Getting stuck into play!

 On Friday last week, Scott's writing group learnt how to make 8 page books! Scott's group were very proud to become authors of books and to show off the writing skills that they have been working on.

Many other children in Tautoru and Autahi saw Scott's writing group's Love of Learning and wanted to make their own books too! Many children explored being a writer through play in Golden Time, Kids Led Learning and during our quiet time after lunch.

Other children have been working on so many different character strengths, social skills, math skills and literacy skills in their play during Kids Led Learning and Golden Time.

A group found the lily pads and started building tall towers. We could hear loud giggles as the tower toppled over and then thoughts of making patterns, counting and skip counting the lily pads to work out how tall the tower were starting to pop up. Here, the students were working on their math skills, social skills and many character strengths such as teamwork, resilience and optimism - among many other things!

The beyblade lovers once again, got out their beyblades and stadiums. Here, children are working on turn-taking, resilience when their beyblade doesn't win, how to cheer on our buddies when they might be feeling a little disappointed and being connected with others.

Stars of Matariki Writing

 We have learned about each of the stars of the Matariki cluster and what they are linked to, and this learning helped us design our dances. This week we have written about our learning journey so far: What have we learned? What has been a challenge? What are we looking forward to?

Here are some examples of our writing this week:

Milli- My star is Pōhutukawa. It is the star that guides the spirits of the people who have died up to heaven.  I am looking forward to the dance for the art celebration with my group Pōhutukawa. It is a star of Matariki. The Māori have that story is real. But other people have other minds. The star Pōhutukawa is a star that makes you remember all your loved people who have died. I am also looking forward to the arts celebration itself.

Lexi- My star is Waitā. It is the star of the ocean and the sea creatures like fish, jellyfish, sharks too. I am looking forward to eating Glacia and colourful lights shining on me and wearing my shark costume in front of the whole classroom.

Sam- My star, Urūrangi, is the guardian of wind, hurricanes, tornadoes. A challenge for me in the dance practice was concentration. I am looking forward to starting and finishing the dance because it is fun wondering what will happen and knowing after.

Scarlett- My star is Waitī, the star of eels. All eels are slow. Eels move with the water and they live in freshwater. We got to paint the eels and eels are like kids on a Sunday. We get to go in the middle of the star. We get to go down and spin around as the water.

Fabian- My star is called Waipuna-ā-rangi. It is like a torch in the sky. My dance is a challenge. I use teamwork and I need to be very focussed. I need to go on the floor and very high and middle. I need to do the right actions. I am looking forward to the performance and being filmed.

Petra- My star is shimmering, glittering Urūrangi. She glistens with the other stars. "Twinkle, twilight," Urūrnagi calls quietly shaking blue dust on flowing rivers. We walk into our circle. Floating up swaying our arms up lightly, forming our line. Up we go down we go. Into our circle again. Spin, spin, spin I go. Circle goes closer but I still spin. Before the music ends I walk off stage and everyone follows.

Source https://www.sciencelearn.org.nz/images/3964-te-kahui-o-matariki

Our Arts Celebration

 We've learned, we've used our creativity to design our dances and we've practiced, practiced, practiced! Finally, today, we performed our hard work.We are looking forward to sharing our dances with you soon. 

Here is a preview of us getting ready for the big day!

The Arts Celebration

Another exciting week working our performances for the Arts Celebration. Tautoru have been dialing up their teamwork and creativity while helping to paint, glue and tie things together.

The costumes are looking great and we have even had time to make masks too.

 

Centennial Reserve visit.

 

Centennial Reserve visit.

We had a great day exploring and learning in the bush on Friday. We were so impressed with how everyone walked down with excited conversations and made it back after a big day with time to spare for Golden Time!

We had groups sketching, exploring the bush, searching for pests and more !  Everyone had fun getting their shoes muddy.

We are so lucky to have the bush so close to school. The students really enjoyed spending time in nature and making deeper connections to our learning in the classroom.

Collaborative Poetry- Tuakana Teina

 

Last week, our Social Positive Purpose Group worked collaboratively with the Year 3 students to create some poetry. The aim was to teach the juniors about the poetic devices that the seniors have been using in their poetry. It was great to collaborate and learn from each other!

When I feel Excited By Nikita and Sitara 

When I feel excited 

I bounce off the walls 

When I feel excited 

I explode excitement 

When I feel sad 

I burst into tears 

When I feel sad 

I read a book 

When I feel sad 

I slam the door 

When I feel nervous 

I freeze into a ball 

When I feel nervous 

I shiver with scaredness 

When I feel hangry 

I scream angrily 

When I feel loved 

I get happy and my heart bursts

Childhood Tracks by Soma and Nina 

Hearing tui waking me up in the morning 

Hearing the teacher talking to my class 

Hearing kids and me playing at playtime 

Eating toast in the morning 

Eating orange for lunch at school 

Eating pizza for lunch 

Drinking water in the afternoon 

Drinking orange juice 

Drinking fizzy drinks at home 

Smelling pizzas cooking in the oven at lunch

Anger by Oscar & Charlie

Anger 

It flies through our head 

like a bullet 

Causing happiness to scramble away 

Making everyone grumpy

Childhood Tracks by Ethan Gigi and Oli 

Smelling delicious flowers 

Smelling pollen in the flowers 

Hearing tui sing loudly 

Hearing beautiful getting pollinated by bees 

Eating delicious KFC 

Eating the burning pizza 

Feeling water on your face 

Feeling the fresh breeze on my face

Love By Charlotte and Cara

Love is form of relationship 

Flying through the air 

as its formed 

Love is a red hot heart 

Burning through 
The soul

Childhood tracks- Sam and Mastani 

Hearing my Dad screaming 

Hearing my little brother throwing dishes on the ground 

Hearing seagulls stomping on the roof 

Seeing my neighbours jumping on the trampoline 

Seeing seagulls flying past the window 

Seeing harakeke bending in the wind 

Eating chocolate caramel goody-goody-gumdrop ice-cream 

Eating pancakes with chocolate and raspberries 

Eating tacos with guacamole and black beans

Junior Cross Country

 Junior Cross Country was a huge success! It was a beautiful morning to get down to our local beach. There were many nerves in the air but the children persevered and gave the race a go. It was so great to see some children giving themselves an extra challenge to do the year above race as well! What a great mindset!

A big thank you to Ashleigh Lake for the photos - they are beautiful!

This week our creative minds have also been writing recounts of their experience of Cross Country. Check out some of them below! If you want to check out your child's writing about Cross Country feel free to pop in in the mornings to have a read or we can post it to Seesaw!

I was stretching. "I can do it" I said in my head. He blew the whistle, 'screeeech'. The race started. I was running as fast as I could. I felt nervous. "Was I going to win or was I going to lose? Let's find out". I zoomed across the ground. "Oh no, I'm slowing down". I was running as fast as possible. The finish line is right there. I rushed across the finish line. I finished. I felt so happy.

- By Henry

When we were at the beach getting ready to race I was scared. I was going to use turbo speed. I was scared I was going to lose but I persevered and came seventh. I felt good and happy. I thought I was a winner!

- By Zen

Crash goes the waves then the whistle foes and everyone goes. I ran as fast as a rocket. I ran around Jeffery. My feet sink into the sand. I felt sand squish under my feet. I ran to the finish line.

- By Mackenzie