The End is Near.

 

It has been a long year and a long break between posts.  I apologize for that.  Even our student class blogs have been few and far between.  We were told that the fine print in the Blogger T.O.S stated our students needed to be older to use it.   We have since been allowed back in and gone back to our old weekly routine of 'trying' to write our blogs.

The lockdowns have been forgotten but not the lack of parents in the gate.  Hopefully, in 2022 we manage to solve that problem. 

The production has been a huge wack of time out of our week and couple that in with Kapa Haka, sailing and other necessary tasks,  the end of the year seems like a dream.

We have been doing a little Minecraft this week and it does seem like the biggest possible carrot to get students focused.   Get your children to show you the layout of the Minecraft Monthly Challenges.   The first one we had a go at was the Island Challenge.

The students had to build something on a desert island and then write out explaining their decisions and reasons behind their choices and why they built what they built.  They also had to explain the environmental impact of what they had built in their islands.  Some did this really well and some had trouble seperating the creating from the writing.  We will continue to try this next year.

I will miss this year's Year 6's greatly and wish them all the best for 2022.

Remembering the Anzacs.

 As term 1 draws to a close Kererū has been looking at and studying the Anzac campaign at Gallipoli.  This was the most awesome unit of work to do and one that has really made the children recognise what Anzac day is all about.   This is a difficult concept for children of any age, especially with the Gallipoli landings taking place over a hundred years ago.

The discussions and short children friendly clips we watched explained the Anzac campaign in very easy language.   I was so pleased with the respectful and responsible way that the year 5s and 6s have totally engaged in this project.  The students learnt about the horrific conditions and a little about New Zealand's effort with the Australians.  We then got into writing mode and put ourselves in the position of an Anzac soldier or nurse and wrote a letter home to family.   The hundreds of lines that are now up on our wall are a true testament to the students understanding.   Try asking them a question about Anzac day now and let us know how it goes.

Kererū 2021 Hits the Ground Running.

 It has been a busy start to our year and even in 11 days we seem to have accomplished so much.  

I always think that there is so much responsibility for our year 5s and 6s to think about.  Sports and P.E. Council, Senior Student Council,  Gate Duty,  Peer Mediators, Librarians just to name a few.  I am really impressed with how this class has jelled together so well.  We have people away for appointments and arranged days off and our wonderful group of students are covering for each other and offering to do duties without anyone having to remind them.  This really is a sign of maturity.

Our writing is off with a hiss and a roar with our Learn, Create, Share philosophy really being tested with our task of creating Ebooks.  We are getting inspiration from the Pobble365 site and creating our stories first.  We are then being reminded this week that when we finish a story that is not the end of the writing process.  We are practicing 'Recrafting.'    Recrafting is going back through our stories and improving them, and being more descriptive in order to paint pictures in peoples minds to make the stories better.

When we are finished the stories we will turn them into ebooks that can be shared.  We will evaluate our efforts hopefully after that.

Looking forward to starting our Rocket Challenge soon and our 1,2,3 Tech Challenge.  Ask your kids what these are.