Pop, pop in the pot!

                                      On Friday we had some brave and enthusiastic readers read to us. 

They have done some great mahi with Whaea Michelle and confidently read us 'Pop, pop in the pot'. They all read their words nice and clearly.

They then surprised us with a special treat of pop corn. First Whaea Michelle popped some corn.

Next we all washed our hands and then enjoyed some popcorn while watching a short movie about a brave and selfless crow. 

 

Our Awesome Brain

We have been learning about the different parts of our brains and how they work. This helps us to understand how our bodies, feelings and thinking works. Here is some of the knowledge we learnt and shared. First we shared what we knew already about brains. Whaea Maria was very impressed with the knowledge the tamariki had.

What do our brains do?

"Our brains help us do good maths." Finley

"Our brains help us to think." Halley

"Our brains sends messages to our bodies." Lincoln

"Helps you to move and look." Zayne

"If you want to move your left leg you use the right part of your brain."           Jade and Ryde

" Helps you grow up when you make mistakes." Shem

"If you read your brain might get bigger." Sophie

"Our brain is protected by our skull." Lincoln 

"Our skull is made of bones." Talisa

Next we learnt a bit more about the 3 main parts of the brain and their functions.

Source: Study.com

 Cerebrum for thinking

Cerebellum for feeling

       Brainstem for simple functions like breathing

And then we got to make our own model brain out of playdough.

Awesome Term 2 Mathematics Learning

We have had a great start to term 2 in Rūma Piwakawaka with lots of great mahi and learning with the tamariki. Many of our class are taking responsibility for their learning and are really focused when working in groups and independently. Here are some examples of our learning.

Fun inventions created by mistake

 We are learning that mistakes can lead to good learning and fun inventions. 

"Mistakes actually help you!" Indigo

"You learn from your mistakes." Finley

Did you know that play-doh, potatoe chips, x-rays, frisbee, post-it notes, chocolate chippie biscuits and cornflakes were all created by mistake?

We experienced some of these mistakes in Rūma Piwakawaka today.

First we made playdough which was invented to clean wall paper. 

                                                              

Everyone was keen to have a go. We mixed salt, flour, citric acid (to kill germs), cream of tartar, oil, whero, kowhai and kahurangi food colouring and hot water. 

"I liked building the playdough." Shem

We made 6 colours from 3 colours by mixing them and we got to take some home.

We then learnt about how Chocolate chippie biscuits were made by mistake when a baker had run out of baking chocolate and had to cut up sweet chocolate to make her biscuits.

"When you learn mistakes about cooking it helps you get better at cooking. They made different new things." Zayne

You can learn more about creations made by mistake in the slide show below.

Things created by mistake

Iris Scott Dog Paintings

 Today we learned about an American painter called Iris Scott. What's special about Iris Scott? She paints with her fingers! We saw a video of Iris Scott painting. She likes painting dogs so we decided to give this a go. Find out more about her here.

We voted to paint a Boston Terrier. It was hard to draw the terrier but we went bit by bit which made it easier. We had two goes because we might have made a big mistake on the first go. We learned from our mistakes! 

Materials we used were: glue, black paper, white paper, paint brushes.

Mediums we used: pencil, oil crayon, black marker, paint.

We tried our best and we feel awesome about our paintings!

ANZAC Day We Remember

We have been learning about ANZAC celebrations and why poppies are used for ANZAC day.

We read the poem Red Poppy together and talked about what poppies signify. 

We talked about what peace meant and got lots of good ideas. 

It could mean: 

• you are lonely, 
• it is quiet, 
• there is no fighting, 
• everyone is kind.

We then made our own poppy so we remember all the people who help make our country peaceful. There was some tricky cutting and sticking.

"We added some red bits of paper and also added glitter and yellow paint" Sophie

"We put glitter on the paint to make it look beautiful and put it on the window." Talisa

Take chances and keep going

On Monday afternoon we had a discussion about trying new things and how it is important to keep going even when it gets a bit hard. 

We completed some drawings that were started by Fox and Racoon by using our imaginations. 

     From Big Life Journal

We were really surprised by all the different drawings we could create from a few lines.

Here are some of our creations.