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)