Te Wā Mahi Tahi- Learning by working together

The Junior School (Autahi and Tautoru) begins the week with our Te Wā Mahi Tahi sessions on the first block of Monday mornings. These sessions are designed to spark our creativity, develop our teamwork and problem-solving skills as well as springboard ideas for further learning during the week. We have been collecting lots of different loose parts materials that are able to engage us in creating, collaborating, adapting, measuring, testing, as well as a variety of other types of problem-solving.

Getting together and spending time being able to imagine, discuss and construct is helping us to learn both social skills (communicating and problem-solving) and the foundational skills for maths (estimation and measurement, Levels 1-2 NZ Curriculum), science (observing, testing, mixing, creating models, Levels 1-2 NZ Curriculum),  and technology (creating and testing prototypes, Levels 1-2 NZ Curriculum).

Te Wā Mahi Tahi gives us lots of ideas and language that we share with each other while creating, so it also gives us language to use for writing and further links we can make through reading about different topics.



Using materials to design a game that varies in challenge level


Sorting materials to create an invention. Testing the angle of tubes to transport a tennis ball. 


Testing ramps that will carry the tennis balls to the bucket

We have made links between what we are doing and the ‘grown-up world’. We identified that testing and constructing is something that, for example, scientists, builders, and engineers do, too. Lots of different occupations have to learn to use and look after different types of equipment, so we are really careful to pack up all the pieces carefully at the end of the session.






Here is one of how a Te Wā Mahi Tahi session links to the New Zealand Curriculum.


“We are working together to make a predator-free house.”
“Why is it predator-free?”- teacher.



“Because it has traps to keep the pests away from the native animals.”
“How is this helpful for the native animals?”- teacher
“The native animals don’t get their nests destroyed and they don’t get eaten by pests.”




Science Curriculum Level 2-
Life processes- Recognise that all living things have certain requirements so they can stay alive.
Ecology- Recognise that living things are suited to their particular habitat.


Technology Levels 1-2
Technological modelling: Understand that functional models are used to represent reality and test design concepts and that prototypes are used to test technological outcomes. Understand that functional models are used to explore, test, and evaluate design concepts for potential outcomes and that prototyping is used to test a technological outcome for fitness of purpose.

Nature of Technology - Characteristics of technology: Understand that technology is purposeful intervention through design. Understand that technology both reflects and changes society and the environment and increases people’s capability.

Weet-bix Kids Try

Worser Bay had 38 students representing our little school on the hill at the Weet-bix Kids Try on Sunday. This was a huge turn out for the event and it was fantastic to see our community enjoying an early morning start to the day.  

Willow - My favourite part was the cycle race."

Leo K - "I liked the biking because it was fun to ride on the road."

Most of the students competed as individuals, we had a couple teams and some of our younger students braved the Dash and Splash race. It was also fantastic seeing a group of students giving the race a go for the first time. 

Petra - "I was so proud of myself. I have not taken my medal off."

Finn - " It was so good to finish!"

Eddie - "It was great and exhausting but I was so relieved when I finished!"

Our Bravery, Perseverance, and a whole bunch of our character strengths were on display not only on the day but during the many practice sessions leading up to Sunday.

Lucca - "I was the fastest in the swimming pool."

Hanna - "I was really happy because lots of Worser Bay kids were there."

Archie - "I loved riding my bike."

Kura - "I found it interesting that there were so many rows of bikes!"

Thanks to everyone involved with motivating, training and cheering the students along on Sunday. Let's make 2022 another great turnout from Worser Bay School!

World Happiness Day

Monday was World Happiness Day and what a day it was. After sharing with our friends the things we like doing, the people we love and that make us happy, our favourite places and colours we worked on a poster to share these with each other.

Some of us learned new things about our friends and made connections with people that we didn't know so well. Discussing what makes you happy and why is a valuable discussion to have at home and it helps to build on what we are doing here at school.

 

More on Manaakitanga

 This week we have continued unpacking Manaakitanga and how we can use this when working and playing with our friends. This is an important, and tricky, skill to learn. 

On Tuesday we shared what a good listener looks like and one aspect that came up was sharing and adding onto others ideas.  In a short group discussion we practiced looking at the speaker and building on the speakers.  ideas. We call this 'piggy-packing'.

We followed this up with a discussion on the character strengths that we could dial up when spending time with our friends. This also includes our new friends. Kindness, Creativity, Honesty and a Love of Learning were stand outs.  Many of the students shared that it was OK for friends to like different things and to have different mates and that it didn't mean they don't want to play with us or be our friends.

We finished the session creating friendships hands. These will include the Character Strengths that we can dial up in order to be the best friend but also when showing Manaakitanga.

Check out our Manaakitanga bags!

 We are well and truly getting stuck into creating the bags for Whānau Festival next weekend! 

This term, Tautoru have been doing lots of learning about Manaakitanga. A few weeks ago on the Tautou blog and on Seesaw you would have seen some beautiful artworks created by the kids that symbolised Manaakitanga.

                               

Recently, the teachers have been busy photocopying, laminating and cutting out these artworks.

The next step in the process is getting the kids back into the action by screen printing the artwork onto bags. 

So much learning has gone into these bags! Learning about the concept of Manaakitanga and how we can show it to our friends, by listening to others and by using lots of different character strengths. Learning to create bold, colourful symbols inspired by Keith Haring. And last but not least, learning about the art process of screen printing. We are so proud of the finished product too.

(The next step, not seen in the pictures, is to screen print the word, 'Manaakitanga' on the bags and iron the print. Then it will be ready to go for next weekend!)

These beautiful, unique bags are available for you to purchase as part of the Whānau Festival Fundraiser. You all have the chance to purchase your child's bag before they are all sold at the Whānau Festival.  

If you would like this one of a kind Calico Bag that was made with love and care, you will need to purchase it for $10 via Online Payments by 9am on Wednesday 24 March. After this date, the bags will be sold at the Whānau Festival and we can not guarantee your child's bag will be there to purchase on the day - so don't wait! 

Girls Futsal Festival

 

We had 3 very enthusiastic teams representing Worser Bay at the Girls Futsal Festival on Friday. All of our teams showed huge amounts of Teamwork, Leadership and Kindness in every game and also when off the court.

Thanks so much to the parents that helped out with transport and managing the teams on the day. You guys were fantastic and really made the day run smoothly.

All of our teams played hard but fair and we managed to win a majority of our games!