Ignition Day - Sustainability

 Ignition Day  - Term Two

On the first Monday of term two the middle school had an ignition morning in the hall  to introduce the children to the term concept - Sustainability.

On the left you can see we had a poster with all the children's prior knowledge - ideas - about what they thought sustainability is.

 The children listen carefully to the opening video and the introduction by some of the teachers, including Mrs Nieuwboer.

 Mrs Nieuwboer comes up to the front to speak as Mrs Waititi and Miss James assist with the preparations in the background.

 Each teacher or teacher aide monitored one activity where the idea of sustaining something was explored.

 Miss James pasted up children's attempts to cut up a piece of paper into the longest unbroken strip.

 Mrs Waititi tested children's ability to sustain the flight of a feather by blowing it from a line.

 The children moved around to the different activities and there was a little singing and dancing.

  Mr Bach was timing how long children could sustain keeping there eyes open and not blinking. The best children got up to 2 minutes without flinching.

Some of the children's illustrations and ideas about what they thought sustainability meant or was about.

 Interhouse Cross Country 2013 

Room 6 students trained up hard over 6 days at the beginning of term 2. We ran for ten minutes every day around the school filed and recorded the number of laps we completed. Our training goals and record of laps run will be put into each child's portfolio

Some children made more progress with their fitness than others

 Poppy trained hard. Here she is putting her hand out to get a lap marker from Mr. Bach.

Naina runs past Mr Bach who kept track of the children's progress. Mr. Bach used to run with the children in past year to improve his fitness, but unfortunately a severe ankle sprain has lead him to retrie from running and focus on biking and kayaking.







Willem and a group of mixed room 6 and 7 girls make their way past the recording point.

 Room 6 children performed well at the school cross country held in the Redwood Forest last Wednesday. Josh (above) and Alex and Misty (below) all got high placings in their year group.

 

Koby (above) and Poppy (below) also ran well for excellent placings in the cross country event.

Some of our year 4 children will be attending the interschool cross country event for certain.














All of the St Mary's staff helped out during the event. Here Mr Volschenk is guiding children to the recording table. Mr Bach was the unofficial photographer and First Aid Coordinator!!!

   



Mrs Park and some girls at the recording station.

The children cheered on the other children from their houses in the races.

 Some children really got into the cheering business.

Sustainability -Term 2 Concept

 Our concept this term at St Mary's is ‘Sustainability’. Children will learn what difference they can make to their immediate environment. We will focus on sustainable gardens and recycling will also be part of the programme. Middle School children will be using the school gardens, looking after the chickens, recycling scraps, running a worm farm and trying very hard to persuade others to do the same.

 The middle school has exclusive access to the school garden's this term and room 6's day in the garden is Wednesday. In class we will be talking about sustainable practices and why sustainability is important but on Wednesday's we are allowed to get our hands dirty weeding the gardens, getting the scraps from the chickens and keeping an eye on the worm farm.

 The children enjoyed their first afternoon in the garden and found lots of fascinating things to talk about. Tae'o and Misty in particular seem really keen to share something with Mr. Bach.







The children were not scared to get stuck in weeding the gardens and looking for insect pests on the leaves.

 Some caterpillars were found on some of the cabbage leaves but with autumn upon us there should be no more butterflies laying eggs.

 This week Poppy also shared something very interesting for news. She brought a large abandoned nest from last summer, probably made by a larger bird like a blackbird or starling. Interestingly among the twigs and leaves used to build the nest was a piece of plastic rubbish.

Koby was also lucky enough this week to receive a special prize at assembly for his holiday reading. He won one of the main prizes - a book voucher. Well done Koby.

 Room 6 News - an opportunity to talk in front of the class

In Room 6 more and more children are taking the opportunity to talk in front of the class and give a piece of personal news. Sometimes during the term we are so busy with our maths, reading and writing learning that we often don't have or make the time to have news. But at the end of the term we often take lots of time each day for many children to give their news. 

Participation during news time is important for all children as it gives practice in talking in front of an audience and finding the words to verbally express oneself. Children also take great pride in explaining some of the things they are doing and achieving. 

Tyler was justly proud to bring in a monster carrot that had grown in the family garden. It was so big it had two root ends that made it look a bit like a giant orange tooth.





If you have something unusual to show the class or an interesting thing happens to your family maybe we can all hear about it during news time.