. Take a look at what we've been doing!

Grandparents' Day

This term our Inquiry topic was 'Here's Our History' and we have been looking at how life has changed over the years. We brainstormed questions to ask our Grandparents and asked them, and our Mums and Dads, to complete a questionnaire about their school days.

Yesterday we had Grandparents' Day, and the hall was filled with our lovely Grandparents and 'Grandfriends' for a special assembly where we showed some of our work and saw some old curios such as Box Brownie cameras. Some of our Grandparents couldn't make it but we were thinking of them anyway.

We then took our Grandparents to Room 5 and showed them all our hard work, and they shared some of the things they had brought to show us such as old photos, books, coins and games. To end the day, we all had afternoon tea together.

Thank you all for coming and sharing your memories with us, we had a lovely day!

BUDDIES!

Our Buddy Class is Room 14 and we have been playing games and singing together, as well as them testing our spellings. Today our buddies read us stories in the library. We like our buddies!!

Capital E by double decker bus

This week we went to Wellington to the Capital E National Arts Festival, where we saw three shows. Firstly, 'Grimace' at The Downstage Theatre, was a dramatic version of mixed up fairy tales with music.
Then on to 'Passing Wind' at the Paramount- a one-man show where Linsay Pollak made and played wind instruments from all sorts of household items such as hosepipes, chairs and even a carrot!! See his carrot clarinet at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LWbj7FYEi3M
The last show we saw was 'Boats' at Capital E, a story of sea tales told using simple props and recorded sounds such as a leather belt for the creaking of the boat. We loved all three shows although the first was our class favourite. What a great day, topped off by the excitement of our return trip to Wellington on a big red double decker bus!

100 years ago..

Yesterday we went to Pataka museum and learned about how people lived 100 years ago. We were told the rules about clothes: boys could be either summer or winter boys, but were not allowed to wear long trousers until they were 14 years old, and girls were not allowed to wear trousers. We had a go at dressing up in their clothes, and we practised not smiling- as they would have had to wait a long time for photos to be taken!
We also had a go at doing some washing, using a washboard and a mangle; we had a game of marbles, and matched some old and new things (telephones, toasters, hot water bottles..). We practised our handwriting on slates and saw some old photos of life at the time.
We also had a lovely time at Aotea Lagoon, eating our morning tea and lunch and playing on the playground. What a great* day!
(* Also described as fantastic and excellent by Room 5)