We have had an exciting week with our visits to see Harold in the mobile classroom. We got a huge surprise when Harold came to our school assembly. Karen asked us questions and some children won bottles of brain juice (water),

Lily left us a comment yesterday. It was way back on the story about her last day so I have copied it for you to see.

Today we went to visit Harold in the mobile classroom. We are learning about "Air to Live". We learned a new version of "Heads, shoulders, knees and toes."

Riverlands Fair

After the athletic fun day we were very tired so we sang some songs in Room 1. Some of our big buddies made up a puppet show to help us learn this new song. It was written by Kath Bee, who wrote our school song.

I liked having a rope on the high jump. Jessica
I was running very slowly with the potato and it didn't fall off. Michael
I loved the running races. Micahla
I liked the high jump and doing the scissors. I bumped myself on the head. Aramac
I thought I couldn't be really good at the running race. It was really good that I came third. Josh
I liked when we were doing the high jump because my mum was watching me. She took photos. Shannara
I thought I couldn't do the potato and spoon race but I could. Emma
I liked the running race because I fell down but I got back up. Ruby
I thought that I wouldn't be able to jump that high on the high jump but I could. Emily Kate
I liked it when we did the potato one because I didn't drop it because I didn't run. Hannah
I liked it when my mum was there. Emily
I thought it was funny when we did the high jump on the mat. I jumped at it.Lucky I didn't bounce off. Blake
I liked the running races when I kept winning but at the end we came third. Daryan
I liked the potato race. We kept winning. Jone
I didn't like the spoon race. I just liked the high jump. Mum was watching. Harry
I didn't like the potato but I liked the bean bag throwing one. I had the biggest bean bag. Jack
I liked the racing ones because I nearly got first. Fergus
I liked when I came first with Chile. Hadley.

The Wonderful Worldy Word Wizard

Our Reflections on a wonderful Maori Performance on Thursday afternoon

I liked when they did the haka. Jessica
They were fighting with the rakau and the man went under. Hadley
They pretended to be birds and they sang a song. Michael
They did bird whistle . Jone
I liked the fighting because they used sticks to fight. Fergus
I liked it when they were swinging the poi around. Hannah
I didn't like the fighting. Emily
I liked the kung fu fighting when they lay on their backs and got up again without using their hands. Blake
I liked it when he had the glasses and belt on and he was fighting. He ised a stick so the other guy couldn't get him. Daryan
When they were fighting it was like "Star Wars Episode 1". Josh
I liked the haka when they poked their tongues. Jack
I liked it when the man wore glasses and the black jersey because the people were trying to trap him but he escaped. Then they went to look for him. Shannara
I liked it when they were kung fu fighting, I liked the karate and stuff. Emma
I liked it when they pretended top be birds. Ruby
I liked the Kung Fu fighting song. They pretended to fight. They were doing great moves. Micahla
It was good when they did finger games. Emily Kate

At literacy time we do lots of activities that help with our reading and writing. These are some photos that we took of words we made using playdough, magnetic letters and letter blocks. We can use these things to help us practice our names, spelling words or just words we want to learn.

Jack, Micahla, Shannara, Emma

Literacy Time

Yesterday was Melbourne Cup Race Day in Australia. We had our own race day in Room 2. We raced 2 horses along a numberline to 20. When we threw the dice, we had to work out where the horse would have to move to. We had to use lots of different maths strategies to work out the answers. Some people used their fingers, some counted on and some even used imaging. (that means they worked it out by imagining what it looked like, in their head-- clever eh!!)
We had lots of fun and learnt heaps.

Race Day in Room 2

Yesterday Room 2 received a very special letter in the mail from Greedy Cat. What a surprise. This is what the letter said.



Waiteria Bay
Marlborough Sounds
Marlborough

Dear Room 2,

A friend of your teacher Mrs Paterson, came to visit me in the weekend and told me that you have been reading lots of stories about me. I love reading those stories. Do you? She showed me your wonderful blog with all the beautiful pictures of me that you painted. Do you think I could come and visit you when I come to Blenheim so I can see the pictures in person and meet the artists. I hear that you are writing your own books. Wouldn’t it be exciting to write some new stories about me. I need some new adventures. Can you let me know when I can come to see you. Perhaps you could read me your stories.

Love from Greedy Cat

Today was Emily's first day at school. She wore our special birthday hat. This is a photo of Emily blowing out the birthday candle. We hope she enjoys being in Room 2.

I loved blowing out the candle and getting a lucky dip. Emily

Greedy Cat

Listen to our story about Greedy Cat while you look at our wonderful paintings.


http://www.fileden.com/files/2008/10/30/2165623/Greedy%20Cat%202.mp3

Daryan, Blake and Jack play summer soccer for the Transformers. Blake and Daryan played winter soccer in this team as well. They braved the horrible weather on Wednesday night to play. Jack's mum took these great photos and sent them so we could share them on our blog. You look great in your uniforms boys. It's a shame the Riverlands Kickers aren't in the same section as you.That would have been a great game to watch.

Today I learnt how to change our video into a Quicktime movie. Now all those who were unable to join us for our special assembly last term, can see how we used our fabulous masks to retell the story "The Beginning".

I have had fun this afternoon learning to do podcasts, again!! I need to keep practicing just like you do. We will have to have a practice at doing them with our poems and stories about Greedy cat. Your parents will be so impressed hearing you on the blog.
Mrs Ives told us about making little quicktime movies as well so we will have to give it a go.
I hope you had a good afternoon with Mrs Webb. How did the running races go?

From Mrs Paterson

Have you found the new puzzle at the bottom of the page? There will be a new one each time you go back to the blog. Some are easy and some are hard. Have a try and tell me what you think.
See you on Thursday. Have a nice day tomorrow. I hope you enjoy Room 1's assembly tomorrow.
Mrs P

Did you see the great photo of Jack and his mum in the Marlborough Express tonight?What a great photo.

If you go to http://www.driftwoodecotours.com/wordpress/index.php you will find a report all about yesterday with lots of photos. You are all really famous now. It is great to see that other people are interested in what we are doing for the environment. Won't it be great to go back to the Reserve again over the next few years and see how our trees have grown.

World tree Planting Day

On Friday Room 8 came to share some tree poems and to talk about our tree planting trip. After we had talked about all the things we would need to bring, Mrs Hepburn gave us all something to hang around our necks.Each tag had a word on it. We sat in a circle and we had to make a web of all the related things in nature. If you had water around your neck you might choose to link to swimming , fun or fish. We had to hold on very tightly to the wool so the web wasn't broken. We were amazed at what we could link things up to.
Then we did an activity when we had to link arms in a special way then link in different ways without letting go. Mrs Hepburn was very impressed with us.

Today was a sad day for Room 2 as it was Lily's last day at Riverlands School. She is off to Westport with her Mum and brother Flynn. Lily's dad will be excited to have the whole family with him in Westport. We hope he is really enjoying his new job.
We made patterns with korus for maths today and made them into headbands to celebrate Lily's last day. We have a lovely new book for our class library from Lily and her family so we will always remember her.
Don't forget to keep in touch. We will look for some comments from you on our blog and hopefully a letter or email or two..

On Monday we are joining Room 8 in planting trees at Simonsen Reserve as part of the ENO Tree Planting Day that is happening worldwide. We are hoping that some of the trees we plant will eventually encourage native birds back to our area.
Remember to wear old clothes on Monday and bring your gumboots in a plastic bag. Depending on the weather on the day come prepared with raincoats, sunhats,warm top, sunscreen. Let's hope it is the sunscreen and sunhats we need to bring. Gumboots are needed whatever the weather as there has been so much rain!!

Omaka Marae

Our wonderful visit to Omaka Marae

I liked touching the carvings and the tukutuku panels. Shannara
I liked touching the tukutuku because they all felt different. Emma
We had to take our shoes off just like at school. Fergus
The tukutuku were telling us stories. Micahla
I liked the waiata that we sang. Jone
I enjoyed duck, duck goose.We called it rakiraki, rakiraki, kuihi . Jessica
I thought it was very clever how the carvings were carved. Josh
I liked doing the poi when we did the helicopter. Blake
We sang our waiata really nicely. Michael
I liked sitting down in the Wharenui and hearing the stories. Aramac
I did a hongi with Kiley. Hadley
I liked sitting in the Marae and I listened to the stories. Lily
I liked hitting Jacks rakau. Daryan
I liked how the carvings were carved. Jack
I liked listening to the stories that were on the wall. Emily
I liked touching the statues. Ruby

We love getting your comments:

Thank you to everyone that has made a comment on our blog. It is great to know what you think of our blog.
If you haven't left a message before, all you have to do is get yourself a gmail account which is free. Just go to the home page at www.google.com and click on gmail. Then all you have to do is follow the leads. I think you can also use a hotmail account.
We would love to know what you think of all the cool things we have been doing this year.
I can see by the large number on our bean counter, that lots of you are enjoying looking at our blog and trying out lots of the links. Why not leave a comment and let us know which ones you enjoy the most. Have you found any other fun links while you were playing? Let us know and we can add it to our links.

Making masks with sculpt-it

Yesterday Chris Cairns walked past our school. He is walking all the way from Pukekohe to Christchurch to help make people aware of being careful at Rail crossings. Mrs Craig's husband has been walking with him and he gave us flags to wave. It was pouring with rain when they walked past so they weren't able to stop and talk. We had a look at his website to see how far he had walked and we saw a video that showed what can happen if you play on railway tracks.

We will never play on train tracks and if our ball went on the tracks we would just have to leave it there.

He is also raising money for the "Chris Cairns Foundation" and Daryan and Fergus put money into the collection bucket. THANK YOU BOYS.

Junior House Soccer

Today we had the finals of our House soccer. Yesterday Rata and Totora lost their games so they played each other today.

Both of our teams won today because we got 1 goal each. It was fun. Shannara
It was great because both of our teams won.When we got a goal we said "Yah Rata!". Lily

I was trying to kick the ball and I nearly got it. Fergus

Kowhai played Kauri in the final

Daryan's team got zero goals and we got three so we were the winners. I had a good game. Joshua
I was chasing the ball very fast and Josh's team scored one goal. Then they scored another one and another one. I liked it when our team almost got a goal. Daryan
We had a practise before the game with our house leaders. Emily

Thank you to Mr Paterson and all of the House leaders for running the soccer competition.

It was: Fun, exciting, cool, wicked,yahoo!,exhausting, funny,scary,
Let's do it again soon!