Making Manu Taratahi (Part 1)

As part of our learning about Rāhiri, we have been making manu taratahi (kites). Rāhiri got his village to make a massive, long rope out of harakeke (flax) and tied it to a kite. He threw the kite into the sky and where it landed he split Ngapuhi into 2 parts for his sons Uenuku and Kaharau. Our manu taratahi are made out of raupo, harakeke and toi toi. First we had to make a frame for our kite. We did this by tying 3 sticks of toi toi in a triangle shape. We also tied a stick across the top to make it stable and strong. Next, we had to tie the raupo onto the toi toi using a criss cross weave. We have been finding this part really tricky but we have been super resilient and we keep trying. We are impressed with how they are going and are nearly finished. We will show you the finished ones next week (part 2). Here are some pictures of our first steps.

Staying in our Bubbles - Lockdown 2021

 During lockdown, we did lots of mahi. It was really different from schoolwork because we were at home. Our teacher gave us daily tasks that were heaps of fun. We got to go on scavenger hunts, make robots, build huts and reading nooks, creating obstacle courses and games, we used our maths eyes, we had active tasks and crafty tasks.  When we finished our tasks we had to take photos or videos to send to Whaea Dana. She loved seeing all the cool stuff we were doing!

We also had learning packs that we could do in our own time.

We had lots of emotions during the lockdown. Happy because we slept in, had no time limits and we spent heaps of time with our whanau. Sad because we couldn't play sports and we couldn't see our friends and other family (we did video call them though). Mad because we couldn't hug. Bored because we were stuck at home. Frustrated because our siblings were doing their own things and wouldn't play with us sometimes.

We love being back at school, seeing all our friends, and playing with them. 

Here is a slide show of some of the mahi we did during lockdown.

First Aid with Whaea Jo

 Today we were learning how to keep ourselves safe. Whaea Jo from St Johns Ambulance, came in to teach us.

We learnt:

- How to put on a safety helmet properly. 2 fingers from your eyebrows to the top of the helmet. A 'V' by your ear and 1 finger space under the strap on your chin.  You should wear a helmet, elbow pads, wrist braces, and knee pads when you are on a skateboard, scooter, and skates.

We also learnt that when we fall we should try to fall onto our knees then our hands to protect our head.

- If you get a blood nose, you pinch the soft part of your nose, lean forward, and have a tissue to catch any blood. Putting an ice pack on the back of your neck can help cool you down and slow the bleeding. 

- Always ask an adult for help when you are cooking with hot foods or wear kitchen mitts.

- If you cut yourself, or chop your finger off you need to hold a cloth onto it and press hard. Call for help. Put your hand above your head to slow the bleeding. If you have chopped a finger off, put the bit on ice and go to the hospital. They will be able to sew it back on. 

- We learnt about RICE for injuries like bruises or sprains.

R = rest - stop what you are doing and sit down.

I = ice - put an ice pack on it for 10-20 minutes.

C = compress - wrap a bandage around the area to put pressure on it.

E = elevate - lift the area up and watch Netflix for the rest of the day.

We had fun learning how to wrap an ankle with a bandage. We are sure we can do the right thing to keep ourselves safe now.

Magnets and Magnetism

This week we have been learning about magnets and magnetism.  We have learnt that the earth is like a big magnet where everything is pulled to the centre. This is called gravity. We also learnt that things like scissors, paper clips, Countdown tiles, staples and sharpeners stick to a magnet because they are made of metal.  We used a big ring magnet that came out of a washing machine to test this.

We also did an experiment called the floating paperclip. We tied a paperclip to a piece of string and taped it to a table. We built a bridge and taped a magnet to the top. We held the paper clip close to the magnet but not touching. We could feel the force of the magnet pulling the paperclip but it could touch it. This made it look like it was floating.

We think magnets are pretty fun and we are looking forward to doing more experiments.

 

 

Room 16's Stopmotion

 This week, we have been learning about stop-motion animation.

Our task was to tell a simple story using the stop-motion app on our Ipads. To make a stop-motion animation, you have to move an object a little bit then take a photo. Keep moving the object and taking photos until your story is finished. 

We learnt that:

1. If you move the object too far each time it doesn't look natural. You need to move it a little bit for each picture.

2. Do not move or hold the Ipad. It must be still at all times!

3. Make sure there are no people in your background.

4. Before taking each picture, make sure the camera is focused otherwise it is blurry. 

5. You can animate anything, but when you are learning, keep it simple. Only have a couple objects that move. 

Here are some pictures of us making our stop-motion, Whaea Dana will post our animation when she has downloaded them all. 

 

Kupe's Travels

This term, we have been learning about Kupe and his voyage to New Zealand.

We created a Google map that shows where Kupe traveled.

Here are some things that we learned.

1. Kupe was a great chief from Hawaiiki.

2. Kupe followed Te Wheke o Muturangi to New Zealand. He killed him because he was eating all the fish in his village.

3. His wife saw the long white cloud and named our land Aotearoa.

4. He came in from the east coast and first landed in Wellington Harbour.

5. When he came back from killing Te Wheke, he found his daughters had slashed their chests and the blood stained the rocks. These are named The Red Rocks or Pariwhero. 

6. He named the two islands in the Wellington Harbour after his daughters. Matiu and Mākaro.

7. He went to Sinclair Head to gather seafood and collected seaweed to make storage bags for the kai.

8. He travelled around the South Island where he found pounamu as he explored up a river.

9. He started travelling around the North Island and went into the Whanganui River to find people. His servant drowned when he tried to cross the river to collect wild cabbage.

10. He planted karaka seeds at Patea.

11. His family travelled all the way up to the Hokianga where they decided to settle for a while because there was plenty of kai available. 

12. While in the Hokianga, he sacrificed his baby son which turned into a taniwha. He also cursed the place Kohukohu because his hangi didn't work. He left his taniwha Arai-te-Uru and Niniwa to guard the entrance to the Hokianga.

13. Finally, he went back to Hawaiiki. He passed on all his knowledge and his waka to his grandson Nukutawhiti. He brought heaps of people over to New Zealand and this was the start of the great migration. 

Here is our map of Kupe's journey.

https://www.google.co.nz/maps/d/u/0/edit?mid=1H-g_5oo79Cvn5laMyIfsVaplF_DDzzJ-&usp=sharing 

Term 2 Week 4 in Room 16

 This week has been busy!

First, we learnt to play Ti Uru. Ti Uru is a Maori game where we have to pass the ball to our team members and try to win a point. We win a point by passing it to a person who is standing in a hoop. When we get a point, the hoop is taken away. When all the hoops are gone, that team wins.  Ti Uru is a really fun game to play. We are learning how to catch and pass a ball, how to spread out to give more space, and how to work together as a team. We can't wait for the tournament in Week 10.

Next, we learnt about healthy drinks with Matua Tupara. We learnt that energy drinks have lots of sugar but also caffeine which makes your heart beat fast and can lead to a heart attack if you drink too much. Ribena has the most sugar in it. We should be drinking water and milk only to keep us hydrated.

And finally, today it is Gumboot day. A day to raise money and awareness for depression and mental health. Mike King says that depression is like walking through mud, which is why we wear gumboots.

Did you dress up for Gumboot Day?

 

Pink Shirt Day

 Today is Pink Shirt Day to help raise awareness for anti-bullying. Most of our kura wore pink clothes, but some dressed up really pink! They looked amazing. 

Pink Shirt Day raises money for the Mental Health Foundation.

We can show kindness by helping others, complimenting others, letting other people play our games, using nice words, including others, sharing with others, showing our 3rs (respect, responsibility, and resilience), smiling at people, and being polite. 

Every day, try to give someone a compliment and chuck them a smile if they look sad.

Happy Pink Shirt Day

Footprints of Kupe

 Excitement washed over us as we arrived at Manea - Footprints of Kupe, in Opononi on Wednesday.

Our guide took us on a walk through a garden of carved statues. She told us old stories about the gods and how they helped Kupe on his journey to Aotearoa.  Next, we went into the dark theatre where we watched a terrifying but cool show about Kupe and the Giant Wheke. We felt Te Wheke's tentacles touch our legs and some people were very scared.

We learnt that Kupe sacrificed his baby son who became a taniwha in the Hokianga. We thought this was pretty sad. There are 2 other taniwha at the entrance to the Hokianga Harbour their names are Araiteuru and Niniwa. Tumatuenga the God of war gave Kupe strength so he didn't give up on his journey. Kupe had his best friend Ngahue journey with him on the waka Tawhirirangi.

The trip was exciting and fun, even if we did get a little scared. We are enjoying learning about Kupe.

Room 16's New Students

 On Monday, four new students came into our class, and sadly, we moved three of our friends into Room 1.  Our new students are Year 1 students from Nga Rau Rito and one of them is a Year 3, new to our school altogether. 

We are excited to have them in our class and have welcomed them with kindness and lots of help so they know how we do things in Room 16. 

We look forward to working with them for the rest of the year.

Making Waka

 This term we have been learning about waka. We made two types of waka. 

The first waka we made was a waka haurua. We made them out of harakeke stalks, wire, popsicle sticks, and paper. First, we draw, decorate, and cut out our sail. We carefully hot glued the popsicle sticks to the harakeke then we attached the sail using wire and tape. Today we put them in the water to see if they would float and to race them. However, everyone got excited and started splashing them which wrecked the sails. Some of them survived and sailed with the wind. We had heaps of fun making and sailing our waka. Next time, we will be careful and not splash them so they all sail better. 

The second waka was made out of clay. We rolled our clay into a log shape. Then, we carved out the center of our log to make the waka shape. Using the leftover clay we made the tauihu and taurapa. We then attached them all together and smoothed them out. Finally, we carved designs into our waka. We found that task tricky but fun. We are impressed with how they turned out.

We hope you like our waka too.

Room 16's Assembly

 Today, we had our assembly. We had to show our learning to the rest of the school. 

We chose to share what we know about the types of waka and the actions we learnt to help us remember the names. We also showed our artwork that was inspired by Andy Warhol, in a style called pop art. Our next item was showing the school Keyanah's sign language that we have been learning. Our final item was a play called Rātā me te Rākau. It is about showing respect to Tane Mahuta for the gifts he gives us. We should always thank him when we use things from nature.

Next time we do assembly we need to work on talking louder so everyone can hear us clearly and also making sure we are quiet when we are not speaking.

Some of our whanau came to watch, we were proud to perform in front of them. We were a bit shy and nervous, but we still pulled off a great show. 

Two Babies and a Funeral

 Yesterday, one of our class fish passed away. We were very sad. We placed it in a box, on a bed of comfortable leaves and flowers, and wrote messages on the lid. 

Today, we all took turns digging a hole in the garden to bury our fish. We each put some dirt on top and said goodbye, then we sang a waiata. 

When we came back inside we discovered 2 baby fish in the tank. They are so small they are hard to see, but they are so cute! We are excited to watch them grow.

Tsunami Warning in the North

Last Friday, there was an earthquake under the sea that caused a tsunami warning in our area. People next to the water had to evacuate to high ground. We were safe because our school is on a hill, but some of us had to go home so we were safe with our whanau. We felt scared because we thought it could get us if it was a big one, and we had whanau that worked near the water that we were worried for.

Some of us went home and watched the news. Those that stayed at school played and we learned about tsunamis.

We learned that:

1. We are safe because we are up high - get to high ground if you are near water.

2. A tsunami is a surge of water that causes a wave.

3. A tsunami can be as small as 30cm or as big as 100ft.

4. We should swim in rivers or the beach after a tsunami warning as it could be dangerous. 

We felt relieved that it turned into nothing major.

Water Safety

 On Monday we had a water safety lesson. We put life jackets on and learnt how to block our airways as we jumped into the water. We learnt to float in the help position, how to get into a huddle and how to make a chain to move through the water as a group. The non-swimmers had to through the safety line to swimmers who were signalling for help. 

We found it hard to fall back into the water because it was scary. We all achieved it though and we felt proud of ourselves. 

We love water safety lessons and can't wait for next weeks lesson.

Introducing Room 16

In Room 16, we were learning to share about ourselves. We made a video that showed all the things we like to do as a class. We learnt that we had to be quiet when we are recording scenes, and that we had to speak to the camera so you can hear what we were saying. The part we found most challenging was saying our lines at the same time. Next time we are going to practice our lines more together. 

We love our video, we hope you like it too.

Room 16 Explores Kawakawa Primary School

 On Tuesday (our first day back at school), Room 16 went for a walk around the school to show our new tamariki around. We took pictures of all the different places and learnt where to find all the teachers and other staff. We also learnt how to walk quietly with our hands behind our back so we don't touch things as we go. This shows respect.

Here is our video of our exploration.