Looking Great Fabulous Amazing Fantastic Everyone!

Dear Families for those of you who are busy and find it tricky to visit our room in person, this is what Room 20 is looking like right now!
Soon we have to take everything down for the end of the year so we thought we would show you all now!

Our Class Dojos. We are all different and we appreciate that fact when we are learning and working together. We each designed our own character and wrote the speech bubble to describe what our character is like.

These are our camouflaged Skinks and Stick Insects - can you find them? What are their Adaptations to their Environment or Habitat?

Look at this herd of Zebras! The idea was to learn how to paint a sunset background and show silhouettes with the trees. And then the Zebra is in the front or the foreground. The black and white patterning links well into maths and was a challenge to those that are used to patterning only from left to right! Black tissue paper was added to enhance the 3-D illusion.

Look at these glorious giraffes! Hands on construction is always fun and it's a great way to recycle found objects. We have used giraffes as a subject for Maths Inquiry learning  about estimation and measuring height.

Drum Roll Please! Our Stadium is complete! Now to use it!

The secret material has been revealed - Bubble Wrap! To create the Water effect we saw in our study of the Water Cube and to let light into our space, bubble wrap seemed to be the best material - all 30 metres of it! So the maths, technology and group problem solving skills have now been extended this week and we have a new and interesting space to work in.

Inspired by the Beijing Water Cube! Maths and Technology join forces in this Storm of Ideas!

One of the sports stadiums we looked at was the Water Cube in Beijing which was built for the Beijing Olympics Aquatics. We talked about why the Architect chose to design the building like this. What does it remind you of? Water, molecules, ice, bubbles, floating - use your imagination!


So we set about making our own mini stadium using paper, card, sellotape and a secret material to wrap it all up in!

The shape of our stadium was begun with a hexagonal base. Then we had to roll paper to make cylinders. Next we chose the triangular frame shape to hold our wall up as we noticed the beams in our classroom were triangles so we decided they must be the strongest shape.

So here is the frame work all sturdy and strong!

The Olympics starts in Room 20 with a popular Chinese sport - table tennis!

The Chinese team won all of the Gold Medals at the London 2012 Olympics. You can play this game too - there are tables to play on at school.

Rollercoaster rides on Google Cardboard

A Moment in Time (Writing)

How can you imagine something if you haven't been there yourself?
Using the Google Cardboard app each child has had the opportunity to experience a ride on a roller coaster through virtual reality on a Smart Phone!

We get excited about the photo prompt!

Next Term please bring along INTERESTING AND THOUGHT PROVOKING photos or newspaper articles to WRITE ABOUT in our own Class Newspaper to share in Literacy time.

The AUTHORS were able to choose if they wanted to write using the PROMPT (which you can read at the bottom of the iPad screen) or use the image alone. The children then recorded themselves if they wanted to, reading aloud their writing. Other children can now use the iPad as a reading device as well as a writing device. We like to hear each other read. Reading and Writing has become interactive.

Children were able to independently choose a picture which inspired them to write about any topic they chose.

Sometimes we have an Author's Block! This app enables us to use our imagination and the world around us to dream up a story - whether is fiction or non-fiction!
Children were able to independently choose a picture which inspired them to write about any topic they chose.

Independent writing using a new app on our iPad mini

Watch out for Slinky Malinky this Week!

Miaow Children and Teachers at Sunnyhills School!

I’m Slinky Malinky,

(a rapscallion cat!)

By day I am just like any ordinary cat

but at night I am wicked and fiendish and sly

I leap over walls and I prowl and pry

All over school I have pilfered and pillaged

 from classrooms and corridors your teacher’s belongings

I’ve pulled them and dragged them and heaved them until

I reached the music room high on the...concrete

Take yourself off to the window to see

If your belongings are sitting there one morning this week

Make sure that your teacher can identify the item I stole

So that your classroom will once again

be whole

Next we made delicious versions of Marvellous Medicine with Soda, Vanilla Ice Cream and a sprinkling of marshmallows!

A drop of yellow or green food colouring for that extra sparkle!

Delicious!!

Our Concoction of weird and wonderful ingredients was supposed to make George's Grandma more agreeable and kind...

Toothpaste from Ali and Joshua!

Sonia squirts hairspray and Evie stirs the mixture.

YUMMY!

where do puddles go?

Wonderings about where do puddles go?

The results of our scientific research into liquids floating on liquids

Is it the art of science or the science of art?

The art of science or the science of art?

Room 20 has been debating the New Zealand Flag referendum. We have drawn our own designs as well as choose from the different designs that the Public have been voting for in 2015.

Which flag would you choose if you had the chance to vote?

We wonder if other liquids can float on water? Can air float on water?

We made a wonderful concoction of water, dye, washing up liquid and cooking oil! We mixed it up and made it bubble as we swished it around with a paint brush! Some brave people blew bubbles with straws. 

We watched to see what would happen. We made our own observations about what floated on the top, what sunk and what mixed and dissolved in the water. Then we carefully lay paper across the top to make a print of the floating ingredients! What do you think was floating on the top? Why? We are going to explore these questions in class.