Aaron Smith Surprise Visit

Aaron Smith at Halcombe School

A few lucky boys from Room 2 had a wonderful opportunity to meet All Black Aaron Smith when he came to visit Halcombe School yesterday.
The boys got to ask him questions and had a photo taken with him. Thanks Aaron, you are awesome and such a wonderful inspiration to our keen rugby juniors!  A link to the video of their meeting is on our blog.  Here is a photo 

Buddy Class Picnic and Games

On Monday Room 2 and 5 had a shared lunch.   We played rounders and capture the flag, as well as a series of fun relay races.  We finished with a wonderful feast of delicious  goodies!  Thanks Room 5, we have had so much fun this year being your buddy class.

Slip, slop, slap and slide!

Room 2 had so much fun on Friday morning.  Room 6 kindly set up a fabulous water slide and room 2 had a blast running and sliding across it.  Thanks so much Room 6, it was awesome!

Athletics

What a great day!

Our Class Trip

Trip to the Farms

We had a wonderful day out on Wednesday. The first stop was Blunden's ostrich farm.  The children saw the incubators, held ostrich eggs and patted the baby ostriches.  Then we drove on to the Thompson's goat farm.  After washing their gumboots and hands, they were allowed to climb into the pens and play with the kid goats.  The goats were nibbling their clothes and jumping up at them.  After a wonderful picnic lunch on the Thompson's lawn, we drove up the Abbiss' sheep farm.  The children had a turn at shearing and drenching the sheep.  It was a fabulous day out!  Thank you to all the parents who kindly came to help make this day so special, we couldn't have done it without you.

Writing

Information and explanation writing

We have been learning to write information reports and explanations.  We have written reports on sheep, using facts we have researched in books.  We drew flow diagrams and wrote  explanations about baby ostriches hatching from their shells. We are hoping to see some baby ostriches when we visit Blunden's Ostrich farm on Wednesday!

Learning about Ostriches

Ostriches

In preparation for our class trip, we have been learning about different farms in New Zealand.  We have studied sheep farming and this week we researched ostrich farming. We have read books and watched clips about ostriches.   Lily bought in her ostrich egg for us to examine.  We can't wait until we see a real one !

Here is some of our wonderful Ostrich Art

Dodgeball with Room 5

Buddy Class

On Friday Room 2 had a game of dodgeball with our buddy class.  We had so much fun, thanks Room 5!

Athletics training

Athletics

Room 2 has been busy training for athletics day.  We have been practising shot put, sprints, hurdles, long jump and high jump.

Cricket

Friday Cricket

On Friday, we had two visitors from Manawatu Cricket come to teach us some wonderful cricketing skills.  The children had fun catching and batting.  Check out our skills!

Maths

Maths

This week in maths we have been studying time.  We have been timing ourselves doing activities and have been learning to tell the time using analogue clocks.  Please encourage your children to read the clock at home.  We have been learning o'clock, half past, quarter to and quarter past.

Dyeing Wool

Learning about Wool

This week we had a go at dyeing a piece of wool different colours. The results were fabulous and the next day we glued the piece of wool onto a card and drew a sheep outline around it. 

Firewise

Learning to be Firewise

This week we had a visit from Fireman Kevin Darling.   We talked about fire safety and what we need to do if there is a fire in our home.  He reminded us to check our smoke alarms and make sure that we all know where our safe meeting place is.  The children were sent home with their fire safety activity books and it would be great if you could keep talking to the children about fire safety. 

To learn more about the Firewise programme please visit this web page

Get Firewise

All About Wool

Sheep and Wool

For our inquiry this term we are studying sheep and how wool is made into clothing.  For our EOTC we will be visiting a sheep farm in the next few weeks and the children are very excited about that.  This week we had a visit from Sue Dawson who kindly demonstrated how wool is spun on a spinning wheel. The children smelt and touched other types of fibre such as goat and camel hair!

Pet Day

Pet day

What a fun day it was. Luckily the weather held out and the animals all behaved themselves!  Congratulations to all the children that entered Pet Day.  It is a huge commitment to look after animals and you all did so well. The children really enjoyed the day and here are a few photos.

PET DAY UPDATE

Pet Day Art Update

I am still sourcing some spare old gumboots please!  I now have 18 but still need 5 more by this Tuesday morning (27th October).  So please, please, please check around home, ask friends, relatives etc , etc to see if you can bring in a couple of pairs by this TUESDAY MORNING. We are painting and decorating them and it would be nice we could have enough for one  each child to decorate.  Thank you to those who have kindly donated pairs. (adult boots are fine too).

Also, could you please pick some flowers (wild flowers in paddocks or flowers from your garden) and bring these to school this TUESDAY MORNING. I need these to go inside the gumboots, so please make sure the stalks are left long (about 20 cm).  Any flowers donated will be fantastic.  

Thank you

Mrs B

cross country

Cross Country Day

Luckily the weather held out and we were able to run the cross country on Friday.  Here we are before our race.

The year 2 and 3's were first up, so we didn't have long to wait before we were off. The children did really well, they all tried their best and did a great job of avoiding the prickles and the muddy creek!

Here are a few photos from the day.  Great running room 2!

End Of Term Show

The Lion And The Mouse

Maths

Geometry

Towards the end of the term we looked at tessellations.  Here we are making and drawing tessellating patterns.

Black Day

GO THE ALL BLACKS!!

Art

Creativity Unit

For art this week the children created some abstract art using unusual objects.  They had pine  leaves, scrubbing brushes, kebab sticks, flowers and other assorted objects.  They had 4 colours and  could paint anything they liked.  It was great to see them experimenting with the tools and mixing and blending the colours.  Great art room 2!

Drama with Buddy Class

Acting it out!

On Friday room 2 and our buddies had some fun doing a spot of drama on the courts.
We played a few warm up drama games before getting into groups to play 10 second objects.  It was great to see everyone working together and thinking in creative ways.  Here are some photos...

Picasso Art

Picasso Art

Picasso

The Study of Famous Artists

For our creativity unit we have begun to study some work of famous artists.  The first artist we have studied is Picasso. Picasso is recognized for co-founding the cubist movement. We had a go at producing some cubism art. 
Awesome art room 2! 

Crazy Day

Look out we are all CRAZY!

On Thursday we had Crazy Day at school.  We all dressed up in crazy costumes and paraded around the school.  It was a fundraiser for the SPCA and the children really enjoyed the opportunity to dress up.

Class trip

Tuesday's Trip to the Esplanade

To finish off our Forces and Motion unit, Rooms 1,2,7 and 8 took a trip to the Esplanade Walkway. The children had a choice of using bikes or scooters.  After a quick morning tea, we got into 4 groups and off we went.  The first group cycled 14 kms and managed to make it all the way to the end of the track.  After an hour of exercise we returned to the park for some lunch and the children got to have a play on the adventure playground.  

It was a fun day.  Thank you to the parents who kindly gave up their time to help us out.

Science

Science

We finished off our forces and motion unit with an experiment on balloon rockets.  The children had a lot of fun making and vdeoing them.  Several balloons popped during the experiment but everybody got to have a turn launching them across the classroom.  We had some great discussions about the force and friction and afterwards the children produced some wonderful writing.  Here are a few of them...

 “What are you doing?” We all asked Mrs Buckley.  Mrs Buckley replied, “you’ll see when I’m done.”  While we waited we listened to a book.  Afterwards we saw what she was doing. Yay I whispered in my head as Mrs Buckley said we were doing an experiment.  We needed string, a straw and a balloon and 2 chairs. We got to do it on our own. I had to get Mrs Buckley to blow up the balloon.  I taped it to the straw.  Zoom off it went.  Air popped out of the balloon and it made a weird sound.

 By Maia

POP! Mrs Buckley popped the balloon.  Me and Austin grabbed two chairs.  It was very hard for Austin to blow the balloon up.  “3,2,1” the class shouted.  ZOOM the balloon was flying across the classroom like a jet.  Mrs Buckley put some soap on the string and there was less friction.

 By Caleb

BOOM! The balloon rockets zoomed across the classroom.  Mrs Buckley put some slippery slimy soap on the string, what happened?  Just guess… okay I’ll tell you.  When Mrs Buckley put some soap on the string the balloon went POP! It exploded, so Mrs Buckley had to get another balloon.  “PHEW!” Mrs Buckley said as she blew as hard as she could.  Then she was done. “Yay,” we said and then WHOOSH…the balloon hit the chair.  It was a good experiment.  The soap caused less friction and made the balloon go faster on the line.

 By Jayda

ZOOM went the balloon.  It went fast.  We put on the soap to make it go faster.  Then we fired it to check if it made it.

By Ngakau

BOOM! The balloon disintegrated.  The balloon popped twice as soon as the balloon got blown up.  We got to have a turn each.  We cello taped the balloon to the rocket.  It went along the line.  It was fun.

By Hilton

How to make balloon rockets.

Method:

You will need a balloon and some string and some cello tape, half a straw and two chairs.

step 1:

Tie the end of the string onto one of the chairs.

step 2:

Thread the straw onto the string like a bed then tie the other end to the other chair. 

Step 3:

Blow up the balloon and cello tape the balloon onto the straw but hold the end of the balloon. 

Then count down, then put some soap on and let the balloon go.

It zooms across and stops with a whoosh.  Be careful they can pop! My favourite part was when I let the balloon go.  Kaleb said in a funny voice,  “I couldn’t get that oops.” I videoed him talking funny.  We laughed.

By Jay

Today at school we did balloon rockets.  We blew up balloons, we tied the string onto two chairs… but the balloon popped. They were fast as a swordfish darting through the waves.  BANG! It crashed.  Then I took videos as the others did theirs.  I also took some pictures as well.  They sounded like a volcano erupting.  The air is pushing the rocket along the rope.  When it was my turn it sounded like an egg cracked.

By Will

Maths week

Junior Maths Trail

Last week was Maths Week.  As part of our learning the Junior Team designed an outdoor maths trail.  It was great to see the children working together with their buddies to solve problems around the school.

maths

Geometry

Science

Check out our great experiments we have been doing over the last few weeks!

Shared writing

Maori language week

In celebration of Maori language week last week,  we read the legend of Kahu and the Taniwha.  Then we did some shared writing to retell the story and we started our drawings of our wonderful Taniwha.

Our drawings will be posted on our blog next week.

buddy class

Making paper planes with room 5

Wow room 5, we are so glad we are your buddies, because we get to do some awesome things with you!

Here we are making our paper planes.  After getting great instructions from our big buddies on how to make our paper planes, we got to test them out on the playground. Kaleb M managed to send his plane flying a great distance and won several times!

Maths

Geometry

In maths, we are looking at 2 and 3 d shapes.  We have been identifying the shapes that are around us and have been looking at whether or not they have faces and corners. Great maths room 2!

sorting our shapes into groups

Finding the circles in our class, here is our class clock

The small hundreds boards are square 

Science

Forces and motion

In science we are learning about forces and motion.  We have looked at how objects move and have started to do some cool experiments.  Here we are testing out our marbles down the ramps. We discovered that the high ramp made the marble run faster and further. The record was 17 feet!

Fractions

Learning About Fractions

We have been learning about fractions and on Friday we create some wonderful undersea pictures using wholes, halves, quarters and eighths! Here are some of the wonderful art masterpieces.. We hope to show them in week 1's assembly next term. Great maths room 2!