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....