Digest This

After Harold's visit we still had some questions about the digestive system and some of the parts of the body that Harold told us about. 

We have been reading 'The Magic School Bus- Inside the Human Body'. It was cool and also gross.

We made the digestive system out of playdough and labelled the parts just like doctors or scientists. We will be doing a lot more scientific drawing and labels, this teaches us to observe (look closely), this is where some of our best questions come from. 

Making small intestines was fun.

Zadyn and Mrs Walker made this together.

One big large intestine.

Ready to operate.

We have a poem about digestion this week. You can see the digestive system through the little windows we cut on our pictures of ourselves in our poetry books. Some people forgot their poetry books so Mrs Walker has kept their poems for them to get when they bring their books back.

Tally Marks

We have been tally marking everything lately. We hope you enjoyed your tally marking lesson during our homework last week.  
We have learnt to categorise items in groups, we have thought of lots of ways to group things, by type, colour or even how many legs or wheels.

Here are some pictures of us at Maths time making estimates and then tallying up objects in our classroom. First we do this as a class and then we have a practise in groups, but we each do our own work. 

We made estimates about a pile of plastic dinosaurs on our mat. Joe said 26, Fergus said 35, Oliver said 100, Tyne estimated 31 and everyone else made estimates between 6 and 12.

There were 39 dinosaurs so Fergus was the closest. He is good at making estimates. Hira was the tally mark master; that means he sits on the teacher's chair and makes the tally marks while we all count. He teaches us all how to do it in groups of five. We are still learning to count in groups of five, we are getting better every day we practise. 

We are also learning to work systematically. There are lots of things to think about to make sure we are accurate.  

Hira's Tally Marks

 
  

Harold's Caravan

We have put this video on the blog so other people can see what it is like in Harold's caravan.
In Harold's caravan we put pictures in order on the wall to show how people grow and change.

Harold was singing about the body. We were all doctors and used a magic wand to light up body parts and organs. We will keep learning about our amazing bodies in class. Keep an eye out for our playdough digestive systems next week. (Sorry our video and pictures are a little dark, it is dark in Harold's caravan so we can see the stars on the roof and all of the things lighting up)

Arty Stuff

We like being in Room 2. This afternoon we have been taking turns finishing our frames for our writing. We have also been working on our Harold books. We are going to see Harold tomorrow. Yay!

Wake Up

This morning we sang 'Wake up' to start our day. We sing a different movement song each morning to wake up and get our brains going. We played a game called Octopus for fitness and we were much better at it today than yesterday. We had lunch and then got to play. After lunch we went to the library for the first time this year. Everyone got a new book out and we need to bring it back on Thursday next week. Our art is on the wall if you want to see it and we will put up pictures on the blog soon.

Welcome to Room 2

Real learning is messy! So our first lessons today have focused on tidying up after ourselves. We have been listening to instructions and putting things away just as the are were when we got them out and we are pretty good at it so far. Well done Room 2, you're awesome!

Today we have been getting to know our new room and each other by making some placemats for our desks and creating our first of many masterpieces for the wall.

We have been moving around to music a lot today (due to rain). We will have frequent 'brain breaks' during the day, just stopping for 3-4 minutes to get our blood pumping. Brain research shows that physical movement has a massive impact on our ability to learn and to retain new learning. Hydration is also important, especially on these hot days, so if you haven't got a named water bottle for school please remember to bring one. I am off to my exercise class tonight so I will be extra fit and it might help me remember all of the new names and faces from today.

Thank you for sending your children to school so ready to learn and for the lovely welcome I have had to Maori Hill School. What a great start to the year. Once I have permission from everyone to share photos of our work I will upload pictures of our finished artwork from this week. The portraits are gorgeous, we have been having lots of fun guessing who is who.