Nothing but Fun !!

School's out.....
During our last week of school we were having so much fun making dance videos.
Each child took their own photos and worked with their friends to create their dance.
Check out these dancing skills!!!!

We would like to wish all of our readers a Very Merry Christmas and a safe holiday season.
See you back here in February 2016.

Children's Choice Discovery

This week the children chose; dress ups, marble tracks, christmas decorations, construction with boxes, and loom bands. Our focus was just to "Have Fun"
This is the last Discovery session for the year and we certainly had fun.

Readers Theatre

Last week we had a go at some "Readers Theatre" For those of you who don't know what Readers Theatre is...
Readers Theatre is a dramatic presentation of a written work in script form. Readers read from the script and all reading parts are divided among the readers. No memorisation, costumes or special props are needed. It is something a little bit different and helps with fluency. A little bit like a play but without any acting.
Anyway we gave it a go...let us know what you think...

First up was Samuel, Zeb, Alex, Ryker and Audrey with:     The Hungry Little Caterpillar

Next was Zion, Stella, Lincoln, Eddy, and Eva with:   The Little Red Hen

Then Logan, Hannah and Zion:   The Snowman

And then  Adam, Leah, Sebastian, Oscar and Ezra with:

 The Ant and the Grasshopper.

We hope you enjoyed the performances. The children seemed to have a lot of fun with these.

The sun is hot and the water's warm....

Lets get in the pool!

    

Discovery Time week 8

During Discovery Time we have been working on being creative and solving problems.
Our activities this week were... working in the sandpit, making different christmas decorations and painting. There was some amazing creativity today and some beautiful work.
As the end of our school year is approaching next week will be children's choice discovery time. I wonder what activities will be chosen?

                 

Our beach stories.

We have been talking and writing about our experience and memories of a time at the beach.Have a read of our fabulous stories.

The beach was called Rabbit Island and the sand was inviting me to lie down on it. My friends were there. It was enjoyable.

Logan

Swimming at the beach is fun because your feet sink in the water like sinking sand. Sprawled in the sparkling sand, I saw children playing.

Ezra

I hear little kids screaming, it echoed through the air. I see a breath-taking view of crystal clear water. I sank into the inviting shimmering sand. I hear the waves crashing on the meniscal grains of sand. I felt overjoyed. I couldn’t wait to go to the shimmering corals.

Sebastian

The sun was hot on me. I sank into the sand. The water was gleaming. I heard little kids screaming. It echoed through the tunnel. The waves crashed up on the beach. I couldn’t wait to go back to the shimmering water.

Zion

I bumped in my car all the way to the beach. “Are we there yet?” I said. And then, we were there…at the rocket slide beach. I was with my whole family.

 I stood up and the sand crunched on my feet as I tried to move to the crashing waves. I spotted hundreds of shiny shells. The rocket slide had a park. I felt exhausted.

Leah

At the beach I saw some sparkling shells. The waves were crashing on each other.

Hannah

There was a mystery at the beach. There was sparkling crystals on the beach. Taran was there and Alex was there too. The water was shimmering gold. I felt overjoyed. It was at 4 o’clock. The mystery beach had shadows, I noticed that when I got out of the car. I saw dark shadows beneath my feet. There were colourful shells too.

Oscar

I saw Taran and we went to the water and we made a track. I felt like I was somewhere else. The waves were crashing into shore. The colour of the sand was the colour if my skin.

Alex

Waves splashed, one drop was golden and there was gold in the sand. The water was sparkling like crystals.

Ryker

The sand went in between my toes. I hear seagulls screeching. Shiny waves splash on me. I felt a crab on my toe. The crab’s nip hurt like a million ticks biting me.

Adam

The sunshine went in my eyes. My dad and mum were there. I was happy because my feet tickled. The sand looked like fluffy sand. I laughed and laughed. I like it. The crashing waves looked funny. I love it. I want to go back. I’m going back now.

Samuel

At the beach I made a sand marble track with my brother Caleb and it was at Rabbit Island. I went in the sea and it felt like a spa pool!

Zeb

I went to a camp. I went to a beach at the camp. My dad and my mum went there too. Shiny shells were there and shiny sand was there too.

Audrey

I went to the beach. I made a pool.

Eddy

The beach was sparkling when the water went on it.

Eva

The water shimmered on my toes. It made my toes cold.

Lincoln

I was at the beach.

Stella

A Stuffed Owl

Eden in Room 2 brought in an owl that her grandfather had hit in his car. The owl was dead of course but it had been professionally stuffed and mounted on a tree branch by a taxidermist. It was quite amazing. The only part of the bird that wasn't real was it's eyes. Room 3 children were very interested in this process.
                                        

A Chicken with Chicks

Adam brought in his pet chicken on Tuesday. She had 3 baby chickens with her.

Sebastian and Zion retelling stories using Tellagami

Our A and P Show Entries

Again this year we put some exhibitions in the Nelson the A and P Show.
We all decorated a biscuit, Did a vege creation, and a sand saucer. Take a look at our creativity...

         

A special visitor...

Stella and her mum brought in her little kitten to show us. It is called Milly and is only 5 weeks old. Very cute. Thanks Stella it was nice to hear about you kitten.

  

Week 5 Discovery Time

One day this week Samuel came to me and said, "The birds keep coming on to the deck."  I explained to him that the birds were actually doing us a favour and eating up all the crumbs that are left from the children's morning tea. " But!"  he said, "I have to sit on the bird poop!"
Well fair enough what could we do about it then?
"We could make a scarecrow"
So hence one of our Discovery activities today was to make a scarecrow for the deck.
We also had bubble blowing,  pretend baking,  construction with boxes, and domino tracks.
We are learning how to be creative...
(I am trying out a new slide show maker)

Watching an Experiment

This morning we were invited into Room 2 to watch Bella's experiment.
She was to make elephant toothpaste....
It looked pretty amazing. We especially liked the green food colouring you added.
Thanks Bella for inviting us in to watch.

      

Junior Athletics at Hope School.

Learning How to Draw Using Shading

This term we hope to have some pieces of art work showing how we can use shading. The first of these are in pencil form below.

Learning about 'Shading' from Hope School on Vimeo.

Discovery Time

This week we were enjoying our Discovery Time session with puppets, shell pictures, duplo blocks, tye dying, and planting seeds. Our focus this week was on being creative!

Discovery Time 30-10-15 from Hope School on Vimeo.

Discovery Time

This week at Discovery Time our focus was to 'think about the choices we make before we make them'
Our activities were: Marble Races, Construction with boxes, Having a Tea Party, "A what can you do with this stuff " table, and Balloon Rockets.
At the "What can you do with this stuff " table, we were pretending to be inventors...to see what we could create. This was a lot of fun...next week we want to call this our "Inventors Table"
At the construction table today there was some very big creations made!
Unfortunately the weather was a bit wet and cold so our tea party had to be held under cover but it was still awesome.
As for the Balloon Rockets... well these were a huge hit with the boys, a lot of working together needed. There is a separate video clip of Balloon Rocket Fun......Enjoy.

A very cute visitor

Evangeline from Room 4 came in this morning to show us her new little puppy, 'Sprocket'. He was very cute. He had a toy Kiwi and he liked to chew on our shoes.
Thanks Evangeline for bringing him in to Room 3.

   

Masked Parade 2015

Oh what fun we had at the Masked Parade on Friday night.

Our Monster Stories

This week we made some monsters (they are very small about 5 cm tall at the most)

Then we wrote stories about them. We are learning to use describing words....

My monster is scary

Lincoln

My monster is happy. Her name is Rose.  She likes to garden.

Eva

My monster eats people and he never gets sick and he eats other monsters.

Logan

My monster is a spy, “Do you know how he can spy”?...He is invisible.

Ryker

My monster can scare people and it can gobble people. It can float on water. It looks like a slushy monster.

Samuel

My monster can hear people and gobble people up.

Zeb

My monster is a very angry bull. It’s got shiny spots all over it. Its name is Mr Spotty. It can do dance moves.

Leah

My monster is happy. It hugs people.

Audrey

My monster has sloshy slime feet, 5 legs and it gobbles up rubbish.

Sebastian

My monster has horns. My monster can turn invisible it’s a ghost. It can go through walls.

Zion

I have a slushy and mushy green monster. It is a girl.

Hannah

My monster looks like a scary ghost off packman. It scrunched up slimy monsters.

Ezra

My gooey monster is stupid like crazy.

It zoomed around lazering. His power is transforming.

Oscar

101 Dalmatians

 A new term and a few more children added to Room 3. Can you spot the new additions??
This is our costume and masks for this Friday's masked Parade. The masked parade is always very entertaining....hope to see you there.

Mr Pritchard Retires from Hope School

After 31 years of being Principal of Hope School, it is time for Mr P to relax and enjoy his next adventure. Thank you Mr P for all you have done for the children, community and staff at Hope School 

Today we made Sweets

Our Country Bazaar is on at school this weekend.  Room 3 children had the job of making some marshmallow sweets to be sold on the day.
We obviously had a great amount of fun in the process.
I  hope you can come along and support our school.

       

Don't forget to also head into the silent auction and place your bid on our Doodle Bugs painting...

There might be something else you would like to bid on too. Each classroom has a piece of art to sell.... Head in and have a look this weekend. See you there.

Gordon came to visit

Today Adam brought in his pet Muscovy Duck called Gordon.
Adam was able to tell us a lot about him and Gordon was very well behaved.
Thanks Adam it was great to meet Gordon.

Discovery Time Week 7

This week for Discovery Time we made daffodils and robots, we played with plasticine and magnets and some of us also practised our skipping and yo yo skills.
Our focus for most of this term has been to "Have a Go" and  "Keep Trying "we have been encouraging each other to try new things and keep trying when something isn't working well. We have learnt that if you are trying to make something and it isn't going well.... if you make changes to how you are doing the task it can help to get the job done.

       

Bugs in a Jar

This term most of our artwork has given us experience in painting with dye. By using dye we get a lovely bright range of colours and we are also able to blend them easily.
After we had finished our piece of art for the Country Bazaar where we had learnt how to draw doodle bugs we then made drawings of  a jar with some bugs in it...take a look.

        

Wants and Needs

This week during our maths lessons we have been learning about money. We have learnt the name of all the notes and the coins. We found out which has the smallest value and which has the highest value. We were working out how we add the notes or coins together to make different amounts of money too.
As part of these lessons we had a visit from 'Captain Cashtastic"' a superhero from the ASB Bank's Getwise programme. Captain Cashtastic had the kids completely engrossed in many fun antics as he talked to them about money and then explained 'Wants and Needs'.
.....Ask your child about "Speeding to your Needs and "Waiting for your Wants".....

   
   
   

Minibeasts

For the first part of this term we have been looking into the life and characteristics of insects and spiders. We have learnt about the body parts of an insect and the body parts of a spider. We have looked at life cycles of some common insects and found out some interesting facts. We discovered among other things, that spiders are not an insect!
Along our learning journey we came up with some questions:
1. What are those things on the back of an earwig and do they sting you?
2. How far do Grasshoppers jump?
3. Do ladybugs bite?
4. How fast do ladybugs fly? and
5. What do butterflies eat?
We used books, and the computers to find the answers to our questions. 
Did you know that...

• Those things on the back of an earwig are 'nippers' and the earwig uses them to catch food. Little bugs are usually what it eats. They can use these nippers to grab onto your finger if they are angry but they do not sting you.
• An adult grasshopper can jump 10 times it's body length straight into the air or 20 times it's length horizontally.
• Lady bugs have biting mouth parts but will not bite you. Their first line of defence is actually to bleed on you! So if it looks like a lady bug has urinated on you - that is actually blood.
• Lady bugs can beat their wings 85 times a second and they can fly 24 kms an hour.
• Butterflies eat nectar from flowers.

Once we had this information we then used the 'Puppet Pals' app on the iPads to present our new knowledge.

For the children to use Puppet Pals there was a huge amount of learning going on: They were taking photos, choosing backgrounds, selecting and trimming the photos, positioning and resizing their photos on the screen, reading their written  facts and recording their voice. Of course all of this, while remembering what buttons to press, how to get back when a mistake was made, how to move on to the next stage and making sure the headset microphone was in the correct place for recording.  Not to mention the reading and speaking skills! 
 All this completely independently
The only thing I did was take some head shot photos ... a few children even chose to take their own selfie. You can be very proud of your children.  Watch our movie below so we can share our learning with you. 
Room 3 You Rock!!

Discovery Time week 5

This week our Discovery Time activities were:  Playing with Goop, Making Huts with Sheets, The Carpentry Table, Spinning Tops, and making a Bug House from Boxes.
Again we were focusing on "Having a go" and persevering when things went wrong.

      

Sebastian is back!

Sebastian has been on an amazing holiday to Australia. He came to school with a great journal he had kept of all his holiday happenings. He told us all about the fun things he got up to. Thanks Sebastian what a great time you had.

Our Art Work is Finished

We have completed our painting that will be sold in the silent auction at our school's Country Bazaar.
The kids have all got a Doodle Bug on this painting and I hope you are able to come along to The Bazaar on the 19th of September to place a bid....I am sure it will look great on your wall!
If you want a close up look at it, call into Room 3. Room 3 children will be more than happy to show you....they are very proud of it.

Simple Machines

We were invited to go into Room 1 on Friday to have a look at the machines they had made. Room 1 had been looking at "Rube Goldberg Machines"... A Rube Goldberg machine is a contraption, or invention that is deliberately over-engineered to perform a very simple task in a very complicated fashion, usually including a chain reaction. You could  click here to take a look at an incredible machine on you tube. Room 1 children had made a few smaller versions. Most of them rang a bell at the end of the chain reaction.

  
    
                                         

Discovery Time week 4

This weeks Discovery Time had a "Bug theme". As we have been looking at insects and learning a bit about them I decided to have a few insect and spider activities. And no, none of the spiders or insects in these activities were real...thankfully, they were all plastic.

      

Something Different

Katherine was our teacher for a couple of days last week and while she was here her daughter came and read us a story.



Katherine also took us for Discovery Time. She brought in some clay for us to make some pinch pots. These pots are away being fired now. Great fun!

Fun Times from Hope School on Vimeo.

A joint piece of art for our Country Bazaar

Our School's Country Bazaar is coming up in September.
Part of this big fundraising day is the "silent auction" where a huge range of brand new goods and services are sold to the highest bidder. In Room 3 we are working on a joint piece of art that will be sold in the auction.
Our art work will be show casing our 'doodle bugs' which we have been learning how to draw.

 As a class it is great to help our wider school community raise funds for our school.

 Every child has a doodle bug represented on our painting. Come into the classroom and have a look anytime....start saving your money so you can put a bid on it. Country Bazaar 19th September. See you there. 

This is what it looks like so far, but it is not finished yet....