Term 4!

Wow I can't believe we are already into Term 4.  There is about 10 weeks until Christmas, which I can't even begin to think about! haha
I hope you all had an amazing holiday. I was lucky enough to head over to Hong Kong with my family to visit friends and to experience the culture. We had an awesome 11 days away. One of the highlights was going to Disney Land.

This term is only 9 weeks and will fly by. Our inquiry is sustainability and we will be focusing on athletics as well as other ball sports involving catching and throwing for eg rippa/tag. Maths will have a focus on shape, symmetry and tessellation's as well as continuing to learn strategies to help us solve problems. In reading we will continue to focus on reading strategies to help with comprehension and our writing programme will have a mix of reports and poetry.

I look forward to this term and all that it has to bring. Please don't hesitate to contact me should you have any queries or concerns.

Term 3 has arrived...

WOW - Term 3 is here!  Term 3 is my favourite term. Lots of interesting, fun and adventurous things will happen during the term which I am excited about! 

Camp and EOTC week will happen from September 4th - 8th. Please keep an eye out for emails and notices regarding these two events!

We are also into our cross country training. Monday, Wednesday and Friday will be our training days. Please send a note in or email me on cmaurice@wgp.school.nz should your child not be able to participate in training for the cross country. 

Our inquiry this term is movement. An inquiry into orientation in place and time; personal histories; homes and journeys; the discoveries, explorations and migrations of humankind; the relationships between and the interconnectedness of individuals and civilizations, from local and global perspectives.

We will continue to focus on reading comprehension and our maths focus will be time, fractions and mapping and orientation.

I'm looking forward to an action packed term. Please feel free to contact me should you have any queries.

Week 10 - Last week before the holidays!

Check out these two certificate winners from Friday's VLC Shearer assembly. Well done Indi and Charlie. You two deserve these! Keep up the great work.

Friday's mufti day was in honour of Team NZ. Charlie created and built the "Old Mug" out of tinfoil and cardboard. Awesome Charlie!

New L5 Ambassadors and Certificate Winners

L5 students who were interested in becoming a class ambassador put forward reasons as to why they thought they would be a good class ambassador. It was a difficult decision but the next two ambassadors for L5 are Indiana Dunn and Pita Sandor. Awesome girls!

 During our VLC Shearer assembly on Friday the following 4 students received a certificate! Well done - you all deserve these!

Mufti Day Supporting Westpac Helicopter Appeal

Mufti Day - L5

James (Daniels dad) flies the Westpac helicopter and came in to tell use some stories and answer some questions we had :)

Term 2!

Term 2

Welcome back everyone!  I'm looking forward to an action packed term with lots of exciting and new things happening. 

We'll be getting straight back into our reading and maths programme focussing on reading strategies to help us understand what we are reading and we will be moving forward and learning new mathematic strategies. In maths we will also be focussing on measurement. 

Our inquiry this term is around properties and changes of matter. In L5 we are going to observe, describe and compare physical and chemical properties of common materials and change that occur when these materials are mixed, heated or cooled. We will be doing some awesome experiments!!

Our writing programme will be based around our inquiry.

This term we are going to focus on striking, catching and throwing for PE. We will be getting out in the winter months to practise these skills.

Watch this space as L5 embarks on their learning journey.

End of term already!

WOW I can't believe this is the last week of Term 1!  L5 students have worked incredibly hard this term and I have enjoyed getting to know each and everyone of them.

Check out the rest of our blog to see what we have been up to :)

Meet our class ambassadors!

Meet our class ambassadors for term 1! Well done Izzy and Daniel. 

The class ambassadors role is to be the spokesperson for L5. When visitors arrive or people within our school community visit L5 it is the class ambassadors that meet and greet these visitors.  They also share what we are doing in the classroom (if applicable).

Week 7 is here!

Week 7!

Have a look under the tabs at the top of the blog - here you will find out more what we are doing in different subject areas.

Also please read the weekly updates - this will prepare you for what is coming up in the week!

Its been a busy week ...

WOW week 5 already!

During this week L5 were interested in their school community - as part of our inquiry we discussed and brainstormed the people who work and are a part of our school community, the areas within our school community and what these areas are used for.  Here is some of our questions and our thinking...

We also watched a youtube clip to further our thinking and our questioning. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDwKTiPXIgA&t=1s

The students are loving their swimming and I can already notice a change in confidence in some of them which is fantastic! Please remember to bring a cap and swimming goggles, especially if you are in year 4!

In amongst PAT testing the students were able to enjoy a session on their bikes again.  It was wonderful to see all the students learning new skills and being challenged in such a positive and safe way.

 Scootering

Scootering

Our reading programme is well underway and you may have noticed books coming home. I am encouraging the students to read 20 mins per night, it may be the journal in their bag or it may be a book they have gotten out from the library.

The students also learnt last week how to open up a google doc and move it into the correct folder in their drive.  On their google doc they were practising their writing, changing the size of their text and the colour....watch this space for more awesome pieces of writing!

Phew...Week 4 flew by!

Phew what a week!  Week 4 flew by.  

We started off our week by heading to the pool. Year 4 headed to the leisure centre and the year 3s stayed and swam in the school pool. Both years enjoyed the swimming and it was a great way to cool off! 

The use of our devices has been successful.  The students are learning to log on independently and onto studyladder (www.studyladder.co.nz) and sumdog (www.sumdog.com). This has required the use of a few usernames and passwords and learning to read what our device is asking us to do. At times this has been challenging for some students but after a week of practice we are well on our way to being experts!

We have been using our devices to practise our maths - basic facts and statistics, watching videos that support our inquiry learning and reading a variety of stories.

In amongst learning to create a statistical investigation, reading, writing and our inquiry we managed to have time to get on our bikes! The use of school bikes and the bike track has made teaching the students important skills on their bikes easier. Some were learning to ride for the first time, some were gaining confidence again and some were practising new skills like hand signalling and keeping control through a small confidence course.  At the end of the session it was great seeing the students using the bike track.

Last week (week 3) L5 started looking at what a community is and the children came up with their own definition. We will continue our inquiry through the next few weeks. 

Our maths programme is well under way and we are focussing on statistics.  The children completed their first statistical investigation last week on the number of siblings children in L5 have. Children were asking questions, collecting data, creating tally charts and will move into creating bar charts and drawing conclusions from this data.

Our reading and writing programme begins this week also. 

Our school has a new challenge - we are to learn a new dance and song from the movie "Moana".  We have been practising all week and the children dance and sing amazingly! Click on the link to see the moves we are learning :)

https://youtu.be/KxJyMOpJrrY

I've also attached the link to the song we are learning!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=REntT1Amvxc

Some of the children also enjoyed swimming in the pool on Friday lunchtime.

What a great start!

L5 - Week 1 and 2

We have had a great start to 2017!  It has been great getting to know everyone and we have been building relationships through PE, sharing, brainstorming, discussions and games. Last week we started building our fitness and we challenged B6 to scatterball! We have looked at our school motto and values and have created our L5 treaty. 

We have also started art - our silhouette pictures with all the things  we like or love to do cut out and glued. On Friday we got to share our "all about me" bags.  It was awesome as we found out things we didn't know about our class community.