The Senior TRYathlon

A couple of weeks ago we competed in our Senior Tryathlon with great results. It was fantastic day and one that will now become an annual event. We had great results with several students placing in the top ten for both the Yr 6 boys and girls races. Check out a video of the race day

Topic -Our Inquiry

This term we have individually researched a country or city to discover

'How would my life be different if I grew up in ............?'

Back in Week 2 of this term we discussed the differences our environment can have on our upbringing and looked at a few examples. The children then had time to browse through a large amount of books and decide which area of the world they would like to explore. We had places such as the Amazon, Rwanda, Jamiaca, Sweden, Mexico and Kenya chosen.

Over the next few weeks they decided on questions, researched, took notes and made decisions on our to present their work. They also had to come up with a conclusion on where they would prefer to grow up, NZ or their chosen country.

Now in Week 8-9 it has been time to share their new knowledge with the class. They were assessed by one of their peers and by their teacher. It has been a fascinating time, learning about so many different areas of the world and just how it would be to live as a child in that country. Almost all concluded that life in NZ is just about perfect, though we may now have a few students with a great desire to travel in the future!

Bridget and Te Iwa use the laptops to research

Costa Rica and Jamaica

It looks like chaos but....here is Rosie, Aimee,

Jayde and Renee putting their posters together.

Proud of their efforts and so they should be...

Harlen - Afghanistan

Olivia - France

Josh R - Kenya

Dominic - Samoa

We had power points, speeches, homemade videos, booklets and posters.

Connor N - Madagascar

Dragos - Romania

Cullen - Rwanda

Tom - Amazon

More proud researchers with their finished work

Renee - Hawaii

Ben - Amazon

Connor D - Jamaica

Jordyn - Sweden

Cayden - Amazon

Corben - Mexico

Computer Tricks!

We have been learning to 'Green screen' and use 'Instant Alpha' on the laptops. This is fantastic tool that allows you to put yourself in a picture of any background you wish. It is easy to use and we found it a lot of fun. Our first attempts were to put ourselves in a scene from the country we have been researching for this terms Inquiry projects. Check out a couple or examples....

Aimee discovers the beautiful beaches in Fiji

Corben outside a Mexican School

Satori checks out a stunning waterfall in Iceland

Josh R up close and personal with the zebras in Kenya

Girls Cricket

Yesterday the girls cricket team played in the quarter finals against Burwood. The score was 114-17 to St Albans! What a hiding! They now move through to the semi finals tomorrow. Check out the photos of our Room 23 cricket stars - Te Iwa, Bridget and Emily.

Jump Jam

Jump Jam has become a very popular option for our daily fitness. Sometimes we have the opportunity to lead the other classes. Recently Satori, Josh R, Cole, Connor N and Connor D showed us their Jump Jam talents performing the moves/sequence to 'In the Navy and 'I like to Move it'
Jump Jam auditions were held this week and I was really pleased to see lots of our class head along and give it a go. Good Luck you guys!

Buddy Time with Rm 15

Each week we meet with our Year 3 Buddy class. On Fridays we help them with their spelling testing and during the week we may get together to read, share our writing or teach each other a game.

Senior BIG DAY OUT

Today we had our BDO at QEII. This term it was a celebration of our efforts with swimming both at school and Aquagym. Also as a reward for the hard work and enthusiasm displayed in our new classes for 2010. We had so much fun and just loved the hydro slides. Even Miss Lythgoe and Miss Woods had races down the hydro slides. BIG kids at heart we are!

Here is a slideshow of us enjoying our time out from school.....

Class Swimming

Check out the kids making the most of the heated pool. It has been wonderful to be able to continue lessons so late into the term thanks to the new heating system. The kids have loved heading off to the pool each day and most have made some great progress. We are looking forward to putting these skills to the test in our TRYathlon this week.

Swimming Champs

Our Swimming Champs! Satori, Emily, Alex, Jayde, Olivia, Te Iwa and Connor proudly show off their certificates from the recent Senior Swimming Sports held at Jellie Park. Awesome effort you guys, we are proud of you!

School Swimming

Jackson and Sam enjoying FREETIME after swimming

lots of lengths!
Josh D has an impressive noodle style
Josh R shows us how to swim breaststroke
Dominic, Connor N and Bridget all set to

race in Backstroke

Satori - our champion swimmer!

Art Time

Heke's Nan, Lee, is a talented artist who offered to come in and work with us. We are working through a process with her to complete a wooden wall hanging. Lee carves and cuts out the wood and then paints her designs, often adding all sorts of materials to finish her art off. Lee brought in many of the pieces of art she is presently working on and we thought they were amazing. She has given us a lot of inspiration to complete our own wall hangings.
First we had to doodle to find our 'inner shape' this was then drawn onto a square shape of wood which Lee took home and cut out for us. We have designed our wall hangings to reflect things we like and are painting them in our favourite colours. When this is completed we will be adding feathers, shells, leaves , wool etc that we have gathered to complete them.
We will put some more pictures up as we head towards our finished product.

Meet Team 23

Here is our class. We have 28 fabulous Year 6 students, 19 boys and 9 girls. Our teacher is miss Lythgoe