Can you Draw the Wind?

We have been enjoying having Neil Sumner working with us over the last few weeks.  Neil is an experienced teacher who is upgrading his qualifications and is someone we have seen a lot of in the past few years.  Neil’s strengths in the teaching of Art, Poetry and Design are well known to us but he has also had the opportunity to show his expertise planning across the curriculum when teaching in Maths and Literacy.

To initiate our thinking around harnessing the wind for sculptural ideas Neil asked the students to visualise the wind and then draw it.  It was something which Len Lye did when living in Wellington as he was studying Art.  He did a pretty good job of it and we think our kids have done a remarkable job too. Neil took these photos.

by Theo

by Rico

by Jan

Cross Country: We Are So Proud!

Runners; what an amazing effort!  We are so proud of all of you!

It was the perfect day for it too; thanks to all of you who did your sun dances, sent your prayers to invoke the sun.  Whatever you did it worked!  There is no place better than Worser Bay Beach on a perfect winter’s morning.

It was great to see the spirit, the enthusiasm and positive energy that went into the running. Our Learner Attribute ‘I am Powerful’ was evident in the determination and grit displayed.  We were also really pleased to see some of our senior students supporting the younger runners.  Manaakitanga is the idea that the Mana (power, prestige, goodness in us) is supported and enabled to flourish by others in the school and this uplifting of the Mana of others was evident in the support and encouragement given to all runners.  Thanks to the parents, the cheer squad too, for your contributions.  Having so many of you there made it a real ‘Event’ with a capital E.

The top 6 runners in each year group will be heading off to the Eastern Zone Cross Country next Wednesday. They are as follows:

Year 4 Girls

Kirsty

Nela

Katherine

Kate

Leola

Talia

Year 4 Boys

Rim

Hunter T

Finlay

Liam

Ridley

Edwards

Year 5 Girls

Greer T

Greer W

Molly

Eleanor

Edie

Mia

Year 5 Boys

Nick R

Ben B

Alexander B

Max

Theo

Alastair

Year 6 Girls

Kaia

Elliot

Evie G

Hayley H

Lucie W

Bethen

Year 6 Boys

Chester

Teddy

Hugo

Haare

Rico

Anatole
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Cross country

   Cross country

Racing up the dunes my legs start to hurt and sand got in my shoes. I got down the dunes Puffing hard I made my way to the finish line across the grassy plain part. Hearing people cheer I force my legs to go faster. I feel joy flood through me as I see the finish line closing my eyes as sand got into them a feeling passed through my body. As I cross the finish line proudness swept through my veins. I did it!!! I thought. Then a sudden flash of pain swept through my legs so I went to sit down with the others.

By Caitlin and Joni

Weather Poem: reading with our friends from South Taranaki

Today we read a poem with a reading group from Auroa Primary School. We read a tounge twister poem about the weather. Our school focus this term is about being connected and we are enjoying connecting with our friends in South Taranaki.

Weather - Poem by Eve Merriam

Dot a dot dot dot a dot dot

Spotting the windowpane.

Spack a spack speck flick a flack fleck

Freckling the windowpane.

A spatter a scatter a wet cat a clatter

A splatter a rumble outside.

Umbrella umbrella umbrella umbrella

Bumbershoot barrel of rain.

Slosh a galosh slosh a galosh

Slither and slather a glide

A puddle a jump a puddle a jump

A puddle a jump puddle splosh

A juddle a pump a luddle a dump

A pudmuddle jump in and slide!

Wind is the answer, what is the question?

Neon and Favourite Colour dress up day!

Neon day is a day that you can dress up in NEON (bright coloured clothing) or in your favourite colour!

We are going to have some FUN!!

There are going to be winners for the best dressed.

The whole Student Council social group are running the NEON/favourite colour day and there are 4 judges who are from the social group. It is on Thursday the 1st of June.

So all those mums out there go tell your children 'hey it is NEON DAY TODAY!!!!!!!'

Check out our posters around the school!

By The Social Group

Eastern Zones Netball

Congratulations to the Year 5 & 6 Netball teams for a wonderful team effort at the Eastern Zones Netball competition on Wednesday. Both teams showed a great team spirit and were very successful.

Clean Our Ocean Scratch Interface Competition: Message from the ICT Student Council

DEADLINE: End of Term 2

You need to make a game. The theme is ‘Clean Our Ocean’. The aim is to program the diver character to save the fish by collecting the rubbish.

What you need to do:

1. You need to set up a Scratch account to compete in this competition. Ask an adult at home to help you set up an account.
2. Download a template below and add it to your Scratch Account:

Year 3, 4 and 5: Clean Our Ocean Beginner 1.sb2

Year 6: Clean Our Ocean Intermediate 1.sb2

3. Make a game

Now it’s up to you to determine exactly how it works. You have to code the parts to the game, for example:

• You program the diver to move and collect the rubbish (it disappears when touched)
• You program the rubbish to move and catch the fish (the fish disappeared when touched by rubbish)

4. Add some surprises and challenges to the playing of your game, like a title page and instructions, new elements and actions, or different levels.

Send finished entries to Nicola nstevenson@worserbay.school.nz

Here is an example by Thomas J: https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/161906126/#editor

Win a Ranger Drone with HD Camera

And the challenge is not the only reward. The winning entry in each category will receive a Ranger Drone with HD Camera for their classroom.

By the ICT Student Council Group

(Thomas, Hunter R, Alex B, Ridley, Jupiter, Alex G)

Swimming

This is Week 3 of swimming. Flippa Ball was lots of fun. By Thomas

Swimming was fun. We practised a lot of back stroke. By Hugo W

Today we did Flippa Ball. We played a game in teams. You have to use one hand to catch but the goalie can use two hands. By Luca

I was doing diving. We went back to the basics and went back to the boards. We did two straight jumps off the 1m boards. Then we moved up to the 3m boards. By Henry

Swimming was really fun. At the end we got to do "Seals". We had to get them from the bottom of the water. By Megan

We played water polo. It was hard to tread on water for so long. We had to put our hands in the air for 10 seconds while we were treading water. We did egg beats. Our ankles really hurt. By Haare

Planting the Sand Dunes at Worser Bay Beach.

We transformed the dunes in a very short amount of time!

On Wednesday we went to the beach to assist the City Council staff planting 3,000 Pingao and Spinifex.  The dunes have taken a bit of a hammering in recent months and the sand is often blowing across the road.  

Sand dunes are a really important and unique ecosystem and in this time of extreme weather events, need extra work to be restored.  We see it as really important work, part of our bigger picture curriculum focus on sustainability and, it’s good for the soul to get outside in the drizzle and do some hard labour!  

The adage that ‘many hands make light work’ was apparent as we dug holes, fertilized and planted.  In a short space of time the dunes were transformed as the above photo attests.  

Everybody was a part of a team, some taking the role of Digger, Fertilizer etc.  I heard one group near by who had a Stomper.  I wonder what they were stomping on?  We are taking a really close look at the attributes of an effective collaborator.  This was a good occasion to see rich collaboration in action.

Good work for the soul!   

Cross Country Training

We have been training for our school Cross Country! This will be held on 30th May at Worser Bay Beach. Eastern Zones Cross Country will go ahead 7th June.

Learning to read weather maps

Today we learned about how to read weather maps. We learned about what the different symbols on a map mean and how we could understand the weather from knowing them.

We watched this clip to understand about reading weather maps:



Next, we tried to make sense of a weather map of New Zealand and Australia. We talked it through in small groups and then some of us tried being weather presenters.

"I really liked learning the different colours for the symbols and trying to work out what it meant" - Janne.
"I liked that now I've learnt lots of stuff on the weather forecast because my family watches the weather forecast and now I actually know what they're saying" - Liam.
I liked it when people came out and tried to be the weather presenter - Hayley.

Collaborative Art in Learning Groups

Today we found out who is in our new learning groups. We had a challenge to create a collaborative piece of artwork unpacking the learner attribute of "I am Connected."

We have been getting familiar with the Collaboration Matrix and using this to reflect on our group work.