Hardcore Hills

We start the day with a "wake up the brain" activity. Today some of us did hill sprints. 

Reflections from students:

Mitchell: Today was my first time to do hill training with Nicola I was very very puffed then when we walked down to the steps I could catch my breath and sprint.

Thomas: Today we were doing lunges and we jogged and stretched. Today I was feeling really good

Alex: Hill training was pretty hard today and we had to walk down the hill and sprint up it and our body's are pretty pumped up.

Lucas: In bootcamp today we did hill climbing which is basically sprinting and climbing at the same time. We did running up the hill and walking down, I got puffed.

Hunter R: Hill training was tiring and difficult because the hill was steep.

Rim: Today we did some hill training it was very hard my heart is pumping very fast too. I was sprinting my hardest ever. The hill was a little bit steep

Why start the day with exercise? 

Education expert, Dylan William in his Classroom Experiment (2 part series) works with a group of students in the UK. He introduces simple changes to their daily routines to improve their learning. One thing that he does is to introduce morning exercise for the students so they will be more focused and motivated in class.

The Classroom Experiment: Episode 1

The Classroom Experiment: Episode 2

Celebrating Matariki and Appreciation of Beauty and Excellence Day: Suz and Anna's whanau group

We had a fantastic day in our Whanau. We did lots of different things with our main focus being around appreciating the environment around us. We also had a focus on Tuakana Teina. Tuakana Teina is the idea of an older sibling helping and guiding a younger sibling. 

It was so cool to see so many people ‘adopting’ siblings and helping them out. 

Our first activity involved print making. We chose our favourite leaves and made prints of them onto fabric. We are going to turn these into mini tents so keep your eyes peeled for them at the Arts Celebration!

Our second activity involved the remnants of Seatoun beach constructed into dreamcatchers. We used wool to make a spider web effect to attach different bits and bobs onto. 

The last activity was some rock painting. We brought some rocks to life by painting a base colour, and then adding black, white and red. Everyone did a range of different patterns and they all look really unique. 

Overall we had a great day! Looking forward to see everyone at our Arts Celebration to see the awesome work we made. 

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Matariki Kites

Kathryn worked with Gabrielle's base group yesterday to produce these beautiful kites. 

Looking forward to Spring and New Life: Sakura (Cherry Blossom)

Sherwin worked with Nicola's base group yesterday to produce these beautiful cherry blossom tree art work. You can see these at the art exhibition on Tuesday and Wednesday evenings next week. 

Celebrating Matariki and Appreciation of Beauty and Excellence Day; Gabrielle and Wanwan's whanau group

We had a very enjoyable day working with everyone. A real highlight was Stan joining us, sponsored by Asia New Zealand, who introduced the children to Chinese painting. He showed them how to paint pandas and birds with a brush and black ink, adding more detail as appropriate.

We also talked about, and appreciated, what people and things were special to us. For many it was pets, family or friends.

We found special leaves and shared what we found beautiful about them, then made our own pictures from groups of leaves. Some of us did a little yoga. We also made stars as collaborative origami pieces to celebrate Matariki. We also had a few student workshops run by people sharing a skill that they had some excellence in. To finish we learned a waiata about Matariki and some of us made videos about what we learned.

Thanks to our parent helpers and friends for sharing the day with us.

Matariki: Appreciation of Beauty and Excellence Day: John, Shona, Tori and Cloe's Group.

Matariki: Appreciation of Beauty and Excellence Day: John, Shona, Tori and Cloe's Group.

Today was a stunning day at Worser Bay School. Our group started the day by looking around to find objects of Beauty and Excellence that we could use to create a piece of nature art.

We then created a piece of art using the bits and pieces we had found.

We then took photos of our art and used the photos to create a "Hei Whakanui i a Matariki" card for our parents. We offered to help them in some way to show our appreciation of all they do for us.
We were lucky to have Hutana come and read us the story of "Te Reo Tioriori o Manu" (Manu's Magic Voice) in Maori. It reminded us how tricky is must be for people when they come to our school and don't speak any English.                                                                                                          

In amongst planting trees with our families, we spent time appreciating the Beauty and Excellence in our own playground and in other objects of nature from around our community. We collaborated to create mobiles, sand sculptures and teepees out of bamboo. We really do live in a very special part of the world.