Spelling learning

We have such a variety of ways to learn spelling in our class - jumping on letters that make up our words, rainbow words, writing them on a whiteboard, playing a board game called ESCAPE, playing a board game that even includes making 5 farm noises.

Here are some poems which are based on a poem by New Zealand poet James K Baxter.

Te Puna is usual enough, it has a rugby club,

a cafe, Maramatanga Park, Wairoa River and even

the Minden Stairs that I have never been to.

My Dad, sister and I  do what families do - walk my dog to the four square, kayak together, go to

the park and run around like crazy people, visit

Te Puna Quarry, walk on Te Puna beach, travel,

feed chickens and visit old friends.

Doing nothing important

Simone

Te Puna is usual enough, it has Maramatanga Park,

Te Puna Beach, a fish and chip shop,

four square and even the Minden stairs

I have never been to. My dad, my uncle and I  

do what people do - drive to the beach to collect

shells, walk to the shops to get some

chocolate, eat fish and chips like pigs,

climb trees.

Doing nothing important

Rhapsody

Te Puna is usual enough, it has a beach, a park,

a quarry and even a reserve that I have

never been to. Denali, Cameron and I do what kids do -

Visit each others houses/orchards, eat sausages at the Country Fair, see animals at Ag day, run down to Maramatanga Park at cross country,buy lunch from the four square,

Doing nothing important

Rikihana

Inspired by Derek Redmond

Our class watched a video of Derek Redmond running his 400metre race in the 1992 Olympics.  Here is some writing we did in response to this video. we tried to vary sentence beginnings and include some complex sentences which include more than one idea. See the Derek Redmond video and Rise song in the Olympic page on our blog.

Derek Redmond, from England, went to the Olympics and ran in the 400 metre race in 1992. It was held in Barcelona. Derek was actually the favourite to win.

Derek Redmond was pumped and of course he was nervous and excited. Derek was determined to win. He had to warm up . he did this by jumping up and down, looking at the other competitors.

Derek was coming fourth but then a very sad thing happened. He was 250 metres to the finish line but then he snapped his hamstring. Derek grabbed the back of his leg and fell to the ground in pain. He started crying. Derek put his hand on his face but then he got up to finish the race because that was what he came to the Olympics for. But his dad came running to him and helped him finish the race - it was a miracle. Derek’s dad put his hand around Derek. Dad quietly said “we will finish the race together”. So as they were running officials were saying to dad “ you cannot help , get back in the stand” But he told the officials to go away. Finally they finished the race together.

I will never forget Derek Redmond. He was my hero. I will never give up and I will do my best just like he did. Hopefully no-one will give up. Never fall - always rise. Listen to the Katy Perry Olympic song RISE, I think it suits Derek Redmond. I hope Derek inspires you like he inspires me.

Simone

Mr E's Box

Mr E, the music teacher, told us a story of how his step dad had a wooden box in his wardrobe that he wasn’t allowed to touch - EVER.

Mr E was tempted to look in the box but he never did, even when he was alone in the house.

When his stepdad died the box was given to Mr E.

This is what we think was in the box.

I am guessing that in the wooden box is the tuxedo he wore to his wedding,it is black and comes with a red bow tie and is made of silk. Mr E wasn’t allowed it because it is delicate and he could break it by tearing it apart into a gazzilion pieces of silk. It belonged to his great,great,great,great grandfather. Rikihana

I think that in mr Es box is nothing. Because he wanted to to test his new son. He wanted to test his new son. He wasn't  allowed to open the box because his stepdad wanted to know if he would or wouldn’t fail the test. So if Mr E opened it he would see nothing but thin air. That’s what I think happened. Ezra

In Mr E’s box might be a old clockwork model blue train from 1979 made out of metal the size of a shoe. I think it was kept away from him because it was so old and you could break it. His dad got it from a stall at a market for $10 000 000. He might have it on a shelf in the doorway. Denali

Mr E has a box, he knows what’s in it but we don’t. I’m guessing it is a scroll from 1899 and it’s been passed on from family generations. It’s probably a dirty brown and dusty yellow colour. I think it was found on a muddy path. He was probably not allowed to touch it because he might rip it to dust. I think that’s what’s in it. Greta

Mr E came to read our thoughts.

Helping circle

After we do our writing we hop in our Helping Circle. In this circle we read our writing to each other - often we find we have left words out or things just don't quite make sense, so it is a great time to edit our work. We also focus in on our teaching point - today was sentence beginnings.

Speech Research

Speeches are coming up this term. We have been researching our topics before we start.
We have also started to practice skills to deliver our speech
Posture
Pronunciation
Projection
Pausing

One of the activities we have started is to say tongue twisters - can you say the following 5 times in a row?

Red lorry, yellow lorry

Unique New york

 

Class Haiku

We have been learning how to write Haiku which are Japanese poems based on nature. 
Our poems needed to have 17 syllables in the pattern, 
line 1 - 5 
line 2 - 7 
line 3 - 5

Here are some of our poems with photos that we took in the garden

Haiku poems!

Today we went in to the school garden to get inspiration for our haiku poems

A haiku poem is a poem that has 3 lines made up of
5 syllables  
7  syllables
5 syllables 

A haiku poem is usually based on Nature

Here is our class doing it in the school garden: