Kindness Cards

It is very strange at the moment being away from all of our friends at school. 

I really miss seeing all your friendly faces and hearing your funny stories.

So this is a good time to think about someone who you could give a kindness card or drawing to. 

It might be someone in your bubble, or you could go for a walk and put it in the letterbox of a friend...? 

Here are a few ideas to get you started...

Draw a picture, write a letter, include some jokes, anything you like!

Then roll it up and tie it with a ribbon and place somewhere for them to find.

 Make an envelope, decorate it and put your letter inside. 

Put it in a friends letter box or somewhere for your family to find (like under a pillow!).

Don't forget to put their name on it!

Make some little cards with notes attached to a string and hang it somewhere for them to discover...

Or try making them a Warm Fuzzy Friend like this...it can have all of the things you like and miss about them written either on the front or back of it. 

Such a nice thing to receive.

Have a go at one of these...or try your own idea.

(Don't forget to put a photo of it on Seesaw so I can see what you create!)

Hayley xxx

Becoming a Digital Citizen at school

Digital technology has revolutionised our lives in the 21st century, expanding our ability to connect, collaborate and create in many new ways. Our year 3's have been learning about digital citizenship and what it means to have a school account so that we learn how to use digital technology responsibly at school.

We began by learning about how to stay safe with our personal information online. These are some of the videos that helped us to understand how to keep our information safe from Hector's World.

Our year 4 buddies from last year helped us to log in and learn about some of the apps that we will be using this year. We enjoyed catching up with them and next year we might be able to show our leadership and help others.

We learned about the importance of being responsible and respectful when communicating online as well. We practised our writing by sending kindness emails to each other. 

Over the year we will be learning new digital skills and using digital technology to support our learning. We will be collecting different badges to show our progress.

Matariki Celebrations: Weaving Stars with Shona and Nic

Today we worked in whanau groups and worked with different people across the school. We worked with different teachers too at different times of the day.

Nic and Shona Activities

We brainstormed the names of the stars and what each star is kaitiaki of. We were blown away by what the students already knew about the different stars.

We sang the Matariki song: 

Nga Tamariki O Matariki

Waitī, Waitā, Waipunarangi,

Tupu-ā-nuku, Tupu-ā-rangi, Ururangi e

Koinei ngā tamariki o Matariki

(These are the children of Matariki)

Ngā whetū e pīataata i te rangi e

(The bright stars that shine in the sky)

Ngā whetū e pīataata i te rangi e

(The bright stars that shine in the sky)

We worked with buddies to weave stars. We used wool and paper plates. We knew it would be tricky so we discussed what Character Strengths we could use to overcome these challenges. Some of the ideas were judgement, perspective, kindness, bravery, perseverance and zest.

We watched the beautiful story of the Seven Stars of Matariki read by the author, Toni Rolleston-Cummins:

Character Day: Chrissy and Gillian's Base Groups

To celebrate Character Strength Day, we got together and explored what gratitude means, discussed what we are grateful fro, read stories about being thankful and made our own movies.

Here they are: 

Character Day: Nic, Kaths and John's Base Group

Today was Character Day!

Nicola, Kath and John's base group worked together to create some art and music. We made kindness and gratitude cards. We also made some trees for someone that we love.

We made music to go together with a story that we read about bravery and courage:

We learnt this song:

International Dot Day- Art- Starting From A Dot

Tomorrow is International Dot Day.  Schools across the globe will be reading, "The Dot" by Peter H Reynolds. The author has challenged us to make our mark. This story links to the character strengths of bravery and creativity...

"The Dot is the story of a caring teacher who dares a doubting student to trust in her own abilities by being brave enough to “make her mark”. What begins with a small dot on a piece of paper becomes a breakthrough in confidence and courage, igniting a journey of self-discovery and sharing, which has gone on to inspire countless children and adults around the globe."

Read by Lily V

The story inspired us to do some artwork. We started from a dot and used our strengths of creativity and bravery to create these: 

By Clem

By Lily V

By Nela

By Marnie

By Ridley

By Greta

By Ruby

By Molly

By Emelia

By James

By Eloi

By Jupiter

By Hadley

By Ari