YEAR 3
A short, but nevertheless full, week for Year 3 these past 4 days. Let us share with you our learning activities:
Students worked well together to create a story map for traditional children’s tales such as ‘The Giant Turnip”, “Little Red Riding Hood”, and “Billy Goats Gruff”. An interesting side note that in a multicultural classroom, not all students share the same memories of childhood stories. A review of common English tales helped many children learn more about the English culture, while reviewing characteristics of a traditional story.
Year 3 took advantage of the good weather this week, enjoying a nature hunt around campus to find things large and small that might be blooming and changing as the spring season progresses.
In Maths, students learned how to organize information in pictograms and bar-graphs. If a star represents 2 objects, than half a star represents 1? Yes! Well done!
On Friday, student council helped to spur the celebration of cultures, prompting staff and students to come dressed in their national costume. Year 3 also took time to learn more about Indonesia; please ask your youngster to share their ‘Passport’ they made in class where they recorded interesting information they learned about these fascinating islands on this fun filled day.
Looking forward to another full week ahead.
YEAR 4
This week Year 4 has been carrying out lots of different activities related to our country India for International Week.
In English, we learnt general information about India and then wrote our own definitions for key words related to it. We also created a fact file about India including showing its location on a map of the world. We also read chapter 3 of our ‘Iron Man’ book and focused on how and why character moods change.
In Math’s we focused on 2D and 3D shapes. We learnt about the different kinds of quadrilaterals, triangles and 3D shapes and how to identify them based on their individual properties. We also cut, folded and stuck nets of 3D shapes together to help create our model of the Taj Mahal.
During Topic and Science lessons, we created display material to decorate our classroom door, which included creating Hana and Rangoli patterns.
YEAR 5
Year 5 have had an excellent week of learning, being sufficiently challenged through varied learning activities in their safe and happy environments, both inside and outside the classroom.
In particular, we have loved completing our ‘straight forward’ Maths lessons where we have revisited the column method for the addition of 5 digit numbers. I have enjoyed marking everyone’s work and can see improved accuracy and presentation from everyone.
In English, we have finished reading about many different explorers who have discovered harsh and interesting environments or places around the world. We began our own research into four relatively undiscovered parts of the world without the internet and then in a bit more detail, using the internet, when it returned on Wednesday. We will continue with this into next week as we prepare and write our own reports to accompany this work.
As we finished off our current unit of work in Science on Life Cycles, we spent some time outdoors enjoying the sunshine and warmth which also helped us to learn new vocabulary associated with nature and living things.
Finally with International Day in mind, we having been building up our focus on New Zealand through the course of the week through homework and art which has enabled us to appreciate the simplicity and beauty of Maori art and design. We will surely enjoy our celebration of New Zealand on Friday(today), for both the beauty of the land and its culture and I look forward to reporting back on this in next week’s newsletter.
YEAR 6
We have had a fun week here in Year 6! We have been working hard learning how to create and conduct an experiment in Science about measuring heart rates. We learned about how to have a control, variables and learned how to measure our heart rates . We had 3 very hard exercises to do and tested how each activity changed our heart rates, it was very fun but really hard. Friday we had International Day, our country was Thailand. We learned about the Songkran Festival, which is a huge water festival from Thailand. In the morning we got to have a huge water fight in the playground, and we got Mr. Marsh very wet! It has been a very fun and challenging week for us in Year 6.
FRENCH
In Year 3, we started a new topic. We spoke about the Little Red Riding Hood. First, we read the story in French and after that, we learnt the name of each character. We tried to remember important sentences that could help kids to tell the story by themselves. Next week, we will work on the writing part.
In Year 4, we did continue the topic about "transports". We learnt news words and we wrote sentences about transports. We did match the pictures with the good description. Finally, using the topic from last week, each of the kids said what kind of transport they like.
In Year 5 and in Year 6 we continued our subject about clothing. Year 5 had a little oral test before the lesson. They showed if they learnt or not the vocabulary and if everything was clear. During this week, we learnt new words and each student had to say what they were wearing during the lesson. Good job Year 5 and Year 6
MUSIC
Such a wonderful fifth week we had at school in music lessons. We practiced with the dancing for the songs of the musical. The students worked very hard. They loved it. The students continued to learn the positions on the stage and how they can speak to be heard by the audience.
ART
Year 3 chose Indonesia. We drew Indonesian masks. The style of the mask and that of the face looks like a dragon, but it also looks like a man or beast. Balinese masks are used in dance, as well as to rid evil spirits. They are also used in spiritual rituals.
With Year 4 we focused on Hindu people. We drew a portrait paying attention to their special features.
As Year 5 chose New Zealand for International day. The children practised in morphing the Koru symbol into different shapes and designs. Students worked on thumbnail sketches for their final compositions.
Over 1000 years ago the first Polynesian people came to New Zealand and began living off the abundant birds and sea life. They were skilled in wood, bone and jade carving and incorporated the Koru (the unfolding fern leaf) in their art as a symbol of new life, growth, strength and peace. It is recognizable in all Maori art forms, including tattoos on both men and women, and has become a symbol used by artists all over the world. The Maori continue to use the koru design in their art as a symbol of life, strength, hope and peace
