How do we learn through play? How is play important? How can play help us to practise our character strengths? Those were some of the questions we discussed as we launched into celebrating Global Play Day.
Global Play Day is an annual event celebrated around the world where children explore learning through play. Learning about teamwork, kindness, relationships, perseverance, zest, creativity, curiosity and all those other important character strengths that also help us be great learners.
Zest and teamwork
Perseverance and bravery
Creativity
Creativity
Love
Teamwork and creativity
Prudence, teamwork and love of learning
Curiosity, perseverance and love of learning- this puzzle was tricky!
We had a wonderful day getting to know new friends, trying new games, negotiating over ideas and enjoying the great spaces in our classroom and school. Play is one of the ways we learn and help our brains to grow.
If you haven't seen this video before, Professor Peter Gray describes how play is important for learning and wellbeing. Don't forget to make some time to play too!
Nau mai, haere mai! Welcome everyone to the beginning of our new school year. Tautoru has been a hive of calm but excited activity to begin the year. It has been a lovely time to see all those Autahi buddies that we met last year move into our learning space.
We'd like to make a special welcome to Cat Bland who is completing her Masters of Education with us this year. You will see her joining in the wonderful learning space that is Tautoru throughout this year. Also a big welcome to James Kyle, our new teacher in the team, and to Leo Mishking and his whānau to Worser Bay school.
We have been busy making connections and revisiting the character strengths of Kindness and Perseverance. We have been thinking about how we can be kind to each other by becoming Bucket Fillers with acts of kindness, and we’ve been spotting each other being kind.
We have also revisited how a growth mindset and perseverance can help us tackle new challenges. These are a few images of us trying something new and using our Growth Mindset to persevere. We tried things like juggling, bounding balls, conquering the monkey bars and skipping. We know that new learning is tricky and we need to use our growth mindset as we launch into a new learning year.
We have been having a great time in Tautoru getting to know each other and our new base group teachers.
Today we had to fill in a chart which was "All About Me", with something I am proud of, something I would like help with next year and something I would like to know more about.
We will use these to inform our learning for next year.
Last Friday we made flowers to decorate our classroom ready for next year. We used pastels to blend our two favourite colours. We worked with buddies to help follow the instructions and the cutting out.
On Friday we had a transition day. the Year 3 students spent a day in the Matariki/ Mahutonga space. We had a chance to get to work with students and teachers that we will be learning alongside next year.
We did an Inquiry into Portraits. We looked at some famous portraits and looked at similarities and differences between these. We did an investigation into the Maths of the face, thinking about proportions.
On Wednesdays we have some Autahi children and some year 4 buddies come in to Tautoru to work with us. This afternoon as part of our inquiry into play, we designed a game together with our buddy, then tested it. Finally, we were able to teach it to another buddy pair which was lots of fun!
It is nice for us to connect with other children across the school and great to see all of the positive relationships and connections being developed.
This week for Kids Led Learning (KLL) we have been making mazes for a marble to go along. Will even put a little place to store your marble in his maze!
We have been making some rubbings of different things like leaves, sandpaper, shells, wood cuttings and coins to see what they look like, which ones work better and then making them into a picture.
We have been secret squirrels, spotting people who have been using their learner attribute of being connected and giving them a little certificate of thanks.
