An Attitude of Gratitude

Over the last few weeks a Character Strength we have been focusing on is Gratitude. We started by thinking about what the word 'gratitude' actually means...thankful, grateful and appreciative of things people may have done for us.

During various times of the day we have taken some time to sit and think about people we are grateful for at home and at school in a Gratitude Circle. 

We have all been able to think of so many examples! Sharing these special people with each other and reflecting on what we are thakful for makes us feel really positive, happy, fortunate and loved. All wonderful positive emotions!

When we recognised and appreciated people at school who we were grateful for, it made them feel proud and happy in return.

Collaborative Collages

We have been using our creativity and curiosity to zoom in and sketch native insects, birds and plants we have been learning about through our Inquiry, Kaitiaki O Te Ngahere.

Some of us collaborated on big pieces. When all of our artwork was complete we combined our art and made collages of our work. Pop by and see if you can spot some of our native animals.

Adding Native Animals and Plants on a Number Line

One of the ways to make maths visual so we can see how we are grouping numbers is to use a number line. Number lines can help us check when we are starting to add numbers in different ways.

Some of Tautoru have been using number lines to explain how we have added different groups of native animals and plants, trying to make tidy tens or use tens and ones separately. We can then link some of the learning we have been doing in our inquiry to our maths problems. Maths is everywhere!

 Here are some of our first tries with number lines.

Sometimes we didn't get them correct the first time but we went back and tried to find where the errors were. We know that mistakes are part of learning!

Native trees at WBS

During Inquiry we have been looking at the native trees and plants around Worser Bay School. We didn't realise we had so many! ...... Pohutukawa, kowhai, puriri, lacewood, kawakawa, manuka, kanuka, harakeke, ngaio, to name a few. In literacy we talked about how we could teach other people about the trees, so that they know too. We have made some little books to tell people about the shape of the leaves and what the leaves could be used for. Did you know that a ngaio tree leaf could be a parachute for a grasshopper, or a skateboard for an ant? And the kawakawa could be a blanket for a centipede or a love heart for a necklace?                   

We have learnt all about publishing and how important it is to spell the words correctly, use punctuation, make sure the writing makes sense and draw colourful pictures so the readers are interested.

Building Positive Relationships Through Digital Citizenship ...

The Year 3's have been pretty excited over the last few weeks....they've finally got their very own gmail account!!

Along with a gmail account comes lots of discussion and learning about Digital Citizenship and how to keep safe online.

Part of our discussion has been focused on how we can build positive relationships through the use of digital technology. We unpacked what a Citizen means - belonging to a community. Then we worked together with a buddy to think about how we want to be remembered online (digital footprint).

 

With our buddy we completed this Venn Diagram. We recorded thoughts about how we wanted to be remembered at WBS and Online. We noticed that we had lots of similar ideas for both communities. Some of our ideas were: leaders, kind, brave, respectful, friendly, responsible, role models.

We also had lots of fun coming up with role play scenarios in small groups. Each group was given a scenario of when something may have gone wrong or wasn't quite right whilst using digital technology. We had to come up with an act in our group to show what we should do in each scenario.

Lots of us had to use our bravery and sense of humour to get up on stage and perform these role plays! 

This week we are learning how to send an email! We have a 'secret' buddy that we are going to email a compliment to. We hope it makes their day!

Growth Mindset and PE

This week we started our PE rotation in Tautoru. Our focus is on using a growth mindset to learn small ball skills.

We have been learning how to bounce and catch and also how to bounce pass with a tennis ball so that we can eventually play Four Square.

 

Down at bottom court we used the wall to practise throwing against and learning how to catch the rebound ball.

Our other rotation is hockey. We have been practising how to hold our stick, do short and long passes and keep our ball close to our stick as we travel.

At all of these rotations we have had to use a growth mindset to learn skills we can't do YET. We know that the more we practise the better we wil get. The character strengths that we have had to use are Perserverance, Zest, Self-Regulation and Humour.

The Lion and the Little Red Bird.

Today we heard the author of The Lion and the Little Red Bird read her story to a young girl in who was in hospital. Have a look at the video. In the story the lion and the bird become friends, even though they can't speak to each other.

The story is all about making new friends. It tells us that being kind and smiling helps us make new friends, even if we can't speak the same language. It tells us that our body language, what we say and how we act are all important when we want to make and keep friends. We practised using our faces (and no words) to show people how we are feeling.

And we showed how we could get people to understand us by using our hands and not our words.

We focused on our thinking to remember what the message was that we got from the story.