Happy Easter Everyone!

Happy Easter Everyone!
We had a lot of fun making our Easter crafts on Thursday morning. The baskets were quite tricky but thanks to Mrs McRae, Mrs Rose and Grandma we got them done.

Who burnt the hot cross buns Mrs Reid??? They were still quite yummy once we cut the tops off. 

Who knew you could make a cute bunny out of a sock? Well Mrs Clark did and she kindly shared the great idea with us. Mrs McRae has now helped make nearly 60 of these! 

So a very fun and busy day. Happy Easter everyone.

Last Friday we had a very memorable visit from Libby Bowles, who talked about making her bamboo bike, and about her work with aquatic animals. Libby and her bike travel around the world teaching people about the dangers of single use plastics. She was inspiring!

She made and painted the bike herself and she has written some very cool sayings onto the bike - like "Yes you can" and "I wonder what would happen of I didn't give up?"

Her main message is that she encouraged us to add the work "REFUSE" to the usual message "Reduce, Re-use, Recycle." Meaning that we should refuse to have a straw with our drink when we are out, or use single use plastic bags, or buy drinks in plastic drink bottles etc. 

Libby is a marine biologist who has spent years working with turtles, giant manta rays and sharks. 

 This week we designed our own experiment about the water cycle. This should show us how the process of evaporation and condensation purifies water.

So Proud!
This was our week to shine, and shine we did! Because the year 7 and 8 students were away on their camp, all the year 6 students in Room 8 were given opportunities to take on extra responsibilities for the week. Savannah and Gabriel agreed to be bell ringers and Gabriel, Ashley S, Arsheed and Nathan were road patrollers for the week.

Several people stepped up to fill assembly roles. We had Connie and Ashley as our hosts. They took the role very seriously, preparing their presentation carefully and delivering it clearly and confidently.

Willow and Arsheed had to take the photos of the Students of the Week and present the slide show about that. What a great job they did.

Ulysses and Porshia were our techies - not an easy task because they had to have many slide shows ready to be popped up on the screen at a moment's notice. 

Finally, Savannah and Gabriel were the stand ins for the Student Leaders, clearly announcing the Wheels Day for the following day. 

Wheels days two Fridays in a row were a lot of fun.

On Friday we had the pleasure of meeting Kobie's new puppy Blue. He is an American bulldog. So far his accent doesn't seem to be a problem in communication. 

Week 6

Week 6 has been another full and fun week, and we seem to have been involved in a great variety of things.
There is some of our Water Art on our Water Wall.

Mike King's visit on Wednesday was a highlight. His message of kindness and self esteem was well received, as were the free hats, wrist bands and bags. Some people even won a tea shirt. 

Some students were at the athletics all day on Wednesday, doing their very best and gaining some impressive placings. Others, and even some of the athletes from earlier in the day, were then at the South Otago swimming champs that evening. Phew!

On Friday we had a guest speaker, all the way from Room 5. Alec Mills came and spoke to us about his trip to Europe in January. It was very interesting and we had heaps of questions. 

We have written some insightful reports about the water cycle. Here are some excerpts:

The water cycle is when water goes round and round in a circle, or you could say a cycle. The same water has been in the world because it gets recycled and keeps on going in a cycle. Water has been on earth for lots and lots of years. Lulu.

First water evaporates into steam. Next the steam builds up into a cloud. Lastly the cloud precipitates. Precipitation is where the cloud starts to get heavy so it rains and the rain flows into a lake, stream, river or ocean and the water cycle is continuous. Ry

Condensation is when water in lakes, puddles, rivers etc starts to warm up from the blazing hot sun. The next step is evaporation when the water is too hot and it turns too little. Then it floats up and more will join it. The next step is cloud formation when the tiny water droplets finish joining together. Gabriel

The water cycle has been going for thousands of years so the water is thousands of years old. When water evaporates it gets so small you can't see it. Ashley S.

The earth needs the water cycle because without the water cycle animals, people and plants will not be able to live and earth will end up being like Mars - dark and silent. Connie.

This week we have learned a lot about the water cycle and desalination. In these photos we are making salt water into fresh water by using evaporation and condensation.

It really is fresh water!

 We have many wonderings about water, and we were able to sort our questions into fat or skinny questions (one word answers or paragraph answers) and then into open or closed questions (only one answer, or someone could disagree and still be right.)

Now we are researching our water questions, in pairs, and next week we will present them to the class.

Of course there is still time for maths in a busy week, and we are getting under way with different strategies for addition and subtraction. Here we are learning to put numbers together to make ten or tens.

Sadly we fare-welled Ataahua yesterday. We wish her and her family all the best for their new life in the North Island.
Also this week we welcomed our new student Ryder Gillatt. Ryder is in year 5 and he is fitting in to Room 8 very well already.