Discovery Time and the Key Competencies through AROHA

This week we are having some time working in "Discovery Stations" in the afternoons.

We are learning to develop the New Zealand Curriculum's 'Key Competencies'. These are life skills such as 'Managing Self', 'Thinking', 'Relating to Others' and 'Participating and Contributing'.

We have 6 stations through which we can develop these skills:

1) Minecraft on the i-pads
2) Maths games on the computers
3) Construction Table
4) Music Table
5) Block Construction
6) Technology and Mechanics Table

Here are some pic's from the first session today!!

Maison thinking hard in a maths game

Gordy, Charlie and Zara participating and contributing to group success.

Jaylah, Rakaia, Trey and Ryder are relating to each other by following each others ideas

Te Whakaturoa is thinking about how to create an Angry Birds character

Room 16's Animations

This week we have been VERY busy!!

As you may know the kids have been studying just one text in detail this week. Learning about the characters, the setting of the story, the plot and finally planning to TRANSFORM this into an animated movie.

As you can imagine, this is a very deep and challenging task, with a lot of learning opportunities and unforeseen problems to overcome. But I am really glad that every group managed to complete their animations and did a great job!!

Well done kids, you ALL should be very proud of your hard work!!

Monster's Vest

By Maison, Harley, Elias and Trey.

The Lion and the Mouse

By Rakaia, Ryder, Shaniza and Jaylah

A Lucky Day for Little Dinosaur

By Charlie, Jesse, TeWhakaturoa, Matthew and Amelia

Little Red Riding Hood

By Gordy, Levi, Ali and Shelby

Jack and the Beanstalk

By Zara, Amorangi and Alahzay

Our 'CONFLICT' Presentations.

On Friday we finished our conflict inquiry relating to the insect world.

Here is our conflict wall now!!

Well done kids, it looks great

Next are the video's of the presentations. Sorry about the sound quality!!

Great work Ryder, Elias and Maison!!

Well done Rakaia and Shelby!!

Super inquiry Zara, Jaylah, Alahzay, Gordy and Wiremu!!

Really interesting work TeWhakaturoa, Levi, Ali and Amorangi.

...and this concludes our inquiry into conflict in the insect world. We will take some time to reflect on this section before setting off on another look at conflict through the Literacy and Science.

Starting our CONFLICT Inquiry

Today we started the 'Inquiry Process' with our conflict topic. 

This process has four steps, 1) form a question  2) find resources  3) interpret the information you find and 4) present your findings. The focus is on the SKILLS the students will use, rather than on the facts they will find out. 

We formed groups and made some questions, tomorrow we will narrow these down to just one question per group to investigate. 

By the way we saw more action with our Praying Mantis' this afternoon. I'm afraid we only have one left now..the others have been devoured by the 'mummy'. It was great to watch though!!!

Quality "wordwork" in our Literacy Time

Today we had two proud boys complete the word rhyme wheels. Perhaps the first in class to do so!?

Well done Ali and Ryder.

"learning to hear, say, read and write rhyme are a vital literacy skill"

Praying Mantis Vs. Weta

Today we observed and discussed the NZ Weta. Many of us had never seen one up close before. It led to some interesting discussion and many questions.

Can you spot the weta in the picture below??

We also wondered who would 'win' in a conflict between the weta and our big praying mantis. We were so interested we even took a vote on it!!

I wonder who will be right? What do you think will happen in the insect farm tomorrow!!!???

P.S. if you are wondering... below is how large a giant weta is:

Conflict in Nature

This term we are inquiring into 'Conflict' as a topic.

Of course this relates to war and ANZAC Day at the moment, and we are looking at this in class this week.

BUT, the kids have also been captivated by the insect farm I have started this term. We have some Praying Mantis, Spiders, Fruit Flies, beetles and a Weta in the insect farm.

Today was very exciting as we saw some live CONFLICT in the insect farm!! The large female praying mantis was eating the small male.

We all looked in wonder!! Wow, what a creepy but amazing thing to see.

See the video's below and look closely, like a scientist. (PG rating!!!)

Applying our new knowledge from Reading Lessons

This week the Kiwi's reading group have been reading about wind power. It was quite interesting and there were many new and tricky words to read.

On Friday they had to use what they had read to make their own wind racers and race them!!

Our book on wind racers. It told us how to make the wind racer.

Gordy and Amorangi before the race with their finished designs.

THE BIG RACE!!!!!!

Self Directed Literacy learning!!!

From today we started a new style of Literacy lesson.

We have handed more control of the learning over to the kids!! They can choose from a range of 'Must Do' tasks at Reading and Writing time and work their way through the tasks in any oder that they like. They can also work with whoever they like, or by themselves too.

Myself and Mrs Chapman are helping the kids to self manage, make smart choices and time manage to complete their learning tasks.

For the first day this was a great start!!

Kids working on their 'word work' activities.

Wiremu and Charlie completing a blends activity

Wiremu choosing his next activity

Harley, Matthew and Te Whakaturoa hard at work on their CVC spelling

Well done Room 16!!!

Mathletics Masters

We were really excited to present this weeks Mathletics Certificates.

We had 2 Bronze and our first Silver this week.

Well done kids!!!

Above are Gordy, Ali and Harley. This weeks award winners!!

our maths strategies on 'Pink for Think" sheets

Today our maths groups were introduced to maths strategy boards, where they work in pairs to pose questions for teach other and show their problem solving strategies in different ways.

Gordy & Wiremu were two stand out's with great questions and great thinking displayed and discussed!!

The boys discovered that by 'putting the bigger number in their heads' they could solve the problem faster as they had less dots to count. Ka Pai Boys!!

Our iMovie Trailer 'The Determined Ones"

Check out Room 16's first movie of the year. Not bad for a first effort. It's all about being determined    and never giving up.

What's been happening in Room 16???

Good question... LOTS.

We have been working on portraits...

We have been learning about sharing, collaboration and team work on the i-pads...

and we have been enjoying LOTS of books while we drink our milk in the afternoons...

Week 3's Jump Jam song

Hi everyone.

We haven't had a chance to do this one in class yet, so give it a try at home!!

Jump Jam for Fitness

To start the year we have been learning some funky Jump Jam songs for our daily fitness.

Here is Week 1's song: DINO STOMP

and here is Week 2's song: AWESOME RAINBOWS

I hope you enjoy them as much as we do in Room 16!!!

Welcome to Room 16's Blog for 2015!!

Kia Ora,

Firstly congratulations!! You have made it to our blogsite! Save it as a favorite or bookmark the site so you can visit us regularly.

We will do all sorts of amazing things as part of our learning journey this year and we want to connect and share this with other students, whanau, friends and learners.

Next for a quick run down on Room 16:
- We have 12 i-pads for our learning, we also have 5 iMac computers!!
- We start the year with 23 students
- We are a Year 1/2 class
- We are part of the Te Manawanui team
- We start swimming from Week 3 this term! Yay!
- We have class mascots that will go home each weekend with 2 lucky students

Finally for a bit about me:
- I am Mr Clayton Evans. I grew up in Dannevirke and have also lived in Wellington and Tokyo, Japan.
- I taught the last 2 years at Huia Range School in Dannevirke.
- I have also taught English in Japan for about 5 years.
- In a previous life I was an Accountant & Analyst
- I enjoy sports and music
- I have a fantastic family!!

Thanks, and keep watching our blog.
Mr Evans