Camp Waiuta 2018

Last week Room 5 spent two nights at Waiuta, a ghost town located in the hills between Ahaura and Reefton. Waiuta was once a thriving gold mining town after a rich seam of gold bearing quartz was found there in 1905. The town was abandoned in 1951 after one of the mine shafts collapsed. Now, very little of the town is left.

Have a look at our presentations on our individual blogs to find out more about Waiuta and what we did on our camp. As always, we love to receive your comments!

Top Team

Last Friday Room 5, along with Room 2 and the Year 6 students, went to Runanga School to take part in the Top Team challenge. Everyone had a great time and lots of people ended up soaking wet. Everyone also learned some things about how to work well as a team!

Midland Line Athletics

On Monday we took part in the Midland Line Athletics competition along with four other small schools from the area. After the stormy weekend we weren't sure if the weather would be fine enough for the event to go ahead, but it was mostly fine with only a short shower in the middle of the day.
We had practised lots and everyone who went in Room 5 made their best effort in distance running, sprints, high jump, long jump, discus and shot put. Some people even made it through to West Coast Athletics, which is quite an achievement. Good luck to Sophie, Tahlia, Isabel, Jake and Jackson who will be representing Year 5 at West Coast Athletics next Wednesday.

Pet Day 2018

The whole school had yet another great Animal and Produce Day (otherwise known as Pet Day) on the first Friday of the new term, with most people able to bring a pet on the day. After judging and the pet parade there were a variety of workshops, including plasticene creations, cupcake decorating and sand gardens. The weather stayed fine and everyone had a lovely time.
Here are some photographs of some of us and our pets. Have a look at our individual blogs to see what we wrote about our pets for our pet projects and to see some more photographs.

Kapa Haka Festival

 Together with students from Room 6, Room 5 students competed in the Kapa Haka Festival at Hokitika in the last week of term.  Have a look at the video of their performance:

Reducing Plastic in Awahono School

After reading a School Journal article about how Collingwood was the first place in New Zealand to ban plastic bags (all the way back in 2005), we wondered how we could make a difference in our school. We noticed that our classroom bins all had plastic bin liners that were thrown away with the rubbish each day, so we all wrote to our principal about this to try and persuade her to do something about it. Here is one of our letters:

Dear Mrs Wallace,

All over the school we use plastic bags for bin liners. In my opinion we should not use them for bin liners. I have three good reasons why we should not use plastic bags for bin liners.

Firstly, I strongly believe we should not use plastic bags for bin liners because we usually only put dry paper and food packaging in most of the classroom bins. It is not wet materials or slimy contents going into the bin, so there is no reason for using plastic bags for bin liners.

Secondly, I think we should not use plastic bags for bin liners because it would save money. We could use the money for other things like school books or stationery. Guess what? We use two thousand plastic bags a year just at our school. THAT’S CRAZY! Think of the savings we could make. We could save at least one hundred dollars a year on plastic bags.

Thirdly, we should not use plastic bags for bin liners. Two thousand get thrown away every year. That's fifty a week and ten a day just at our school. It all goes into landfill ruining the environment. If we don’t stop plastic from polluting our earth,  the world might just be a big pile of plastic floating in space. You know that plastic is a problem and we can do something about it here at school.

In conclusion, I think we should not use plastic bags as bin liners at school because we don't need them, it would save money, and it's good for the environment. I hope that you will make some changes at this school to help the environment.

.

Yours sincerely,

Amelia

Mrs Wallace read all our letters and then wrote
back to us, saying that she agreed with what we
had said and that as from Term 4 there would be
no more bin liners for dry rubbish in our
classrooms! Great result, Room 5.

We realise that this is a small change, but if we all make a small change to try to reduce the amount of plastic we use, all the small changes will add up to make a bigger change.

Plastic Ocean Collages

You've Got the Power!

The highlight of this week - or even this term - was a return visit to Awahono School by magician, El Gregoe. El Gregoe astounded us with his incredible illusions, magic tricks and skill as a ventriloquist, assisted by his collection of stunning tropical birds (including a blue macaw named Zazu), his dinosaur puppet named Seymore and a little grey guinea pig named Harviana. 
El Gregoe had some important messages about bullying and how to deal with it. One of his messages was to use your WITS: Walk away, Ignore it, Talk to someone, say Stop.  He also reminded us to always treat others the way we would like to be treated.

Visit from Jenny Sommervell

Today we were fortunate to have Jenny Sommervell in our school reading two of her picture books, The Day Dad Blew Up the Cowshed and The Eel Hunt. We  learned lots about how Jenny gets her ideas from real experiences and stories from childhood, and she also told us about her writing process. It takes a long time and a lot of effort to get a book to the publishing stage! Jenny told us that the most important thing is to get the story right first, then to think about choosing the right words to use. She also told us how important it is to have the characters encountering lots of problems because that is what makes the story interesting.  This is known as "torturing the characters"!

Symmetry

Room 5 worked in groups to draw and cut out shapes that were symmetrical. First we folded a square of paper in half, then we drew lines with a ruler to make different straight sided shapes with three sides, four sides and more than four sides. We cut in from the fold, so when the shape was cut out we could unfold the shape. The fold line went down the middle of the shape, and each side of the shape was exactly the same as the other side. The fold line is the line of symmetry. It divides the shape exactly in half.
We grouped our shapes according to how many sides there were. Here are some pictures of the finished work. Everyone had to explain what they were learning on their individual blog. They needed to explain the task and say a line of symmetry is.

Please visit individual blogs and give us feedback on how successfully you think we have explained our learning.

Fraction Art

In Room 5 we have started this term by working on fractions in our maths. We decided to do some art work using fractions.  We cut out circles in different colours, then we folded the circles into halves, quarters, eighths and sixteenths and use the fraction pieces to create an underwater collage.
Here are some pictures of us working on our collages. Have a look at our individual blogs to see our fraction creations!

Awahono School Fun Run

As you can see from these photographs, Room 5 had a great time at the school Fun Run last Friday.
The course included a number of obstacles to go over, under and through. The goal for Room 5 students was to run at least three times around the course, but many people exceeded that goal with some managing a whopping ten laps!
Everyone dressed in their house colours and after lunch the senior students ran games for the rest of the school.

Midland Line Cross Country

Years 4 - 8 took part in the Midland Line Cross Country at Kumara last Monday.  Everyone made a fantastic effort and seven people from Room 5 qualified for West Coast Cross Country which is this Wednesday. Have a look at our individual blogs where we describe our experience of cross country, and you'll also see some more pictures.Good luck Jake, Miro, SophieB, Leah, SophieW, Solly and Isabel at West Coast Cross Country!

Room 5 Portraits

Wacky Hair Day

Last Friday Awahono School held a Wacky Hair Day to raise funds for the Westpac Chopper Appeal.
There was lots of colourful, weird and wonderful hair in Room 5 that day and everyone had lots of fun.

Visit from Paul Beavis

Author and illustrator Paul Beavis visited Awahono School today, and he talked to Room 5 about his work. He read the first book he had published, Mrs Mo's Monster, and we joined in with some actions.  One thing we learned was how many different versions of the story and drawings Paul tried until finally the book was published. Paul didn't give up when the publishers rejected his first attempt, he kept trying different things until eventually he achieved success. A highlight was when Paul taught us how to draw our own monster, step by step, then he autographed each of our drawings.  We had a great time!

Have a look on our individual blogs to find out more about Paul Beavis.
Click on this link to listen to Paul Beavis reading Mrs Mo's Monster.

Room 5 join in with actions while Paul Beavis reads Mrs Mo's Monster.

Paul Beavis shows us how to draw a monster step by step.

We are following Paul Beavis's instructions to help us draw our own monsters. 

This is how we decided to draw the monster's arms.

This is Paul Beavis's monster drawing.

These are our finished monster drawings.

Rākau

This term the kapa haka group has been working with rākau. It takes a lot of practice but Room 5 are getting better! These are some pictures from our practice this week.

Hunting and Fishing Competition

During Easter weekend many of the Room 5 students were involved in activities to do with the Ahaura Hunting and Fishing Competition. The children made up teams and spent the weekend hunting for hares, magpies, possums, goats, wild pigs and deer, with the help of their parents. As you can see from the photographs, many of these pest species were caught. This helps to keep numbers down, which helps local farmers and landowners.

Coming soon: look on our individual blogs for some of our descriptive writing based on our experience of the Hunting and Fishing Competition.

Hares are piled up on the back of a truck.

Deer are hung from the side of a large truck.  The animals are weighed before being displayed.

The antlers of the stags are measured.

A tractor is used to move the animal carcasses.

Wild pigs and chamois are displayed, as well as deer.

These are the goats that Haylee's family managed to hunt down.

Room 5 Art

We were inspired by the work of Californian artist Lee Anderson to work together as a class to create an art work to brighten our walls for the start of the year. We used a variety of patterns and chose groups of colours from a selection we were given.

Life Education

Our school had a visit from Carmen and Harold in the Life Education truck this week. Room 5 learned about healthy eating and also about how to read the information on food packaging.

One thing we learned was all the different words that are used for sugar: dextrose, syrup, fructose, glucose, lactose, corn syrup...

A highlight was when Isabel was x-rayed and we could all see her digestive system! That helped us to find out how our food is digested and how all the nutrients in our food get into our  bloodstream to feed organs like our brain and heart.

Isabel's Digestive System

We read the labels on food packaging to find out how much fat, sugar and salt the food contains. We were looking for 10g or less of fat and sugar per 100g, and
400 mg or less of salt per 100g.

Swimming Sports

Awahono's Visitors

Earlier this week Miro and Solly brought two young hedgehogs to the school for everyone to see.  They had found them on the road the night before when they were out in the car. One of the hedgehogs had rolled itself into a ball and was rolling along the road to try to get itself out of danger quickly. When the two hedgehogs were in Room 5 they were both asleep, then one of them woke up and we watched as it ate some cat food.

We all gather round to look at the hedgehogs.

The two hedgehogs are sleeping.

One hedgehog is eating some cat food.

Successful Learners

Swimming

We've been practising hard for our swimming sports in Week 6, which will be held at Awahono School this year as the Greymouth pool is being renovated. We've had lessons once or twice a week since the start of term to help us to improve our strokes. Recently the lane ropes went up so we've been doing lots of racing practice.

Summer Learning Journey

Twenty Awahono School students took part in the Summer Learning Journey during the summer holidays, and thirteen of those students came from  Room 5. Blake and Sophie B were two of the three top bloggers and Solly was one of the winners of a spot prize. Allie C, who read all the blog posts and wrote comments, came to our assembly to present the prizes and she also presented every participant with a certificate. Well done to all our participants, and a super well done to our prize winners!

Tuhi Mai, Tuhi Atu

We are looking forward to being part of Tuhi Mai, Tuhi Atu once again and can't wait to meet our new blogging buddies from Waikowhai School and Park Estate School.  This is a slideshow introducing ourselves.

We love to receive feedback on our blog posts and we promise to always reply to comments. If you want to comment any of our work, we would prefer comments to be on our individual blogs, rather than on the class blog (although we'd love you to comment on our posts there too). We will put at least one new post on our individual blogs every week, so please keep visiting our blog sites. We are looking forward to reading our blogging buddies' posts and we promise to give positive, helpful feedback.

Room 5, 2018

School started once again on Monday 29th January. Room 5 is a small Year 5/6 class of sixteen students at present. It has been so hot this week that we have really appreciated being able to swim every day, and also coming inside to a nicely chilled classroom, thanks to our air conditioning. This is a picture of the new Room 5.