100 Seconds!

 Do you struggle remembering quick time tables off by heart?

I do, most of them I get wrong when rushing through my basic facts! So our teacher had set us a task this week to try out a new math game called Timestables.

For this game, we have 100 seconds to complete as many basic facts equations as possible within the time frame! We had 5 minutes to play this game, and  after a few rounds we had to screenshot our score!

I love this game and I'm sure I will definitely improve my memory soon!

Here is my score:

Catherine's Cup of Tea!

 St Catherine McAuley is the namesake of our Blue house group at PCS.

Since last week on Wednesday it was McAuley day, we were doing research about Catherine, her background and what impact she had on the world. In doing so, we also were set to complete the slide Must-Do's!

I enjoyed this quick task, and I'm sure I will carry this knowledge with me to share!

Wacky Wardrobe!

 Fashion is the big talk now these days! For hundreds of years the style has gone from Disco-CRAZY to modern, flashy suits! This week our task was to create a fashion collage of things we like to wear!

It was a simple and relaxing task for me, but it was also very time consuming because I had to remove the background using Remove.bg for each image. I loved this task as well because I have done collaging on paper before, and I find it as a great activity!

I am happy with my final result and would love to do this again!

Tooth Trouble...

 All Saints Day is a special event where some people (especially the Catholic Church) celebrates all the saints who have died. 
Each Saint is well known for their own thin eg. St Valentine is known for lovers and Bee Keeping!
This task we have been assigned is to research about our chosen Saint then complete the slide about the following!
I chose St Apollonia, which I have never heard about before! She is a wonderful example of Self-Worth, Devotion and Sacrifice. Her story is incredible to read and is definitely one of the most interesting I've ever read. Her story can be found here: St Apollonia

Here is the Slide that I decorated and completed!

My Weekly Wondering!

 This week has been crazy! But to get a better understanding of what happened let me explain...

Something unusual happened on Monday right after morning tea. Whaea Danni our main teacher had introduced another student teacher who would be coming in each day for Term 4. Her name was Miss. Lawless and she happened to be an unknown relative of mine! As Whaea Danni stumbled back into the classroom after the bell rang we got sad news that she would have to rush out to a tangi (funeral) and eventually only attended school for 2 days this week! Although it was interesting having Miss Lawless teach us!

Something I enjoyed was having Mrs Dromgool teach us today, and having a split class yesterday! Te Kahu class got split into groups and were spread across the school, my group got sent to Pukeko (the year 1-2 class) and I luckily had my best friend Piper with me! This was lot's of fun because Mrs Dromgool doesn't come in often to teach us, and I loved helping the younger students spell.

I didn't enjoy Athletics that much, because I have training everyday. But I mainly disliked participating in High Jump! I am not that tall, but I am quite short; so I struggle with this activity. My class mates say I am good at it but I don't like to do this one as much as sprints or long jump! After having athletics everyday though I tried to encourage myself to just try my best because of the up coming central zones and just for my own achievements! I now just try to do high jump, though I can't wait to run!

Next week I am looking forward to the new learning, having Miss Lawless teach us all week! Along with trying to beat my goal for high jump!

Do you have a favourite school activity?

If not what is your least favourite school activity?

Daring Design

 This week our contract has been packed with tasks to complete! I favoured many of these activities, but this one overall was my favourite! 100%

For this task we were learning about The Arts and all the main 5 things that fall under this category. These subjects include: Music, Visual Art, Dance, Drama+Film and Fashion+Design.

We watched videos on each of the slides and after, we had to write our own summary of what these 5 things mean to us.  Personally Visual Art is my favourite since I love to draw but I do enjoy Music as well!

This is the slide I completed!

Moving With Media!

This week for the first session of Term 4 we had Whaea Donna come in on Tuesday for Cyber Smart!

This was all about Media, at first I thought I knew all about media and it being a digital network to communicate and share information with people around the world; but I was wrong!

There are actually 3 different types of Media, Print Media, BroadCasting Media and Online Media.

The rest of the lesson we reviewed about this topic and then we were set to create a DLO (Digital Learning Object) to show our findings.

Here is my DLO and what I learnt about Media!

To The Lake We Go!

The sun gently peeked through my soft pink curtains as I squinted under the covers and positioned myself comfortably. I cheered softly as I realised the school holidays had just begun!

At  7am my Mum rushed in and woke me up to get ready for training! I groaned and moaned as I discovered that we had our Waka Camp that week! This meant we went to go to train everyday in the morning but we had a choice to stay at home or at Coach’s house (who happened to be my Mum!) Once ready we would await for the other members to arrive!

When everyone was finally ready to go, we slouched and slowly made our way into the silver van dragging our gears behind us. Squeezing in tight mum flipped on the heater and started to drive to Lake Ngatu. Still half asleep my Mum supplied us with 7 Hot Chocolates in total for a big energy boost! They were the best! Warm, coconut milk and fluffy pink and white marshmallows filled the cup as we left her job.These cups of coco-goodness is what woke us up for the big training ahead!

At the lake we shivered as we stepped out of the oven-like van and into the winter wind! We grabbed our paddles, headed down to the waka and said karakia before rushing out into the icy-cold water! We paddled slowly to warm up over the crystal clear, calm lake. The reflection of the surrounding mountains and bush leaving us in awe. The mist lining the shore sent chills up our spine and the ripples from our paddles sent a long, slow chain reaction!

Then begun our daily training, the goal to paddle 20 km everyday and our time getting faster and faster. If we didn't achieve this goal or slowed our time then our punishment was to run around the lake twice! This continued daily from Monday through to Friday.

The morning mist and charcoal sky was all I saw as we drove past the dark silhouettes of thick bush. It was the last day of training and we decided to go for an early morning swim at the nearby Te Rangi Aniwaniwa swimming pool. 6:30am came and we dove into the pool swimming like fish, the hour flew by as 7:00am arrived and we marched headstrong to finish our goal!

Luckily we beat our time each day and a punishment was NOT required!

Still celebrating we spent our time relaxing in our well-deserved beds. I spent 3 days with my cousin laughing and watching movies after the hard, rewarding training. Feeling accomplished we rambled about what we achieved throughout what was meant to be our school *holidays* but then my family was to venture from Kaitaia to Hamilton for a surprise last-minute gathering for my Aunty's 40th Birthday!

I was so excited I bounced off the walls! We packed our luggage and sped off into the morning distance. Stopping regularly we had to make sure to let our little dog Awhi out just in case-she was well known to run away often so we couldn't afford to lose her while we were gone. The only other option was to bring her with us! Due to her small size she was rather cute company!

Pulling up into the hard, gravel drive way joyful chatter was echoing down the street as we greeted one other happily! Hugs, laughter and quick unpacking commenced as we entered the great house. The large house was fitting for us to cram in and for the first time in a very long time all 8 moko's, 3 Aunty's, 2 Uncle's and 1 Nana were all gathered together under the same roof!

Over the next and final 4 days we filled our shopping carts with fun stuff and face masks for the girls, we went to time zone and played with the VR headset along with winning hundreds of tickets (due to so many of us!)

We watched movies together and cherished the little time we had together. We played with the baby and went bowling! This was the best time ever!

On the last day we went to see my cousins in their new house in Hamilton nearby as well Rico! We had not seen them in 6 years, so we took our chance for we don't know when the next gathering would be. As we approached their house the giant property left us in shock! A giant brick and cream-wood lining. A fish pond, a disappointing (not so deep) well and incredibly large rooms! After taking a tour around the house and eating some dinner we decided to play spot light! Chasing and calling around the house outside in the dark was all to be heard, then when the honk of a car sadly surprised us and we left.

Returning home late and sleeping in, my dad repacked the van and we all followed home to Auckland then separated from there!

Now only 9 more weeks to go before we can finally meet up again!

Analysis!

 For the whole day today we have been working on our Blog Post Analysis!

This is where you view over the amount of posts you have, analyse that data, put it onto a graph etc. Then once we were done we had to write 3 statement about the information we collected and write a short paragraph about what the graph is showing. After all of this we put it onto a google drawing and this is my outcome!

This took surprisingly long and I am so glad I have finished it! 

(Can't wait for the Holidays!)

In the Step of Suzanne

 This week for R.E we are learning about Suzanne Aubert. This woman is significant to our school since one of House Groups ( groups we split the school by)  is named after her! Every year we celebrate the people who the house groups are named after by dressing in that colour. Aubert day is coming up this Friday so we will be dressing up in Red!

Along with the upcoming event we decided to do some research about Suzanne herself; once we gathered the information from this Video we were set to create a DLO (Digital Learning Object) / Fact File with at least 10 facts minimum.

I enjoyed creating my factfile on google drawing and I am very pleased with the outcome! Since I am also in the "Aubert" House group I am looking forward to celebrating Suzanne in remembrance!

Here is my Fact File!

My Weekly Wondering

 This week has been amazing! We had 2 of my favourite step-in teachers and I managed to complete all my learning!

I enjoyed most tasks we had this week because most of them had drawing involved as options! That was my favourite part because now my books are filled with all sorts of colourful illustrations! I also enjoyed watching the U9's play soccer and playing cricket/soft ball on the field with my friends on a sunny day!

I struggled with managing my time because I was behind on some tasks due to me focusing on one task too much! 

Next week I aim to use my time wisely and cover the range of ALL of my tasks so I don't repeat this mistake, and so I can receive / achieve my Golden time (free time) !

I am looking forward to the School Holidays so I can sleep in, chill & vibe in bed and play with my dogs and whanau!

Te Wiki O Te Reo Maori!

This week is Te Reo Maori Week! So our learning has basically been based all around it. I found this learning quite overwhelming but otherwise I managed to complete it! This week on our contract we had to complete 4 Te Reo Maori Tasks, 3 R.E task s(Religious Education) and finish our Statistics tasks in maths.

I loved this contract because I chose most of the tasks with drawing involved! Along with other tasks that I could complete quickly but to a high quality! Here are my finished products:

My Pixel version of Maui

A Poster to Promote Te Reo Maori Week!

My own word search for others to complete. And I completed a paper copy version given by my teacher!

Then I made this Graph for Statistics about whether the milk in our school should be given out more often! : My Graph

And I finished my R.E Tasks in my Faith Journal.

I struggled a lot trying to keep up with this work but otherwise I enjoyed everything I worked hard on to complete!

My Weekly Wondering

 Last week was very enjoyable for me! Because our main base was around Social Justice Week, Filming and Spoken Word Poetry!

I enjoyed learning about Poetry because I find that it is a great way to let your mind run free and to be creative with no limits! This particular genre of poetry is very inspiring though; artists that master using spoken word usually post them on youtube for motivational quotes! Prince Ea is a great example who posted Sorry. I love this video and now love watching other spoken word videos too!

I found completing my work challenging to complete because there wasn't much time given to complete it! The week flew by and I never imagined how difficult it would be but in the end I finished!

This week I hope to complete my work to higher standards and manage my time wisely. I hope to stay on task and not get distracted by others around me; I will work with my friends but focus on my activity at task the best I can.

Joyful Justice!

 For the past few days of this week I have been working hard to complete this task for Social Justice Week! This task is especially meant for Social Justice Week, and I am so glad it's done.

I had to create 2 DLO's for this task and complete the slide and here it is!

 

A Poetic Promise

 This term we have been focusing on Poetry! This task today is the Spoken Word. The Spoken Word is a special type of Poetic Writing where you base your entire poem about one word. We then looked further into this by choosing one of four videos to watch of poetic artist present their Spoken Word Poem.

Then the follow up task was to complete a slide created by our Teacher Whaea Danni! Decorate it and post it on our blogs. 

Here is my Spoken Word slide deck!

I enjoy Poetry very much! I love learning about it and writing my own. I found this task very fun but unfortunately this task took me a long time to complete it. Next time my goal is to finish these tasks in a quicker time period and manage my time wisely.

My Weekly Wondering

 This week has been very challenging for me and here is why:

Our teacher was away sick for two days and we had 2 substitutes that were extremely busy! This made my learning difficult to keep up with along with my filming I was doing with my group in the background... This was challenging to cope with but in the end I managed to finish my work and finish our video. 

I enjoyed filming different scenes with my group since I was given the role of being Director! I was able to lead and assist my team to get all the right shots we needed! I really enjoy filming and it's one of my passions, so this is a task I had no problem with! But it was difficult to listen to all the different ideas everyone had, and stay on planned theme.

This week I succeeded to be independant and a leader. Having to manage my own self along with others taught me that not only do you have to think carefully but you have to use your time wisely. I struggled with this but I completed my tasks to a high standard and achieved my goal to be more independent with my learning throughout the week!

Next week I am looking forward to a not-so-crazy and normal week. I am looking forward to Fathers Day and sleeping in tomorrow!!!

Independant Intuition

 This week has been CRAZILY PACKED! 

For most of this week I was filming with my group during learning time, which caused me having to miss out on finishing my contract work. But then the rest of my class also had mass, music, kapa haka, and other things as well interfering with their time too!

So this week ended up flying by fast and ended up with one [articular task as our contract. We had to be very responsible and independent for our teacher. Whaea Danni was away for 2 days and we had 2 substitutes who were both extremely busy, but I feel we have done well.

This task I did, took me ALL week to finish and I am proud that I was able to achieve my Golden Time now!

I did find this challenging to sort out but the planning steps behind it will be very useful for in the future!

Sacrament Saviors

 This week we started an R.E ( Religious Education ) task! 

For this activity we had to do research on Priests, Bishops and Deacons; what they are, what they wear, what they do and how you become one. After we had the information we would then put it onto an infographic ( a visual way to show our learning like a poster ) and post it up onto our blogs. I found gathering the info a piece-of-cake but creating my infographic difficult since I've been away for most of the week. 

Today I managed to complete it! I am very proud of what I made with the little time I had. Piktochart is a great site and I will be definitely using it for future learning purposes!

Playing with Poetry!

 Today we had a quick, simple and fun task to complete!

We had to write a poem using our 5 senses, then take away The I smell, I taste, I see etc... just leaving the rest of your sentence for each sense. Something I found challenging with this task was taking away some words but having my poem still make sense.

I love poetry, so this task was lot's of fun for me! I hope we do more stuff like this.

Here is my end result!

Confusing Collaboration!

 Today we had another great Cyber Smart Session! The task assigned today was all about clear instructions.

First we would pick a partner and who would be Player A / Player B. My partner was Therese; she was player A and so I settled with player B. We then had to make a copy of the slide we had as your player! Therese had an image on her slide with pictures in a certain place, my slide did not. She would then explain to me and give me instructions on where to put the images on the grid; the rule was we were not allowed to look at each other's screen!

After that it would then be my turn to explain where my images were on the grid! The next few slides didn't have grids so it made positioning the images difficult! Afterwards we got to create our own images with shapes and continue the following steps...

I found this very challenging to compare our left's and right's along with explaining where images were; but I found this task very fun and I would definitely do it again!

*-_ My Weekly Wondering! _-*

 This week has been packed! We had Speeches, P.E and lot's of learning to complete!

Although my school schedule has been filled with things to do I managed to complete all my work. I enjoyed finishing my work with plenty of time to spare! This also gave me my privilege to listen to music, achieve golden time ( Free Time ) and draw!

A super success I achieved this week was winning our PCS School Speech Competition! Usually I make it semi-finals but I haven't qualified to the Far North Speeches before; this is a huge step for me and I cannot wait to present what I wrote! 

I found working with the sudden weather changes a tough challenge. The heavy rain was very distracting and the heat of the sun would just bake the day away! Even though we have an AC we try to save power when it isn't required. 

I learnt that there are many different parts to the brain! The frontal Lobe is what gives humans the ability to make their own smart decisions where as animals can't think for themselves! This is really cool but humans have only been learning about the brain for the past 100 years; there is probably so much more to learn about!

I look forward to the art we might be doing next week! I always enjoy this subject because I get to be creative freely! Otherwise I look forward to writing because I use words to paint incredible pictures!

I have shown the value of Pono ( Truth )  this week when I tick off the tasks I have completed. I only tick them off when I have fully completed them; therefore I am being truthful with what I am doing.

I had lot's of fun playing basketball at break time, carefully learning how to play my violin in music class and just enjoying the time I have at school. We might go into lockdown so I make the most of the social time I have with my friends! 

_-* From a Pebble's Perspective*-_

 Today in Te Kahu we are continuing to follow up on personification. Instead of writing about being the desk in front of us we are writing from another thing's point of view; Particularly one during the Normandy War. 

Here is my writing piece:

The charcoal sky is decorated with fading stars as I lay there in silence. I am surrounded by others and we admire the beauty of the peace and quiet as the salty waves gently crash upon the shore. My smooth skin collides with the cold, sandy bottom beneath me as I breathe slowly. The frothy, white wash piles up as the tall grass sways and dances to the whistling wind just at the crack of dawn. Suddenly I begin to hear muffled voices..

They are coming from heavy, black ships that are approaching the calm beach shore. The buzzing of motors begin to creep louder. The sun slowly peeks from its hiding place and the sky blushes pink but the beautiful setting is broken by the intense commands that are heard from the army of boats. The clashing of gear and equipment slice through the sound of crashing waves. I worry and quiver as they get closer and closer to shore before thousands of pairs of feet splash in the silver waves...

Sharp toothed, barb wire incase the beach. Yelling and shouting are all I hear, the camo, green gear race back and forth in front of me. The soldiers disembark and march all over the beach, and the peace is wildly broken by these uninvited guests.

Then BOOM! My friends are suddenly flung into the air and I am trampled by a stampede of  marching feet. The loud shots of guns and musty smoke echo through the air, I scream and wonder what is happening before me. Right as I knew it the Normandy War had begun! 10 more soldiers appear out of nowhere, thousands are shot as quick as lightning and my life flashes before my life as I slap against the crystal, blue sea! 

The sun began to quickly disappear, hiding from the chaos. The crazy orchestra of guns, cannons, ships and soldiers slowly drift further and further away from me as I sink deeper and deeper. The dim light softly lights my way as I continue to fall; as my withered, battered body bathes in the salty water in pain I finally reach the bottom.

I am a pebble at the bottom of the sea, now laying broken in half. The moonlight glistens upon me as I wonder where my friends are now. I remain traumatised by this brutal war and I replay these events that scar both my memory and body forever.

I enjoyed writing this piece because I felt like I got a lot deeper in my description of the setting, the sounds and smell. I love writing from non-human points of view and I cannot wait to use this in other writing pieces as well!

How would you feel if you were something else in a crazy or weird situation like this?

What were you- A tree- The sun- The sea? How did it feel? What did it see?

 Give it a go and be Creative!

Being Smart with Sacraments!

 This term in Te Kahu we are learning about the 7 Sacraments for R.E ( Religious Education ).

The 7 Sacraments are the different stages you go through along your Catholic / Religious  journey. Since Pompallier is a Catholic schol our faith is one of the main structures that the teachers allow into the students life; and learning about this is something I really enjoy! These 7 sacraments are known as:

• Baptism
• Eucharist
• Confirmation
• Reconciliation
• Annointing of the Sick
• Matrimony
• Holy Orders

As people go through these stages most do not complete the final two: Matrimony and Holy Orders. This is when you become a Preist etc and confirm your connection with God. After this recap we had to create a DLO about the 3 different catagories that these 7 subjects fall under. 

Here is my DLO:

_-*Preaching Personification*-_

 This week in Te Kahu has been crazy!

Settling back into our books we have been learning about writing features, and figurative language. One of these topics happen to be Personification! 

Personification means to give human-like qualities to non-human things such as plants, inanimate objects or animals etc. To follow up with this learning we were assigned to create a piece of writing using personification about the desk in front of us that we work on!

While doing this we were given tips that would help with giving our tables their own personalities! Like how they would feel, how they look and how we affect the tables themselves such as working on or around them. I enjoy creatively writing so this task was lot's of fun.

Here is my writing piece:

I enjoy the peace and quiet; the students are so loud when working but now I get a quick break. CRASH! Through the door burst the wild pack of students as they rush into their classroom. Before I knew it 2 of them rush towards me and slap books and stationary on my bright, green body.

I itch as the left-over tape sticks to my side, and quietly I giggle as pencils tickle me gently. Close to the ground I stand strong holding up the pressure and weight of school supplies as my students work! Keeping the struggle inside but yet through all the pain I am satisfied.

I love the joyful laughter and silly jokes the students exchange in front of me. The cheshire-like wide smiles are the thing I look forward to all day; but they're my favourite thing to see! The more they work the more scars that appear on my body. I start to notice the small stains, chips, ink and glue left on me...

Away they charge out the door as quick as light! As my good friend rings the home-time bell; I stretch and look out the window to see crowds of kids leap into cars and leave. The other tables and I share our daily experiences before laying down back to rest.

I shuffle and shift to get back into my positioni; as I do everyday. Now here I await for the students to return once more...

I really enjoyed this task because I felt that I was able to writer a high standard piece from the view of my everyday table. Now I am attached to my desk and I don't just think of it as a desk anymore! XD I discovered that I use personification in my writing much more often then I realised and it puts lots more detail and description into my writing!

Try using personification yourself about your desk!

How would your bed or device feel?

Crazy, Cluttered Comments!

This week we have begun to start our Cyber Smart sessions again, this task we did today is our first for Term 3!

We first picked a partner ( my partner was a good friend of mine Therese ) then we shared a google drawing with our task.

This task was about quality blog comments, what they are and the difference between what makes a good one and a bad one.

To complete this task we had to mark each comment on the drawing with either a thumbs up or thumbs down; 5/10 were marked good and the other 1/2 was marked bad.

I enjoyed this task because I love our cyber smart sessions. I liked marking the comments and now I know what a good quality blog comment looks like and hopefully I can take this new information and use it when I comment too!

My Weekly Wondering

This first week of Term 3 back at school has been very quick, and my schedule has been packed!

Everyday we have had a full day of learning, activities, p.e, and more.

I feel that I have completed my contracts surprisingly fast and ended up with plenty of time to work on creating a book for the junior students within our school.

The learning I was given was fun and challenging but I feel that I could have completed them to a higher level.

 Next week I will try to achieve this goal and continue to strive to completing them to high expectations.

I also want to work on covering all the learning we had done over the past few terms because I seem to have let my mind slip and forget. To do this I can watch videos at home to help me remember then do some side tasks to support that.

I cannot wait to see what else we learn in our class next week, and I'm sure it will be just as 

Practical and Peaceful Prayer

For the next few weeks of Term 3 we are focusing on one of our school values Pono meaning Truth in Maori and is represented in green.

This week for R.E (Religious Education) we are focusing on creative/ imaginative prayer and what it means to Pray. For this task we did today we had to go onto a website and read 5 scriptures about what the bible says about prayer; once you're done with that we would then copy the 5 readings into our Faith Journal (the book we keep all of our R.E learning in).

After that we had to write a summary about what prayer is based on the information from the scriptures and create a DLO about our learning.

Here is my DLO with my summary:

I really enjoyed this task because before we started Whaea Danni put relaxing music on so we had time to reflect and pray; which I thought was really calming then I worked independently and finished my work early!

Happy Holidays!

The glimmer of sunlight peeked through the window curtains. As I awoke in my cousin’s fresh bedroom, I was relieved to know we had finally arrived in Hamilton, and the last week of the school holidays would be amazing!

It was the day that we would explore the Hamilton Gardens for the entire day, my 2 younger brothers, 5 cousins, NaiNai (my grandmother) and I. The Hamilton Gardens include sections based off of both plants and ways to display them from other countries. We leaped into our silver van and drove towards our destination; everyone was leaping as we flew from the car into the entry of the crowded building. 

Together as a group we split up. Nainai with the 4 boys as a crew; and me with the 3 girls. We divided into our own pathways as we crossed short decorative bridges and still ponds and rivers. Through rough, dirty tunnels and caves along with overgrowing, exotic plants or neatly, trimmed trees. We saw recyclable items being used in a collage, ancient fountains and statues with historic backstories.

My favourite exhibit there was the Enlarged garden. There we found a large rusty water tap and an old, still shovel that both towered over humans.

Green plant-like machines that looked as if they were clawing the sky and slowly moving by themselves giving the entire garden a magical vibe! Curved, concrete pathways and a grand gate fit for a Giant, that gate was the height of a 2-3 story building!

As we exited the maze of gardens we exchanged eagerly what we saw and were impressed by. Each garden had it’s own story to tell, and they were all so beautiful, unique and very different. Dearly wishing to stay, my cousins and I slouched as we slowly climbed back into our dusty van; before returning home for a delicious, warm meal.

-Cyber Smart-

Over the past 2 terms I have grown more interested in our Cyber Smart sessions with Whaea Donna.

These activities we do within the hour have been very useful and fun; especially with my group of friends I work with.

One of my favourite topics to learn about within Cyber Smart Time is filming!

I love filming because my group and I started filming a mini thriller/horror film which was very exciting; the learning through this was testing different camera angles, 3 rule, collaboration and using our storyboard to help guide our way to build the mini movie properly.

I enjoy learning about Filming but I would also really enjoy learning about editing and animations.

Animations are another one of my favourite things to do especially to share my learning, but it becomes difficult when I cannot use websites like scratch or gamefroot because I am enable to post it to my blog. 

It disappoints me that I can't share my learning.

I also want to learn more about techniques and ways to edit since filming is such a passion for me.

I find that knowing how to edit short clips would be great for our prototype movie we are making but not knowing how to edit makes things difficult. 

I can't wait for our next Cyber Smart lesson so we can possibly try both of these things.

~End of Term 2 Reflection~

~End of Term 2 Reflection~

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I really enjoyed this term especially since it was a great relief to see my friends after a long time in lockdown!

The biggest challenge from this term was my STEAM challenges because I am very competitive and I can be very bossy/controlling. But luckily I had great partners throughout the tasks we did and we came out with good and surprising results!

I have learnt so much from this term! One of the things I am very proud of improving on was my geometry and my measurement! I found these two subjects very difficult to work out but I focused on myself and what I needed to learn and later found myself completing those equations easily!

The highlight of the term was definitely this week we have been through so far! 

We have been doing fun activities and dressing up which I enjoy! The tasks that we have done, the fun we had has been the most fun all year!

Something I have learned this term was that goals are crucial!

Setting goals can lead you to so many opportunities and chances to take, I now realise that in everything I do I have a goal. Whether it's to finish a task before Morning tea, or walk to a place before an hour is up or even if it's just to play a game with my friends! I set myself higher goals now and I know that I'll achieve them eventually!

I cannot wait for the school holidays! But I can't wait for the fun things we will do next term or even the things I'll learn, discover or try! 

I wonder what will happen next term!

Matariki Breakie!

~Matariki Breakie~

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Now that the end of Matariki is coming along with the end of the term; my class/school has been doing fun activities to celebrate both events!

On Tuesday we had Pajama Day and a big class Matariki breakfast!  Everyone came to school wearing their pj's and my class spent time together eating a big breakie because that's what Matariki is all about. Spending time together!

During this time we also shared our goals for the Maori New Year that are written on my slide.

On Wednesday we planted little herbs/crops into pot plants to take home!

This was also to celebrate Matariki and it was really fun. With this task we were put into groups to plant with and to create a DLO (Digital Learning Object) about the two Maori Gods related to agriculture!  All the information about them were put onto this shared slide, along with photo's of our end result with our plants!

I enjoyed this week very much and I hope that we can do more fun activities like these!

Character Web

Character Web.

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This is the second Creative writing task and it was quite easy.

All we had to do for this one was choose a character from one of the provided sites, articles/stories or videos and fill in this google drawing about your chosen person.

I chose to do the Immortal white snake:

Here is my character web and links to the video!

Part 1- Immortal White Snake         Part 2- Immortal White Snake

I am really proud of myself for finishing these tasks quite fast and I also had lot's of fun watching the videos. They were quite interesting and no I am sure to watch more!

Mountains of Food!

Mountains of Food!

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Here in New Zealand we are still in the season of Matariki!
To celebrate this my class will be having a big Matariki Breakfast next week, otherwise we are learning about the Maori kupu for different kinds of foods like fruits, vegetables or meat!

Our task was to make a copy of this slide and fill in the Maori words using a Maori Dictionary Book (NOT ONLINE) because it can give you other words that we don't use here in the Far North.

After you have done that you would add in images of all the foods and record yourself pronouncing how to say each word.

My chromebook would not allow me to play sound on the slide, which was very disappointing!

But I managed to complete the entire slide deck!

I enjoyed this task because some of these words I didn't know, and now I can share this information  with others!

Try saying some of these words too!

Forbidden Creature

-Forbidden Creature-

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In Te Kahu we were set more creative writing tasks. The first thing we had to do was to read, watch and play the videos, texts/articles and sites provided on our class site; these were all about ancient and mythical stories throughout many different countries.

 Then afterward we have to complete all 5 of the follow-up tasks, this task I chose to do was to create your own Mythical Creature on google drawing and explain what it does.

For my creature I did a bit of research for the name and other things to help me create my creature.

It took some time to draw but  I am very happy with the end results!

The bit on the side says:

Name: Nawa = Storm in Egyptian
Habitat: Lost Sea Cave near Egypt
Info: Nawa symbolises what a forever promise means.
Story: One day the goddess rose from the sea and stared a lonely, peasant boy in the eyes. Then the boy saw a tear run down from the serpent's emerald eyes and it came closer to him. He gave her the only necklace he had and promised never to steal another Jewel again. But one day the boy broke his promise and the Goddess went crazy, in disappointment and anger she leaped from the krusty earth over and over creating and earthquake! To calm her he threw the stolen jewel into the sea and Nawa followed hiding away in a Sea cave. Now the people shower her with precious belongings to make promises of their own by throwing them into the cave also, but if they ever break it Nawa will set chaos and destruction once more until they can satisfy her with a sacrifice in apology...

I really liked this task and I will continue to complete the other ones just as good as this one!

Try making a Mythical Creature of Your Own!

Bursting with Creativity!

Bursting with Creativity!

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This week in Te Kahu we continue to learn about creative writing. For the past 2 weeks now we have been watching videos, reading and practicing using creative vocabulary/words for our writing that we are practicing to prepare ourselves to make our very own children's book for juniors in our school!

For this task we had to complete this slide independently and by ourselves, this is so we can finish this to our own highest abilities!

I enjoy creative writing because I like to get very poetic and descriptive through writing and drawing so I found this task very fun!

Here is the slide I completed:

This task was easy and quick for me to finish and I cannot wait to start publishing my own book! There are can-do tasks included at the end of the slide that I might complete later on during the week.

High in the Sky!!

High in the Sky!

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Matariki is coming and we have been learning a lot based around it's history and the cultural way of what it means.

Matariki is the symbol / sign of the Maori New year, and now-a-days people know when it's coming; but back in the day it was much more difficult to know when the arrival of the Matariki cluster would arrive, the way they would spread the word would be through ManuTukutuku!

ManuTukutuku is a maori kite and when they were flown it was easier to communicate to other tribes that Matariki had come.

So my class had begun to make our own ManuTukutuku.

Here is the process of our planning on this slide!

I enjoyed this task and I cannot wait to make more at home!

Have you ever made a ManuTukutuku kite before?

Try it at home!

Hope upon the Lighthouse

Hope upon the Lighthouse

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This week in Te Kahu we have a fun activity on our contract which is based around Creative Writing.

For creative writing we have watched videos, and exchanged ideas about how we can form our own piece of writing that will later be turned into a children's book. We will then read our final product to one of the younger kids within our school from the youngest class Piwi.

I enjoyed filling-in this follow up because I have a talent for writing poetically and with deep description (most of the time), I also love to draw and write stories so this task will be really fun to complete.

Here is a link to my Doc with my answers and the link to the videos we watched:

                         My Follow-Up Doc  The Lighthouse Video   Creative Writing Video

I can't wait to start my story!

If you wrote/drew a story what would it be about?

How would it end?

Marvellous Matariki

Marvellous Matariki

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Since Matariki is coming up my class and I have been watching videos, doing research and have created our very own animations retelling one of the many versions out there.

I chose to retell this story by using scratch; and this story was one I am unfamiliar of.

This animation took me 2 weeks to make because I am not the best at coding (although scratch makes it easy) and because I had painted my own characters online instead of reusing other people's.

I enjoyed learning about Matariki and all the other versions I have never heard about.

Here is a link to my scratch animation for you to see!

Tiana's Matariki Animation

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I am very pleased with the end results and I hope you liked it as much as I did! Although next time I want to finish it faster and get more creative with the characters if I try to paint them again! 

Did you learn anything about Matariki from my animation?

Do you have a different version of this same story?

Floating in Space!

Floating Around Space!!

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For this task we had to use a site called Pobble 365 to finish some tasks about Gravity. Gravity is the natural phenomenon where light, planets/stars, galaxies and even mass or energy comes toward one another.

Like when you jump up in the air you are pulled towards the sky/moon/planets and stars and then when you fall back down you are pulled towards Earth!

There were 6 tasks in total you could choose from but we were set to choose 3. I chose to draw a classroom in space, answer questions about gravity/space and improve a sentence describing what it's like to be in a place with 0-Gravity!

Here are my answers and drawing:

  :) My drawing 

Questions:

If you lived here how would life be different? 

Living there life would be different because those who get car-sick or sea-sick may not deal well with being not able to control their movement.

It is thought that one day it may be possible to live on another planet. What do you think about this?

I think that moving to another planet would be cool! But there may be severe changes in the way we live: Dogs/pets may not deal well due to weather or air conditions?

Is it a good Idea? Why do you think that humans are looking for ways to live on another planet or in space?

No, it is not a good idea to move because we have never been on that planet before or know what kind of things happen there naturally.

If living in space, how would you be able to do everyday things in your life like brushing your teeth?

I would master doing special tricks to do normal things, or bolt things like tables down so they don't move.

Sentence:

Improve this sentence using your own choice of words!

I float around the room. To move around I push off things with my feet. It feels weird...

I drift around the room, not knowing where I'll end up next. To move, I struggle but I use my sturdy feet to push off the walls to get to other places. I can't control where I land next, swirling through the ship. 0 gravity, feels unusual...

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 I enjoyed this task very much because I got to draw and get creative, and answer questions that I've never been asked!
I hope to do more learning around space and 0 gravity soon!

Remembering Religion

Remembering Religion

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For this task we had watched a movie, videos and read about the Kings, Prophets and Judges in the bible; our task was to create a DLO (Digital Learning Object) about a definition on what each of these 3 topics are. I took notes in my RE (Religious Education) journal, to help me with creating my google drawing.

It took me quite some time to create this but I am proud of the end product! I added facts about the Kings, how they acted and what they liked along with how they ruled at the top; I added what the Prophets were on the right side and what the Judges were on the left.

Here it is!

I found this task very entertaining and I hope you like it as much as I do!

Jumping Jack

Jumping Jack

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Back at school we have started doing a fun task called STEAM.

Steam stands for: 

Science Technology Engineering Art Maths

For this task we did the Egg Drop challenge; first we got buddied up in to pairs by picking out a stick from a cup with numbers. Whoever had the same number as you would be your partner; my buddy was a good friend of mine Blake, others in the class got close friends as buddies too!

Next we had to plan out a parachute to support and sustain the egg from when it drops from the deck and keep it from cracking! Our parachute was just about finished when the tape ran out; and our egg was going to roll off! But we managed to tie it to the bag and we were able to test the drop successfully!

Poor Jack (the egg) was fine, but he had cracked in one spot...

We failed but I had lot's of fun and cannot wait for our next STEAM challenge!

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Next time, I want to work on my collaboration with my team and hopefully our next test will be successful!

End of Week Reflection

End of Week Reflection

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My first week back at school has been amazing! Though I did struggle with coding and publishing my Pepeha Game that I made on Gamefroot; it frustrated me and others who tried to help me but I am proud of the end product that I did make! 

I really enjoyed playing sports throughout the week everyday, it really motivated me and I had lot's of fun playing dodgeball and Capture the Flags safely.
A big highlight of the week was definitely seeing all of my friends face-to-face and learning together in person.

I achieved completing my work quicker than I did last term and I found myself learning tips, tricks and methods better because I enjoy it!

Next week I am striving to complete my work independently and to try to understand how coding works next time we do it.

I really enjoyed this week and I think I completed my work the best I could; I can't wait for Monday so I can have lot's of fun all over again!

Speeches, Speeches and more SPEECHES!

Speeches, Speeches and more SPEECHES!

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For my school this year they decided they would have speeches earlier on instead of Term 3, so my class and I have been learning about writing them.

Our teacher has been providing us with videos, slides and tasks that are based around writing speeches to help prepare us for our own; today she gave us this google drawing.

This google drawing is based on introductions and some different ways you can start your speeches with. With this we were set to move the options around to what we thought would be most effective for starting your speeches (at a year 7/8 level) to the least effective.

I thought that asking a question would be a great hook! It would draw your audience's attention and they would want to listen to what your speech is about; where telling a joke might not be the best way to go, especially if it is about something serious or if you want them to take your speech seriously. 

So I ordered them and this is my result!

I'm glad that we are learning about speeches now because I feel that with the new information I have, I can write a great speech using all the techniques, feedback and tips I learnt!

Do you start your speeches using any of these options?

If so why, do you think that would be best to start with?

Playing with Playdough

Playing with Playdough

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Another fun task on my class contract is the "Playdough" task.

For this task we were given a slide with ingredients and a method to make our own playdough at home; then once you've coloured it to create your own creature/animal using it!
I thought this was such a cool idea since my mom and my younger brothers have made playdough before!

Here is the method/ingredients and my creation!

I really enjoyed this task because I was able to let my imagination run wild and free! I chose to create a baby "Earth" dragon because I love dragons and I find them so magical.

I hope we can do more tasks like this at school, it would be so much fun!

Try making your own playdough creation with the method above in the slide!

Milk Monstrosity

Milk Monstrosity!

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My class and I continued to learn about science today, and 

we have been learning about density. 

Density how much substance an object can hold (it's volume) along with the amount of matter in that object (it's mass). To extend our knowledge about density, we were provided with videos that elaborate on what volume and mass is. 

After we watched the videos we were set to complete a science experiment using milk which also based around density! This was the milk and food-colouring experiment.

With this project, you fill the bottom of a bowl or plate with milk then you pour a few drops of food colouring in; then you take a cotton bud with dishwashing detergent on it and it will cause a chemical reaction!

In the milk there are 2 main components: water + fat. The fat is much heavier than water so when the food colouring is added in it sits on top of the fat because the water in the colourant is lighter.
During this experiment we would have to take photos, insert them into this copied slide and write about our observations about the reaction.
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I really enjoyed this task and I did this one twice, once for the slide and a second time with my younger brothers. They were fascinated at the reaction and I taught them about why it was happening; they enjoyed the task and couldn't stop talking about it to my grandparents! 
I hope to do more hands-on science tasks like this one!

(Experiment photos and observations on slide 10/11)