Saturday, 24 May 2014

The Maritime Museum

Our trip to the Maritime Museum was so interesting and educational! We loved the ride on the Ted Ashby and enjoyed watching the bungy jumpers from the Auckland Harbour bridge. The cannon being shot at noon was so loud some of us jumped!

Learning about how different people came to New Zealand to form communities here was great, and our educator was skilled at enthusing the students. Walking through the exhibits after lunch was fun as well. Here is a montage of our day, ask your children about their favourite part...

Tuesday, 13 May 2014

Welcome to Term 2!

Hello viewers!
It has been a while coming and I do apologise, but here we are!

In Term 1 we have set up a friendly classroom learning environment, and the students are working well together and making good progress in their learning.  As we can't go back in time, here is a montage of some experiences from the start of the year:

Water safety at the Parnell Baths was fun, as was the school picnic with lots of games, laughter and lollies. 
After brainstorming what the students wanted to find out, we looked at how rainbows appear and why, and we also observed a monarch butterfly hatch from its chrysalis and studied their life-cycle. 
For Chinese New Year we made lanterns to celebrate the Year of the Horse, and have worked with our buddy class to improve our spelling and reading, and develop relationships throughout the school. 
We have made the most of our opportunities to work collaboratively, and will continue to do so as the year continues. 
The term ended with a trip to see the play of 'The Owl and the Pussycat' which was a new experience for many of the students.

So, Term 2 has begun with a determined focus on Community - we have moved beyond ourselves and are looking at how roles and responsibilities are shared in our families and at school with a view to understanding how the wider community works further on.

On Monday 19 May at 2pm, our class is hosting the full school assembly in the hall.  We welcome families to attend and support your children as they share an item of interest to our school community. 

Thank you for your patience, and we will be posting more regularly with content from your children in the near future.

Kind regards to you all, Gretchen.







Tuesday, 17 December 2013

Young potters

  The children feel very proud of their achievements!
 
Ella - I feel pretty happy that we made them.
Saihaj - I think they are pretty cool.
Giselle - When I was making them I felt like I was in Ancient Egypt.
Gigi - They look so cool, they look like they are from Egypt.
Poppy - I'm gonna cry because they are so cool...
Farah - I had so much fun making them.  I want to make them again.
Solana - I really want to make another one because I love feeling the clay and seeing what I have created.
Charlie - I want to make as many as I can because they are amazing.
Anya - When I grow up now I want to be an Egyptian pot maker.
Mia-Rose - When I was making it I felt like I was in Ancient Egypt.
Harrison - I like it because I like the feel of the clay.
Milana - I like mine even if it is broken.
Jayden - I really want to make a lot of them when I grow up so I can give them to my family.

Latest new ancient Egyptian pottery


Here they are!  Our glazed coil pots are finished!  They are all waterproof and can be drunk out of or used as a lovely vase or for salad dressing....  Anything really!  They can go in the dishwasher but you might want to hand wash them to protect the handles. 

Tuesday, 10 December 2013

Genie Stories Updated

We have updated our Genie Stories Flipsnack book so that each story now appears on each page as it should have done.  Please enjoy our stories and we would love to hear from you, letting us know what you think of our stories in the comments below.



Egyptian pottery...

Today we got our first terracotta pinch pots back.  They have been fired and are dry, hard and feel a little bit rough.  We are quite happy with them!

The coil pots we made have been glazed with a blue glaze to seal them and make them waterproof so they could be used as vases.  Hopefully the glaze will seal up any little gaps in the coils!



This is what the kiln shed looks like at Auckland Studio Potters where Ms Werder is glazing our pots.  Busy place!  Hopefully they will be glazed by Monday next week to hand out to children before the end of the year.