Measurement in Room 9

Yesterday we had great fun making chocolates in the Student Centre. All of Room 9 took their ingredients over there and spent a long time melting, pouring, stirring and tasting their products.
During the creation, all the students had to measure the weights and sometimes volumes of what they were using. Everyone was really engaged in the task and spent a lot of time perfecting their creations. Check this out to see everyone hard at work.

And the class dance party shot.

Peak Trailblazer

We had a great turnout from our school at the Peak Trailblazer. Check out this flipagram.

View on Flipagram

Chocolate bars

Today in class during maths time we made so,e chocolate bars. As we are focused on measurement at the moment we measured he weight, volume, area and many different attributes of our chocolate bars. Afterwards we were forced to see what they tasted like. Great authentic learning experience for the class.

Historical misconceptions.

Over the last couple of weeks we have been looking at historical misconceptions. We studied the Black Plague and how many people thought that they had the best remedies to cure this. The class studied some of the various cures that were available at the time. None of these cures actually worked. The class then had to present their work as a persuasive poster trying to make os believe that their cure was the best. Here are some of the final pieces that class made.

Social Dancing

We have been practicing a variety of social dances in Sheppard House. The children have learnt 5 paired dances and 4 line dances in a few short weeks which is an amazing feat. Here they are hard at work learning the Figure of Eight dance, one of the most complex dances we teach them.

Milkshakes and smoothies

As part of our vocabulary writing focus our class was focused on choosing the most appropriate words to give a set of directions. We created and tried out some smoothies and milkshakes. There were a few groans from the tastiness experienced in class.

Sheppard house tech challenge

Sheppard house competed in a technology challenge recently. The students had to create a device that stayed in the air for as long as possible. It had to be free falling. All the students were given a limited amount of materials and time in which to complete this. We then tested out our final designs on the high playground equipment. 

Here are some pictures of how the class went.

Coding transformation

In Maths we have been focusing on transformation.

We used an online coding programme to create some patterns that show transformation. Some showed rotation, some showed translation, and some showed reflection.

TRANSLATION - Click the picture and follow the link to see the code work

ROTATION - click the picture and follow the link to see the code work.

A lot of learning was happening about angles and distance with this along with how to make symmetrical patterns.

Tangata Whenua - Powhiri

This week celebrate Matariki so the Year 7 classes at HNI have all been lreaning how to conduct themselves on a Marae at a Powhiri. Yesterday we were the Manuhiri for Room 2. Today we were the Tangata Whenua welcoming Room 7. The class all stepped up to the occasion and performed very well. After the Powhiri we then went back to class to share some learning and kai. The class all had their own jobs around the classroom showing Room 7 people what they have been working on over the year.

Planting some trees.

Last Friday we planted some trees for our treemendous makeover of our drain. Everyone planted at least one tree. Luckily the ground was quite moist so digging wasn't a hard job. Our panel is also shown in the area.

Orienteering

Last week our class, along with the rest of Sheppard House went orienteering. The class navigated their way through the High School (while they had a teacher only day). There were two different courses for them to take. It was great to see them all having fun and challenging themselves with something new. It also linked in with our maths focus from last term with position and orientation.

Mathematical thinking

Lately I class we have been focussing on discussing our mathematical thinking. Children have been justifying and defending their ideas and equations. Others have also been asking questions of, and clarifying information others have presented. The children are becoming more confident at sharing and challenging ideas in a risk free environment.

Here are some pictures of the kids in action.

Congratulations to our new class leaders.

Congratulations Oliver, Jena, Claire and Issy on their new leadership positions.

Rube Goldberg Success!

Over the past 2 weeks our class has spent a huge amount of time problem solving, experimenting and learning through failure about how to achieve success. The class persevered and all achieved success in the end, no matter how long it took. A great lesson to be learned.
Here is a video showing the machines they made.

Bring on Term 2

This term we are focusing on innovation and biodiversity. To start off with innovation the children are going to be needing to working on making Rube Goldberg machines. Here's a taster of what Rube Goldberg machines are like.


Hopefully by the end of Week 2 the class will have a successful machine to present, but this is all about making changes to existing items and learning resilience and persistence through experimentation. Hopefully the class will realise that you can't always be successful straight away and that failure is not bad but helps give direction for future success.

Volleyball

Over the past few weeks we have been working on volleyball and learning the main different shots to perform in the game. The class exhibited these skills well when practicing them. After this we got into playing some games just using the patter tennis nets. Here are some pictures.

And the punch shot courtesy of Hilton :) (not one we practiced)

Wet day P.E.

Over the past 2 days with cold and wet P.E. times we have had to use the hall. With four classes, sports in the hall was not an option so we have made an early start on our Social dance unit that is traditionally held in term 3. Here's a movie of the classes (and teachers) in action.
ENJOY!

Foreshortening Art

We have been doing some interesting in art over the last few days. We experimented with creating some 3d effects called foreshortening. Here is a clip of the class presenting some of their work at the school assembly.
 
I'll put some pictures of the actual work up when it is all up on our roof in the class.

Some addition homework

Here is some horrible work for the class to have as homework for the coming week. I'd like to see them challenging themselves and trying harder levels than they are comfortable with.

The more you risk the greater the sense of satisfaction when you achieve guys!

Embed Game

REACH Values

The class was tasked with coming up with some presentations to show the REACH values that help define our school.

The class all decided to make videos for it. They made them on iMovie and had loads of fun. They show aspects of the values really well. Filming and editing was all completed within an hour and a half so they did very well! WOOHOOGLES!!

Resilience


Engagement



Accountability

Courtesy
Honesty

Kiwiana work

Part of our work about Turangawaewae is looking into some of our favourite NZ music. Some of the girls in the class came up with a dance to a song by Stan Walker.

REACH values

Here at HNI we try to live by the values of REACH. These stand for: resilience, engagement, accountability, courtesy and honesty.

Today the class was set the task in groups to come up with some sort of presentation to show these values. Every group decided to present their's as some sort of film.

Here are some shots of what they were doing.

Nice photography Mr Billings showing half your thumb.

Over the next few days they should have these fully made. Today was mostly for planning out how they wanted to present this as planning is an integral part to success.

Stay tuned for the final videos!

Journey through the Stars - Fotobabble

Yesterday the class read the poem, Journey through the Stars, by Alan Bagnall.
The class then drew a picture about what they thought was happening in the poem. This was to help them with their visualisation skills which is one of the many different skills that good readers exhibit.
After this the class took a photo on the iPads. They uploaded it to fotobabble and narrated the poem over the top of the image.
Here is a great example by Tobey.

Sheppard swimming

Last week we had some swimming trials to see who our team would be for the inter house competition. After the children competed in the various different strokes we then had some time for some fun games and a free swim.

First art activity

Our first class art activity was for the class to create a collage of themselves showing all their interests for the rest of the class to view.

The students had to show a face on the page along with their name and room number.

Children had to ensure that all the white space was covered up so that they had to really work hard locating and representing all of their interests on the page.

Everyone was really engaged in the task and they all showed off their artistic talents to the best of their abilities.

Well done on some great work Room 9

Class Expectations

Today the class came up with some expectations for the year.The defined some expectations for other students in the class and also expectations for teachers. A lot of sports was wanted and many of the students also set their expectations that I give them free food from the canteen, KFC and many other places (that's not going to happen)
It was great to see the class collaborating on this work.
We also practiced blogging today. The children in the class all have a similar post to what you see below. It would be great if you could access their blog and comment on them.

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