Stardome

On Tuesday our whole school got to visit the Stardome observatory.  After an awesome time learning about the stars and Matariki, we visited the playground in Cornwall Park.  Here are some of the things the children remember about the visit:

Zakaria: The blue stars are more hot than the red ones.
Pheyton: Stars are hot.
Avah: There was a big telescope.
Benhur: The golden one is the sun.
Raagavi: I saw a candle and it was blue and orange and yellow.
Pauline: We saw Maui's fish hook.
Sophia: The sun is a star. Our sun is smaller than Matariki. The earth moves around the sun slowly.
Lefine: Some people think the Scorpion is Maui's fish hook.
Shyloh: There's a story about seven little girls.
Seralia: Some children were holding the stars.
Adnah: Te Ra is the sun.
Rosa: I saw a rocket.
Tevita: There was a space rocket.

 

Dance

This term, our physical education is Dance!  In this lesson we are learning about percussion, timing and using space.

Taste of Samoa

This week as part of Samoan Language Week, the lovely Samoan bilingual team ran "Taste of Samoa" in the hall for the whole school.    We got to experience a whole range of things from learning action songs and haka, looking at jewellery and mats, scraping taro and grating koko. Fa'afetai lava, Lumana'i Manuia Mo A Taeao!

In Room 8, we tried to sing along to the Samoan National Anthem, count to ten in Samoan and learn the song "Savilvali means go for a walk".


Looking at Samoan jewellery, wooden bowls and products made from coconut.



 
Grating some koko.


Trying on some items for a performance.


Looking at pictures from Polyfest.


Trying some tapa patterns.

 
Scraping the skin off taro.


Learning Samoan songs.


Examining tapa cloths and fine woven mats.


Our singing teacher!

Book Character Day

What an exciting end to our Book Week!  Read some of the children's writing below about their costumes.





I am a fairy.  I am wearing a dress and wings.

I like my rainbow and princesses.



I am a police man.

I am a witch.  I am wearing a dress and hat.

I am a ballerina.  I am wearing a ballerina dress and shoes.

I am Little Mermaid.

I am Spiderman.

ANZAC Day

This week we have been learning about ANZAC Day - what it means and why it is important.

We had a special school assembly on Monday to create a field of remembrance, where crosses with the names of people from Mt Roskill who died in World War 1 were placed in the ground along with poppies.  All classes visited the crosses, looked at the names and talked about the men and women who died.

The crosses were removed at another assembly on Friday where special guests joined us to again remember our ANZACs.

Bike Track

Pheyton: Two men were digging the field.  They were on their diggers. I was watching a cartoon with diggers.

Sophia: There are diggers and the drivers are men.  They are going to put concrete on the path so we can ride our bikes on there.  I already have a bike. It's my brother's but he can't ride it so I've got it and he's got a little bike.

Zakaria: They cut a tree to get the diggers in.  They're digging up the grass. It's for riding your bike. I have a blue, shiny bike.  I ride with Aadil.

Pauline: Ms Mey took a photo of us at the field.  We were looking at the trucks and diggers.

Sonny: There's yellow stuff so nobody can go in.  The diggers are making a track.  It looks messy.

Luqman: I saw two diggers digging.  They were picking up the dirt and making little hills.  They will take the hills away and put it on the field to make it flat.  At the other side we saw a gate broken and a tree cut down.  There were some tall trees and shady trees.  They are going to get cement on top of the path so it will sink. It's pretty curvy like a zigzag.

Shyloh: There were diggers.  We saw another girl.  She had boots. It was fun.  We saw the dental clinic. I like the trucks.

Raagavi: I saw a white butterfly.  I was looking at it.  It was so pretty.  It was on the grass.

Leonzay: The diggers are orange.  There are two diggers.

Race Relations Day

It's always special when we celebrate Race Relations Day at May Road School.  Although we always show respect for others, Race Relations Day gives us an opportunity to see each other in our cultural clothing, talk about ourselves and ask each other lots and lots of questions.
We were so lucky that Room 11 helped us to use Explain Everything at the end of the day to share some things about ourselves.  Watch this space for more on that...

EOTC week

What a busy week it's been! While Kauri team have been at Camp and our lovely Samoan Bilingual classes have been rehearsing for Polyfest, we've had lots of fun doing activities outside our classroom, focusing on fitness. On Monday we did lots of tabloid sports. On Tuesday we had James from Roskill Rugby come and teach us how to play Ripper Rugby. We also had a visit from Constable Telisha and Constable Trev come and talk to us about their jobs. On Wednesday we had athletics and then the lovely Year 4 children at school taught us some new games. On Thursday we walked all the way up our special mountain, Puketapapa, and all the way back down! On Friday we went to Waikowhai Park and looked at rockpools, native trees, did lots of walks and had a play on the awesome playground. Phew!

Green Day

On Friday 24th, our school had a Green Day - an opportunity for the whole school to focus on looking after our environment and keeping our school looking great.

On Monday we looked at how to recycle properly.

On Tuesday we looked at the butterfly garden and planted seeds that will hopefully grown into flowers that butterflies like.
 

We also observed a praying mantis and adopted a couple of snails we found in the garden.  We did some sketching and writing about them before returning them to the garden.
   

On Wednesday we did some weeding in the rainbow garden and on Thursday we did some more weeding with our buddy class.  We dug out some potatoes and harvested some silverbeet, mint, parsley and spring onion.

 

On Friday, we enjoyed a potato salad made with our produce, raked lots of leaves and hosted green day assembly with our buddy class.  Phew!