Rob the Nest

Today a senior student at our school took the class for a game of Rob the Nest.
Great teaching skills Jayd.

Research Time

This morning some of our class went to the library to do some more research about Wonders of the World. They used encyclopedias

Waiata and Topic work at the same time!

It's Thursday afternoon.

Room 4 is busy with topic work about the Modern Wonders of the World. They are matching pictures with written information. Then they will choose one of the Wonders to research, using books and the Internet.

They are singing a waiata Hoki Hoki Tonu Mai as they work.

Tino Pai Room 4 - what a focussed class of learners!

Music with Mrs Sweney

Room 4 go to music with Mrs Sweney, the Room 5 teacher. Do you know these old songs?
The cushion in the middle is a pretend campfire!

Here we go, doing our writing!

We are writing about a picture in a beautiful book from the Timaru Library. The book is called The Natural World, by Thomas D. Mangelsen.

Some people are writing on the floor, some people are writing at desks.

The timer is on - 10 minutes to write about a photo of some lions on a rock in Africa. Then it will be checking time, then sharing time.

Watch this space - we'll put some of the writing up here for you to read soon.

DEFENCE BUS

Today the Defence Bus came to Twizel Area School to talk about careers in the army, air force, and navy.
This was for our senior students, who are thinking about what they might do when they leave school.
We were lucky because we got to go too!

Bike training practice

Room 4 had to practice some of our bike safety rules.

Swimming

This year we worked very hard on improving our swimming.

These people represented our school and class at the Upper Waitaki Swimming Sports in Kurow: Caleb, India, Ellen, Zak and Jacob.

The people that got places were presented their certificates at Junior Assembly by Mr Feasey our school Principal.

Two swimmers also represented our school at the North Otago Swimming Sports in Oamaru. They were Christine and Caleb.

Tino pai to everyone from Room 4 who improved in their swimming ability this summer.

D.E.A.R. Reading

Each day after morning tea break everyone in our school does D.E.A.R. reading.
D.E.A.R. stands for Drop Everything and Read.
We all get to read our novels for about 20 minutes.

Here are some of our class members favourite novels:

1. A.J. likes reading Goosebumps books because they are good books to read for his age. A.J. says they are not scary for him.

2. Iain likes reading Goosebumps books too, because they are funny. His favourite Goosebumps book is Monster Blood.

3. Jack is reading Will Solvit and the Dreaded Droids by Zed Storm.

4. Shanelle is reading a book called Castle of the Zombies.

5. Laelani is reading one of the Silver Dolphin adventure books.

6. Ellen is reading Just Jack by Adele Broadbent. Just Jack is the one of the finalist books in the N.Z. Book Awards.

Natural Wonders of the World

This afternoon we spent some time on the Internet finding out what the Wonders of the World are.
We learned that there are more than one list on Wonders and that the Greeks made the first list of wonders from places near Greece. We learned that they put seven wonders on their list because they thought 7 was a special number.
In these photos we are studying and colouring pictures of the Natural Wonders of the World and talking about where they are and what amazing places they are. Everyone is trying really hard to get the colours right.

PHOTOS OF OUR LEARNING

Here are two photos that show some of our learning. The first is the hallway outside our classroom. Our animal stories are displayed for other students, parents and visitors to read. We have some writing on the table too, about a scene in Iceland.

The second photo is part of our topic wall, with lots of maps about the wonderful world we live in.

We love our bright classroom and the bright display boards in the hallway that Mr White and the seniors made.

Knowing Our World

KNOWING OUR WORLD

We are part way through a big study about Earth. We have been doing a lot of work together and soon we will start an inquiry into Wonders of the World.

Today we have sat down with partners to share the work in our books.  We talked about the things we have learned. Here are some photos of the sharing time.

Here are some of the things we have learned:

* The names of all the continents - Joseph
* How the world might have been a long time ago (Gondwanaland) - Samuel
* The names of some of the big mountains, for example the Andes in South America -Shanelle
* I thought there would be less deserts in the world than there are. I learned there are more by studying maps - Jilun
* I learned all the ocean names - Sarah
* I got a bit confused when we did a jigsaw of the continents joined together but I liked doing it - Zak
* I learned where the great lakes are in North America and I learned their names. The names are Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie and Superior - Jaimee
* I learned about mountains in the oceans. I didn't know there was mountains in the oceans - A.J.
* I learned about the volcanoes and the fault-lines in the Earth - Ryan A.
* I learned the world names from the old days - Eurasia and Gondwanaland - Iain
* I learned about the longitude and latitude - Kian
* I learned that Europe has over 5 million people - Lewis
* I learned that there are trenches in the ocean - India
* I learned the names of the some of the biggest cities in the world. Some are Tokyo, Seoul, Mexico City, Mumbai and New York City - Josh
* I learned some of the places where hardly any people live. Some of them are Greenland, Antarctica, the polar deserts, the Sahara Desert and the middle of Australia - Bailey
* I learned the names of the winds, for example the Roaring Forties and the South East Trade Winds - Jacob
* I learned about the vegetation in the world. I was surprised that the map showed nearly of New Zealand was temperate forest - Ellen
* I learned that the oceans have lots of valleys called trenches - Stormy-Lee
* I learned what the longest river in the world is. It is the Nile River in Egypt - Laelani
* I learned that Madagascar has some mountains - Tom
* I learned that the Himalayas is the biggest group of mountains - Kyle
* I learned the names of places that have lots of rainfall. Some are South America in the Amazon Rainforest, the West Coast of the South Island of N.Z., the Cook Islands, parts of Africa and the bottom of Asia - Ryan N.
* I learned about the points on a compass - Taine
* I learned about keys on maps - Amy
* I learned that there are lots of mountains in the seas - Jack

We are feeling clever!


Watch this space for more news about our world study, especially about our Inquiries into the Wonder of the World.

Aoraki E


Aoraki E is our school waiata. Here are Room 4 singing and doing the actions in the music room with Mrs Sweney.

HERE ARE A COUPLE OF OUR ANIMAL STORIES - DO YOU LIKE THEM?
We hope our writing puts a picture in your mind.

Tessa The Sleepy Cat

Tessa likes to sleep in my room on my bed. It is annoying. I get angry at Tessa. Tessa hates it when I get angry at her. I get angry at her because she chews my blanket. It is my favourite blanket.

Tessa is grey with a bit of black. Her eyes are green. She is grey and has a bit of black on her back and face. She is mostly grey. She has long whiskers. Her noise is small and pink.

Tessa well never chase a ball or play with my other cat Dusty.

I love her no matter what. She is my favourite cat.

Tessa loves to drink milk. When mum gets the milk out of the fridge she mieows for milk. She is cute.

By Laelani 

My Pet Cat

Gin my cat is sometimes naughty. Gin is naughty because she claws your neck and bites. She jumps to scratch you.

At night Gin goes out to chase birds or rabbits, and in the morning a bird or a rabbit is on the floor.

Every day our cats fight and they run around the house and nearly trip us up.

At night when I am trying to sleep Gin comes on to my bed and she stands on my neck and puts her head in my face. It hurts.

Gin has brown eyes, black and white fur, and a white tummy too.

Her birthday is on the first of October. She is 2 years old but she is 3 this year.

By Bailey 

The Smiley Dog

Chevy is a smiley dog. When he smiles it looks like he is growling. He smiles lots. When we arrive he comes straight to the garage to see us. When we get out of the car he jumps up at us a crazy way and smiles.

Chevy loves to go to work with my Dad. He loves to go so he can chase rabbits. He roams around free like a wild animal. He smells like a wet dog that he is. We have to wash him lots and whenever we go to the lake Dad throws him in or he throws a stick in the water so he goes to get it.

Chevy is black, white and brown. He has a black back and head, and white and brown legs.

Chevy would never jump up at the fish tank.

He loves to play with Dad and mouth the bottom of your pants when he is excited.

By Jaimee  

Kim My Dog

Kim is a funny dog when she jumps up like a human.

When the cat is not looking she likes to sneak up and fight until Molly runs away.

Kim is very adventurous. She likes sniffing the place when we go for walks. She sometimes runs after rabbits.

She would love a tennis ball. She has her own flat soccer ball as well. She sometimes drops the ball on Molly. Sometimes she eats all the cat biscuits. Once she found a banana skin on the ground. She looks at me with her circle brown eyes wagging her tail.

Kim would run as far as she could but she’s not allowed to. We always give her a pat before we go to school. She is a border terrier.

By Kyle age8

My Best Animal Friend Joey  

Joey is a smart dog - the smartest Jack Russel I know.

If Joey wants to get an apple from up high he will make a plan to get it down. He grabs some stuff and makes a high platform. Then he jumps up and takes a bite out of it with his jaw. After that he starts ripping and tearing it apart. When he is finished he walks away. It gets all mouldy. It’s pretty disgusting.

Sometimes Joey hides somewhere in the house and we think he’s outside. Then he quickly jumps out of his hiding spot and jumps onto the chair, then he jumps onto the table and takes one big chunk out of a cake. There’s just one thing that Joey would never do – that is he would never rip and tear up a couch like most guard dogs do.

Joey is a naughty dog - the naughtiest dog in town. He pulls a lot of pranks. Some pranks are funny and some pranks hurt. The funniest prank ever is when he farted in my room and when I came out I smelt horrible.

I am sad because Joey died but he will always be in my heart.

By Zak

My Awesome Dog Roxy

Roxy is a playful dog. What she does that is so playful is jump all over me.  When I wake up she’s always on my bed and she jumps on me and licks me. Then I push her off me and she bites me. Even when I’m on the sofa she licks me. That’s annoying!

Every time we go on a walk Roxy goes crazy man. When we come home Roxy gets a special treat and guess what the treat is - it is cat biscuits. Every time my cat Tockso see’s Roxy eating his cat biscuits Tockso will steal them or claw or bite Roxy’s face off.

Roxy will never play with Tockso or Shadow my other cat because Tockso does not like Roxy and Roxy does not like Tockso and because Tockso will just claw her face off and Roxy will bite Tockso.

When Roxy is sad she looks at me with her brown eyes. She will just jump on me and she will go to sleep on me for hours when I’m in my bed. When it’s bed time mum calls Roxy to go on the mat and go to sleep but Roxy does not listen. Instead she sleeps in my bed and when I wake up there’s black, white, and brown dog fur on my bed.

Every time someone comes down the drive way Roxy barks. Sometimes when she barks she gets sent to the laundry and sometimes she doesn’t, and when the person comes in Roxy jumps all over them and I say no and then I say  “Roxy down” and she goes to the laundry and in a while when the person leave I let Roxy out of the laundry.

At night Roxy sneaks in the cupboard and sneaks cat biscuits for a midnight snack and I catch her in the cupboard and so does Tockso and Tockso tries to sneaks some and I say “Go away Tockso.”In the morning it another day with Roxy Dan dada!!!                  

By Joseph

BIKE SAFETY STUDY


We have been learning about Bike Safety. Constable Hocking came from the Timaru Police to help us. Some parents came to help with the last session too.

MATHLETICS

Mathletics is a great computer programme. It helps us learn and it is fun too. We do it at school and lots of people do it at home too.

Room 4 Learning Diarys

 This is Room 4 writing in their learning diaries. We have to write in them every day about what we are learnt that day. You have to have about 30 or more words. Some people get about 100 words each day!

Reporters- Ellen and Jaimee