Gardening!

This term we are learning about the diversity of plants.  This means we will be discovering lots of different plants, types of plants, the many places plants can be found, and the many ways we can look after plants....not to mention the many uses of plants.  So much to learn!

This week we've started off by planting some seeds and plants, so we can watch them grow over the next few weeks.

Yesterday we planted some radishes and potatoes in our section of the edible gardens.  There are a lot of keen gardeners in Room 10.

Lleyton holding some radish seeds...aren't they small!

Alura holding two potato plants Miss O'Neill found in her garden at home.
The potato plants had 'self-sown' themselves in the flower garden!
So we will see if they will grow in the school garden instead.

We had to loosen up the soil by digging it up.  It didn't take long for 10 of us to dig up the garden!

Here are two potato seeds.  They are a lot bigger than the radish seeds.

A big thank you to Connor for taking these wonderful photos.

Road Safety entries...

Over the last several weeks some groups of children have been working hard on creating a storyboard about staying safe as they come to school.

This was the process each group followed:
1.  Brainstorm different ways to keep safe on their way to school.
2.  Choose one of the ways to keep safe.
3.  Decide who their characters will be.
4.  Plan a beginning, middle and ending for their story.
5.  Follow their plan and create a storyboard (stretch out their beginning, middle and ending).
6.  Re-read their storyboard, change, add or delete...
7.  Miss O'Neill put their creation onto a powerpoint, then printed it.  The groups then had to re-edit it.
8.  Record their voices reading the story.

So you can see it was an extremely long process - how clever are the children from Room 10!

Here is Rosie and Timothy's creation:

Rosie and timothy safer journeys from keenyoneill

Here is Alura and Julie's creation:

Alura and julie safer journeys from keenyoneill

School Holidays

Mr Bojangles resting.

Oh dear!  Both Miss O'Neill and Mr Bojangles have been sick with the flu over most of the holidays.  Luckily after lots of rest we are feeling much better and can't wait to see everyone again on Monday.

While we were sick we discovered some ways to stop our germs reaching other people.  I wonder if Room 10 know these too?

1.  Wash our hands, especially after using the toilet, coughing, sneezing and blowing our noses.  In Room 10 we share a lot of things like pencils and crayons...let's show WE CARE by washing our hands regularly.

2.  Cough or sneeze into our elbows if we can.  If we cough or sneeze into our hands...remember to wash them straight away.

3.  Don't come to school sick!  Keep your germs at home!

Adam from Kelly Sports

On Monday Room 10 were lucky enough to have Adam (from Kelly Sports) come and take us for PE. We love Adam!  He teaches us how to play so many fun games which make us move, jump, pass the ball and lots more.

Here we are playing Volcanoes and Valleys!  Make a comment if you are interested in how to play this game!

Mr Bojangles trip to Orana Park!

Rosie took Mr Bojangles to Orana Park the other day...what a treat!

A view from the sky...

Here is a picture of our beautiful school from the air.

See if you can find the following:
1.  Room 10
2.  Middle playground
3.  School hall
4.  Lunch area
5.  What else can you see?

Room 10 Photo

A few weeks ago we had our class photos done.  

Here is ours.  

What an absolutely good looking classroom we are!

A wee mistake...Warren was also absent on photo day.

June 22

Yay!  The sun came out today!

To begin the day we had Discovery Time (which was cancelled last time due to the snow).  In Room Ten, children could choose from three activities.

1.  Spinning wool!  Alura's nana (Mrs Renaud) brought along her spinning wheel and some wool for children to spin.  Lots of boys and girls wanted to have a turn.

2.  Mini-computers!  Some children practiced their math, word and problem-solving skills on some online games.

3.  Mexican Hats!  We decorated some polystyrene cups with felts, then popped them into our new oven.  The children loved watching the cups shrink into mexican hats.

A huge thank you to Denise Renaud (Alura's Nana) and Leah van Zijl (Martina's Mum) for helping out at Discovery Time.  Parent help is always valued and appreciated.

As earlier stated Otakaro have a new oven!  Not only that but we actually have two new ovens and 2 new hot plates.  We are very excited about them.  So in the afternoon we made some biscuits as part of our Inquiry on 'Changing Matter'.  We discovered the term viscosity  (different thicknesses of liquids).  We made a biscuit dough which is a liquid (but very thick) and turned it into a solid by cooking it.

Rosie and Shikana mixing the butter, sugar and egg together.

The biscuits cooking in our new oven!

Rosie and Shikana think the biscuits look pretty good!

Caring Citizens!

Last Friday Jesse and Jaxson were presented with a certificate and drink bottle each at assembly.  These two boys have shown what Absolutely Brilliant Citizens they are!  Here's what they did!

One day the boys were playing outside in their backyard.  They noticed that their elderly next door neighbour (who is over 80 years old!) had fallen over while fixing his tractor.  Jesse and Jaxson raced over to see if the man was okay.  They could see blood on his head and he was in a lot of pain.  The boys tried to help him up, but couldn't.  Jesse and Jaxson ran to get help.

It turned out that that elderly neighbour had broken his ribs, pulled muscles in his leg and suffered a gash to his head.

Thank you, Jesse and Jaxson for helping your neighbour!  What wonderful and caring citizens you are!

Jesse, Mr Buckner and Jaxson
Good job!  I am so proud of you!

Cold and wet...

Today it was quite cold, so some children chose to stay indoors during lunch time.  It was great to see that all children had made great choices about what to do, and were playing nicely with others...they're like this all the time, of course!

William and Kody on the class computer.

Elijah, Charles and Emme on the mini-computers.

Korbyn and Warren playing with Miss O'Neill's "special" lego.

Martina and Daniel sharing the class ipad.

Plus, a big welcome to Shikana who joined us last week!

Our Paint It All Black entry...

We have officially entered the Paint It All Black competition.  For more details about the competition click on our photo!

Room 10 had a vote and photo 1 was the best.  Thanks for the parents for voting too.

Fingers crossed everyone!

Ice blocks

As you know, Room 10 have been learning about the ways matter can change.

Last week we made mini ice blocks out of apple juice.  Today we got to eat them!  Yum yum!

This week we will be creating flow charts on how to make an ice block.  We're so clever in Room 10!

Nom nom nom!

Tasty!

Yum!

Paint It All Black...and Win!

On Friday most of Room 10 came to school dressed in black to support the PAINT IT ALL BLACK...AND WIN competition.

To win the prize we needed to take a photo of our classroom supporting the All Blacks.  What awesome prizes there are too.  

The Prize:

Teacher gets two tickets to the All Blacks v. Ireland test on 16 June.

Classroom gets a visit from some of their All Black heroes (plus Jase and Dave from Classic Hits) on Friday 15 June around 10.30am.

$500 electronics voucher.

$500 sports equipment voucher for the school.

We decided to do our writing on black paper while dressed in black for our photo. There are several photos and I'm not sure which photo to use...please vote!  You can vote by posting a comment and saying which number photo you like the best.

I need to enter our best photo by noon on Wednesday 13 June...so please make your vote by Tuesday evening.  One vote per family...thanks!

Photo 1

Photo 2

Photo 3

Photo 4

School day in the snow...

Today we had a late start to allow safe travel to school. Those who couldn't safely get to school were encouraged to stay home...hence we had a total of 12 students in Room 10 today!

We started the day with a snow fight...even Mr Buckner joined in! After that we created some fabulous snow stories, maths games, making snow flakes and went to music class.

Everyone had an ABSOLUTELY BRILLIANT day in the sun and snow.

A reminder that there will be another late start tomorrow (Friday at 11am) due to low temperatures forecast over night and the amount of ice and snow still on the roads.  See you at school!

Custom Glitter Text

Look what some of Room 10 did on their snowy day off!

Police and rewards!

Room 10 have once again earned twenty pieces of silver.  Their class reward was to make (and of course eat!) pikelets.

Just yet another way to demonstrate the different states of matter, and how we can change a liquid into a solid.  We even learnt the word - viscous!  Can you remember what it means?

Yesterday we had six police officers come to visit the Otakaro Team.  They even cooked up a sausage sizzle!

We had a lot of fun trying on all sorts of police uniforms, looking inside a police car and truck, and we learnt a bit about keeping safe on the road and footpath.

A big thank you to all the police officers who came along - please come again!

CSO

Today a group from the CSO (Christchurch Symphony Orchestra) came to play for the students at Wairakei School.  They played 4 instruments - harp, violin, viola and flute.  They were brilliant musicians!

A few of the students got a chance to play an instrument, or conduct the small orchestra - what fun!

Warren and Mr Bojangles...

Warren took Mr Bojangles home tonight and has been introducing Mr Bojangles to his cat, Puss.  What a lovely way to show that We Care.

Cross Country

We had beautiful weather for our Otakaro Cross Country, and a huge parent turn out...absolutely brilliant!  I was really impressed with how everyone gave the cross country their best effort...most of them managed to run the whole distance without stopping too.

Congratulations to Rosie who got 1st equal, and Martina who got 3rd in the six year girls race.

Congratulations to Kody who came 2nd in the six year boys race.

Changing a solid to a liquid...then back to a solid!

We are really enjoying being scientists in Room 10!

On Friday we decided to change a solid into a liquid.  We decided that butter was a solid because it is hard, it has a shape and it cannot be poured.  But did you know that butter can also be a liquid?  All you need to do is add heat!

See what we did...

We also decided to see if we could turn the melted butter back into a solid.  Lyric said we could put it in the freezer...yes but then we would have frozen butter.  Emme said we could let the air cool it down...so we tried that.  It worked too.

In the afternoon we described the changes we saw.  We are learning how to plan our writing in different ways.  We can plan our writing by drawing a picture, creating a mind-map OR making a flow chart.  Aren't we clever?

A big welcome to Emme!  She comes to us from Isleworth School.  Emme had a wonderful first day in Room 10 yesterday...even had to run the Otakaro Cross-Country - what a start!


Also a big happy birthday to Timothy who turned 7 in the weekend.  Poor Timothy was sick yesterday...maybe too much cake?

Cross-country pictures are coming soon!

We made butter!

On Friday we became super scientists and changed a liquid into a solid!

The children were shown a bottle of cream and they had to decide whether cream was a solid, liquid or gas.  We decided it was a liquid because...
1.  Cream can be poured.
2.  Cream can change its shape when poured into different containers.
3.  Cream feels wet!

We then had to think about the different things we could do to cream to change it into a solid.  We came up with 3 different ideas.  Alura thought we could put it into the freezer.  Nina thought we could mix it really hard to make it go lumpy.  Oscar thought we could cook it.

We chose to try Nina's idea!

So we put some cream into jars and shook them.  We also put some cream into a bowl, and Rosie and Nina used an egg beater to mix it.  Miss O'Neill beat some cream using the electric food mixer.

After a while our cream turned into butter!

We used it to make some fairy bread!  Yum!  Yum!

A big thank you to Jaxson and Rosie for taking the photographs!

States of Matter

As you know, we have been learning about the diference between solids, liquids and gases.

Have a peek at these videos...



.

Jaylee!

We have a new student in Room 10 and her name is Jaylee.  Everyone in Room 10 did a fabulous job at making her feel welcome and showing her the routines at Wairakei School.  We hope she enjoyed her first day here.

Liquid Nitrogen!

We are learning about the changes in matter.  We know that matter comes in the form of solids, liquids or gases.  We also know that matter can change if we add something to it.

Today Miss O'Neill had A LOT of fun using liquid nitrogen to change the properties of some solids and gases.  How awesome!

Have a peek at our photos.  Underneath the photos are some youtube videos showing the same experiments.

Using a balloon...

 Using a carnation...


We also used a banana. When we hit it with a hammer...it shattered! Here is another youtube video where the scientists use liquid nitrogen to make ice-cream! Yum! Unfortunately we didn't make this.