Room 5 News-week 2

30/4/2012
Dear Parents,
Hi everyone,
We are looking forward to our trip to the Waipawa Settlers Museum and Oruawharo Homestead this Wednesday.  We will be leaving HNPS by 9.15 and will return to school before 3 o’clock.  The children need to wear school uniform.  Please ensure they have a fleece and a rain jacket, a large lunch and drink of water.  If your child does not travel well please let me know and I will place them near the front of the bus and keep an eye on them.

Glued into the back of homework books is an updated essential spelling list.  Please keep working through the high-lighted words.  Re-visit words frequently to ensure consolidation.

Posted recently on the blog site is a slide show of Discovery Learning and our thoughts about war and ANZAC. On the maths page there are a variety of games to help learn and reinforce fractions which is our learning focus in Numeracy at the moment.  Just a reminder that two new homework tasks are set on the mathletics website each week.  Please encourage the children to complete these.

Remember to view our wiki page http://rimaroom.wikispaces.com/ and class blog http://hnpsjarvis.blogspot.co.nz/.  This is a great way to get the children talking about their learning.  We would love you to post some comments onto our blog.

Homework Tasks-reading, essential spelling words, mathletics, numeracy knowledge ladder and handwriting.

Have a great week, Sue

Anzac Day

We read, discussed, wondered, questioned and had feelings about war and ANZAC day.  Here are some of our thoughts...
I noticed that poppies were as red as blood. Lily
My Pop was in the war and he didn't die so he must have been a very good soldier. Lachlan
ANZAC Day is a very special day because we celebrate the members of our family who went to war. Jessica
I remember that after the battles the poppies were the first flowers to grow back. Zoe M
The cenotaph looked tall. Mia
Tomorrow it is ANZAC Day and my Dad's Dad was in the war and lots of people lost their lives. Madeline
I do not know why the Germans were trying to take over the country. Leo
The cenotaph is not quite the shape of a circle. Harry
Tomorrow it will not be a school day because it is ANZAC Day and lots of people died in the war. Aiden
The cenotaph is a reminder of the people who fought in the war. Thomas
I noticed that our wreath was blue and white. Zoe C
I feel sad about the soldiers.  They helped us a lot. Nicole
The cenotaph is special because it says the names of the people who died in the war. Violet
I wonder how they defeated the Germans. Louie
I remember NZ soldiers helped France in the fight. Jack
I do not think the Germans and the New Zealander's had a good time in the war. Alexandra
War is not a nice thing.  Lots of people lost their lives in war. Fionn
My Dad's great grandfather was in the war.  All his medals are at my Dads uncles place. Callum
I wonder why the Germans are so mean.  I noticed the Germans tried to steal the towns. Alex
War isn't a happy time because heaps of people lost their lives. Zak

Discovery Learning

Yay...discovery learning.  Look how focussed we are!

Room 5 News-week 1, Term 2

22/4/2012

Dear Parents,

Hi everyone, welcome back to you all.  I hope you have had a happy, restful holiday.  I’m looking forward to catching up with the children on Monday but thought I’d send this email out to remind the children to bring their book bag and smiles back to school.

Term 2 Overview

Here is an outline of some of the learning and fun we have planned for term 2. 

Rich Theme and Key Competency
For the next 5 weeks we will continue to develop our rich theme “History-what excellence looked like 150 years ago”.  We are looking forward to our trip to Waipawa Settlers Museum and Oruawharo Homestead on Wednesday 2^nd May.

KEY COMPENTENCY- Relating to others     The children will-    Use active listening skills.    Ask learning questions.    Respond appropriately.   Discovery Learning Discovery learning will take place again on Fridays from 11.30-12.30. The rich theme and key competency form the basis of these sessions. If you would like to join in and help with the fun, we’d love to see you! We are collecting collage materials for making and creating - boxes, material, magazines, beads, buttons, lace, lids, wool etc. Writing Our personal writing on a Monday morning is where we encourage the children to write from their experiences and tap into their memories. We need to encourage the children to notice, wonder and question. Talking to your child on a Monday morning about what they are going to write about helps them focus more readily. On other days mini lessons will focus on retelling and sequencing of ideas, hooking the reader into our writing, using interesting descriptive words to paint detailed pictures for the reader and the use of punctuation so the reader can make sense of the writing. We would like to encourage the children to bring photos, tickets or brochures of different adventures they have experienced. We will glue these into their personal diary as a reminder of an experience and at some stage they may like to write about it. You may have collected some items over the holidays that would be suitable to glue into their books. Word Study The children are involved in this fun, interactive phonics programme, Mon-Thurs. A homework sheet glued into the homework book should come home on a Monday so that you can reinforce the learning happening at school. Essential Spelling Lists Well done to the children on their learning last term. Many of the children have made great strides with their spelling knowledge and this is also making a marked difference to their writing. A highlighted list of words to learn will be glued into homework books next week. Oral Congratulations to all the children on last terms oral presentation based on their family tree.We heard many fascinating stories about life long ago and it was interesting meeting the members of your family. This term in weeks 3, 4 and 5 the children will prepare an oral presentation about something old…game, object, piece of clothing, machine, toy or tool. We hope to set up a museum in our classroom of “Olden Day”, things. More information will follow on this. News day is on leader day. We encourage show and tell on these days.  Reading All children have a focus “skills and strategy”, sheet for the colour band they are working on, glued into their homework books. A reminder that our Library day is on Monday. Numeracy For the next two week’s our focus is on fractions. Numeracy learning is on number knowledge, place value and simple addition and subtraction. We will then move into mult/div. Please keep up the great work on the Numeracy Knowledge Ladder and Mathletics. I will be introducing “Live Mathletics” to the children this term. This is a great way for children to quicken their responses to simple basic facts. P.E. We have a fitness focus every day and begin with developing ball skills. Grant Hastings will be back towards the end of the term to develop eye/foot co-ordination and soccer skills.  As you can see the term is action packed! I hope you are enjoying our class blog and wiki. It is a wonderful way for the children to share their learning with you! http://hnpsjarvis.blogspot.co.nz/. http://rimaroom.wikispaces.com/ Child/parent/teacher conferences will take place towards the end of the term. With my support the children will share their learning and next steps with you. If you have any questions do not hesitate to make contact with me. Thank you so much for your wonderful support. We have a lot of learning and fun to look forward to this term. Regards, Sue

Measurement

As part of our measurement unit we were learning to-

• Make sensible esimates.
• Measure carefully using handspans.
• Order and compare objects by length.
• Use language of length such as longer, shorter, same as, wide, taller.

Family Tree Presentations

We have all completed our Family Tree, oral  presentations.  It was so interesting learning about the people in our families.  Everyone made a great effort to present their family tree in a creative way.  We were learning to speak clearly and with confidence in front of an audience and answer questions appropriately. 

Our images of The Ice Age

After using the question matrix to generate questions about the ice age we found anwsers by researching using books, google, encarta kids and experts.  It gave us a better idea of what life was like at this time.  We captured our understanding in a picture.  We crinkled the paper to make our picture look old.

Room 5 News-week 10

2/4/2012

Dear Parents,

Hi everyone,

Easter is just about upon us and with it the end of term 1.  I would like to take this opportunity to say a big thank you for your on-going support. The children are really beginning to jell together and the learning that has taken place this term has been tremendous.  A huge thank you to the marvellous parent helpers who come in each week to help in the classroom. Whether it be gluing in newsletters, hearing reading groups, helping with the number knowledge testing, art sessions and discovery, your support and energy make such a difference to the learning and confidence of the children. 

Well done to all the children who presented their family trees to us last week.  We heard many fascinating stories about life long ago and it was interesting meeting the members of your family.  A slide show of the children presenting their family tree has been posted onto our class blog.  We look forward to the rest of the children presenting their family trees to us this week.

Thank you for your quick response in returning the permission slips for our trip next term.  In the next few days I will contact parents who have kindly offered to come with us. 

I am quite excited about the classroom blog.  Last week I made several slide shows of various events and learning, that took place in and around our classroom.  If you view the site with your children they will be able to share with you their learning.  Posted on the site recently are slides of the oral presentations and our Wednesday word problem solving sessions!  You will notice that from the blog you can now link into the class wiki.  With the help of our big buddies the children have again updated their own page.  On the maths page there is a very good site called “doubles” where there are a variety of games to help learn and reinforce this concept.

Please return the chocolate fundraising boxes to the office if you haven’t already done so.

There will be no phonics sessions this week.  Our Maths focus will be on length and area.  The children will experience different measurement activities by rotating through to a different room/teacher for their daily learning.

 Don’t forget to visit our wiki page http://rimaroom.wikispaces.com/ and class blog http://hnpsjarvis.blogspot.co.nz/. 

Homework Tasks-reading, essential spelling words, mathletics, numeracy knowledge ladder and handwriting.

 I wish you all a very happy, safe and relaxing holiday.

Sue