WELCOME TO TERM 4!!!

Hi everyone! Term 4 is here already! We have got so much going on in Term 4; it's going to be a SUPER busy time...

Maths Homework:

Mrs de Jong has had a lot of excited Room 8 students coming up to her with news that they are having LOTS of success with learning their Basic Facts at home - GOOD ON YOU!!!! The first test round will be Friday 23rd October. 

There are sure to be a LOT of people going up to the next level, with the amount of hard work that's being done at home.

YOU DESERVE THE SUCCESS YOU GET!  

Topic:

This term we will be looking at Light - 
a) in the scientific sense
b) in the cultural/traditional sense
c) and the light WITHIN US (what are our qualities that makes us "shine"?)

We're going to do a selection of very cool rotation activities in other classes in Week 2, and then choose an area of light we would like to learn more about, while shining our own special light within us...

Spring Fair: 

October 31^st 2015

11am – 3pm

Only 2 weeks to go!!!  

We have started to receive donations of Jolly Jars for our stall -  THANK YOU!!!  It would be fantastic if we could receive so many that Mrs deJong will have to clear ANOTHER shelf of her cupboard to fit them in!!

Remember, you could make them with any sort of theme...  Halloween, Christmas, Boy/Girl, Craft, Sports, Babies, Weddings... use your imagination! (Google is a great help, too!)

We would very much appreciate any help we could get with manning our stall on the day...do you think you could spare an hour?
There is a chart up on the window in Room 8 with time slots on it - please feel free to pop in and put your name down...Thank you; it would help our day to run smoothly. 
We are also on the lookout for a marquee/gazebo to run our stall from - would anybody be able to help out with this?  There must be some awesome family out there who wouldn't mind helping us out with one!


Some other classes are selling food which celebrates different cultures:

 *Celebrating cuisine from around the globe…

We invite you to share your cultural dishes with the Arahoe Community at our Spring Fair…

*We are looking for -

Butter Chicken

Vegetarian Curry

Rotti

Samosas etc

If you can help or for further information please contact

Evelyn Vanga Room 18 evelynv@arahoe.school.nz

Jay Patel Room 18 jayp@arahoe.school.nz

*We are also looking for -

                           Raw Fish                    

Rewana Bread

Fried Bread

Chop Suey

Taro and Cream etc…

If you can help or for further information please contact

Angeline Tan Room 22 angelinet@arahoe.school.nz

Shanelle Kivel Room 22 shanellek@arahoe.school.nz

Your support is greatly appreciated to help this event to be a success

Basic Facts Homework

Week 10

Hi Parents....

Brace yourselves, the holidays are nearly here! 

*FINAL ASSEMBLY:  9am Friday.

*ART WORK is still for sale. Many thanks to the parents who have supported us so far!

We have just completed a round of basic facts testing, and you will be pleased to know that the majority of the class have had varying degrees of success in their basic facts - let's keep up the good work!
If you are curious as to what your little darling achieved, I would be happy to discuss it with you in our next round of interviews next term.

To help the children experience even more success, I'd like to let you know that the basic facts homework will have a change in format next term.

Instead of your child writing down their basic facts, they can practice using the tables below, all of which relate to what they are working towards in the Maths Curriculum. 

(It may be advantageous to have a few "trial runs" to keep those brain cells fresh over the holidays!)

Have a safe, happy holiday break, Room 8 and families...

Mrs deJong  :)

Basic Facts Homework

Every second week, students will be tested on their basic facts knowledge in class.  The goal for each student is to successfully complete each basic fact within the allocated time frame, whereby moving up to the next basic facts list.

Please note there are 3 different home learning lists for each stage.  These teach the skills required for the student to be successful with their basic facts in class.  In class, students keep track of their progress and successes on a graph that is glued in their maths book as indicated by their fortnightly test.

Please note that for the E and CA lists, they must obtain at least 85% within the time limit to pass.

All other lists must obtain at least 96% within the time limit to pass.

If you click on the lists, you can choose your degrees of enlargement, for ease of use.

  

 

Hi everyone!

2 of our students, Tarapatiki and AJ, go to a Pasifika Literacy Group run by Mr Moncur in the first block.
This is a fantastic group, because it helps students with their reading, and they do all sorts of interesting activities to get them thinking about the different ways they learn to read and write.

A couple of weeks ago, they made siapo (tapa) patterns on a visit to Kelston Boys High School, and Mr Moncur made a fotobabble of their creations - they are so cool!!

Here is a link to Tarapatiki and AJ's fotobabbles:

http://www.fotobabble.com/m/M1Nnc0hHN1Y5WjA9

http://www.fotobabble.com/m/czNra29HcEl3OWM9


The group also made a slideshow about a story they read, called "The Tree Of Life".  Have a look and see what you think about the learning they may have done.  Here is the link:

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/15Q1TNvIXRwGHw0G6svSS0MjDASatzD--H25R8KDU380/edit#slide=id.g66a3a3d72_0_5


SPEECHES
Congratulations to Angel Churchward-White, who achieved 2nd place in the Ara Pakeke Speech Finals this week, with her persuasive speech on why you should buy dogs, not cats. Well done to Leila Claypole, who did her best as well, with an interesting speech on palm oil.

Bye for now!

Hi everyone,

Just a reminder that you can view Room 8's art work for sale via the "Arahoe Art Attack" section of the Arahoe School webpage.

Have a look, then perhaps you may like to support your child and school by purchasing their piece of art.

The link to view Room 8's pictures is:

https://sites.google.com/a/arahoe.school.nz/arahoe-art-attack/room-8

You can either directly purchase the art from Room 8, or pay at the office and bring the receipt to show me. Both options are cash only. The pieces are $10 each, but if you feel you would like to donate a little more, it would be hugely appreciated by the Arahoe Community Group.

They have already been backed, and would make lovely Christmas or birthday presents!

Looking forward to seeing you....

Christina de Jong

Hi everyone!

Here we are in Week 9 already... not long until the holidays!  There has been, and still is to come, a lot of things happening for Room 8 students.... we are really going to need a holiday soon!!


Oral Language/Writing:
Last week we capped off our persuasive writing focus with our class speech competition. Mrs de Jong is so proud of the hard work that Room 8 students have put into this. She has been really excited to see how we worked through the Writing Process in a persuasive style, and produced great speeches at the end of it.

There were so many fantastic speeches, and poor Mrs de Jong had a very difficult decision to make as to who would represent Room 8 in the Ara Pakeke Speech Finals on Tuesday 15th September at 9am. 
We are proud to announce that Angel Churchward-White will go forward as the Year 4 finalist and Leila Claypole will be our Year 3 finalist. Congratulations to you both, and we wish you luck!


Reports/Parent Interviews:
Reports will go home at the end of Week 9 to students who are due them, and to follow there will be another round of parent interviews in Week 10. Please book interviews through the booking system on the Arahoe School webpage.

Arahoe's Got Talent:
The finals will be on Thursday 17th September at 10.30am. Good luck to everyone - parents welcome!

Syndicate Assembly:
This will be held on Friday 18th September at 1pm - parents come along again... we're keeping you busy this week!

Spring Fair:
This will be held on Saturday 31st October. Room 8's stall will be selling Jolly Jars! Mrs de Jong will post further information on these in the near future... let's hope for good weather on that day!

Topic:
This is drawing to an end, and we have had a brilliant time creating our various video games, board games and marble runs, while learning to follow a technology process. The only trouble the teachers have had is finding space in the classrooms to store everyone's work! Here are some photos Mrs de Jong took of the different groups at various stages in their product creations...

Mrs de Jong would have loved to have got around everyone to photograph their work, but she also needed to keep an eye on how her group (board games) were doing!
Well done everyone on some fantastic creations...
In Week 9 we will be reflecting on how well we followed the technology process, looking at what went well and what design changes we might make if we did it again.

Wet days...
Spring is here, so that means there have been plenty of wet days lately. It might be a good idea if we made sure we had a change of clothes in our bags, just in case we slip over in all of the mud that's around.
 Room 8 sure know how to keep busy in those wet lunchtimes...we have mature people in our room who read, draw, write and BUILD.  Look at our neat breaktime creations!!!

With more wet days to come, it might be a nice idea to bring some games from home to share with our friends. We will be responsible for looking after them, although Mrs de Jong is happy to lock them in the cupboard if we wish.

Thank yous...

• A big thank you to Sarina for her continued help in putting books away in the resource room
• Thanks very much to Whaea Leanne for donating a lovely big bag of aprons, which came in very handy during painting sessions at topic time!

Bye for now....

Week 7 Update....

Hi everyone!

Just a quick notice:

Homework: Instead of basic facts and spelling, our homework this week will be speech writing. We will save the new lists we made last Friday to use in Week 8. Parents, please try to support your child with their writing efforts as they craft their speeches during homework time over the next 2 weeks. They will be able to show you the steps they are using to create their speech, but any help you can give would benefit them. Once the children have their final speech drafted and edited, they can put them onto cue cards and start practising them.

The focus on speeches is in preparation for the Ara Pakeke Speech Competition  in Week 9.

Our class speech competition will be at the end of Week 8, most likely Thursday and Friday. It is from the class competition that a Year 3 and a Year 4 will be selected for the Pakeke competition.

Below are the marking criteria for the speeches. While the prop/s and slideshow are not compulsory requirements, they could potentially add another 10 points to the speech score. The slideshow only needs to be one background picture, to add interest for the more visual learners in the audience.

Going through this with your children will also help them to stay focused on what is required.
There has been an interesting range of persuasive arguments being cooked up so far in Room 8- it's going to be exciting to hear the final products!

Week 6 Blog

Hi everyone,

This term is going so quickly!!!  We have been working very hard, so that has made the time seem to go faster.

Here are a couple of important events for this Friday:

~Ara Pakeke Assembly, 1pm

~Ara Pakeke Disco.  Starts 6.30 pm, finishes 7.45. Please pick children up from the Hall..  The theme is "Game On". Dress as your favourite game character, or a game piece...use your imagination!!!  What a fun way to end the week.  We have been practising the "Continental Drift" dance for Friday, and there will be prizesfor the best dancer. Will it be a Room 8 person???

Here is a link to the dance moves for anybody wanting to get REALLY GOOOOOOOD


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMuJxd2Gpxo


Writing;
We are really getting into our Persuasive Writing now. We have just finished a persuasive argument about whether or not Rm 8 people think homework should be banned. Mrs de Jong was really encouraged to read that most of the people in Room 8 think homework should NOT be banned! That tells her that Room 8 value their learning a lot, and are already starting to think about their futures.  What an amazing group of learners Room 8 are.

  Mrs de Jong has noticed that some Room 8 students who were finding Writing tricky are starting to find it easier and enjoy it more when they follow the Writing Process, because "it gives me ideas on what to write, and helps me when I'm stuck".  (Moutaz)


 Here are some photos of  some of us as we were working through the Writing Process to produce our  persuasive work:

Reading:
A lot of us are really proud of the progress we are making in Reading, and so is Mrs deJong. Some of us are REALLY close to moving up...to help us get there we have to READ, READ, READ. And that means taking Choosing Books home.

Some of the boxes are a bit empty though, because people have been fantastic at taking them home, but are forgetting to return them to the box at school, so other people are missing out.  Let's have a good hunt at home and bring back the books that are hiding under our stinky socks, our cat's bed, under magazines on the coffee table, or in parent's cars. Thank you!!

Mrs de Jong has found other fun things for us to read at home to keep our skills growing... check out these great videos that we can read along and practise with:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zt6GSoouja0


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DrlXLPP7c0U


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1X7GaRCw5HA


Maths:
As well as fractions, we are looking at Measurement in our Strand Maths. We have been deciding what the best benchmarks would be to measure things with.
We had fun with our discussions when we worked out that it's probably best not to try and measure a nose in KMs, a car in MMs or the Sky Tower in CMs!!!
We have been estimating then checking the measurements of objects around school, and thinking carefully about the benchmarks we would use.

Topic: 
We are right into making our prototypes now, it's really exciting! Mrs de Jong's Board Games group will need to remember to bring along any bits and pieces that they want to use to decorate their boards with, or make game pieces with.
The strong card for the base boards and card for use in the game will be supplied by Mrs de Jong.

Parent Interviews:
The next interviews will be in Week 10.

Bye for now!!