Counting and proportion Christmas decorations

Today we created some beautiful wreaths. We practiced our counting while we waited for the hot glue to dry. We had to consider what decorations would look good on our wreaths and where to put them.

Good cat or bad cat mystery.

We had a mystery to solve in Rūma Piwakawaka on Thursday. Whaea Maria's cat had been catching skinks and bringing them into the garage. Whaea Maria had collected and frozen the skinks so we could study them.

There are 2 types of skinks in New Zealand which look almost exactly the same but one in native to Aotearoa (good) and one that is a pest called a Rainbow Skink which came from Australia (bad). Leo said "The native has 2 scales in the head."

We got out our magnifying glasses to see if the cat was killing good or bad skinks.

Whaea Michelle also showed us that some skinks had short tails and some long tails and some no tails. Whaea Michelle taught us that skinks loose there tails so they can escape cats trying to eat them.

We also looked at the skinks under the microscope and took photos. Quinn said "There is no scales on the tail. Oh that rhymes!" Their feet are a bit like our hands

Some of the tamariki were brave and touched the skinks. "It feels like a soft blanket." said Talisa, Jessie said "It felt weird!" Vann said "It felt scaly." Maddy agreed and said "It felt a bit like a snake because the scales look similar."

Unfortunately we think from our investigation that Missy is a bad cat as she has been catching native skinks.