Merry Christmas!!!

It was our last day of school for the year today and now we are on holiday until January 31st.  When we get back there will be a new bunch of children in A3.  It has been a great year and we have had a lot of fun together.  Thanks to everyone who has supported our blog this year.   Wally has promised to update the blog with tales of his holiday, so stay posted for his updates.  We wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a happy New Year. 

Letters to Santa

Here are the last of our letters to Santa written by Deziah, Rishaad, Aliyaah, Kaya and Sandy.  We were very excited when he commented on our blog and we are looking forward to hearing from him again!

The Unexpected Guest

Yesterday we found a skink outside the classroom.  We caught it and kept it for the day, then we let it go again before we went home.  We loved having the skink in our classroom, even if it did scare us a couple of times! 

Take a look at the videos of Aliyaah and George reading their stories about the skinks visit.  Rohit made these videos with the help of Miss Mac, it was his first time using iMovie and he has done a great job. 

Catch it if you can

We have been reading the poem Catch it if you can.  It's about cooking pancakes so on Friday we decided to make some pancakes of our own. 

 Sandy, Noelani and Ennie have written stories about the pancake experience:

Tui Garden Challenge

A3 and A1 have entered the Tui Gardening challenge and on Monday we started getting our gardens ready.  We pulled out all of the weeds and old plants from our garden beds.  As part of the garden challenge we were given new gardening tools and these were very helpful to pull out the plants.  

Ashley with some of our new tools

One of our gardens before we weeded it.

Take a look at this slide show to see the children hard at work.
   

Four of the children wrote and recorded stories about their gardening experience so far. 

Dinosaur Prints

Last week we were very busy working on  dinosaur prints. It was a lot of work but we love the results. We made two different prints.  For the first one we chose one colour of ink to use, then we used dye and creative glue to add detail to the picture.  For our second print we were allowed to chose two different colours of ink.  Take a look at our slide show and let us know what you think.

Untitled from Kirsty Macfarlane on Vimeo.

Maths Week

Last week was maths week.  Each day we worked in groups to solve a different maths problem.  Some of the problems were quite tricky and we enjoyed the challenge of solving them. 

Here is Aliyaah, Ofa and Noelani telling us how they solved the following problem:

Mother Bear is making her 5 bear cubs new coats.  The coats have 3 buttons each. How many buttons does Mother Bear need?

We also used paint to copy a picture of a robot using shapes.  Take a look at the slide show to see the results. 

Monster Mash

We have been reading 'The Monster's Party' by Joy Cowley and we decided to have our own monster mash. We made monster masks and played charades, musical chairs and pin the hat on the monster.  After we had finished the games we ate lots of jelly!  

 

Here are some photos of the scary monsters at play. 

We also made a sound scape to match what was happening in the story.  We had to think of sounds that matched the story and then we added actions.  We hope you like it. 

The sandpit has opened!

Our sandpit is open and we love it!  So far we have made sandcastles, volcanoes and whales and we can't wait to see what else we can make.   Amalani, Sandy and Aliyaah have written stories about what they did in the sandpit, can you think of anything else they could make?

Movie Magic, by Aliyaah

Listen to Aliyaah's story about our movie experience.  

Bye Bye Wattle

Friday was Wattle's last day in A3.  He has been visiting us from Australia for the last 7 weeks and now it is time for him to go back to his class Learning Together.  We have had lots of fun with Wattle and we are going to miss him, but we are looking forward to seeing our giraffe Wally again.  Take a look at the video to see what Wattle got up to while he was with us.  

Untitled from Kirsty Macfarlane on Vimeo.

Here is a video of us singing a goodbye song for Wattle.

Meeting the kittens

On Thursday we skyped with our friends in Australia, Learning Together.  We got to see their rabbit blue bell and her seven kittens.  The kittens have grown since we last saw them and Wally is having a great time playing with them.  You can see Wally playing with the kittens by clicking here.   

Wattle is saying hi to his classmates.  

Going to the zoo!

We went to Auckland Zoo yesterday and had a great time.  We were lucky the sun came out and all the animals were very active.  Wattle came with us and he had lots of fun and he made some new friends. 

Wattle met some friends at the zoo and he saw a real wombat's skull!  

Take a look at the slide show and movie to see photos and videos of the day. 

Untitled from Kirsty Macfarlane on Vimeo.

Futuristic Transport

Once a week A3 goes to the library to work on the computers with Ms Clark.  Last week they were learning to use kidpix to draw futuristic transport.  Take a look at their amazing creations.

The Dark Dark House

This week we have been reading a poem called 'The Dark Dark House'  We wanted to act it out and we needed a dark dark box to do it.  

Take a look at the video to hear us reading the poem and see what comes out of the box. 

Wattle and Wally have arrived!

Today we received an envelope in the post and inside we found Wattle and Wally.  There was also some vegemite and a book full of stories that the children from Prep K and Prep S had written.  Wattle and Wally said they had had a great trip, although they had been a little frightened by the tornado.  Wattle is going to stay with us and Wally is going to spend his time in A4.  Take a look at the video to see what Wattle got up to on his first day here.

Untitled from Kirsty Macfarlane on Vimeo.

Teddy Bears Picnic

On Friday our Teddy's came to school for a picnic.  We spent the morning getting them dressed up and ready for the big teddy parade, and then we made some fairy bread for our picnic.  We think the teddys really enjoyed coming to school for the day.

Bubbles

Last week we read the book 'Bubbles' and on Friday we went out to blow some bubbles of our own.  It was a perfect day for bubble blowing and we had lots of fun. Check out our video.

Untitled from Kirsty Macfarlane on Vimeo.

Here are some of the children reading stories they wrote about our bubble experience.

Untitled from Kirsty Macfarlane on Vimeo.

Our Dragons

We read the book 'Tell me a dragon' by Jackie Morris.  Some of the children have written stories about their dragons and we have recorded them to share with you.  Leave us a comment and tell us what your dragon is like.

Noelani used paint to draw a picture of her dragon. 

My dragon is colourful because he can fly and take me everywhere and he can make the rainbows shine and the stars shine.

By Noelani

Two little birds

Last week we read the poem two little dicky birds and we decided to paint pictures of what we thought the birds might look like.  We experimented with mixing the colours and it was a lot of fun.  Take a look at our video to see the results of our hard work and to listen to us reading the poem.