Carina wrote a fabulous story today about her time in Australia.  It is really well written and well worth reading.  Click on this link to get to it.
http://2014toscar6.blogspot.co.nz/2014/09/australia.html?showComment=1411344001041#c8895879273089853874

Room 6's blog has reached a new milestone - we have now exceeded 3000 hits from all around the world.  A lot of the hits are using the class website as a gateway to children's blogs.  Dylan has nearly reached his goal of 1000 hits on his personal learning blog.  Some children have really interesting hits from places like Cyprus, Croatia, and Russia.  It is fun to discover where these countries are!

Monday 11th August 2014

Waikanae School Room 6 students were among the 87 students from the Te Aramoana syndicate who went to assist with planting over 1000 native plants at the Waimea Lagoon, at Waikanae Beach. 

It was a lovely day with the weather and everyone worked together to complete the task.  

The Waimea Lagoon Restoration group has been going for 15 years and this is the first time that Waikanae school has been involved.  The current work is being done in conjunction with the Kapiti Coast District Council. 

There were around 6 or 7 varieties of native NZ plants including toi-tois, swamp caprosma, flax  and mahoi. "Plants are the seed for [the children] for the future - it gives them the an appreciation for the hard work the KCDC does." said Dan Green from the KCDC.  

Anya and Molly  click their orienteering map at one of the checkpoints.  The fastest children were Alfie and Isaac who completed the course in 29 minutes.

Scott checks out our story map for our orienteering narratives.  We based our narratives on our experiences, using what we knew to form new made-up stories.

 A couple of weeks ago we learnt about the biggest snakes in the world.  We read about them in a school journal.  They were prehistoric and the information was gathered from fossil records.  It was so big the height of it would have come up to a man's waist.

Jasmine made a model snake - the bulge in the middle is where her snake ate a soft toy animal!!  Good one Jasmine!

 Some of the girls in Room 6 play netball on a Saturday morning.  Our house is near the courts and I hear the noise from the courts when they start playing - shouts of encouragement and cheers when a goal is scored.  If I look out the window I can see some of the courts.  We wish them well for their games during the netball season - especially those wet, or cold frosty mornings when I am at home and it is warm and comfortable..

Laura G had her birthday.  Her mum turned up at school with two large cakes, one banana and one chocolate.  Laura had to figure out how to cut it so there would be enough for everyone.    I had the chocolate and mint flavoured cake.  It went really well with my lunch.  Thank you Laura and Mrs G.

Dylan with his cup of delicious vegetable soup.  On a cold day it was much appreciated by lots of Rm 6-7 children.

Last week was a cold week with frosty mornings and some wet days as well.  Laura G's mum kindly made a large pot of soup - with veges and pasta.  It was hot and really delicious.  Thank you Mrs G.

She is going to come to class and teach some children how to make soup and the class might get taste some more.  These practical skills may help develop and interest in cooking and the ability to cook for their own family.

Some of the Room 7 children also enjoyed the soup.

NEWSFLASH!!!!

Next week I hope to have the real Patches McPatches come and visit Room 6!  He is due back from PNG at the end of the week but will need a couple of days to get over jetlag.

Due to the rising popularity of Henry as a travelling companion, and the range of exciting and dangerous undertakings Henry has with his adventures, we have had to make the unprecedented decision to hire a stunt double. Fortunately we have located an excellent look-alike who has morphed into the familiar Henry 1 appearance.  Jasmine has kindly allowed her bear, who we will call Henry 2, to also participate in some adventures - today he was off to gymnastics.  Can't wait for the photos. 

Meanwhile Henry 1 is off to on a separate adventure.

Tonight he has gone with James B and Quacky (Read James individual blog to find out about Quacky's adventures) for the night.  I get the feeling Quacky and Henry will have a fabulous time - but I hope they don't get into too much mischief when James isn't looking.

Check back tomorrow to find out more about what Henry has been doing.

Been wondering about Henry - He has certainly had an exciting adventure.  He had a big day out with Ben's mum who is a vet.  Watch and see the mischief he got into ..... and how he ended up getting a check-up and more.

Bens 140403212209-phpapp01 (1) from CybEd

Thank you Mrs V for taking such good care of Henry. :-)

The Adventures Of Henry the Travelling Bear.

26 March 2014, Waikanae - Wellington

I'm going on my first trip today and I'm very excited. I have to wake up early at 5.30am. We leave Waikanae by car at 6am and it’s still dark outside. I know that Wellington is the capital of New Zealand and it must be a big city. It’s almost an hour to drive into Wellington, and I’m getting a little bit bored so I play “sweet and sour”.  I waved to the other cars out the back window and some drivers smiled and waved back at me, they were sweet J

It’s still dark when we arrive in Wellington at 7am. Here’s a photo of me as I get out of the car in Willis Street.

I’m quite hungry now and as a special treat we go and have a breakfast at a café.

Then it’s got light outside and it’s a clear autumn day today. There is no wind – I don’t know why people say “Windy Wellington” at all. As I walked out of the café I saw this red phone booth in “Post Office Square”. I tried to phone Waikanae School but they told me that there was no one in room 6 just yet. I might sent you a postcard instead. 

We went to a street called “The Terrace” where a lot of tall office buildings are. We parked the car under one of the buildings in an underground car park. Then we went up in a lift to the 7^th floor and I liked how shiny and silver it was and I got to press the buttons. I asked whether we could go all the way to the top floor. I was allowed to go to the 12^th floor three times – yayyyy! Then I thought I'd better let other people use the lift too and I went to start work.

I needed to be very quiet at work. People  looked very busy and serious but everyone is very friendly and said “Good morning” to me. I was allowed to sit on the desk and watch everyone all day. I got a bit bored so I was allowed to draw pictures with highlighter pens on white printer paper.

At lunchtime we walked down the road to “Lambton Quay” which had a lot of shops on it. We had sandwiches for lunch and we sat on the grass in front of the parliament buildings. Parliament is where the people from the government meet up and talk about the laws of New Zealand. The main parliament building is called the Beehive. I bought a postcard on the way back to work and mailed it to Room 6 at Waikanae School – did you get it??

In the afternoon I was allowed to go to a meeting where everyone was sitting in a big meeting room at a round table. Sometimes everyone talked at once, but there was a person at the head of the table who was chairing the meeting. The chairperson decided whose turn it was to say something. Another person was the minute-taker and wrote down notes about who said what and also wrote down all decisions that were made in the meeting. When someone was given a task then this is called an action. At the next meeting everyone who was given an action had to say whether they had finished and what the outcome was.

After work we went outside and it was a lovely sunny afternoon. We walked along Lambton Quay again to the “Cable Car”. The Cable Car goes from the centre of the city all the way up a big hill to where the university is. I looked down on the rails of the Cable Car and I could see that there was one thick cable in the middle of the rails that was attached to two carriages.

So one carriage is pulled upwards the track while the other one is going down.

When the Cable Car moves there is no engine noise so it’s not very noisy but it does rattle a bit like it does on a train, but it goes a lot slower than a train.

On the way back to Waikanae I was a bit tired and I had a sleep all the way back to Waikanae. I can’t wait to get back to school and show you all my photos from today.

                HENRY

NEWSFLASH

An update on Henry – our class Bear.  Inspired by the adventures Patches McPatches in PNG, Henry decided it was time for him to go on an adventure too.... although not feeling so brave he decided his first trip wouldn't be overseas.

Henry hitches a ride with Jill – off on his big adventure!

We have had a card from him too.  He even got to go to Parliament!

Henry writes

“Dear Children of Room 6 and Mr Corlett

I’m on a trip to wellington today and I am having such an awesome day J.  I will tell you all about it soon when I get back to class.

Thinking of you.

See you soon,

Henry

Term 1 Week 7  The Yr 6 children went on camp to Palm Grove.  It was a fabulous camp - great parent helpers, awesome kids, well organised (thanks Michelle), and a camp site which gave children a great number of fun but challenging activities, which we share with you through this video.

Check out the Year 6 children's individual blogs for their views of the camp.

Room 6 and lots of other children from the school discover the simple joys of creating their own entertainment - sliding down a grassed slope on a piece of cardboard.

"It was great to see you having fun with the cardboard boxes on the top field" Waikanae School principal, Mr Bevan Campbell, told the children, after watching their antics.

However as all things come to an end, the bare grass patches giving testimony to the number of children who joined in and the grass needed time to recover before the arrival of wet weather the area was likely to turn to mud.

Patches McPatches the wandering lion teaches us about life in PNG

The final chapter  - until he writes again :-)

By then it was time to make dinner. We use a lot of coconuts for our cooking here. When a coconut is ready it falls off  the coconut tree, but it looks different to the ones you see in the supermarket because it still has a husk on it like the ones on the ground in my picture. Aunty Rosa taught me how to use a sharp stick to rip the husk off. It takes lots of muscles but she’s very good at it. 

 Once the husk comes of we break it open with a big knife, scrape the coconut out of the shell and make coconut cream with it. We cook things in the cream a lot, but we don’t eat much of the coconut. Most of it goes to feeding our chickens.

After such a busy day it was time to hang out on the balcony of my house with a big glass of juice.

I love my life here in PNG in the tropical sunshine.

Mr Corlett told me that you’re going to be taking my good friend Henry on some interesting adventures too so I’m looking forward to hearing lots of great stories from you all.

  

Bye for now

Patches Mc Patches xxx

Patches McPatches the wandering lion teaches us about life in PNG.
 Chapter 6

After that I needed a rest so I went and sat under the shelter on the bridge next to my house. My neighbours Bob and Lucy made it all by themselves. The roof is made from leaves and it helps to keep the rain off of the wooden bridge so it doesn’t rot. PNG doesn’t have 4 seasons like NZ does, it only has 2. Wet season and dry season, so sometimes it rains here A LOT!

After that I felt a little bit sick, maybe I ate too many green guavas, so I went down to the hospital. Nurse Grace said I had a high temperature. She gave me some pink medicine to make me feel better.

Come and read some more tomorrow and hear the final chapter of my letter about every day life at Kapuna..

Several children are exploring using Movie Maker as a way to share their learning and show the activities they have been involved in at school.  Here are Meghan and Dylan's first experimental movies.
Well done!  Great new learning!

Patches McPatches the wandering lion teaches us about life in PNG.

The next McPatches post will be here tomorrow - check out the next episode of his adventures.

Chapter 5

 Patches McPatches the wandering lion teaches us about life in PNG.

After that I needed a rest so I went and sat under the shelter on the bridge next to my house. My neighbours Bob and Lucy made it all by themselves. The roof is made from leaves and it helps to keep the rain off of the wooden bridge so it doesn’t rot. PNG doesn’t have 4 seasons like NZ does, it only has 2. Wet season and dry season, so sometimes it rains here A LOT!

After that I felt a little bit sick, maybe I ate too many green guavas, so I went down to the hospital. Nurse Grace said I had a high temperature. She gave me some pink medicine to make me feel better.

Chapter 4

When I got home I put my rice away and went to check on my garden. A lot of the food we eat here we grow ourselves. 

First I went and checked the pineapple patch. You have to be careful because the leaves are really spiky. 

Then I checked the Ma’a tree. There were no ma’as today but the tree had lots of pretty pink flowers instead of yummy pink fruit. 

Then I checked the guava tree. A guava starts out green and turns yellow when it’s ready to eat. This one is just right.

Some of my friends saw me in the trees and wanted to play.

In some parts of the world people are subsistence farmers  - they grow what they eat and live on whatever fish or bush animals they can catch. If you had to grow, harvest or catch your own meal what would it be?

Activity.

Design and make your own swing for your back yard.  Does it work as well as the one in the photo.

Life as a child in PNG

For further reading use this link or the tab at the top of the page.

http://2014waikanaeschoolroom6.blogspot.co.nz/p/more-from-papua-new-guinea.html 

Chapter 4  Patches McPatches the friendly but well travelled lion teaches Room 6 about life in Papua New Guinea.

Next I found some of Grandma’s Kapoks. Kapok is a plant that grows here. Its seeds get all fluffy like wool. Once they’ve gotten fluffy enough you pick them then take all the seeds out of the soft wool. We use it to make pillows but it takes a long time and a lot of work to get all of the seeds out.

What did sailors once use kapok for?    

Ask your grandparents if they ever had kapok pillows or mattresses.  

What else could you use kapok for?

MORE FROM McPATCHES

Chapter 3 McPatches teaches us about life in Kapuna, a small hospital in a remote part of the southern Papua New Guinea jungle.

On the way home I stopped off to have a look at the jetty. It was low tide so all the canoes where resting on the mud. But when the tide comes up they’ll all be floating again. The people put long sticks on each side of them to stop them from floating away when the tide rises. These canoes are how the people get to hospital. Sometimes people have to travel for 2 whole days rowing down the river to get help because there are no roads here and some of the villages are far away.

Compare how people get to hospital in Kapuna with how New Zealand people get to hospital.   Did you know that in the Kapuna Hospital the patients are looked after the patient, while the medical staff look after the medical needs?  

Look at the canoes in the background.  What are they made of?  How many people would be needed to power it?  McPatches has some grey patches - could that be mud? Look at the plant life around the canoes .... how muddy is it?

Why is the wharf such an important to the hospital and villages as part of their  transportation infrastructure?

A letter from Patches McPatches - Chapter 2

We are learning about the different countries in the world.  Patches is teaching us about life in PNG.

Shopping at Kapuna.

After school I went to the shop. There’s only one little shop at Kapuna. I brought some rice with my kina. Kina is the kind of money they have in Papau New Guinea. The shop isn’t like a supermarket where you fill up your trolley. You stand behind the counter and tell shop keeper Anna what you want and she’ll get it for you then tell you how much it costs. Anna let me help her serve the customers. It was really fun!

What do you notice about the style of shop is in the photo? 
What is for sale?    
Compare the quantity goods compare to the place your family shops. What do you notice?  What does this tell you about the diet of the people in Kapuna?
What sort of money do they use?  How much do things cost?  What is that in NZ money?

Read  more tomorrow!

McPatches Travel Log

Hello Mr Corlett’s class

My name is Patches McPatches the Travelling Lion, but you can just call me Patches. I’m from Wellington in New Zealand, but for nearly 2 years I’ve had a new home. I live in a small rural village in Papua New Guinea called Kapuna. It’s a hospital in the middle of the jungle next to a big river with crocodiles in it and we help the people who live in the nearby villages when they get sick.

I like my new home and there’s lots of interesting things to see and do here.
This morning I went to school just like you do. The children were doing science. Their river is a tidal river. That means that it has fresh water from the rain but also salt water from the sea in it, so the river has a high tide and a low tide just like the ocean does. They have done an experiment measuring high tide and low tide in their river and taught me how to draw graphs to show what they found out.

WAIKANAE SCHOOL SCHOOL COUNCILLORS

There is a special role that two children from each class fulfil in the school as school councillors.  They represent the class and bring ideas and suggestions for ways of improving the school - they represent "student voice" in the school decision making process, and help run events and school assemblies.

Here is Room 6 presenting their desk place-mats in assembly in front of all the Year 1-6 students. Chloe introduced us and all the children held up their placemats for everyone to see.

Three Room 6 children  (Ashton, Chloe and William) were amongst those who received certificates from the principal, Mr Campbell.  

WELL DONE & CONGRATULATIONS 

Click here for the Rm 6 video that didn't work in the assembly.  It is about all the cool things we have been doing. 

 (It is best seen on a small screen unless you turn the quality to HD in the settings on the bottom left of the Youtube clip, but if you want the full 64Mb high resolution version, please send a memory stick along to school.)

Testing Time For Room 6.

Along with the rest of the Te Aramoana and Te Poutama syndicates Room 6 undetrakes a barrage of tests in reading and Maths.  The results are used to help inform teaching so that what is taught is relevant to students needs. They are also used for reporting to parents, the Board of Trustees and the Ministry of Education.   Tests range from 20 - 45 minutes.
Here Rm 6 children work on a 45 minute Reading Comprehension test.

We have fun with the class birds and sometimes we let them out so they can play with us in the classroom.  We have to be settled and not wandering around so we don't stand on them or hurt them.  Beaky, the cockatiel likes to nibble on pencils and the edges of books.  Relish, the Rainbow Lorikeet, likes his neck scratched, as it helps unfurl his feathers.

Today has been a fun day.  We started with a trip to the School Library with Mrs Burns.  Sshe is doing a stocktake and discovered that we have over 7000 books in our library.  We like Mrs Burns because she is really nice and helps us find great books to read.  She taught us about finding a best fit book - we read a page and every time we find a word we don't know, we put up a finger.  If we have 5 fingers up before we get to the end of the page we need to get an easier book, or use it as one for Mum or Dad to read to us.

Ashton gets his book issued by Mrs Burns

Can you see the cat?
Our new computer skill today was to use TAGXEDO (www.tagxedo.com) to create a word cloud with our spelling words.  The programme allows us to practice typing our spelling words and is a fun spelling activity.

Here is Meghan's tagxedo.  What would word you suggest she add to her next spelling list?

THE LIFE EDUCATION CLASSROOM.
Today's session with Paula in the Life Education classroom was all about how to work and play with others, the importance of being honest, and ways of coping with peer pressure .... six different strategies which included things like

•  Learning to say No!
• Walking away.
• Tell a trusted adult
• Change the subject.
• We got to role play some situations to practice using our skills.And before we finished Harold popped out and talked to us.  We will keep working in our yellow Harold booklets
•