Pōhwhiri Practice

Powhiri is next week and we have been oiling our Haka muscles. If you have been at pick up you might have heard some pretty powerful renditions of Toia Mai and some very sweet singing.

We have also been learning about the purpose of powhiri and the roles that the many different people play in order for the powhiri to take place. An example of this is the Kaikōrero who cannot speak without the support of the Kaikaranga.

The marae is a place where different people meet. They share ideas, sometimes dispute and argue and, in most cases they come to agreement. The marae is the domain of Tūmatauenga, the god of war but in our case we look to Rongo, the god of peace. Rongomātane is normally the god of the Wharenui where people meet after the powhiri. We don’t have a Whare so we conduct that part of the ceremony on our Marae.

Our place is one in which the kaupapa of peace, positive education and wellbeing are at our foundations so our Powhiri is welcoming and a beautiful occasion. See you there!

The Wrap 2020

 Yesterday at 'The Wrap' we performed Taku Manu for welcoming. Then Tika tonu for coming of age!

Year 6 students recited the poem "Spring Morning" by AA Milne. 

And the Grand Finale...

Morning Rotations

We are getting back into the swing of things at school, which means we are back doing morning rotations. This system is set up so students participate in Te Reo Māori, Typing, Handwriting or Spelling for the first 15 minutes of their day. 

Students rotate around the senior teachers in the order of John>Jenny>Nik>Nicola, starting at their basegroup teacher on Tuesdays. 

Te Reo Māori

John runs a ‘booster’ session that compliments and reminds students of learning in Te Reo Māori from Thursday’s full lesson. We are currently looking at how to ask what others are doing and to reply to this question.  In order to do this we are learning many new verbs.  Next we will be looking at saying the same things but in the past and future tenses. 

Typing

Students work through the Typing.com lessons which helps them to increase their speed and accuracy when using a computer. 

Handwriting

Nik takes students through a few sentences with the focus of forming letters correctly and making our work presentable.

Spelling

Nicola supports students to practice their spelling words. During the week, students test one another on their words (or an adult will help) and then they generate new lists. New words are either taken from the students writing book, the essential word list or from phonics that they are learning. Words on the essential word list make up about 75% of writing, so they are very important.

Spelling words are posted on Seesaw. If you would like to practise spelling at home you can use these activities.

Kei te Aha Koe? What are you doing?

These are some posters we have made to help us remember how to say what we are doing in Māori.

 I am singing, I am fishing, I am falling.  What other actions can you see in the poster?

She is winning!

I am growing

Kei te pai Koutou! He tino pai rawa atu o mahi!

Pepeha with our Friends at Auroa School

We recently did a Skype with Auroa School in Taranaki. We took turns saying our pepeha and saying it without reading it. We acknowledged the other school for giving it their best shot. It was a great experience speaking to others in a different language and getting the courage for public speaking. We think they did good for the first time saying their pepeha to people they didn’t know for the first time. We were very nervous and one of us nearly chickened out of doing it but he still persevered.

Singing on the Bus

On the way to swimming today our bus driver, Kini encouraged us to sing a song. Kini LOVED this. Music and singing enhances Positive Emotions.

When we connect with music it has an impact on our emotions, and is an activity where we can connect with others, revive our energy, and experience greater joy. Music can lift our moods when we are down.

When we want to share good times and celebrate, music is often involved. Music helps people come together and embrace the moment by rejoicing and having fun. When we see other people having a good time it can be contagious and provide a shared emotional experience.

Emoji Emotions

We have been learning about feelings in one of our Maori rotations. We made emojis about different emotions . It helped us with our pronunciation too. 

By Nela

By Nela

"Ka tahi ti"

This term in Kapa Haka we have been learning the chant "Ka tahi ti." 

When Matua Henare explained the meaning to us last week we were immediately able to connect to what we know already about our special native bird population. The chant first refers to one cheeky Pīwakawaka, or Fantail, joining another in harmony. Matua Henare also mentioned that depending on where you are from, a pīwakawaka following you through the forest could be a good omen or a... not so good one...

Here are the words and translation of the chant:

This chant also has connections to the stars, speaking about the careful watch of the stars and the sea. As we already know, our school's site was the perfect perch from which to observe and gain crucial information for planting crops and travelling by sea. We will be thinking more about these connections as the year goes on. Watch this space!

One thing is for certain, Ka tahi ti is an ear-worm of the highest order.

Pepeha

Pepeha is a way of introducing yourself in Māori. It tells people who you are by sharing your connections with the people and places that are important to you. 

We have been learning about why we acknowledge the land before we talk about family and ourselves. 

We have started to create our own pepeha artwork.

By Kate

By Emelie

By Joni

Kapahaka

Today we started Kapahaka with Henare Parata. 

This is us doing the "kapo kapo ringa ringa" waiata:

 

Matariki Celebrations

Matariki on the Beach

Today we went down to the beach at 7:00 am to celebrate Matariki. When we were at the beach we gathered round the fire and SHOUTED our maori haka and sung a song. After we listened to some people talk to us about Matariki and the maori history.

After all that we walked up the very, very steep hill to get to school. Once we were at the top of the hill at we all ate our breakfast/ kai that we had packed (mostly everybody had croissants) in Tautoru or Mahutonga. Then we all split into our whanau groups and had a brilliant day.

By Nell

Matariki Celebrations

This morning we went to the beach at 7:00 in the morning. We sang songs by a bonfire and did the haka. We were celebrating Matariki!

After that, John did a quick speech about Matariki, then we all had a walk up and down the beach to remember our ancestors that had passed away.

When we got to school, we went into our classrooms and shared breakfast with each other. Later…The bell rang. Anna said that we all had to go into Tautoru and listen to some speeches. John introduced some people that had come to talk about our ancestors like Kupe and talk about other things like the seven stars.

Dean & Xavier are some experts and knew a lot about Miramar. They told us about Kupe and how he followed the giant octopus whēke. They also talked about kupe climbing some rocks but damaged his penis. Everyone laughed. They told us about what their job is. Their job is to look at different places in New Zealand, which we imagine is pretty cool. They talked about different areas around here. We liked the idea of doing this as a job.

It was the best beach celebration that we had ever had. 

By Evan and Angus

Matariki

Matariki is coming up and we are going to celebrate by walking up to school from the beach on Wednesday 4th July, starting at the beach. We will have BYO kai at school to celebrate.

We have learnt about stars and how they are kaitiaki. We chose one out of all nine of them. We will also sharing what we found out with others. Here is a slideshow to help us with our learning about the stars...


By Yasmin and Orla

Matariki Celebrations - Save the Date - Wednesday 4 July at 7am

We will be celebrating Matariki - Māori New Year on Wednesday 4 July. All whānau are invited to join us at 7.00am with a Karakia and BYO breakfast together, before the school day starts as usual.

Throughout the day children will be involved in Matariki learning through the arts, moving around different workshops and working in whānau groups. There will be further information in the next few Newsletters, so save the date now.

4 Dimensions of Health: Hau Ora

We made a human whare, discussing the different parts. 

We have been using the whare as a metaphor to examine the 4 dimensions of health; Hau Ora.

Taha Tinana (the body)

Taha Wairua (spirit)

Taha Whanau (Family)

Taha Hinengaro (mental health)

We have been thinking about how this fits with our Positive Education model: 

Sing: Upoko

Lyrics to Upoko

Vocabulary for constructing the Whare:

Poupou =  Posts/carvings (inside the Whare, around the edges, each of these carvings represent a significant person)

Maihi =  Arms. (On the outside of the Whare)

Kuaha =  Door

Matapihi = Window

Poutokomanawa = The main centre post inside the Whare representing the ancestor

Tahuhu = Backbone or ridgepole of the Whare

Heke = Ribs, the ceiling

Worser Bay Powhiri 2018

On 23rd February we welcomed our new families and staff at our Powhiri. It was a magical event! Thank you to Olivier for taking these beautiful photos.