Shadows

On Friday we had fun exploring how our shadows changed shape throughout the day.  We drew around our shadows using chalk at different time throughout the day. We found that our shadows got longer whilst we were at school.  

Ship Ahoy!

Today we went to the museum to the ship ahoy exhibition.  We pretended we were on a boat like in the olden days.  The museum was awesome because we got to see some spew and we got to dress up.  The girls had to wear white dresses.  The boys had to wear a waistcoats and hats.  By Room 12 and Sally

Wonkey Donkey

On Monday Craig Smith who wrote Wonkey Donkey visited our school.  He read us the Wonkey Donkey book and his new book called Wilbee the Bumbleebee which is also based upon a song.  He also sung us the 'Big Drip'.  He showed us how to make the cool raindrop sounds with our mouths!

Watch the video below to see him performing his famous Wonkey Donkey song.

12 months in a year!

Week 1 Term 4!

We had a bit of fun last week to begin Term 4.  This term our new inquiry topic is based around the sun.  Sally took us on a bear hunt, we ended up in a cave where we discussed lots of things about the sun and light and dark.

Here are some of us  inside
the cave.

On Thursday, we were treated to a performance from members of the New Zealand Secondary Schools Brass Band. They were a lot of fun.  They even showed us how to make a musical instrument using a mouth piece, garden hose and a funnel! 

Holiday Fun

To end our inquiry unit and celebrate the end of term we made fizzy lemonade. We learnt that the yeast in the mixture helped to create the gas to make it fizzy.  We tasted some of the lemonade and then Sally froze some of it and turned them into ice-blocks.

You might like to try making some lemonade at home during the holidays.

Lemonade

You will need:

- A clean two-litre plastic bottle with a screw on cap

- 3 lemons

- 1 cup of sugar

- 1/4 teaspoon of yeast

- A jug for pouring

1.  Put the sugar into the jug.

2.  Add some hot water from the tap, and stir it all until the sugar has dissolved.

3. Cut the lemons in half and squeeze them into the jug.

4. Pour the mixture into your bottle, then add cold water until the bottle is almost full.  Leave about 5 centimetres of space at the top.

5.  Add the yeast  to the mixture.

6. Screw the cap on tightly, and tip the bottle to mix everything.

7.  Leave the lemonade for at least four days.  A place that is not too hot and not too cold is best.

You can tell if the lemonade is ready by squeezing the bottle.  It is ready if the bottle feels quite hard.

During the holidays you might also like to play some of the games on the wiki by Lorraine Duncan from Wakaaranga Primary School, Auckland.

Folk Dancing Display

To celebrate all that we have learnt in folk dancing this term we joined with Renwick 2 for a folk dancing display.    We danced to 7 Jumps and Carnavalito.  We then joined with Renwick 2 and did the Birdy Dance.  At the end we danced with our parents.  It was a lot of fun, especially having our parents dancing with us!

Yum!

Over the last week in inquiry we have learnt about solids, liquids and gasses through food.  We have investigated how jelly turns from the solid to a liquid and then back to a solid again. We had a little experiment in class comparing the difference between jelly made with hot and cold water.  We left them on the shelf in the sun and watched how they changed.  The cold water jelly still stayed solid whilst the hot water jelly softened up and broke into pieces.  We wondered if the jelly would turn back into the crystals, but it didn't.  .

We then heated some chocolate and watched it melt.  After we took it off the heat and put it into some molds we quickly saw it set into a solid again.  We learnt that chocolate is reversible.

Today we made lemonade.  We used yeast in the mixture to create a gas to make it fizzy.  At the end of the week we will get to try some and then we are going to turn some of it into ice-blocks to celebrate the end of term!

Changing State!

Today in inquiry we explored how water changes from a solid, to a liquid and then to a gas.  We watched a block of ice melt during the day and then we saw some of it evaporate when we boiled it in the jug.  We then created a diagram to show how heating and cooling the water creates the change in the state of the matter.

We then had a quick look at this game below
To play it in a larger screen click on this link
http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/ks2bitesize/science/materials/changing_state/play.shtml

Skip Counting

This week for Maths we have been singing this song.  It has been helping us to skip count in 2's, 5's and 10's