Fresh Fish Stinky Fish

 Things That Help or Hinder Our Learning

For one of our beginning-of-the-year class activities, we used Fresh Fish Stinky Fish to identify and discuss the things that help and the thongs that hinder our learning.  We included things that make us feel low, impacting how we learn.  

Our focus with this task is to ensure we are aware of what we do to have the best possible opportunities at school and beyond.

These are the thoughts we recorded after a Think, Pair, Share activity.

Be Funky

 Angitu Staff

Today our Angitu staff spent a bit of time getting creative by using BeFunky.  We took a staff photo and used different features to change the photo up a bit.  Check out one of our results:

Writing Time

 Te Ara Angitu Write

Each day we have time to develop our love and skills for writing.  Today we had time for free writing where we could choose any writing style and topic.  

This is a quick video of what writing time in Te Ara Angitu looks like.

Bubble Art Photos

 WHOLE: Bubbles

In Te Ara Angitu, our WHOLE Programme which stands for Wonder-filled Hands On Learning Experiences, started off with a bubbles theme.  

Check out the photos that we took to add to our bubble art.

When we have our art on our learning space wall, we will share those too.

Prototec Pros

 Starting Our Prototec Journey

As part of our Numeracy learning this year, we will be working on our Basic Facts and number knowledge.  Part of this will involve using Prototec and documenting our progress.  

To be able to do that, we need to know how to take screenshots of our work and add these regularly to a slide.  

Today, we had a go at doing this on a shared slide.

Welcome to Te Ara Angitu 2022

 Te Ara Angitu 2022

Kia ora and welcome to a new space and new year with Te Ara Angitu.  We are currently six weeks into the term and the start of the year hasn't gone quite how we would have liked but we are glad to be back and settling into our new learning space.

We are looking forward to sharing our learning throughout the year with lots of changes and opportunities for growth ahead.  

Festival of Flowers

 Our Creations

This year as part of our Community Inquiry and Visual Arts, Whakamanawa created chalk pastel sunflower art that we could enter into the annual Festival of Flowers hosted by the Wigram Lions.

We used this art to decorate our learning space, create calendar art and for the festival exhibition.

Check out our first-ever YouTube clip that also shows some of our photography entries that some students created during our time in our lockdown bubble.

(This is Miss Waho's first time uploading something to YouTube so we could have some background music).

Prototec Time

 Timed Prototec - Checking My Basic Facts Knowledge

Today we had a set amount of time to complete a Prototec Basic Facts session.  We then all had to stop, take a screenshot and post this to our blogs so we could share how we went.

We had 6 minutes to work and then had to stop.

I did Stage: 

My score was: 

Next time I need to: 

Here are my screenshots:

Insert your screenshot here:

Whakamanawa Writing

 Our Holidays

This week when we were working in our home base class, Whakamanawa created a collaborative piece of writing to share something about our holidays.  

We each had a slide and specific learning outcomes and criteria.  Throughout the week, we gave each other feedback and feedforward.  We then edited our writing and focused on what we could do to improve the quality.  Miss Waho then gave some more suggestions and we acted on those.

On Friday, we got into groups and read our writing to our partners.  We gave a final piece of feedback and feedforward and discussed what it means to be able to work in a group for different situations.

We worked on our digital fluency skills and shared a screenshot of our individual work on our blogs.  

Here is the slide we created:

Next time, we will duplicate our slides so we can show our before feedforward and the finished version.

Māori Art

 Māori Art and Fried Bread

To celebrate Te Wiki O Te Reo Māori, for Fun Friday, Miss Cabral and Miss Waho did a Māori Art and Fried Bread activity.  Penny had to help Miss Waho out to make the fried bread throughout the day because she's got the skills.

Here are a few photos from the afternoon:

Have you tried fried bread before?  If you haven't, you should.

Goal Check In

 Steps Web Goal - How Am I Going?

This term our focus for Goal Setting is Steps Web.  In July, I set a goal for the rest of the term.  Today, I am checking in to see how I am progressing.  

This is my July goal:

Today, in September/ Mahuru I have done 852 minutes.  This means I have done @#$ minutes so I am on track to reach my goal.  I will continue to do what I have been doing.

or

I haven't really done much so this means I need to do more Steps in my own time.  

or 

I have already reached my goal for this term so now, I can set an even higher goal which is to be on level  $^(*) by the end of the term.

Māori Language Moment

 Celebrating Te Reo Māori

This year to celebrate Te Wiki o Te Reo Māori, our whole school took part in the Māori Language Moment.  This was when we all stopped what we were doing and did something that involved any of the following:  ako-learn, whakarongo-listen, kōrero-speak, tākaro-play, pānui-read, waiata-sing.

In Te Ara Takitini, we were in our Numeracy classes so our MLM was done with Numeracy teachers for 15 minutes.  In Miss Waho's class, we ended up enjoying it so much that we were able to do something for all areas of focus.

We started by listening and watching the lyric version of Six60's song Pepeha.  We talked about what the different kupu mean and made connections with our own pepeha learning.

We then went over how we ask someone how they are and selected three different responses that we could give.  We connected with three different people and had a kōrero to see how we were feeling.

Kei te hia kau ahau.

Once we were all warmed up, it was time for us to read.  We got out a selection of pukapuka and sat in an oval to have a browse and a read.  We have such a good selection so it was great to see what words we recognised and read some texts in Te Reo Māori.

When we were tidying up our books, we learned how to say pass the book and to reply with here is the book.  Homai te pukapuka.  Anei te pukapuka.

When it was time to tākaro, we had a go at a warm-up from Māori Movement.  This was new for us but we loved this and are looking forward to trying out more of these sessions.  We can see and feel how good this is for our taha tinana.

For our waiata time, we looked through our waiata anthems slide and akonga chose to sing Aotearoa by Stan Walker, Troy Kingi, Maisey Rika and Ria Hall.  This waiata is one of our bell songs at the moment and one of our favourites.

Our whole school participated in the Māori Language Moment this year and have shared our moments in a slide.  Check out what else happened around the school:

Today's activities really made us realise that we need more of these moments.  It has given us more motivation to be creating opportunities for us all to refresh, learn and grow.

Dog Lovers

 Delightful Dogs Day

One of the activities that Miss Cabral got Whakamanawa students to do, was about our favourite dogs.  We then got to do a quiz that would show our dog matches.  This is my future dog friend:

I thought this activity was really interesting.  It shows all of the different things you need to consider before taking on the responsibility of owning a dog.

This quiz can be found here:  IAMS Dog Breed Selector

Have a go and let me know what dog breed you got matched with.

Virtual Fish! Tickets

Showing Our Values

In 2020 when we were in lockdown, we created virtual Fish! Tickets to replace the paper tickets we use to acknowledge students for showing and growing our school values.  This year, we decided to continue doing these because we have so many students who show great engagement as we learn and work from home.  

For Whakamanawa, we also have Miss Cabral who has created a personalised ticket for sharing.

Here is our 2021 version:

If you haven't heard of the Fish! Philosophy, check it out on YouTube.

Daffodil Day Dedications

 Our Daffodil Day Learning

This year, our Daffodil Day activities have been put on hold so we can't shave heads until we all get back to school.  Mr Huggins will have loads of hair by then. 

In Whakamanawa, we have had a digital learning object with some activities to do that are based around Daffodil Day.

For our online fundraising, we have raised over $1000 for the Cancer Society.  We are so pleased with our efforts and know that this number is sure to grow...kind of like Mr Huggins and his hair.

Check out our DLO.

Make sure you check out student blogs too because there are some cool Voki on some of the blogs.

Learning Languages

Português with Miss Cabral

This term we are really lucky to have Miss Cabral from the University of Canterbury. Whakamanawa is always keen to learn new languages and because Miss Cabral is from Brazil, she has started teaching us Portuguese.

Before lockdown, we started learning how to say hello and ask how people are. We also started learning how to respond by saying I am good thank you.

Lockdown has meant that we now need to learn in a different way to when we are at school so Miss Cabral has created a slide to help our language learning.

Check it out and maybe you could learn some too.

Incredibox

 Creating Music

Today as part of Whakamanawa's distance learning, we started exploring the Arts section of our Takitini Site.  We had a go at creating music using Incredibox and then sharing our mixes to our blogs.  

In our class Meet session, some students shared their screens and showed the rest of us how to do it and what they had created.  They were so cool that Miss Cabral and I were inspired and planned to have a go.

This is one that I had a play with and then used Screencastify to record it.

My next step is to try different types of music that this online app has.

Lockdown Challenges

 Whakamanawa Create Challenges

We have been really impressed by the creative ways teachers are encouraging children to make lockdown learning fun and interactive.

Today, in one of our daily class Meet sessions, one of the students suggested that we do something involving challenges for Whakamanawa.  We created a Google Slide and decided what areas of challenge we would have and came up with physical, creative, social and kindness.  

We then decided that students can have a part in setting the challenges.  

Here is what we have so far:

Lockdown Listening

 Whakamanawa's Lockdown Music Favourites

We all enjoy music and some music helps to get us through difficult times or allows us to reflect on things in life.  Our moods and the way we feel can be influenced by music.

In Whakamanawa, we decided that we would share some of our current favourite songs that are helping us cope better during the lockdown.  

This is a collaborative slide where we share music and explain something about what we like about each piece.   Check it out.

Mr Wilkinson's Birthday Surprise

 Happy Lockdown Birthday

Many people will be spending this year's birthday in lockdown mode and that includes our very own principal, Mr Wilkinson.  Usually, if we were at school we would do something special and we are pleased that lockdown didn't stop us.

One of our students created a slide for each of us to share pictures and messages.  we asked Mr Wilkinson to come to our class afternoon Google Meet.  We all changed our profile pictures and turned our cameras off so when he arrived, he was greeted with this:

We played this version of happy birthday and had a go at singing altogether. It was a cool bit of lockdown fun and we all loved seeing our principal on his special day.