Task #2

Good morning all,

I know you have all been awaiting the next task so here it is ...

My thanks go to  Ruth Cairns for this fabulous idea.

Remember you have until Wednesday night to do this task. You can be as creative as you like.

Hmmmm I think I might start with 'Angela' and then put 'books' on top. I wonder what I should put for C ...

Good luck and happy stacking!!

The Challenge was Accepted!!

On Sunday we set our tamariki and whanau the task of creating some strange home visitors. It was really great to see the different visitors that showed up. Check it out ...

I wonder what the next task will be ...

All will be revealed here tomorrow at 10am.

Till next time x

Holiday Visitors ...

Hi everyone,

As we move into our new school holidays, I wanted to touch base with you all to check that we are all okay. This is not our normal holidays but we can still create fantastic memories that we will keep with us.

For example, today we had some very interesting visitors. I've read the story 'The Tiger who came to Tea' by Judith Kerr but never imagined that a tiger would EVER visit my house but that's exactly what happened. I know it's hard to believe but I took photos so you would all see our spectacular visitor.

Richard (my husband) even got to pat it. turned out it was really friendly and was looking for a warm place to have a bite to eat :)

Not only did we have a tiger visit but a horse knocked at our door so we just had to let it in and then, surprisingly, a shark also swam into our house. I know, I know, it's really hard to believe but that is exactly what happened. Yes I took photos so you could definitely see our fabulous visitors. 

As you can see, the shark thought it could eat Richard's arm but being as his arm is robotic, the shark chose to leave it alone, thank goodness :)

What a very crazy day!!! You too could have some strange visitors visit you. For instructions on how to do this, check out the comments. When your strange visitors visit you, make sure to take some photos and blog these. You may even want to add your strange visitors to ours by sharing your photos as a comment on this post. 

Stay safe out there and I hope you get some interesting visitors to your house :)

Wednesday 25 March 2020

It is now 5.25 pm and my family and I have just about completed day 1 of isolation.  Boy...do I miss the masses of smiles, cackles from the girls (who remind me of a bunch of hens in the hen house), and the general mayhem that is Te mahuri in the morning.
Life is going to become crazily calm, quiet and generally pretty settled for us all.  We have to feel gratitude for being safe, at home, with our families.  We have to create a new normal by organising our own timetables.  Your children could spend the morning doing some school work, and let Mum and dad have a wee lie in, and then play board games as a family??? Remember to lose with dignity and win with grace.  You have been practicing this when I win at hangman, just saying.
You could look up funny jokes online and come up with a whole load of them in readiness for a jokeathon in term 2....
Whatever you do do not give up on all the great work you have created this term... keep learning... keep striving to be your best no matter what... keep focussing on making the world a better place one good deed at a time.
Until my next blog... Over and Out

Ms Dods

An Abrupt End to Term 1

Term 1 may have ended abruptly, but there has still been a lot of amazing things that we can reflect on and celebrate. 

We are very proud to say that we have had a fantastic term in Te Māhuri. Our tamariki are really enthusiastic about their learning and it really is a joy to be apart of this.

With summer lasting a little longer this year, we made the most of our swimming pool. During this time, we watched our students grow in confidence in the water and show resilience when faced with new skills.

In the classroom we have been developing our skills when using chromebooks. All our learning can be found online at our class website and our students have been encouraged to be self-led learners by always checking the class website and their group planning docs to see what they need to do for each session. 

On our individual blogs we have learnt how to insert an image and how to use screen castify to share our learning. Check these out by clicking the links on the right of this blog page.

So as we say goodbye to Term 1 and as well move into a nationwide Level 4 lockdown we want to reiterate what our Prime Minister has stated,"We will get through this together, but only if we stick together. Be strong and be kind."

See you all in Term 2.

One Year Ago ...

Last weekend it was exactly a year ago that Christchurch experienced a terrible tragedy with the Mosque Shootings. Our students were affected by this in a variety of ways. Of course like all other schools in Christchurch we went into lock down for quite a few hours and our school day did not end at 3pm.

Over the coming months, we all worked together to understand what had happened and to focus on the message of peace and that we are all New Zealanders and we stand together as one team, no matter our race, our religion or where we live.

One year on we remember that horrible day. We still believe in peace and we are still on the same team. We chose to come in lots of colour for our mufti day and to raise money for St Johns Ambulance as they were the first responders on that day and we are very thankful for them.

Wonderful Writing! What?

This week in our class some of my writing teams have been learning about iSPACE. Do you know what iSPACE is? No? Well what a minute and I'll tell you. It is going to make your writing fabulous!

iSPACE is a clever way of starting your sentences in different ways. We can use an -ing word, a simile, a preposition, an adverb, a connective or an -ed word. A-ha it really is a wonderful thing to know.

We started with looking at these two pieces of writing and thinking about which one was better and more importantly why it was better. Which one do you think is better? Why?

The part we have found challenging has been making sure we use the iSPACE words at the start of our sentences and not just in our sentence.

We've really enjoyed learning about this because we know it is going to make our writing more exciting to read. We also love the idea that we are writing complex sentences. How cool is that?!  Have a go at using iSPACE in your writing.