Kite Making

 This term we have been exploring kite making using the technological process. We have researched, created criteria, developed a design, built our designs and then tested them. We are in the process of redesigning and making modifications before we make our final kites. 

We have enjoyed working with our buddies on this project and there have been some very impressive designs! Unfortunately on the day that we tested our prototypes the weather was not the best! We had to content with a howling gale! Some of our kites definitely had their 'durability' tested!

Our Friendship Wall

 Managing friendships can at times be tricky. We have had conversations this year about what a good friend looks like and how they act. Knowing this can help us to recognise when maybe a friend isn't really a friend. It also helps us to think about how we can be better friends to others.

Frosty Morning Walk

 A lot has happened in Room 7 since our last post. The next few posts will be a bit of catch up!

We will begin with our frosty walk down to the Outram Glen. The Room 6 and 7 walked down to the Glen to practice our stone skimming skills. Nate from Room 6 had practiced lots during lockdown, so he had some good tips for us. 

The walk down to the Glen was certainly chilly! The path was frosty and the puddles were frozen. 

We enjoyed working on our stone skimming skills down a the Glen. Some of the students had great success and were skimming more than 15 times! 

When we got back to school, we used our experience as a writing motivation and created some lovely pieces of recount writing.

Term 1 Activities

It has been a while since I have uploaded any of our work! We have been pretty busy in Room 7 and there is a lot to share! Here are some examples of our learning and other activities.

Room 7 Self Portraits
Our self portraits this year are inspired by Abstract artists. We looked at the work of Joan Miro, Wassily Kandinsky and Paul Klee. We liked their use of colour and shape. After looking closely at the artworks, we all saw different patterns and shapes emerging. This art unit had a link to writing and we all completed poems about ourselves. We created our background lines and shapes using pastel and then painted over them with water colour paint. The final step was to add a black and white photo of ourselves. We had to each think of an interesting pose. We were so pleased with the final artworks.

A visit from the Trillian Trek crew. One Monday we had some very special visitors come to our school. They were part of Trek 2020 and were travelling around NZ raising money to help kiwi kids. We enjoyed seeing all the cool vehicles and meeting all the great people involved. They really spoiled us with lots of treats and goodies - we were so lucky!

Our school Highland Gathering was a great success! What a great day it was! There was so much to see and do, from eating yummy food, getting your face painted, pony rides, finding Nessy and so much more! We have a very hard working Friends of School committee -  thank you and well done everyone!
Our class stall was 'Pop the Haggis' and it was great to see so many people take up the challenge and have a go. Thank you to the parents who helped out by giving up some of their time on the day to help out with our stall - we couldn't have done it without you.

A Challenge to Start the Year!

Today, as part of our start of the year fun, Room 7 were given a challenge. They were given 8 paper cups, a bunch of ice block sticks, 10 small cups and a small figurine. The challenge was to build the tallest tower that they could, that would support the weight of their figurine. The tallest tower would be the winner.
A big focus of this challenge was 'Relating to Others', which is our key competency focus this term. To work well as part of a group you need to: listen to others ideas, take turns, share ideas and ensure everyone is contributing. These are great skills to have. I asked students to choose their own groups and make sure that they were working with a good range of people and I was very impressed with how students were able to organise themselves.
What a challenge this turned out to be! The word of the day was definitely 'resilience'! There were a range of different techniques and ideas used by all groups and everyone was very positive when they encountered trouble (i.e. - the tower fell down!). The winning tower ended up being 60 cm tall!

Welcome to Room 7 2020

Welcome back to school! We have a very busy and exciting year ahead of us and I can't wait to get to know all of the amazing Room 7 students.
We will use this blog to share our work, our experiences and activities, and also as a place to keep links to interesting sites that we will be using.

At Outram School we are positive digital citizens - we always make sure we use the internet responsibly. We use our school values - Respect, Kindness, Integrity and Resilience in everything we do.

CSI Private Eye

Here is the link for the CSI website.

CSI Literacy Cloud