Syndicate Assembly Wk3

TP2W

(The past 2 weeks)

It has been a full on first two weeks of term with the students settling in well. 

·      Last week was testing week and early indications from the results is that; overall, the students have done really well. 

·      There was a trip to Wellington to see the NZSO and by all accounts it was very enjoyable. 

·      The Y5/6 Touch Rugby team updates from Friday nights matches are on the Muritai Sports blog

TN2W

(The next 2 weeks)

Sport

*The Muritai School Y4-8 Athletics will be on Monday 5^th November

(pp. Monday 12^th November)

*Y5/6 CZ Cricket tournament is on Tuesday (pp. Thursday)

*Muritai School Triathlon Squad

·      There will be a meeting in Room 12 with Mr. McKay @ each Tuesday lunchtime

*Touch rugby draw is posted on the Muritai Sports blog for the first 5 weeks. 

General

*iPads

·      This week is the first full week where each class in the Y5/6 team will get to use the NEW iPads.  It is exciting to have this new technology and it will be great to use these tools in our teaching and learning

programmes.

*Testing

·      There are few students who will need to catch up on some of the testing that they missed last week.

*Topic/Inquiry

·      Next week we will have a nutritionist, Marie Walters (Food For Thought) working with each class.

*EOTC week

·      There will be a ‘paper copy’ of the EOTC week outline sent home today.  We need the permission and help slip returned ASAP so that we can continue to make preparations for the week.

·      ‘Passport to success’ – It has been great to see the students working towards the CARE certificates.  The students have another 6 weeks to ensure they have all 4 certificates. 

·      Ms. Berry will be sending home a newsletter about the overnight stay, which is on the Thursday of EOTC week.

*Library

·      In the library on Wednesday lunchtimes the Year 6 librarians will be reading picture books.

·      There are lots of NEW books to read!

·      Check out the cool stuff on the library blog, especially the links to some websites.

*HELP NEEDED!

·      There are a few events where we need some parent support:

LOWER HUTT CENTRAL ZONE ATHLETICS MEETING - Years 4-6

Tuesday 20th November, 2012, 9.15am – 2.20pm @ Hutt Rec

EOTC Week: Triathlon, Adrenalin forest, Amazing race and Days Bay day

If you able to assist in any of these please contact/email Mr. McKay (mckay@muritai.school.nz)

*Reminders

Class Blogs

The class blogs are a great way for you to capture a ‘glimpse’ of what is gong on in/outside of the classroom.  We encourage you to visit often!  We would also like to see the students commenting on the posts that are made, as it is a great way for the students to reflect.

Stationery Check

Many students are still missing pens, pencils and rulers and have also filled up their books. These are necessary for everyday class work. Can you please ask your child if they need any items and replace them.

Sun Hats & Drink Bottles

It’s term 4 and each child needs a hat to wear everyday outside. It needs to be a wide brimmed hat, not a cap and ideally should be left at school in their desk for easy access. Thank you to those students who have remembered. Students not wearing hats have to stay in the shade area by the junior rooms.  It is also recommended the children have their own named drink bottle at school. As the days get warmer it’s important they are fully hydrated.

ENJOY THE TN2W!!!

Testing away

Today the students of Room 13 were lucky enough to be the first class to use the schools new iPads. The students were required to be app testers, testing the apps that the school would have access to. They rated them, said how easy they were to use and then gave them a suitable year level.


iMotion HD review:
This app is great for creative minds as it allows you to create your own animated movie. This app would be good for year 3's and up but this app may need adult help because it could be quite confusing.


Tap tap 4 reviews:
Tap Tap 4 has good music and is good for getting the beat of a song. We rated it 9 out of 10 because it is quite easy to use as long as you know what to press.


If you love music then Tap Tap 4 is the app thats perfect for you. It's about memorizing the patterns and learning different songs. It's suitable for yr 3-8 and gets a 10 out of 10 because it is easy to use.

We thought it was fun and easy to use. I liked the music and thought there was good song choices. That is why we gave it a high rating (8 out of 10) and it is good for any year group.


Scribblenauts reviews:
We think that scribblenauts was fun and is good for all ages so long as you can spell. You need to be imaginative as well.

If you are an imaginative, creative and like humour then scribblenauts is perfect for you. We recommend this for years 2-7 as it is easy and great for kids.



Sock Puppets review:
We liked it because you could choose what characters said and what they sounded like. It is fun and quite easy to use. We thought that year 2 and up could use it but the year 2's might need adult help.



Toontastic reviews:
Toontastic is an awesome app. The purpose was to make a fun play. I recommend year 3 and up.

We gave Toontastic a 10 out of 10 because it was so much fun to get to make your own cartoon. We could choose our characters and setting, then we recorded it so it was just like a real show! It's suitable for all ages but the younger ones may need a little help in starting the game. We recommend it for people that want to make their own short movie with only a bit of guidance. Toontastic is awesome!!!

I think this app was fun to use and it was funny at times because your voice sounds different. Overall I really liked it, it was funny.

A bit of Food for Thought

‘Live Right, Feel Great’

Food for thought

Today the students were introduced to our inquiry topic…all about ‘FOOD’.  Our unit will cover many things from nutrition to understanding the how our body uses food to planning and preparing a meal for a ‘Master Chef’ competition.  This term we will have a Nutritionist (Marie Walters, Food for Thought Nutritionist) work with the students as well as ‘Harold’ (and Jo) from the Life Education Trust.

‘Food in schools’ has been a hot topic in the media recently.  We watched a video clip about the differences in the amount and types of food that students eat before and at school, at a decile 1 and decile 10 school. Check out the video clip: Lunchbox-differences-in-decile-1-and-decile-10-schools

It is shocking to see that so many New Zealand children are going to school hungry.  It is also very sad to see what some children are eating for their lunches.  This video clip has helped us think more about, not only the need to eat food BUT to eat the ‘right food’ so that we can ‘feel great’ and make the most of the learning at school.

Happily this is a selection of the our classes lunchboxes:

Another busy day

 Food for Thought

This term for inquiry our focus is food for thought so yesterday we designed our title pages, in our inquiry books, for that subject.

Term 4 Goals

At the Year 5/6 syndicate assembly we were told that if we wanted to participate in E.O.T.C week, we had to earn a passport to success. Each passport had to be signed off by the teacher saying that the student had earned a citizenship, achievement, responsibility and effort certificate, as well as completing all their homework each week and behaving well. We wrote our goals around this.

 

Posters 

Today we designed posters based on the certificates for ur passports-effort, achievement, responsibility and citizenship, in five different groups.

Syndicate Assembly Wk1

Kia Ora Koutou!

Welcome to Term 4 of 2012. It’s hard to believe we are now in the final term of the year. Firstly, a huge thank you to everyone who supported our very successful production, ‘The Uno Effect’, at the end of Term 3. It was a huge undertaking for everyone involved, the children performed fabulously on stage and they thoroughly enjoyed the whole experience.

As usual, Term 4 is set to be another busy one.  Below is a run down on the term. Feel free to contact your child’s classroom teacher if there is anything you wish to discuss further.

Literacy

Our major writing focus for this term is persuasive writing, where we will be exploring how advertising is used to persuade others. We will also be looking at poetry and short stories as a minor focus through the term.  Our Reading lessons will continue to focus on developing comprehension skills and will be linked to our inquiry topic.

Numeracy

We start the term revising some key concepts from the year. We will be focusing particularly on the operational strategies of addition/subtraction and multiplication/division. We will also be looking at algebra as well.  Please continue to encourage your children at home with their Mathletics, particularly their basic facts.

Inquiry

Our big idea is: ‘Live Right, Feel Great’. All classes will be involved in an inquiry where each child will develop a healthy menu for children. Their task will involve preparing for a ‘Master Chef’ experience during our EOTC week.

Health

Towards the end of the term Year 5 classes will be involved in revisiting the concepts around ‘Peer Mediation’. This is a programme created by the Peace Foundation and is part of their ‘Cool Schools’ initiative. In this programme the children will learn the skills of resolving conflict. At the end of the programme the Year 5 students will have an opportunity to apply to be a Peer Mediator in the playground at lunchtime so they can put these skills to good use. This will be an excellent leadership opportunity for children when they are in Year 6.

Physical Education

An exciting term for PE is planned, starting off with Athletics. The children will be taking part in Long Jump, High Jump, Vortex, Shot put, Quoit and Sprints. This leads in nicely to our school athletics day and Zone competition. We end the term with Swimming starting again down at the local pool.

EOTC Week

EOTC will be in Week 9 (10^th-14^th December) and planning is currently underway. Activities will be finalized by the end of next week.  As usual, we will need a lot of parent support for these days. More information will be sent home once ideas and dates are confirmed.

Year 5 and 6 Camp 2013

There will be a meeting for Forest Lakes Camp 2013 towards the end of the term. Details will be sent out closer to the time. You might like to consider whether you would like to be a parent supervisor, preference will be given to parents who can attend the whole week.  The dates for our camp are 19-22 March 2013.

*Important Reminders*

Homework

Homework will be given out each Monday and is due back in on Friday.  The continued focus for homework is the basics: reading, spelling and maths – using Mathletics.  The ‘classroom activity’ aspect of the homework will be based around our inquiry learning and will also use ‘Ryan’s Thinking Keys (http://www.tonyryan.com.au/home/innovation/thinkers-keys/).

Syndicate Assemblies

In term 4 we will continue to have ‘informal’ syndicate assemblies.  We found that this worked very well last term and we will continue to have these meetings but on a fortnightly basis.  We will blog/email the minutes of each meeting.   

Class Blogs

The class blogs are a great way for you to capture a ‘glimpse’ of what is gong on in/outside of the classroom.  We encourage you to visit often!  We would also like to see the students commenting on the posts that are made, as it is a great way for the students to reflect.

Portfolios

If you still have your child’s portfolio please return it for updating this term. They will go out at the end of the term with the reports.

Stationery Check

Many students are now missing pens, pencils and rulers. These are necessary for everyday class work. Can you please ask your child if they need any items and replace them. Thank you.

Sun Hats & Drink Bottles

It’s term 4 and each child needs a hat to wear everyday outside. It needs to be a wide brimmed hat, not a cap and ideally should be left at school in their desk for easy access. Thank you to those students who have remembered. Students not wearing hats have to stay in the shade area by the junior rooms.  It is also recommended the children have their own named drink bottle at school. As the days get warmer it’s important they are fully hydrated.

Footwear and clothing

This term we need students to wear clothing that is suitable for outdoor sport. Please ensure your child wears shoes that they can run easily in, especially on Friday’s as this is our syndicate sport (athletics) day.  Jandals and boots are not appropriate.

If you have any concerns or worries please contact your child’s teacher by leaving a phone message at the office or by email: teachers surname @ muritai.school.nz.

Mauri ora! Kia ora!

The Year 5 and 6 team,

Deane McKay

Murray McMillan

Raihania Chadwick

Kirsten Berry