Sculpture is go!

Today we put our school sculpture - just in time for the arts festival! Rose and Emily's prototypes were selected as our final designs and Mr White came in to help us with the metal bending and drilling.

What do you think of our final product? Make sure you ask the children what it represents and the key elements involved.

The Great Orange Challenge is on!

Today we started planning for our Measuring Oranges project - we'll be doing the fun part this Wednesday. Each team of three has been challenged to find a fun, creative and mathematical way to measure an orange. We have to plan, measure, record and post a reflection on our class blog.

This is something my class did last year and it's an excellent way to test all the skills we've been learning this year - co-operative skills, team work, measurement skills, blog posting, video / photo taking, graphing and just 'getting into it.'

Here are some of the measurements Great Eight are planning;

Robbie, Tim, Andrew, Logan - How many poc marks are there on the surface of an orange?
Cameron, Mac, Kes - How far can you fire an orange in a homemade slingshot?
Olivia, Jaidene, Simone - What distance an orange will splat when dropped off our playground fort?
Sophie, Gabby, Emma - how much juice does an orange need to loose before it can float?
Karen, Sophie, Kaitlyn - What's the best method to juice an orange?
Liam, Travis, Zach - How far can we shoot an orange from a pipe shotgun?
Aleisha, Ruby B - How long can we make an orange stay airborne using human forces?

This should be fun! - Watch this space, after Wednesday for the posts to come...

Our Highlights Mag - so far!

Crazy Class!

What do you think of our crazy class photo?

On Friday we had a 'Jandal Day' at school. Bruce is a member of the Nippers junior Life saving club at Oreti. Here he is with his massive jandal and all his jandal followers. We managed to raise $148 dollars! Great job.

Showme

Sculpture Showcase

Have a look at the cool creations that are being made at our sculpture elective! Scroll down to see how they are learning about all the key elements of sculpture in their inquiry this term.

Year 6 Camp

The Year 6s in our class have been on a four day camp at Borland Lodge. They are busy making a highlights book at the moment but here is a slideshow of what they got up to!

Here's our Sculpture Blog!

What's your camp goal?

Xtramaths!

XtraMath Overview from XtraMath on Vimeo.

Here's a new maths site for us to try - use our class code and your own password to have an explore. We'll make a PMI and decide whether it's worth using at the end of the week!

Smart Goals

Use this slideshow to help us set Smart goals for camp!

Setting Goals The Smart Way

View more presentations from Elona Hartjes

Blogging Round up!

Here are some highlights from Great Eights blogs over the last week.

Bruce has been learning about spacing and catchy words when persuading others through a poster. Here's his effort about Pet Day! You've used some bright colours here, Bruce!

Simone has been learning how to persuade readers when writing. Her post on obesity and how we should be doing more P.E. has paragraphs, sequencing words and, as we've been learning in her literacy group, it's had a lot of 'weight' added to her argument through the use of some facts and figures! Great work, Simone. I especially like the way you've spelt persuasive - even if it's wrong... =)

Great work on your blogs this week, Great Eight - I think the due dates on your learning plans are helping you get your posts finished and I'm reading some thoughtful, meaningful writing! I'm very proud of your efforts!

Mr Herring

Pet Day - What a blast!

Can you share one funny, weird, strange or wacky story from Pet Day? This week - try to improve our intention of sounding like we're talking and not reading from our books.

Still write a first draft though, it helps us know what we're going to sy in advance - another one of our criteria. We can't wait to hear about your day!

GE Blogging Round up!

Here are a few highlights from last week's Great Eight happenings.

The Pens literacy group were challenged to write a news article for their blogs with a really great one being posted on the school website! Here's Travis' post that he wrote about the classroom upgrades.

He's written about the four Ws and an H and did a great job on the G.S.P.I - gramma, spelling, punctuation and interesting words! He even used alliteration in the title. Nice work, Travis.

We've also been working our written reflections. We try to use a slogan to help us reflect on our learning - 'what, so what, now what'. It help s us think back to what we've learnt, why it;s important to learn and what are we going to do next. Robbies, reflection - here and pictured below, especially what he plans to do next. Well done, Robbie.

Lastly, Jaidene has posted about her 3d shapes she has made with a partner. One of last weeks tasks, listed on her learning plan, was to photograph her shapes and reflect on how many vertices, edges and faces they have.

These tasks have a due date at the end of the week and requires her to co-operate, reflect and problem solve to complete. She is using a wide range of skills learnt throughout the year to complete and she's done a good job! Keep it up, Jaidene.

3D Shape Interactives

Try these interactives that will test your knowledge of 3d Shapes!

Starter activity

Shifting Shapes

Fling the teacher
Shapes OnlineLong Shape 3D

How many cubes?

Guess the Dance

This is a dance we created (in 30 minutes) using the 4 key elements of dance - Body Movement, Time and Energy, Space, and Relationships. Can you guess what we are communicating...here's a hint. It's a BIG thing.

Wahoo!

Congratulations, Great Eight! Our science documentary is a finalist in this year's 2011 Made Awards. All the effort and hard work has paid off and it's fantastic to see you all get some credit.

We're in the running for some amazing prizes - check out the website to see what we could win if judged the best in our category! Here's hoping...

And here's the video we entered. We'd love some comments below!

How to persuade

Use this slideshare to get you started on your own piece of persuasive writing. Read the slides, follow the instructions and write your own piece - on your own topic. Complete the draft by Friday.

Digital literacies – persuasive writing

View more presentations from Kevin Cummins

3D Shapes

Tribute for Mr McCaw!

Here's our voicethread for Mr McCaw. We're practising how to give speeches and this is our chance to get better at knowing what we will say without reading it out loud.

Term 3 Highlights!

Ruby: I liked to Science inquiry and the ski trip

Mac: I passed my three times tables

Benjamin: I learnt how to make graphs in Keynote

Kees: When we went on the bike ride (big morning out)

Olivia: passing the rocket spelling lists

Sean: I learnt new interesting words to put in my writing from rocket spelling

Tim: The ski Trip and doing science inquiry

Bruce: Ski trip was great, I liked the science inquiry also the big day out was fun

Simone: I liked the ski trip

Liam: the ski trip because it was fun and I got to go with my friends down the sugar bowl

Ben: I liked skiing

Aleisha: I loved biking the big morning out was AWESOME!

Kaitlyn: I loved making the movies with my group it was FUN,

Zach: I loved the biking it was so BUMPY

Sophie s: Ski trip I liked falling over on it.

Robbie: I really enjoyed all the learning in class and setting up my khan academy

Jack: I liked doing my science experiment

Jaidene: I enjoyed the hiking

Sophie W: I liked going on the biking trip accept i was stuffed at the end

Travis: The big morning out!

Karen: I really liked the production because we didn't spend most of term 3 doing it

Emma: My favourite part was going on the hike

Gabby: My favourite part was the hike.

Mr Herring: Seeing so many people reach level 4 on our licence levels Most people have really improved at working independently this term.

Typed by ruby

Penta Blogging Comments

Hi to all our Penta Blogging friends. We're really enjoying reading all your comments and appreciate the feedback. We're learning lots about things we can do in the future with our classroom blog and also our student blogs!

Today we had a great conversation about making our comment settings available to allow 'annon' comments. We want to reflect this some more before we act but would still LOVE your individual comments!

If you are unable to make a comment on our student blogs could you leave them attached to this post? We will be able to read them in one place. Just leave the name of the person's blog you are commenting on.

Thanks again! We're fast becoming addicted to the 'Penta!'

Buddy Reading in Room 1

Buddy Reading in Room 1 from mark herring on Vimeo.

We paid a visit to Room 1 in Term 3 to practise our oral language focus - reading out loud with expression and clarity.

iMovie Themes

Here's a movie I've made using the themes in imovie 11. I wanted to show you how you can add some extra entertainment to your docos with themes, sound effects and music.

Watch out for the sneak appearance from Ben, too.

Persistence -Habits of Mind

Can we make a persistence video like this?

These are the things we think make it a great film / video
- framing - not too much space above the heads (face is in the top third)
- the shot was in the same space, lets the viewer see the 'things' moving, not the camera
- the camera is still
- humour draws in the viewer and keeps attention
- speaker knew what he was going to say
- easy to hear his words and sound effects

Next we had 10 minutes to see if each team could create their own persistence video that meets the criteria. Here's our best effort!

Efolio Spotlight - Benjamin

Here's our first efolio spotlight! This is where we put one of our 'efolios' in the spotlight and have a look at what makes it shine.

This efolio, by Benjamin, has all the things we have been working on! He has some reflective posts that cover the 'what, so-what and now-what' steps, he's embeded his animation and he some images to break up the text. I also like the way his posts are easy to read and 'mostly' well G.S.P.I'd.

Great work, Benjamin - keep shining!

The Alphabet Key!

Here are some of our ideas for science vocab that fits under each letter of the alphabet. It's kind of like 'scattegories'. This is one of Tony Ryans Thinkers Keys that we sometimes use for oral language. Do you like our ideas?

A = Asking K = Knowledge

B = Beakon L = Liquid

C = Colloides M = Matter

D = Define N = Nitrogen

E = Experiments O = Oxygen

F = Figuring Out P = Plasma

G = Gas Q = Question

H = Hypothesis R = Research

I = Ideas S = Science

J = ?? T = Test

Random Equations

Yesterday we played a game where you had to think of some creative ways to make a number. For every way you can think of that no one else thinks of you get a point. Here was our first attempt with the number 49.

Kees knew the number equation of using every operation to end up at the same point. If we multiply a number by itself, then divide it by itself, add and subtract and so on - we come back to the original number! Nice work, Kees.

We also saw how we need to put brackets around the parts of an equation with more than one operation.

Our Final Animation - Credit Card Crisis

Here's the last of our class animations - The Credit Card Crisis. This was created by Aleisha, Ruby B and Sophie W.

The competition for the most popular animation closes on Friday! The movie with the most youtube views will win - time to get watching!

Olivia's Poem - Silentness

Here's a great poem that Olivia wrote durig our silent writing time. We spend 15 minutes each day writing whatever takes our fancy! She told me she sat by the door and was inspired by looking outside. Great writing, Olivia. We can almost sense the quiet while we read.

Can you hear that? It is the peace, the quiet. That is what it is .

Can you see that? It is the birds, the bees. That is what it is .

Can you feel that? It is the hug of the sun, the breeze. That is what it is.

Can you smell that? It is the fresh mowed grass, the beautiful spring roses. That it what it is .

Can you taste that? It is the rich taste of cadbury dark chocolate. That is what it is.

By Olivia Fraser

Rhythm Interactive Reflection

Snow Trip 2011

Lots of us went on a snow trip last Friday. Here's a video I took, following Bruce and Emma.

Snow Trip Action 2011 from mark herring on Vimeo.

We've been learning about the different camera angles and techniques that will help the class film their documentaries next week. What kind of technique am I using for this clip?

Fire Fire!!!

Here's an animation made by Emma, Olivia and Kaitlyn.

The Guy who tried to fly

Created by Andrew, Bruce and Tim.

New Position

We have a vacancy for the job of Great Eight DJ. You can apply be sending me an email with a list of reasons why you would be suitable.

The position pays 20 Snidges a week and requires you to setup and run the sining for the class - playing the song of the week on the IWB for us once a day.

Applications are due this Wednesday.

Penta Bloggers!

This week we are starting a 'Pentablogging' project. We're in a group of 5 classrooms that will be sharing, reading and commenting on each others blogs. The idea is that we have 1 class as a focus for the week and we all read and post comments on what they're up to. When we're the focus we get to post on the other blogs.

This week we're reading the blog of this classroom - Grant Braes School, Room 1.

Use your silent reading ICT time to read their posts and post great comments - let's go over what a great comment is again! Have fun!

Planning our experiments

Today we learnt more about the experiment part of the scientific method. Each group learnt how to plan an experiment and the steps that go towards making them rigorous and accurate.

Here's a video of one team arranging their 'experiment steps cards' that we learnt about - before I mixed them up! Karen will explain why she's not talking in the video...

"I wasn't allowed to talk cause I was always putting up my hand and being the expert. The only way I was allowed to communicate with my team was by nodding or shaking my head - and I banged my head on the table!" Karen thought that was pretty clever.

The Scientific Method

We're just about up to planning our project experiments! Here's a vid to help you remember and understand the process we'll be using to answer our questions - using the scientific method!

Persisting Punk Talkers

Animation Scooter Guys

By Travis, Liam and Ben

Lego Animation Success!

Here's our first animation on our new Youtube account. There will be many more coming for you to view soon. Watch on youtube and add a 'like' to vote for your favourites!

GSPI - What's the 'I' again?

Let's use this site to help us understand and get better at the 'I!'

Now use this version and make your own!

Force of Attraction - Matter and Method

Today we dug deeper into the big ideas of what matter is and how we can find out using the scientific method.

We've been learning about solids, liquids and gases and what makes them different. Sophie has been able to draw and explain what is different about the atoms in each form of matter.Next we wanted to have a go at putting the scientific method into action - observe, question, hypothesis,test, review and explain. We observed a glass of water that was fill to the top. Next we wondered what would happen if we added a little bit more water to the glass. Would it spill over or would the water stay on the top? We were divided on the answer.

Here's a picture of what happened when we tested our hypothesis.
We saw that the water formed a kind of bubble on the top. We kept adding very small amounts of water and the curved water grew with it until at last it spilled over. Here's our Cause and effect map - a butterfly thinking tool.

We were able to see that the atoms have a 'force of attraction' that kept them holding onto each other - until there was too much weight and gravity pulled them over the edge. Our thinking box helped us gather our thoughts and create a definition / description of what was happening.

Stay tuned for some amazing science in our independent 'tri teams' - coming up next week!

Animation Projects

Today was one of our filming days for the animation projects we've been working on. They are based on a theme from a Habit of Mind. Three weeks of storyboarding, narrative writing and preparing our sets and characters has led to a great day of group co-operation and problem solving.

Next week we'll be adding our sound effects and music. You can see our movies on youtube soon - the most number of hits, combined with a criteria grade will determine who has the best film!

Here are some shots from today's action.

Decimal Rap - Assembly

Room 8 performed the decimal rap we found on youtube at assembly today. What do you think of our actions?

Animation Video = How to

Let's watch this vid and start a 'helpful steps' chart of how to make a great stop animation.

Blogging Circles

Here's this weeks trial to help us read and comment on each others blogs. Read and post on your circle's blogs at least once a week! Remember to comment with a positive and a 'have you thought / suggestion' style comment.

What is Science?

We've been using 'Hot Tools' to help us order our thinking. Today we used the Thinking box which helped us define what science is. Below are Ruby B's and Aleisha's definitions. You can read it at the top of their boxes.

Reading with expression

We're going to learn how to read with fluency and expression. Let's watch this talking book and see what makes a great reading! We'll add the criteria below the vid.

Decimal Rap

Will this help us remember what the places after the decimal point are?

Area Video

Andrew is becoming an expert on using showme, an ipad app that is great for explaining. Here's one he made with Travis and Jack today about finding the area of a 2D shape. Great work, boys!

Animated Movies examples

Storyboard example
The imagination of Mackenzie

The Elevator

Area and Perimeter

Use this site to help prepare you for the area and perimeter test this afternoon. Work in groups of three. You have 25 mins to 'fine tune' your skills - once you've written an understanding reflection first.

How to find the Perimeter of a shape

Hitting the target

Yesterday we started setting our L.P. goals for the next 3 weeks. We played a game where we had to let a stretchy band go at the same time an make it land on a paper target.

We learnt that we have to have a target to aim for and we have to be really focussed to reach it - not act silly and just fun all the time. Guess what? We did it - but only after we worked together and tried our hardest. Here are some of the goals that we're working towards.

WE can animate!

This term we are going to use our street scenes to make some short animated films - in a narrative style. Here's an example of a professional animation that uses the same setting as ours.

Here's a great slideshow that explains what makes a great story.

How to write Narratives

View more presentations from Jacqui Sharp

Room 8 Labs

Welcome to the first day of Room 8 Labs. Here's a fun way to start our tuning in week.

NB: Kids - don't drink anything before asking your teacher or parents first!

Safety Town Flyover!

Here's a flyover of our 'Safety Town' project, combined with Room 7. You can see some certificates for the blocks that had the best design, best detail, best safety features etc.

Safety Town Fly-Over from mark herring on Vimeo.

This project combined all our key understandings of identifying hazards, choosing the right action to take and using the design process. Well done, teams! You should be very proud of your efforts! Watch out for some stop animation projects next term...

Jibboo Highlights - Week 10 T2

Here are some photos from a very impressive Market day for our Jibbo programme. Jibboo is a money literacy project that is worked on in the student's free time all week but has a market day every Thursday for 30 minutes.

It's focussed on teaching the students 'real life' lessons about money, businesses, employment and working with others - but it's also a time where every curriculum area comes together in one! We have an advertising time at the start of every market day that involves oral and visual language skills! One benefit of the project is the amount of growth the students experience from being self motivated and independent. Thanks to all the parents who help their students at home with some amazing, creative ideas!

Kaitlyn and Emma are selling jelly treats. There is a sugar tax so they've created some products sugar free.
Jack, Mac and Cameron are selling chocolate dipped fruit. They'll get taxed 90% for the sugar content and our Tax Officers will have to work that one out!
Benjamin's managing our bank. There are lots of people waiting to withdraw 'snidges' from their accounts.
Sophie and Sean are busking beside the bank. They think they've made 'heaps' because they've strategically placed themselves near where people are walking around with cash - beside the bank!

First Aid - CPR

Today we had a session with Jo from St Johns about first aid. We learnt what to do when someone stops breathing, among lots of other things about keeping ourselves and others safe!

Here are some snaps of us practising C.P.R. - can you remember what that means?

G.E. TV News

Ben, Karen and Aleisha are giving this week's News show. We've been learning about all kinds of situations where we need to keep safe.

This week's team gives us some info about dog safety!

G.E. TV News - DOG SAFETY from mark herring on Vimeo.

Great Eight Times

Here's our first ever publication of 'The Great Eight Times.' This was one of our literacy Teams projects for the last two weeks. Well done, Andrew, our Chief Editor, and the following contributors!

Editor: Sophie White
Photographers: Ruby, Robbie
Journalists: Tim, Olivia, Sean and Kees

The Life Education Bus!

Today and last Friday we spent some time with Harold, the Giraffe from the life education bus. We learnt that we're all unique and that we don't need to conform to things that we don't want to do.

Harold took us on a journey to the planet 'conformity' today where everyone acts the same! We loved the stars on the roof and the karaoke song at the end!

Maths Strategy Video - Tidy Numbers

Olivia and Robbie explain how to use the 'Tidy Numbers' strategy to add large numbers. This is another in our ADD/SUB strategy strategy series. Great job, you two!

Tidy Numbers Addition Strategy from mark herring on Vimeo.

Week 8 Term 2 Happenings

Here are a few photos of what's been happening this week in Greateight!

The first two are from our market day for Jibbo - our money literacy programme. Cameron has a business that sells baking and they have just started diversifying with an entertainment activity - hence the gun and the target.

Sophie and Jaidene are selling popcorn and having a raffle - gambling carries a heavy tax burden of 90%!

We're also working on making great comments for each others blogs. Here is an image of a comment Ruby recieved from Mrs Thompson, the teacher from Adelaide we skype a few weeks ago. Andrew also has some nice comments on his blog post about his Problem Solving super hero. Well done, Robbie and Jack!