Thursday 29 July 2021

Matariki writing

This week, Tautoru have been learning about the Matariki stars. We now know that there are 9 stars that are kaitiaki of different things.

Waiti = watches over the freshwater environment

Waita = watches over the saltwater environment

Tupuanuku = kaitiaki of food from the ground

Tupuarangi = kaitiaki of forests and birds

Waipunarangi = kaitiaki of rain, hail and snow

Ururangi = kaitiaki of the wind

Pohutukawa = kaitiaki of those who have passed away

Hiwa-i-te-rangi = the wishing star

Matariki = connecting everyone together

Here is a website that gives more information.

Check out some of our finished writing pieces from the week.


























Preparing for Matariki

Today, Worser Bay School have been getting their hands dirty in preparation for our Matariki celebration tomorrow. 

Suz talked to us about the different Matariki stars and what they are kaitiaki of. Tupuanuku is the kaitiaki of the food that grows in the ground, Tupuarangi is the kaitiaki of the forests and birds, Waiti is the kaitiaki of the freshwater animals and waita is the kaitiaki of the sea water animals. This is why we have vegetables grown from the ground, seafood and chicken in our hangi. It is said that the steam from cooking the food feeds the Matariki stars.

Remember the Matariki Celebration, with a BYO lunch and a nibble of the kai prepared today, starts at 12.50pm to 1.40pm. Students will still need to bring their own lunch as there isn't enough veges to fill all their bellies!

Many of us learnt a new skill, how to peel vegetables! Now they definitely can't use the excuse of they don't know how to when you ask them to help with dinner!















Thursday 8 July 2021

Keeping the Beat with Scott

 To finish off the term we have been delving into making some rhythms with instruments.  We revisited what we learned about the physics of sound (how sound travels in sound waves and it is caused by an energy source). Now it's our turn to be energy sources and make some sounds. 

We practised making a beat and putting our sounds together to create a composition. Scott showed us how to make a four bar pattern. We are going to miss Scott in our music and everything else next term. Haere rā, Scott.

We look forward to seeing you all refreshed next term for another great term of learning. Have a great holidays!


















Thursday 1 July 2021

The Impasto technique

Tautoru are well into their Arts learning. In Visual Arts we have previously learnt how to hold a paintbrush, mixing colours, sketching techniques and how to hold a pencil effectively when sketching. In Music, we have learnt about listening to the beat and making our own beats with simple notation.

This week, we are learning a new painting technique called Impasto. We are basing our artwork off the artist, Banksy, with this portrait.

Here is the Impasto technique we followed. We talked about the new language of 'dubbing' the paintbrush, 'loading' the paintbrush so there is lots of paint and the different 'elements' that will be shown in each picture (such as Tanē Mahuta pushing Ranginui and Pāpatuanuku apart).


We started with an apple on small card to practise the impasto technique of 'dubbing' the brush with small strokes and thick paint rather than long strokes. We had to use a lot of Perseverance as this was very different to what we are used to!


We did a museum walk where we walked around the room to look at each others work. Then, we gave each other feedback before we moved onto our painting of Ranginui and Pāpatuanuku.


In Writing, we have been retelling the beginning, middle and end of the Creation myth of Ranginui and Pāpatuanuku so we were all very clear on how the myth went.

We then got into groups and decided who was going to paint the beginning, who was going to paint the middle and who was going to paint the end of the Māori myth.







We are going to put our art together into the sequence of the story just like how the artist model has lots of different paintings that make up one whole art piece.