Saturday, June 17, 2017

Friday, June 16, 2017

Shanty Town

Learning about the Chinese gold miners at Shanty Town. 

             

Saturday, June 10, 2017

Quiz Night Fundraiser


West Coast Cross Country

West Coast Cross Country

Well done to Caleb, Beau, Emily and Isla for doing so well at the West Coast Cross Country event during this week. Congratulations to Caleb with 3rd place for the Year 5 boys race. 

Monday, June 5, 2017

TANGRAMS

Pukeko Class has been learning about Tangrams, so combining Chinese studies with Maths (Geometry - Position & Orientation and Measurement - area). 

A tangram is a traditional Chinese puzzle made of a square divided into seven pieces (one parallelogram, one square and five triangles) that can be arranged to match particular designs.

The seven flat shapes, called tans, are put together to form shapes. The aim of the puzzle is to make a specific shape (given only an outline or silhouette) using all seven pieces, which may not overlap.

It was invented in China during the Song Dynasty, and then carried over to Europe by trading ships about 200 years ago. It became very popular in Europe for a time and then again during World War I.


We made lots of different shapes...Reid S was the first to put the pieces back together to make a square.  Vanessa was the first to make the tree.

We learned to SLIDE, FLIP and ROTATE the pieces to make the outlined shapes on the card.  This week we are going to try to make animals...bears, rabbits, camels, horses, dogs, cats...

Magnetism

Pukeko Class investigating 2 forces, Gravity and Magnetism!!!  We managed to get some paperclips floating in mid air!!!  A bridge of magnets made from a metal ruler managed to overcome gravity!!!  Magic!



Students found that if they put their fingers inbetween the magnets and the paperclips, then the paperclips STILL floated...the magnetic forces passed through their fingers!

Some students found that if they put a magnet UNDER the table and one on TOP of the table, then they could move the top magnet around without touching it!!!  Magnetic forces could pass through the table!

We found that magnets could ATTRACT (or pull) other magnets towards them...or they could pull metal things towards them..but not ANY metal...only the metals that had iron or steel in them.  Mrs Johnstone's metal rings weren't magnetic.

We found that if we turned one of the magnets around, then it could PUSH (or repel) another magnet away!!!

We could move black iron sand with magnets.

We couldn't move brass or copper or gold or silver metals with magnets :(

Magnets are clever!  Cool to play with!

Thursday, June 1, 2017

Enviroschools Action Day

What an awesome opportunity to help revegetate such a special place near Punakaiki. These amazing students helped to plant 520 trees and learnt about wetlands, pounamu, and our native forest. Where will we be able to plant next? 




Fire Brigade Visit

Thank you so much to Tim Burden for your talk to us about how to stay safe in a fire. 



Cross Country

Well done to everyone who took part in the 2017 Cross Country. A special thank you to all the helpers we had for the day. The kids did a fantastic job and used so much perseverance. Bring on next year!