Term 2, Week 7

 Welcome back from what I hope was a fabulous long weekend for all :) And, first of all, a big well done to everyone in Room 3 on winning the We Care Award last week for taking care of our classroom. What a super bunch of tidier-uppers we are! We can always practise being tidy at home to help out our families too :)!

We had a great time kicking off last week with a gymnastics session in the hall! We really enjoyed learning a new tag game, sharks and islands, and are becoming very good at using safe techniques when we jump, roll, land, balance and hop! We made some high impact mixed media art work (and began some spectacular 'winter' art with Mrs Jessop), and had fun posing on our new junior playground. Have you been in to look at our gorgeous photos on our writing wall? We did an awesome job of sharing these photos and our stories when we performed at junior assembly on Tuesday. We also made some very effective digital puppet plays on our ipads.

This week we will continue with our gymnastics programme, and will begin to explore responding to music and to rhythm in text using our bodies to create and echo beats. We’ll also be looking at the way music videos enhance the music they support, and will look at a range of different music and video styles with a mind to creating some video clips of our own next week! 

Of course we also continue to race along with our reading, writing and maths as usual. Some families will have noticed that their children are now reading at level 12 (green) or higher, which is the standard expected after one year of school, i.e. at age 6. These children will no longer bring home four books a week as their reading mileage is already very high. Instead they will bring home one book every two days. Please re-read the books sent home on Mondays/Wednesdays on Tuesdays/Thursdays (this pattern will of course be disrupted this week because of the public holiday :)). On the second reading, children are expected to practise reading with fluency and expression. Ask them to explain what they are reading in their own words.

Once again we are looking forward to seeing Mrs Fleur Jessop on Wednesday while Miss Driver is working on our new topic unit (sustainability) with the school planning team : )

Gymnastics

We are so excited to be beginning our gymnastics programme in Room 3! Today we started with a very energetic game of sharks and islands to get our blood pumping, and then moved on to rehearsing our skills for jumping and landing (bent knees for great spring and shock absorption!), and for balancing as we walk forwards and backwards along a beam. We know that when we extend our arms and keep them straight (and when we keep our head up and our eyes straight ahead) that it is easier to balance - we are keeping a very even centre of gravity.

Cameron (Lucy M's little brother)

We were so lucky in Room 3 today to have a visit from Lucy M's very new baby brother Cameron and from Lucy and Cameron (and Ben's) Mum Sharon. Cameron is only a few weeks old - it's amazing to think that we all used to be that cute :) Thanks for the visit, we enjoyed asking lots of baby questions!

Term 2, Week 6

Thanks again to everyone for another super week in Room 3, and a big congratulations to all Room 3 students who ran in the junior school cross country last Tuesday, it was an amazing effort by all! We have also now competed our Chinese experience with Mrs Pauline Chan as well as our KOS programme with Constable Garland.

This week the junior syndicate is beginning a gymnastics programme. We will go to the hall twice a week and try out a variety of equipment as we develop our balance, strength and agility. We are also continuing with our mixed media art programme as well as our music focus, and we’ll be using the ipads and laptops to refine our ICT skills as we reflect on our KOS skills for saying no (ask, tell, yell!) and what we have learned about time. 


A note for all students and homework helpers; as a class, we need to be paying close attention to the words we read when we are sharing a story. Please focus on monitoring your own reading to check that what you are saying matches the sense of the story (you might find some clues in the pictures), and that it matches the letters you see as well. If you get stuck on a word, try


- guessing what might make sense
- looking for a clue in the picture
- sounding out the letters (get your mouth ready for the first sound and then go from there - you could even robot as you sound out!)
- going back to the start of the sentence to try again
- looking for smaller words that you know inside the bigger one (e.g. today we found FOUR words in shellfish - she, is, shell and fish!)


Once again we are looking forward to seeing Mrs Fleur Jessop on Wednesday while Miss Driver is on release.

KOS Constable Garland's final visit

We really enjoyed our final visit from Constable Garland. He talked to us about safety rules for different confusing situations, and we practised "saying no"! We must always remember to ask, then tell, then yell, and to step back out of reach as we say "no"! We also talked about people we trust, and people we can tell "secrets" to if we are unsure about something that has been said or something that has happened to us. We know that we must always keep on telling people about these things until someone believes what we say and fixes the problem so that we feel safe. 

In our photos we are looking at different tricky situations, and we are asking, telling and yelling at Constable Garland and moving out of his reach when we say "no" - we certainly know how to stay safe!! Bridget is practising dialling 111 (to speak to Miss Driver, the ambulance officer)!

Firewise

Last Wednesday Room 3 had a visit from two local fire fighters. They taught us the safety rules for preventing fires, and all about what to do if there IS a fire. We understand that we need to stay low to the ground in a fire so that we are below the level of the smoke and don't breathe it in, and we practised leaving a building quickly in this way. We know the number to call if we need a fire engine - 111. We also talked about smoke alarms ... Do you have working smoke alarms in your home? Have you tested them lately? Remember, smoke alarms save lives!

Cross Country

Well done to all students who ran in the Junior School cross country last Tuesday. It was awesome to see children putting in their very best effort and remembering to lift their knees, jog their arms and breathe steadily. Top job Room 3! Congratulations to all children who received a certificate for first, second or third place, and a big cheer for everyone because you all deserve it :)

On our marks ... get set ... go!

Term 2, Week 5

What busy times we've had! We enjoyed our Rooster Booster session on Monday (none of us are anywhere NEAR tall enough yet to be out of our booster seats…) and we loved our visit from Valanga Khoza on Tuesday. We talked about and named the different parts of our bodies, described how different kinds of touch make us feel, learned about saying "no" to Keep Ourselves Safe, and had a visit from Constable Garland on Friday. It was also fabulous to see so many Room 3 children at lunchtime Jump Jam on Tuesday and Thursday!

This week we enjoy the final session of our Chinese programme, and welcome Constable Garland again for a final KOS visit on Friday (this week we are learning about secrets and tricks, asking for help, and safety rules). Don’t forget – our school cross country is on Tuesday (22 May), and parents are invited to come along to watch us race! This year the course has been set around Birchwood School (for safety and timing reasons), and we’ll be starting out on the field beside the school hall at 11.30am. Please make sure that children are wearing appropriate shoes (with their school uniform, as usual), as the course won’t be suitable for bare feet (there is a bark-chip section over the senior playground). Parents may sit on the hall steps, or with their children who will be seated in class groups on the grass beside the hall (children must remain with their classes).  We are also looking forward to a special fire safety session on Wednesday with some fire fighters from the local station.

Once again we are looking forward to seeing Mrs Fleur Jessop on Wednesday while Miss Driver is on release.

Valanga Khoza

Last week we were thrilled to have a visit from Valanga Khoza, a very talented South African musician and performer. We loved his improvised instruments and funny jokes!

Rooster Booster

On Monday we met RB, Rooster Booster! We learned that it in order to be safe in the car we need to be in a booster seat until we are 148cm tall... The tallest person in Room 3 was just over 120cm tall, so we have a long way to grow before we can leave our booster seats!

We enjoyed being measured and meeting RB!

Music in Room 3

In Room 3 we have been enjoying listening to different styles of music from different parts of the world. When we listen to the music, we think about what we hear (beat, rhythm, tune, tone, speed, energy, sounds) and what could be making the sounds we hear (voices, instruments, other ...). We experience how the music makes us feel and how it makes us want to move.

If you are interested, these are two great sites for looking at different kinds of music and instruments ...

http://www.classicsforkids.com/

http://www.soundjunction.org/default.aspa

Term 2, Week 4

A big thanks to everyone for getting through week 3! All of the relievers in Room 3 tell us what a lovely class we are, and it's great to hear that we practise our good manners and keep up our super positive attitude to learning even when our routines are a little disrupted :) 

We really enjoyed our NZSL experience and our Chinese experience last Monday – some of us even had kapa haka at lunchtime, and that makes four languages (counting english!) in one day, fabulous!!! We enjoyed sharing our mixed media artwork in junior assembly, and had a great visit with Constable Garland on Tuesday, as well as Bible in Schools. We had a number of different teachers, and on top of all that we tried out a few experiments for science week, made up some puppet plays, and began our music unit – whew!

This week we continue with the Chinese programme and Bible in Schools, and are looking forward to another visit from Constable Garland on Friday. We have a Rooster Booster (car seat safety) session on Monday, and our fabulous performing artist Valanga Khoza on Tuesday (another good chance to be thinking about music!). We’ll also continue with our fitness focus – the cross country is coming in fast, so make sure you get in plenty of practice :) 

Once again we are looking forward to seeing Mrs Fleur Jessop (our art specialist!) on Wednesday while Miss Driver is on release :) Don’t forget your library book and bag, Wednesday is our library day!