Mr Tucket Illustrations

We have recently finished reading the 'Mr Tucket' series by Gary Paulsen.  Here are four awesome illustrations that students have done to show their favourite moment:

Staff vs Students - Patter Tennis

There had been a lot of talk leading up to this epic match.  The students thought they could 'waste' the teachers, and the teachers thought they would 'smash' the students.  After the pre-match haka ritual (which totally destroyed the confidence of the students), the game began.  There were some awesome hits from both sides, but the teachers were just too good.  This is the first Staff vs Students match the staff have won for awhile, and it sure felt good!

Photographer:  Emma H

The haka:

The game:

Great sportsmanship:

Team photo:

Winter Sport - Basketball

Here are some action shots from our basketball session with Miss Jeynes yesterday.  Thanks Miss Jeynes, we had fun!

Tech Challenge

Today it was time for another mega Tech Challenge!  Here is a list of reasons why activities like this help us to be more super awesome:

• you need to be able to communicate well with others
• problem solving skills are required to be successful
• you need to persevere - a lot sometimes!
• a willingness to compromise is important
• you learn how to make a positive contribution to a team
• being able to think creatively and come up with unique solutions is a useful skill
• it's a great opportunity to practice our leadership skills
• we find out about risk taking and sometimes experience failure
• it allows us to work with a mixture of people
• our fine motor skills (skills required to do 'fiddly' things) develop

We adapted a challenge we did in 2015, when the task was to make a ramp to make the marble roll as far as possible.  This time, we had 45 minutes to make the marble roll EXACTLY three metres.  There was a lot of excellent discussion as each group made tiny adjustments to their ramps.  Everyone managed to get very close to the line.  Well done team!

There was a lot of tension...

Project Huia

The Green reading group has just finished reading 'Project Huia', by New Zealand author, Des Hunt.  This book was very popular, and everyone really enjoyed it.  Reasons for this included:

• the book is set in our local area
• it was interesting to think about our ideas around whether extinct animals should be brought back to life (not all of us agreed they should)
• there is a lot of action and suspense, especially at the end
• it was cool the way the story flicked back and forth between present day and what happened in 1947
• the characters were interesting

Wonderful Wonder

The Blue reading group has just finished reading 'Wonder', by RJ Palacio.  Everyone in the group LOVED the book, with several people saying it's the best book they have ever read.  Considering these girls read a lot of books, that is high praise!

Assembly Awesomeness

Tech Update

It was all action again in Tech this week.  It's the highlight of the week for most people!

It was movie making day for the ICT Group....

Winter Sport - Soccer

Today it was our turn to play soccer with Miss Fleet.  After practicing some skills and drills, we had a game.  Thanks Miss Fleet, we had heaps of fun!

Photographer:  Alyssa

Game time!

Mr Tucket

Over the past couple of months, we have read the Mr Tucket series by Gary Paulsen - 'Mr Tucket' and 'Tucket's Ride'.  The story is set in the 1840s, where Francis Tucket is first kidnapped by Indians, and then learns to survive in the wild with the help of a one-armed man called Mr Grimes.  They have many adventures, and come close to death several times.  We all really enjoyed these books and recommend them to people who love adventure and survival stories.

Created with Padlet

Yum Yum!

Go All Blacks! Game 2

Tech ICT

The Tech ICT Group had loads of fun experimenting with a cool app called Toontastic today!

Buddy Class

We had the BEST time in Buddy Class this afternoon.  We split into two groups and half the kids played soccer with Mrs Howie and the other half played rippa rugby with Miss Simpson.  After 15 minutes we swapped over.  It was so much fun, and we had lots of laughs.  Some of those Room 2 kids are VERY quick and hard to catch!  What a great afternoon.

Photographer:  Catherine

Interhouse Patter Tennis Finals

It was GAME ON this afternoon!  It was finally time for the Interhouse Patter Tennis Finals!  First up Rimu faced Totara in the play off for 3rd and 4th.  Despite some excellent shots by the Rimu players, Totara managed to beat them.  Next was the final between Kauri and Matai.  It was looking very good for Kauri, but thanks to some great skills by some of the Matai players, they managed to steal the win!

There was some excellent sportsmanship on display throughout the tournament:

Congratulations to the winners - MATAI!

Winter Sport - Netball

We had a great time playing netball today - thanks Miss Main!  Here are some action shots:

Hockey Time

After being inspired by Kayla Whitelock last week, we decided to give hockey a go!  It was a lot harder than it looks, but we had heaps of fun!

Photographer:  Emma J

Tech Challenge

Today we had a Tech Challenge - the first one for ages!  The task was to build a flag pole from which we could fly the Jolly Roger.  The winner would be the team who could fly their flag from the highest point.  After splitting up into groups, we talked about a plan and then got stuck into it!  There were lots of different theories for what would make the best flagpole!  It was great to see everyone working well with their group, and doing their fair share of the work.

After construction was finished, we had to present our flagpole to the class and attach the flag.  Some worked, others didn't!

Go All Blacks! Game 1

Treasure Maps

If you'd like to become mega-rich, please follow these maps to find the treasure!  But, you need to watch out - there are some dangers lurking on these islands.  Good luck!

Tech - Rotation 2

We were all excited to start our second rotation of Tech today!

Taniwha

Taniwha are supernatural creatures that some Maori people believe live in lairs known as rua taniwha.  These lairs could be deep pools, caves or dangerous waterways - areas that people avoid.  We've been learning a little about taniwha and have used water coloured paints to create some cool art - check out the work by these early finishers:

Winter Sport Rotation - Rippa Rugby

We started our Winter Sport Rotation today with rippa rugby.  Over the next few weeks, we'll get to play netball, soccer and basketball too.  We've all set goals around things we'd like to get better at, and you can read about these on our blogs.  

We started off our rippa session today with some fun relays - what an awesome way to warm up!

After that, it was game time!

Interhouse Patter Tennis

Our next interhouse competition has begun - patter tennis!  We played the first games today.  Rimu bet Totara, and Matai bet Kauri.  There were some awesome shots and some awesome sportsmanship on display.  Well done everyone.  Bring on the rest of the competition, which will be played over the next few days.

Measurement

We started a new unit in maths today - measurement!  First we had to do a test to find out what we already know about things like area, volume and perimeter.  After that we worked with a partner to find out of the statements below were true or false.  It was lots of fun, and quite a few of the statements turned out to be true!

Special Visitor

Today we had a visit from a real life superstar - Kayla Whitelock from the New Zealand Black Sticks Hockey Team.  Kayla is a New Zealand Olympic Ambassador, and spoke to us about her career and what she hopes to achieve at the Olympics later this year.  It was awesome, thanks Kayla!

• I enjoyed the presentation Kayla showed us, because I learnt about what the Olympic Village in London looked like - Catherine
• It was interesting finding out about an athletes life at the Olympics - Jack
• It looks like representing your country at the Olympics is great fun, and an awesome way to make new friends - Lydia
• It must be 'great fun' going into the ice baths after a game.  Athletes do this to help them recover and so their muscles don't hurt - Georgia
• It was really interesting hearing Kayla talk about her training schedule, because it seems like it is pretty hard work!  - Alyssa 
• I really enjoyed hearing Kayla tell us about what the Olympics is like - Te Ata
• I enjoyed hearing about the Olympic protocols, the Olympic Village and how you get all the food and drink you want FOR FREE! - Jensen
• I liked watching the presentation Kayla showed us.  I also thought it was cool hearing about her experiences at the Olympics - Willow
• I thought it was very impressive how Kayla got back up after her knee injury - Emma H
• It was amazing to see how much passion and dedication Kayla has for playing hockey for the Black Sticks.  I thought she might have scored more than 70 goals though - Greer

Tough Kid Challenge

BEWARE!

Please keep an eye out for these dangerous pirates!

Pirate Day

We've been learning about pirates and so today, we all dressed up like pirates!  As usual, everyone put in a top effort and we looked awesome!  Mrs Simpson's maths class also organised some special activities for us.  We worked with younger buddies to solve some pirate puzzles.  Good times at Halcombe School!