Tuakana Teina Technology Challenge

Today we had our Tuakana Teina day with Room 9. We did a technology challenge with them, and our challenge was to make clothes out of newspaper and tape. Our goal was to make:

• Girls' clothes: 1 shirt, 1 skirt
• Boy's clothes: 1 shirt, 1 pair of shorts.

Our restrictions were 12 sheets of newspaper and 2m of tape. We had a great morning and were able to show off our creativity with our Room 9 buddies. Thanks Room 9 and Mrs Tafea for joining us with our challenge.

Last week, Room 7 & 8 went on their Senior Camp to Kokako Lodge in the Hunua Ranges. We all had a great time learning new activities and being out in nature. The first day was a bit tiring doing out hike around the area but we all made it in the end. Archery, abseiling, kayaking, raft building, high ropes and team-building were the activities tried on the following days. Here are some photos of our time out at camp.

Along the Shore

TPS Wong Along the shore from Tamaki Primary on Vimeo.

Along the shore was a poem written by Deandra in Room 7, inspired by the beautiful oceans around us.  This was part of our Tagata o le Moana inquiry, in which we developed our strong connections to the sea.  This beautiful poem was paired with beautiful illustrations by students and teachers.  Enjoy.

Fancy Learning!

As a Manaiakalani School, we get many people coming in to see how we learn today.  We thought we would create this movie to share how it's done!  We love learning at Tamaki Primary School and we hope you enjoy our movie, Fancy Learning.

Calendar Art with Mrs Manuyag!

Today, Room 8 were lucky to have a session in the Art Room with Mrs Manuyag!  We were working on calendar art, which will be sold to help fundraise for our school.  Mrs Manuyag introduced us to Zentangles.  It was a really fun experience and they came out looking fantastic!  We can't wait to place our orders!

Here are some photos from the experience!

TPS at OMGTech!

On Saturday the 18th of October, Miss Kyla joined three students from Room 8 to attend the first ever OMGTech event in Auckland City!  The day was filled with great activities ranging from:  disc drive destruction, marshmallow catapults, 3D Printing, Coding and more!  We even got to meet the Mayor of Auckland - Len Brown!  It was such an amazing experience and we hope that this programme continues for other young people in New Zealand.

 

Technology Challenge #1

This term, our Inquiry is based around technology.  We are especially investigating how the way we think, affects the outcome and are trying to develop our problem solving skills.  Today we had to create a newspaper tower that could balance a whiteboard pen for 10 seconds, without anyone holding the tower up.  Here are some photos from the experience!

Rahmon's Story Writing - Le Ato/The Bag

Listen and watch Rahmon's latest story about a mysterious bag.  Enjoy!

Rahmond's Story - The Girl Who Went Fishing

Here is Rahmond's story about a girl who goes fishing.  Rahmond is working very hard in Room 8!  Enjoy his story!

Mavis, Malia and Alison - Poem

Inspired by our Duffy Role Model, Joshua Iosefo, Mavis, Malia and Alison decided to collaborate to create their own poem.  Thank you for your amazing words of wisdom, Joshua.  We hope you enjoy this poem too...

 

Tuakana/Teina Time with Room 1!

Today, Room 8 had a great time teaming up with Room 1!  We wrote descriptions about imaginary sea creatures and we learnt a new waiata about Kaimoana.  It was so much fun!  Check out the photos above or watch the short video below!

TPS at Waitangi!

In Term One, the Royal Pages reading group entered the Our Nation's Children Film Competition...and WON!!

It truly was an amazing experience.  Thank you to Westpac Bank and the Waitangi National Trust for allowing it to happen!

Here is a video showing our trip and trip highlights - enjoy!

Iziah and Tanisslous' Ocean Inspired Legend

How a penguin was considered bird

“Let me tell you the legend of how a penguin was considered a bird.”

It all started when the man upstairs, started to create animals. He first created reptiles then

lions and then dogs and many, many more great species. He looked upon earth and said there is nothing in the beautiful blue sky. So he started to create an animal that could levitate off the ground. His finished product had a pointy beak that was the colour of the yellow light in the sky, it had a smaller body, compare to the rest, it had wings and it could fly, it was called a bird. God said “What a beautiful animal.” He soon created more and more and more until the blue sky was filled with these birds.

One day, God saw that the land of ice was only filled with seals. Form making all those birds he was still in the mode of making animals with wings. After about 1 year after the birds where flying about in the sky god decided to create something called a penguin. This creature had a beak but slightly bigger, this creature had a bigger body, feet, and wings. God released the penguin onto earth he named it Raj. God didn't see Raj as a bird he simply saw it as whole other animal.

Raj waddled along into the jungle where he saw lots of other birds soaring through the trees and sky. The other birds were fascinated when they saw this unusual creature. One bird said “Hey, look this one looks like a zombie!” All of the other birds made fun of Raj. One bird even said “Can he even fly?” Raj flapped his wings as fast as he could but he failed. All of the other birds laughed.

Raj was then determined to show the other birds that he could fly. He stayed up all night jumping from tree to tree, after jumping lots and lots of trees he gave up saying, “Forget it. I’m not a bird. I’m never going to able to fly.” He stomped off to the water.

He didn’t know what was happening but he was attracted to the water and the ice. He jumped in and flew under the water towards the cold areas, after about 1 hour of flying through the water he finally he found how he could fly, in the water! He ran back to where the birds lived and announced that he could fly, but they just stared at him for a moment...then laughed and flew into the air showing off their talents and then minding their business. Raj was disappointed.

Walking around the birds’ home he saw a letter.  It said Flying competition! Only for birds that can fly. He took a deep breath and signed his name to enter. Raj kept practicing some life or death tricks but he couldn’t master his best one.

The competition was one all the birds that were in the competition were in a line waiting for there time to show of, Raj was third. When it was Raj’s turn, he ran as fast as he could and jumped into the water. The champions from last year’s competition were the judges.  They were all impressed at this penguins talents he perform the most dangerous (it was only dangerous to the bird not to the penguins).

After when all the birds had all performed the judges had to pick the best act and crown them as flying champion for 1289. “Raj!” All the judges voted Raj, he sank into a glorious feeling and stood proudly as he was being praised with love from everyone.

That is how a penguin was considered a bird because he could fly...but in the water.

Trip to Kelly Tarlton's Underwater World!

Today, the senior syndicate went to Kelly Tarlton's as part of our inquiry "Tagata o le Moana."  It was an amazing trip and we saw so many wondrous creatures.  It has really helped to focus our thinking about how special sea life is and how we can help to protect it for our future.  

Mavis: Why Collaboration is Best for Learning

Collaboration. The thriving source of new knowledge. Why deprive yourself of the golden opportunity to expand your learning? Collaborating is how we get better in learning. I believe collaborating gives you a better foundation for more learning. I will collaborate.   

Collaboration motivates the growing mind of a young adolescent experiencing loneliness. Collaboration provides that adolescent with the feeling of comfort when working with other students in their class. It extinguishes exclusion and loneliness. Why is this best for a student? Imagine feeling lonely and you’re put into a group who asks you to collaborate, you would feel happy right? If it was me, I would definitely be happy!   

Collaborating gives us the opportunity to build on our self-confidence. It gave me a time and place to speak to people to be confident. I started to trust in myself. It meant that I was heard and considered giving my class/team mates/members to add something new to their ideas, giving it a little more level so that it can grow more steadily and evenly.   

Working with others also means collaborating. Collaborating means contributing toward your friends work with constructive criticism. Imagine your friends insulting your work but they had good intentions all along. Look when I give my finished craft to someone I’d actually like to collaborate with them, let them give me constructive criticism. Getting constructive criticism means getting advice you can use to build on and to be better.    

Collaborating with others gives us the opportunity to express ourselves, our opinions, and our choices. Collaborating gives more than opportunity....it gives friendship.  It gives focus to the distraction. I chose to  collaborate.....but will you?   

Taylor Writes: Why Collaboration is Best for Learning

Collaboration.

When it comes to learning in the classroom, collaboration is the best, right? That is why I have chosen  to collaborate , and hopefully, if you are one of the “no -  to - collaboration” people, then this is the piece of writing that will convince you to collaborate.

When collaborating, you gain new knowledge and also, share prior knowledge with others giving you the opportunity to improve your idea. This means that when working with  a group, you will share your knowledge, and also, gain more knowledge from others in the group. Since having this reason here, we all share lots of knowledge, because we learn more from our friends than our teachers (no offence). Sometimes when your teacher teaches something so hard, you just lose focus, but when you teacher says for you to think about what it means in a GROUP, your friends might break it down for you and before you know it, it’s like a walk in the park.

My second reason for why collaboration is best is because you get more work done when you are working cooperatively. This is meaning that when alone, sometimes, you might  distract yourself. When with others, or in a group, you don’t get distracted, and instead, do more work, and with more people with you, the more work done. For homework, me and some of my friends work together for homework. We got more work done than the other times I worked by myself.

My final reason for why collaboration is best for learning, is because you can develop skills that you need when you go to highschool - you might go to a school where you hardly know anyone so it is good to have good social skills and make new friends. What I mean is that if you are on your last year at school, working with others will help you develop more skills you will need for college. I have worked with groups, and so far, I have many skills, and am ready for next year.

When you think about the word collaborating, what do you think it means? Well,  hopefully this explanation has said it all. Maybe you will think of collaborating as something better than what you thought before. So now you can collaborate with others in your everyday life.I  will choose to collaborate

Improper and Mixed Fractions

Today, Room 8 worked together to improve their knowledge about improper fractions and mixed fractions.  They worked in groups to create improper fractions using fraction pieces and then had to rearrange the pieces so that they represented mixed fractions.   

Mary-Jane Investigates - What is Room 8's Favourite Beach in Auckland?

Mary-Jane wanted to find out what Room 8's favourite beach in Auckland was.  She collected data by interviewing Room 8 students.  Here is her completed Pie Graph.  We didn't realise how popular Mission Bay was!

TPS SCIENCE FAIR

Today, Tamaki Primary School celebrated our topic of 'Discoveries' with a science fair.  All 10 classes shared their discoveries that they had made from throughout the term.

Here are some photos from the event!

Jennifer, Chasity, Willy and Taylor Write a Song!

To help practice their spelling words this week, the 'Tamaki Quartet' wrote this song!  Willy was inspired by an ad he saw on T.V and through the power of Google Docs, these students collaborated to write this song.  They recorded it today.  Here is the final product!

Taylor, Willy and Chasity's Homework Task: How to be a good Room 8 Student

For homework, students had to write an explanation to explain how to be a 'good' student in Room 8. This was Chasity's explanation. We definitely have a lot of students like this in our class!

Hello there my fellow student,

Room 8. It has had a history of good students since 2009. As you are reading my explanation, you will, by the end of this explanation, know how to be a good student in Room 8. So, read on student, if you dare...

First of all, you will need to show you're interested into learning, being eager to learn. Not just saying "Yes" to everything, ignoring, making noises, nodding when you actually didn't pay attention at all, and so on. What does this mean you ask? Well, this means that the teachers have expectations for the students (or you, if you are the student), and since you show interest in learning, your report could be nicer than last years. Doing this, you could have a good reputation for your teachers.

Secondly, if you want to be a good student in Room 8, you would have to be able to self-control and self-manage. This means:  

• Not getting others in trouble, and also, yourself in trouble
• Doing your work and finishing it on time, but let's face it, some of us will get interrupted during the time.

Doing this, you will end up with many work time gone and free time here. This also means you could increase the amounts of blogposts you currently have.

My third and last point on how to be a good student in Room 8 is all about the new students. This means if a new student is in your class, well, put your hand up! It will go well, talking to them, having a chance to show them the school, the playground, the field, the wall, the hall, etc. Doing this, you will end up with a good friend, who you have known since their first day.

Since you have read my explanation, you are now able to store this knowledge in your mind, knowing on how to be a good student in Room 8. This includes:

• Having an interest in your learning and being eager to learn.
• Being able to self-manage and self-control.
• Becoming the new student's friend by showing them the school, getting to know them, and many more.

Now, you should know what to do, go get'em tiger!

Mehi, Jennifer and Maopa teach us colours in Samoan

Simon, Iziah, Pate and Stanley teach us numbers in Samoan!

Record and upload audio >>

As part of Samoan Language Week, Room 8 were challenged to create resources that could be shared with other classrooms to help teach one part of the language.  This group chose to create a simple song counting to sefulu (10) and back down to tasi (1) again.  Check it out!

Building Smart Relationships

Today, Room 8 reflected on the power our words can have online.  We discussed how with only 140 characters, people have the power to make others feel good, or bad.  We practiced writing 'tweets' that send positive messages, and that encourage others to think about the words they use online.

Check them out!

Flubber Experiment!

Today, Room 8 attempted to create their own flubber.  We had to predict what would happen when we added the materials PVA glue, food colouring and liquid detergent.  It didn't quite work out how we thought it would, but we are good discoverers and we know that sometimes, you have to try something more than once.  We're already wondering what we need to change for next time!

Iziah explains: How to be a good discoverer...

Do you want to become a discover?

Do you want to find out how gravity works? How the atom was split? Who invented the light bulb? Then keep reading my explanation.

Along this journey with me, you will learn a lot of new things that will help you become the best discover you can be, so keep reading!

To be a good discover you have to sacrifice some of the most important things to you it might be hanging with you friends to playing a sport. sacrifice means that you have to give up something important to you for something that you have to do. You also have to make serious choices like homework or sport training. This will help become a good discover because you can now free some space up of your day to do what you whatever you want to do.   

One of the requirements of being a good discover is being hungry all the time as you have to be eager to challenge your self. This means you have to push yourself to the sky...to the limits! Because there is nothing you can’t do, so push yourself and always be ambitious. If you do this, you will learn how not to take no for an answer.

A good discover always has an open mind. This means thinking outside the box and reading between the lines. Having an open mind helps you with asking more complex questions.If you achieve this you will become comfortable when asking questions. It doesn't matter if you're learning English, Science, Math or even sport.  You need an open mind for all of these areas in your life.

Along your journey reading this item with me, I hoped this helped you a lot, but remember these important steps:

1.Sacrifice and always make good decisions

2.Always be hungry to learn and to challenge yourself

And the 3rd and final step is to always have an open mind. If you follow all these steps you will become the best that you can be, you will also be successful in life and just remember this!..You could be the next Albert Einstein.

Sau Explains - How to be a good discoverer...

Hi all! If you are reading this then you are wanting to be a discover. Being a discoverer is one thing we have all find hard, but it is real easy if you put your heart into it. If you follow my explanation, you too could head your way into the world of discovery.

To be a good discover you have to be ambitious. Being ambitious means challenging yourself and always asking questions about things. It means being curious to find out answers and striving to succeed. If you are ambitious then it means you are always challenging yourself.

Being a discoverer means you need to have an open mind. Having an open mind means thinking outside of the box, being creative when doing your searches, and also admitting when you’re wrong at times when people have their say. Doing this, you could be a closer to finding the truth.

Another point on being a good discoverer is having strong evidence. This means that you need some proof (pictures, results) to help you make your point. Doing this, you could have everyone believe you when you have evidence with you.

If you follow,do and be these three words, you could have a bright future in front of you. If you are willing to be a discoverer, you will be:

• Ambitious
• A discoverer with an open mind and being creative
• Determination

These things will help you in your journey on being a discoverer, and maybe you could encourage others to become discoverers too, as we are all born curious. I would become one because I am always wondering about everything around me, like Why is the sky blue? And how can we see colour?

Thank you for reading my explanation.

CONGRATULATIONS ROYAL PAGES!

Today, Miss Kyla received a fantastic email...

We are SO excited!  The Royal Pages get a FREE trip to the Bay of Islands to visit Waitangi and much, much more!

Check out the movie for yourself, and let us know what you think!

Cool Science Clip

Iziah and Wiremu found this cool youtube clip showing 100 science experiments.  We watched this clip to help us learn the differences between physics, chemistry and biology.  It is so entertaining!  We highly recommend watching it!

The Royal Pages Present...

This Term, the Royal Pages Reading group were given the challenge of creating a movie for the 'Our Nation's Children' movie competition for 2014.  The theme of the movie had to be "Why is the Treaty of Waitangi still relevant today?"

Although we are not allowed to publish the movie until after the judging, we created a slide show to show some of the process, including our script writing and storyboarding.

Due to time constraints, we didn't end up filming like we wanted to, but Miss Kyla tried her best to edit what we had with a mixture of other media.  We all took turns to record our voice overs and ensure our key messages were included in the final product.

Wish us luck!  And check back here on the 6th of May for updates - if we win, we'll let you know!  If we don't win, we'll share our movie with you!

Tuakana/Teina Day: Term One!

Tuakana/Teina Days are so important to us.  Not only because it allows our teachers to meet together to talk about our learning, but because it gives us the opportunity to be real role models to our friends in the junior school and help build stronger relationships in the school.  This year - our 'Teina' class is Room 9.  We spent the day focusing on writing information in our own words and making ANZAC wreaths using signs, symbols and text that was significant to our learning about ANZAC this term.  Here are a few photos from the day!

Kiwisport Term One: Baseball

We have loved improving our Baseball skills with Ricky this term.  We are so lucky to have extra sporting opportunities with Kiwisport.  We can't wait to find out what sport we are going to focus on next term!

Willy's Powtoon about how to act smart against cyber bullying!

Here is Willy's first published Powtoon.  The key messages support what you and others can do when witnessing or begin victims of cyber bullying.  We are just getting used to using Powtoon in Room 8 and so far, we really love it!  Next time, Willy is going to add sound to his Powtoon to make it even more engaging and effective.  Enjoy!

Pate and Stanley's Smart Relationship Memes!

Today, we got to choose what to create to show what we had learned about building Smart Relationships online.  Pate and Stanley chose to create funny memes about cyber bullying to engage their audience in a funny way.  Here are their creations!

Inquiry Investigations

Today we chose which Inquiry topic we would like to investigate further and as a class, created the marking rubric that we would use to make sure our presentations were a high standard.  We are presenting our information in Week 12.  Is there anything you think we might have missed off our rubric?

Tamaki Primary at the Festival of Education 2014

The Festival of Education was an event that took place at the Viaduct Events Centre and ran over 3 days.  The aim of the festival was to showcase all the amazing things happening right now in education.  We were part of the MANAIAKALANI stall.  We were there from 1pm to 4pm.  Student representatives included:  Willy, Cypress, Mavis, Jayden, Alison and Darwin.  All students spoke well when asked questions and represented our school and Manaiakalani proudly.  It was an amazing experience and we came back to school buzzing with inspiration and ideas to make our school an even better place!

Student Council Receive Badges!

It was a proud moment for Room 8 today, to see so many of our class members receive their badges for being part of the School Council.  Simon even followed up with a short speech thanking the students, teachers and other student council members.  We are so excited to see what amazing things they achieve this year.  They have already done so much in Term One!

Here are some photos from the whole school assembly.  Including Simon and Malia presenting our Junior Leaders - the Fruit Monitors with their badges.

Keep up the amazing leadership, Room 8!

North Head Movie!

Room 8's Trip to North Head!

Today, Room 8 bused into the city, caught a ferry AND walked to North Head to see the Historic Reserve as part of our studies on ANZAC.  It was an amazing day and we saw so many interesting things.  For some students, it was their first time on a ferry!  We look forward to applying our learning from our trip into our classroom learning for the rest of this term.  Thank you to the parents who helped us get there and back safely!

Welcome Mr Wong!

Today, Room 8 officially welcomed Mr Wong to our classroom.  Mr Wong comes to us from the Manaiakalani Digital Teachers Academy and will be team teaching in Room 8 alongside Miss Kyla.  He has many talents including being able to speak Japanese and knows Bujinkan - a type of Japanese Martial Art.  Mr Wong went to Auckland Grammar School and has travelled all around the world.  We are so excited to have him in Room 8!

(Miss Kyla and Mr Wong)

Malia's Experience as a Year 9 at Tamaki College

From Y8TCDay

I have had an amazing day today at Tamaki College and I have learnt heaps of new things there today. I was scared at first but then I felt confident and I was so eager to learn more things.

A lot of schools went to Tamaki College to experience what is the life to be a year 9 and so we can be prepared for college. I met heaps of new people and I got to see some of my friends and family from other schools. It was so fun and I just had an amazing time there.

My favorite class was science because we got to make bouncy balls and we had to make a helicopter that can go the highest. The one that went the highest got a prize and the prize was some yummy lollies.  I had so much fun and I got to learn more things and some new sites I can go on to help me with my learning.

Thank you so much Tamaki College for all the hard work you have done for us. Thanks for the free lunches you have gave us! GOD BLESS!!

Year 8's Visit to Tamaki College

On Thursday, Week 5, the Year 8's from Room 7 and Room 8 experienced what life as a Year 9 student would be like at Tamaki College.  Tamaki College organised an amazing day for us as we were put into our classes for the day and moved around to experience things like English, Maths, Social Studies, Food Technology, Business Studies and much more!  We had such an amazing day and can't wait to go back in Term 3.  It was such a valuable day for us - and now we're not so anxious about starting College next year!

Mr Dunn said we have to work hard to ensure we have the best chance at College.  We are going to focus in our learning and achieve the best we can.

Learning how to Sketch our Faces!

This term, Room 8 are learning how to sketch our faces with realism, using 6B Art pencils. 

Here are our first drafts! Enjoy having a look!

Picasso is in Room 8!

Look at our AMAING self-portrait's - Picasso style!

Baseball in Room 8!

Today we began our first day of baseball training with our coaches Ricky and Nick. We were put into partners and learned about how to use gloves for catching. Poor Jennifer was put with Mrs Manuyag, who had to be taught about how to throw properly. Wiremu and Sau proved that they were fab partners, winning one of the competitions, with Stanley and Pate, and Brodie and T.J winning the other two. 

Next week we are learning about how to hit using the baseball bat!

Can't wait!

Being put into partners

Chasity showing her throwing skills!

Wiremu and Stanley face off

Our coaches - Ricky and Nick

What is 'Adolescence'?

Today we started our learning called 'Skills for Adolescence.'  We unpacked the word 'Adolescence' by thinking about what it means to us and the types of things we are going to explore further.  It is a scary and exciting time in our lives.  Can you think of anything we might have missed?  What is one message about growing up you can share with us?

Maths Rugby

Today Room 8 were introduced to one of the games that would soon become a group tumble task.  The game was called Maths Rugby.  Miss Kyla showed us how to play it simply by turning over a card and 'making 20'.  Then we had to think of other ways to play the game.  Some ideas we came up with included:

• Make 50, 100 or 1000!
• Times the card by a chosen number
• Making wholes and tenths after flipping over two cards
• Multiplying two cards that have been flipped over
• Taking away the smallest number from the biggest number when two cards are flipped over
• Doubles
• Halves
• Adding two cards together

We had so much fun, and can't wait to play this as part of our tumble times!  Can you think of any more ways to play maths rugby?

Unpacking the Key Competencies

Today we unpacked the Key Competencies.  We worked in groups in a bus stop activity.  Each piece of paper had a Key Competency and a question.  The challenge was to think of new ideas that had already been taken by the group before us!

We then had to act out a 'photo image' to represent which Key Competency we had.  It was challenging trying to think of a way we could pose to communicate the message to our audience.

Key Competencies are so important because they are core skills we need to have in order to have a positive time at school and a positive life.

Looking forward to 2014

Miss Kyla asked Room 8 what being back at school means to them and what they are looking forward to this year.  Here are some responses presented as a wordle display!  What are you looking forward to achieving in 2014?