busy term!

This term we have been doing our inquiry topic on paddock to plate! 
Students have each come up with a question and have been using different methods of researching such as reading books, watching you tube clips and using the internet to find fact and answers to their questions. The inquiry learning is mainly focused on teaching students the skills of research and finding answers, being curious and asking questions.
We have almost finished out inquiry posters which will be up on seesaw soon. 

FRIDAY-TOMORROW!
Students dress in BLACK and RED to support the earthquake hit towns in the south island. The money goes directly into the fund aiding the towns and is organised by the various councils in the Wairarapa and is a Wairarapa wide event. This is a gold coin donation. 

Next Tuesday: Mt Holdsworth trip

We have had a great response to parent help for the trip and now have transport for everyone! This will be a great day exploring the out doors and getting some fresh air and exercise. PLEASE make sure your child has a full, healthy lunch to keep them going all day, is wearing sun screen and has a drink bottle - as the great outdoors does not provide drinking fountains! 

Week 2

Week one down! Onto week 2!

We have been working hard on our calendar art and now it is on Seesaw and in the hall for parents to see. An order form will be sent home this week to order your students lovely art as a calendar, diary, mouse part, sketch book etc. They all look great and they are so proud of them. If you are not signed up to Seesaw please email me at bridget@solway.school.nz and I will send you a code. It is super easy and quick to use. It's a lot like facebook. 

Make sure you keep supporting your child with their talking topic. Some of us get worried about speaking in front of the class, so if they have already discussed the subject at home, they are prepare and feel more comfortable. Talking topic does not need to be written.

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Bring on term 4!

WOW! Time for term 4!!!!

Welcome back to term 4. We have loads of exciting learning experiences in store this term. Details about our different learning areas for term 4 are in the Harakeke newsletter which is on our Harakeke Facebook page and will also be handed out on Monday. 

Along with this, will be our talking topics for term 4. Please make sure your child is supported by discussing the talking topic at home the night before their talking topic day.

Also -- don't forget pet and flower day FRIDAY OF WEEK 1! This is such a great day of discovery and fun for the whole school and would be great if you could come and join in the fun in the afternoon - a remainder of the days activities will be sent out on Monday with the newsletter and talking topic. 

Last week of a busy term :)

Wow we have been busy! 

The production was amazing! I was so proud of Harakeke and the brilliant job they did with their dance! They worked so hard with their partners with their partner dancing and the joy on their faces was so rewarding!

We were lucky enough to have the Life Education truck come to visit Solway last week -  we discussed relationships and respect with our fellow class mates as well as adults. We talked about "Happy hands, happy feet and happy words" to keep us safe. We also explored different ways to sort of situations between friends without running to a teacher. We also looked at the different ways of talking to someone and how that changes the way they feel and react. These are all things we regularly discuss in class and it was great to have Harold and the team supporting our class treaty theme of "treat others the way you want to be treated". 

SCHOOL disco week 9 - Thursday (time to be confirmed)

Yes school disco, theme of Pirates and Mermaids (how appropriate) fundraising for our fantastic Kapa Haka group to got and perform in the Wairarapa Kapa Haka festival in Carterton! 

Looking forward to this week - back to our usual Harakeke routines with no production rehearsal/haka practices etc. :) 

Week 7

Whoop whoop! 

It's getting closer to show time ---- Pirates Vs Mermaids! Hope you all have got your tickets - no ticket = no entry. 

Thank you to all those parents who have supplied a towel for the production - don't worry - no scissors will be going any where near it. 

Remember - boy are wearing PJ's that Miss Connor has bought. If you would like him to take the PJ's home to keep afterwards $4 needs to be brought to Miss Connor before the production starts.

We have the HAKA world record attempt on Thursday -- Harakeke did a great job at the school competition, so now it's time to all join together and celebrate the beautiful Wairarapa!  

Last note: talking topic did not happen last week due to production rehearsals so this week students may choose between this weeks topic of "production" or last weeks topic of "respect and inclusiveness"

We have been having a great term in Harakeke! Here is some of what we have been doing....

- Production! We are Splish Splashing in our Pirates Vs Mermaids production! We have started learning the dance and have been joining the whole school in the hall each Thursday and Friday for singing and a run through of the show! We are also loving doing some sea-inspired art about both mermaids and pirates!

- Olympics! W have been discussing the Rio Olympics during class. What the sports are. What we know about them and we are trying to keep track of all the medals NZ have been winning! It's great to hear that students have been watching and discussing this world wide event at home. Many facts and ideas have been shared about the Olympics in our talking topics this week - which you will see up on your students Seesaw page very soon!

Pictures are to come - but we want to try and keep the dance a surprise! Some exciting adventures and writing coming out of Harakeke!

Term 2

Our inquiry this term has been on bridges!

Thanks to those parents who came and helped at the park, so we could explore the different kinds of bridges. 

From there - we looked at the different structures and features of their designs and what makes them strong.

You can see what we have learnt about the types of bridges on Seesaw! 

We have now been working on designing our own structures using the knowledge about shape, size, materials and stability. 

We have been doing this in our learning buddies so they all get a chance to work as a team and share thoughts and ideas. 

Here we are creating and problem solving! 

The cycle of water and the classroom!

Here we are making wheels to visualize the water cycle. We are also working on using our oral language skills to verbally describe the water cycle to each other. 

We have also been working on different ways to manage ourselves in class. We have made a noise meter which tells us where we think the noise level should be while we are doing different kinds of learning. 

Busy, busy, busy with water!

Wow have we been busy the last couple of weeks! 

Our water inquiry is in full swing, where we have been exploring the water cycle-where water comes from, how it can help us and all the things we use it for. 

Here we are experimenting with how marbles flow down a slide like a water flows down a river. We pretended we were looking at water with a microscope and each marble was a molecule of water. We watched how they split over each other, just like water does when it moves. We then watch water run down the slide int he same way. 

We are moving on to multiplication with our mathematics --- so lots of skip counting in 2's, 5's and 10's to counting things at home please! :)

Keep up with the spelling and basic facts. They also work on these in class every day, so they will be well and truly learning then both at home and at school. 

Have a great long Easter break and we will see you all back on the Wednesday, all ready to go!

More learning in week 5

Week 5:

We have had a fun week in Harakeke this week, as we have started our inquiry into water. Lots of interesting ideas have come up about where we get our water from and what it does. We are all working on finding a wonder question that we would like to inquire into. Here are some of the students 'wonder questions' that are raining down from the ceiling!!!!! (not scientifically correct I know) 

We are getting started on our spelling programmer where the students have been doing their spelling both at home and in class. Their mission was to fill up the whole table in their various spelling words during reading time, before it was time to change to the next rotation on the star. This group worked particularly hard and were the first group to successfully cover the whole table top! well done! they look very thrilled! 

 Awesome work team!!!!!

Our beach trip!

Thank you to everyone who helped out on our beach trip on Friday. 

It is fair to say all the kids and myself had a brilliant time! 

Educational and fun, even us adults learnt a thing or two! 

It was such a great and valuable experience for the students to have! 

Here are a couple of snaps from the day!

Week 2 and 3

Swimming sport! 

We had an awesome time last Friday at swimming sports. 

Harakeke displayed their best swimming skills and we were all very proud.

 It was also great to see so many parents coming to support their learners! 

We have been working hard with our maths already this term and we are smiling about it! Great to see!

Here is our treaty that we have all signed. The students came up with these on their own and we discussed and agreed upon them as a class. 

We are all SO excited for the beach trip tomorrow and we can't wait to learn many things about safety in the ocean! 

Harakeke 2016

It is right back into it for term 1 2016 at school. 

It has been great to welcome many fresh faces into Harakeke this year plus having some of our last year Harakeke faces staying on with us as year 3's. 

We also welcome two new students to Harakeke who have arrived here from different schools. It is a pleasure to have them join us on our learning journey. 

Our classroom is set up so the students have choice as to where they work. They can choose to sit at desks, tables, on the floor, on pillows, the couch or lean on a chair, as they go about their independent activities. 

Together we have co-constructed our learning treaty in Harakeke where we all agree how we behave and go about our learning. All the students have "Signed" the treaty by creating their own personal figure to stand beside it. 

(picture to come)