Puriri Celebration Picnic

Here we are at the Puriri Celebration Picnic at Grey Lynn Park. We had lots of fun! Hope you enjoy looking at the pictures, thanks to Maddy for taking such great shots!

EOTC Day!

On Friday, it was the Puriri Team's EOTC Day. EOTC stands for Education Outside The Classroom. We went on an amazing race around Grey Lynn. We were given old photos of buildings in the past and we had to walk to them and complete a challenge in order to get the next photo. Finally we ended up back at school! It was lots of fun. Watch the slideshow to see some photos of one team competing.

Reading Groups A and C perform Three Billy Goats Gruff

Here are Groups A and C to show you their fantastic retelling of the story of the Three Billy Goats Gruff. We hope you enjoy watching!

Room 4 and 8's Zoo Trip

On Friday Room 8 and Room 4 went to the Auckland Zoo as part of our inquiry into changes in the Grey Lynn area in the last 100 years. We got to see lots of changes, even since some of us had last visited! Check out our photos to see what a great time we had, and see if you can recognise any changes to the zoo since the last time you were there!

Charlotte's Writes: Clare and the Seven Witches

For narrative writing this week, Room 8 kids were given a book cover. They were then told to work with a friend or on their own to write a narrative using the book cover. Here is Charlotte's one. See if you can find her orientation, problem and resolution.

Clare and the Seven Witches

Once there were seven witches. They lived in a small cottage far away in the jungle. The witches were mean witches, but they were nice to each other because they all knew they had to stick together or die in the terrible jungle.

One day, a little girl passed their cottage. Her name was Clare. In the window Clare saw a pizza and she felt really hungry, so she went into the house to take a bite. Clare didn't know that the witches were hiding in the little cottage. They were hiding up on the roof. When they saw her take a bite of the pizza, they jumped down the chimney behind her. They reached out and grabbed her. "Oh no," she said. "It's a trap."

The next day she woke up in a cage. Then she saw one of the wicked witches and the witch said, "ha ha, you have to do our cleaning for the rest of your life." "Oh no," said Clare. "I don't want to be here the rest of my life."

Clare had to wash the dishes, the floor, the walls and everything else in the house. It was hard work. Two days later she was still cleaning without a break. She was so hungry and tired of all the world. She started to think of a plan for running away. She said to herself, "I am going to try to get away tomorrow." So all night she washed, did the dishes and cleaned until it was almost the morning. Then she checked to see if the witches were still asleep. They were!

Her first job was to find the key to their bedroom so that she could lock them in and then to find the front door key. She looked in the wardrobe and found a marvelous gold key. It said "bedroom" on it. She kept it in her hand and very silently she looked in the bookcase to find the other key. At the end of the shelf was a hollow book shaped like a diamond. Inside she found a very clean silver key that said "front door."

Quietly she went to the witches bedroom and locked the door. Then she went to the front door, which was locked. She got the silver key and unlocked the front door. She crept through the door silently, locked it again and then raced away, chucking the key into the bushes on her way. She sprinted all the way home and into her own house. When she got there, she thought, "well I guess I learned my lesson about stealing." After that, she lived safe and happy in her house, never doing the dishes again.

The Ngarara: A narrative

Here is the Ngarara narrative written by James. Check and see if he's used any time connectives, adjectives and similes to make his writing interesting. If he has, leave him a comment saying so!

Once upon a time there lived two girls called Molly and Sophie. They wanted to paint a Ngarara on the wall because they had learned about him at school. First they drew it on a piece of paper for a rough copy. It looked as good as a real painting. Then they started to paint it on a blank space on the wall.

When they were finished, they thought they heard an earthquake! They heard a rattle and a shake and a thunk. Then suddenly they heard a swish that came from the wall.

Narrative Writing: The Ngarara

Here is Toby's narrative about the Ngarara, based on the School Journal story. Can you see if he has an orientation which explains the setting, problem and resolution? If so, leave him a comment!

Once upon a time there was a Ngarara trapped in the wallpaper of an old house. The house was owned by a man names Bob. He was 39. He had brown hair and green eyes.

One day he took down some of the wallpaper. Then suddenly the Ngarara sneezed his way through the hole in the wallpaper! Bob was terrified. He ran to the phone and called 111 as quickly as he could.

When Bob turned around again, he couldn't see the Ngarara. He sat down on his chair and suddenly realised that he was sitting on the Ngarara. The Ngarara said, "I will eat you." Bob was very upset.

Then the police arrived. When they saw the Ngarara, they ran away because he was so scary. Bob tried to run away with them, but as he was running, he tripped over some paint. It splattered everywhere, all over the carpet, all over the walls and all over the Ngarara. "Ahhhhhhh," cried the Ngarara. "It's burning me!" Then the Ngarara turned to dust and everything was ok again.

The Ngarara: A narrative based on the School Journal story

Last week, Reading Group C read "The Ngarara" by Melanie Drewery, from School Journal Part 1, Number 5, 2007. Then they set about writing a narrative with the Ngarara as one of the characters, based on what they had learned about him in the story. Here is Elijah's narrative.

Once there was an old and creaky house. Living in the old house was an old, happy man. However, he didn't know that his house was in the woods where the Ngarara lived.

One stormy night, the old man wanted to go for a walk. He opened the door and there was a flash of lightning and in the flash, he saw the Ngarara! He was very frightened. He ran back into his house, slammed his door and locked it. Then the Ngarara flew up to the roof. He blew hard and the roof fell off.

The Ngarara flew inside the house and then saw that the old man was wearing a uniform. It was a Air Force uniform, complete with a walkie talkie. He used the walkie talkie to call the Air Force. They came as fast as thought with their jets and fired at the Ngarara. That was the end of the Ngarara.

Narrative Writing: The Enchanted Anklet

Oli and Maya got a book cover with a picture of a foot with an anklet on it. Here is their orientation and problem. Leave them a comment if you'd like to read the ending...

The Enchanted Anklet

Once upon a time there was a beautiful princes. Her name was Angelina. She lived in a palace with her mother and father and she was a really happy girl. She always listened to her father and mother. She had blonde hair and blue eyes.

One day, it was her birthday and she wanted to wear a very pretty dress. She ran to her closet and picked a splendid dress. Behind the dress there was a gold box which said "birthday jewellery." She opened the jewellery box and saw an outstanding anklet. She had never seen it before. She took it out of the box and slipped it on her right ankle. Then she hurried downstairs for her birthday breakfast. On the way down, she tripped and ripped her pretty dress. "Oh no," she said. "I wish I had a better life." Suddenly a portal opened. She fell into it. There were clocks and pianos and all sorts of strange instruments. She sank down to the bottom and landed in some sort of school. The teacher said, "this is a new student called Angelina..."

Narrative Writing: Weaving Earth and Sky

Here is the interesting narrative that Nina and Juanita have come up with so far. Can you tell what parts of the narrative they have written? They also received a book cover, and this is what they came up with!

Weaving Earth and Sky

Once upon a time there was a boy named Maui. Maui had three brothers named Kae, Kia and Matua. Maui was the most powerful. He lived in the wharenui with his brothers.

One day he went to the beach while his brothers went fishing. Suddenly he saw a taniwha in the water. "Oh no," he said. "There's a taniwha in the water! It might attack my three brothers in their boat." Maui ran as fast as a moa back to the wharenui and got a taiaha. Then he ran back to the beach, dove into the water and said...

Narrative Writing: The Great Big Enormous Turnip

Here are Nathan and Arlo to share their orientation and the complication of their story with you. They were given a book cover and told to make up the story that went with it. Leave them a comment if you'd like to hear the end of this exciting narrative!

The Great Big Enormous Turnip

One Saturday evening a man had just remembered that the King was coming to his cottage to have turnip stew for dinner the next day because he had won a stew contest and the King wanted to try it. He had all the ingredients for it, EXCEPT for fresh turnips, so he walked to the seed store to get turnip seeds. On the packet he took it said, "Magic seeds in this packet." "Yeah right," the man said to himself. When he got home he planted his seeds, then went straight to bed.
When he woke up in the morning, there was a great, big, enormous turnip blocking the window. He went outside and mumbled, "Wow!" then said "this could serve a million people. I could invite the Queen, the Prince, the Princess and thousands more!" He ran up to the turnip to pull it out but the problem was, it wouldn't come out! He twisted and turned and tugged all about but it just would not come out...

Calendar Art

Our photos are finished! We are very proud of our spring tapestries and the nature photos we took of them. We have decided to use them for the calendars that will be sold in the next few weeks. Parents, get your child to show you which photo is theirs so you know what you're buying, or come into Room 8 and look at a hard copy. Also, if you click through to the vimeo website you will be able to view them full screen. We hope you enjoy looking at our fantastic spring tapestries!

Spring Tapestries from Georgie Hamilton on Vimeo.

Spring Tapestries

Here are some of our finished spring tapestries. Once the border had been sewn, we went stick hunting and found a stick to thread through the material at the top of our tapestry. Then we plaited wool, using colours that would compliment our work, and tied it to the stick to give us something to hang our tapestries with. Next we took them outside and placed them in natural surroundings. We took photos of our tapestries in three different locations and then chose the best photo. Watch the clip to see the results!

Weaving: Creating Spring Tapestries

The last few weeks, Room 8 have been learning all about using fabric and fibre in visual art. This week we have been concentrating on creating a spring tapestry using hessian as the backdrop and sewing patterns or objects that represent spring to us into the hessian. They are almost finished and are on their way to some lovely mums who are going to frame them for us. Have a look at the clip to watch us in action and to catch a glimpse of what the final product might look like!

The Castle: An orientation

The Castle

Once upon a time there lived a Prince called Edmund. He was on a quest for his father to find a special castle made entirely of metal. He walked for hours and hours until he came to a steep hill. He walked up the steep hill, his cloak swinging side to side and his gold hair swirling in the breeze. Finally he was at the castle. His blue eyes popped out like they were going to explode from his head when he saw a beautiful princess in the doorway. She had long blonde hair and a purple dress. Her eyes were the colour of the sky. Her name was Sophie.

Sophie saw the Prince walk up to her castle...

The Gruffalo: An Orientation

Arlo and Ernie have written a very interesting orientation all about the Gruffalo. We can't wait to read the rest of the story and find out what happens! Please leave them a comment and tell them whether you could see the gruffalo in your mind by reading their orientation. Picture by Arlo.

The Gruffalo

One day something very bad happened. Something very, very bad. It started when an ugly gruffalo walked into a town and that town was made of gold. There were 16 buildings in the town all made of gold except for one, made of silver. The silver building was the building for the sherrif, who was a gruffalo fighter.

Just to tell you, the gruffalo wasn't only ugly. He also had purple prickles down his back that he could shoot at you. He had orange eyes that shot lazers and he had claws that he could rip out and throw at you. As well as that, he was twice the size of a sky scraper. So watch out, the gruffalo could be anywhere...

But don't worry, right now he was approaching the town.

Another Narrative Orientation

Here are Madeleine and Anetema to share their orientation with you. They focused on making sure the reader knew who, what and where, and that when the reader read her orientation they would be able to see the characters in their minds. Were they successful? Leave a comment. Picture by Madeleine.

Where's Lilly?

Two girls named Chloe and Bridget were walking to a pet store because they desperately wanted a rabbit. Chloe and Bridget were twins and they liked wearing the same clothes! Their gold hair shone in the sunlight as they walked, and their new chuck tailors were as pink as could be! Chloe and Bridget were 16 years old.

As they walked, they went by a fish and chip show. They could smell all the fish and chips. It made them feel hungry. In the distance they could see the pet shop. Chloe ran ahead. She could see on the roof it said, "get pets here, get pets here!" There were so many pets in the huge windows! As Chloe ran to the door, she shouted, "HURRY UP BRIDGET!"

Narrative Writing: The Orientation

We are learning how to write a narrative in Room 8 at the moment. We know that a narrative needs an orientation, a problem and a resolution, and this week we are focusing on the orientation. The orientation sets the scene and tells the reader who, what and where. Here is Josie's orientation. Did she explain who, what and where? If she did, tell her so in the comments!

The Problem With The Triplets

Once upon a time there lived three girls who were identical triplets. They even liked to wear the same clothes! Their names were Torey, Maya and Emma. They had black straight hair and their favourite outfit was a denim skirt and a violet top.

They lived in a small, old brick house with their mum and dad. The house was two storeys but it was very skinny. The bedrooms were upstairs and the lounge, bathroom and kitchen were downstairs.

The girls were lying on their beds in the room that they shared, listening to the storm that night. Their parents were downstairs in the lounge, drinking a cup of tea when . . .

Term 4 Goals continued...

Here are the rest of the Room 8 learners to share their goals with you!

Term 4 Goals

Last week we reflected on our learning and set ourselves some new goals in reading, writing and maths so that we can continue to get even better at these things. Then we picked one goal to share with you!

Term 4: Looking Forward

Here are some more Room 8 members to share with you what they are looking forward to.

Term 4!

Welcome to Term 4 in Room 8! We are back for the last term of the year and are very excited about all the things we are going to learn this term. Check out the movie to see what we will be learning.

Collage Cards

To say thank you to all the visitors we had over the Centennial weekend, we used our collage skills that we have learned this term to make beautiful thank you cards. We used ribbon, beads, cellophane, coloured paper, craft scissors, buttons, glitter and lots more to create the card we had designed. Watch the slideshow to see the results!

What we have learned in Term 3

Here are some more Room 8 learners to share the most important thing they have learned this term.

What I learned in Term 3

We have been reflecting on Term 3 this week, especially on our learning. We made a list of ALL the things we have learned this term, and then we went away and wrote about the one that we felt was the most important to us. Here are some of the answers - the rest will be up as soon as they are recorded!

Grey Lynn School Centennial

On Friday, it was Grey Lynn School's 100th birthday! To celebrate, there was a special morning tea that past pupils, teachers and parents were invited to. There were also lots of special events all weekend. As part of the morning tea on Friday, the visitors were shown around the school by Year 6 volunteers. We had lots of visitors in Room 8 and we wore our "100" crowns especially for the occasion. It was lots of fun showing the visitors our learning and how we do school today. They told us that there had been many changes since they were here! Thanks for coming, visitors.

The 2000's: Just Google!

Now that the production is over, we would like to show you our learning about Google from the term. Here is the movie that played behind us during our decade, the 2000's. We hope you like it!

Google - changes in the 2000s from Georgie Hamilton on Vimeo.

What is the best place to have a party?

Here are Maya and James to tell you why Clip and Climb is the best place for a party. We will be ready for a party once we have finished the production tonight!!

What is the best place to have a party?

The best place to have a party is at Clip and Climb.

Clip and Climb is a great place because you can learn how to climb trees and rocks.

There are lots of cables. They lower you down and pull you up the rocks. You have to wear a harness to keep you safe.

When you get to the top of a course you have to press a red button and that means that you are at the top. It is lots of fun because it is a great place with heaps of courses to do.

The best place to have a party is Clip and Climb because it is a cool place to go.

By James and Maya.

Where Do Unicorns Come From?

We are busy doing our matinee performance of the production today. Tomorrow is our evening performance and we are so excited! In the meantime, here are Charlotte and Queenie to tell you all about where unicorns come from.

Where Do Unicorns Come From?

Unicorns come from the land of lollies.

In the land of lollies there is a knitting machine. It makes unicorns.

The knitting machine knits the unicorns body out of lollies. Then there is another machine that undoes the knitting and pushes in the heart lolly and knits the body back up.

Finally, they are fully made of lollies and are free to run away and explore lolly land. They can eat all the lollies too.

Unicorns come from the land of lollies, they never come from anywhere else.

By Charlotte and Queenie.

Why Does The Sun Shine?

Here is Maddy to tell you all about why the sun shines. She has used her imagination spectacularly, incorporating things she learned about the first space tourist!

Why Does The Sun Shine?

The sun shines because it is a ball of fire.

The sun shines because there is a woman living in space and every morning she goes over to the sun. She lights the sun with a match and the ball of fire lights up.

The woman got her job from NASA (which is a country). The United States and NASA fought over whether to give her the job or not because USA had someone else who wanted the job. In the end, NASA won!

The name of the person who has the job is Kin Handerson. She is 40,000 years old. She has black hair and brown eyes.

The sun shines because it's a ball of fire that gets lighted every day.

How To Fight Pirates

Elijah, Nathan and Ernie have written a very imaginative explanation about pirates. See if they have an identifying statement, explanation sequence and a summary statement!

How Can You Fight Pirates?

You can fight pirates with a sword.

To fight off pirates, you will need a ship to sail in. Then you will need to sail your ship out to sea. Make sure you have enough food and water to eat and drink on the way.

To find the pirates you will need to use a magic compass. The compass will point the way to their ship. Then you can find their ship and attack.

When you attack the pirates, use swords to fight the pirates because they will have swords too. You will need to be a good swordsman to beat them.

To fight pirates you will need a ship, a magic compass and a sword.

By Elijah, Nathan and Ernie.

Where do unicorns come from?

Here is Arlo to tell you exactly where unicorns come from. He drew his inspiration from "The Enchanted Wood" by Enid Blyton, which features the Faraway Tree.

Where Do Unicorns Come From?

Unicorns come from Unicorn Land.

Unicorn Land is a lush, beautiful land with lots of grassy fields. The fields are grassy green with unicorns running everywhere. The unicorns have a yellow mane and a white body and horn.

Unicorn Land is up the Faraway Tree and up the ladder at the top of the tree. Unicorn land comes to the Faraway Tree every month on the fifth.

If you want to visit the land, make sure you come when it is at the top of the tree. Then you will be able to see the unicorns.

Unicorns come from Unicorn Land up the Faraway Tree.

By Arlo.

What makes ice cream colourful?

Josie decided that she'd like to tell you all about what makes ice cream colourful. We are reading "George's Marvellous Medicine" by Roald Dahl as a class at the moment, which might tell you where she got her imaginative ideas from!

What Makes Ice Cream Colourful?

Ice Cream is colourful because of the colour of paint that is added to the mixture when it is being made.

Ice cream doesn't taste like paint because there is a special powder that they put in the mixture. The powder is magic powder that is made by fairies.

Some colours taste like paint even though they have the powder in them so we don't get those colours in the shops because if we did, we would be eating ice cream that tasted bad!

When the ice cream leaves the fairies, it gets to the shops by a magic password. To make the carpet go to the shops, the fairies have to read the password. The password is ^@#)!{*U3.

Ice cream is colourful because of paint and still tastes good because of magic powder.

By Josie.

Writing Imaginative Explanations: Why does the sun shine?

We have been writing imaginative explanations recently, where we answer a question but the answer might not be factual, or the question might be a bit silly! Check out Isobel's explanation of why the sun shines:

Why does the sun shine?

The sun shines because the Sun Man makes the sun shine every morning and tells it to stop every night.

In the morning, the Sun Man tells the sun to rise. Then the sun does. The sun has to do what the Sun Man says because he is magic.

The Sun Man's real name is Supercalafragalisticexpalidocious. He lives on the moon with his wife, the fairy princess. She gave him the magic power.

Every morning the Sun Man wakes up, gets his magic wand, waves it in front of the sun and says "rise and shine." Then the sun has to rise and give us light.

The sun shines because the Sun Man makes it. Without the Sun Man, we wouldn't have light.

By Isobel.

Follow Up: The milky bar kid

For those interested in seeing Queenie's audition to become the New Milkybar Kid, click here to be taken to her youtube video, or watch it below! Fantastic job, Queenie!

Room 4 and Room 8: Buddies!

To have a break from production practice, and to practice getting along with others, Room 8 got to visit Room 4 and have some time to do different activities in their classroom. We got to write letters and cards with them, play different reading and maths games, and even use their dress up box! Lots of the kids in our class loved the dress up box, and Gail remembered them loving it even when they were in her class when they were in Year 1!

We enjoyed playing together, sharing and being kind, and having great learning conversations.

Recount Writing: The Next Milky Bar Kid

We are taking a break from all our explanation writing and have written some interesting recounts this week. One person who worked really hard on her writing was Queenie. Here she is to tell you all about the search for the next Milky Bar Kid!

Wow! I might be the next Milky Bar Kid! But I'm not the only person who's competing...

First we went online to the website and printed out the script. Wow! We looked at the information and felt amazed.

Secondly I had to learn all my lines for the performance. I had to read them and read them and read them until I knew them off by heart.

Finally, we filmed my entry and we entered it into the competiton on youtube. It was the best day of my life.

By Queenie

Measurement: Taller and Shorter

For maths, we have been drawing Kid Pix pictures showing at least two things, one tall and one short. We could choose to draw anything we wanted. Some people chose to draw shapes, others drew flags, and Toby even drew dinosaurs! Watch the movie to see our amazing pictures, and don't forget to leave us a comment if you think we got it right!

Writing to explain: Why is Barack Obama important?

Why is Barack Obama important?

Barack Obama is important because he is the president of the United States.

Barack Hussein Obama is the President of the United States of America. He is a man who was named after his father and in 1992 he married a Lady called Michelle. They had two kids called Malia and Sasha who lived their whole lives in Chicago until they moved to the white house.

First Barack Obama was a lawyer and then he became State Senator for the state of Illonois. On February 11 2007, he said he would run for president of the United States. Then lots of people all over the country voted for Obama and after they counted the votes they knew who won: it was Barack Obama.

Barack Obama is important because he is the first African American President that the United States has ever had. He is the 44th president.

Barack Obama is important because he is the first African American President.

By Jack, Elijah and Matalena.

Can you see the identifying statement, the explanation sequence and the summary statement? If you can, leave this group a comment and tell them they met the success criteria!

Writing to explain: Who was Michael Jackson?

Who was Michael Jackson?

Michael Jackson was a very famous singer.

Michael Joseph Jackson was the King of Pop, a dad, a recording artist, a father, a man, a great singer and a fantastic dancer and also the best moon walker so he was very famous.

Michael Jackson was a singer and a dancer. He also gave money away. He was a part of the Jackson Five. He wrote lots of songs and he had a monkey called Bubbles. He owned a theme park because he had so much money. He made music videos.

When he died on June 25th 2009 a billion people watched his funeral on T.V. He died because something was happening with his heart. He took drugs and he had a heart attack. He died at home when he was sleeping. His home was called Neverland.

Michael Jackson was a very famous singer because of all the music he wrote. He died in 2009 but is still famous now.

By Syris, Benjamin and Nathan.

Can you see the text connectives (that means words like "so" and "because") that this group has used? If you can, they have been successful in their learning! Leave them a comment and tell them so!

Writing to explain: How do kids learn?

How do kids learn?

Kids learn by going to school and by asking questions.

One way to learn is to go to school and your teacher will teach you some things. You could also ask your friends a question. Then they might tell you the answer. At school you can learn lots of things like reading, writing and maths.

Another way to learn is to go on the internet and go to google. You can put in what you want to find the answer to and press search. Then you can click on different websites to find information.

Parents also know lots of things so you could ask your parents a question and they could tell you. They could also show you how to do something because they are clever.

Kids learn by going to school, finding out things on the internet or by asking their parents for help.

By Maya, James and Zara.

This group brainstormed all the ways that they thought they learned things. Then they chose the ones they thought were the most important and wrote about them. What do you think? Are there other ways that you learn? Tell us in the comments!

Writing to explain: The first female Prime Minister elected in New Zealand

This is the next explanation in our series explaining important changes in the 2000's. Can you see the identifying statement, explanation sequence and summary statement the group have used? If you can, leave them a comment!

Who was the first female PM elected in NZ?

Helen Clark was the first woman to be elected as Prime Minister.

Helen Clark was born on 26th February in 1950. Her mum is called Margaret and was a teacher. Her dad is called George and was a farmer. Helen Clark has a husband called Peter Davis. When she was young, she went to Epsom Girls Grammar School.

Helen Clark was the first woman to have won at an election for Prime Minister. Clark was Prime Minister from 1999 to 2008. She was also the Minister for Art and Culture. Her party was the Labour Party.

Helen Clark is now in Washington DC. On April 17, 2009, she became the Administrator of the United Nations and she is the first woman to have this job.

Helen Clark was the Prime Minister for New Zealand. She is now the first female Administrator for the United Nations.

By Queenie, Charlotte and Inaise.

Google Earth Tour - Where we went in the holidays

Today we were lucky enough to have Mrs Burt come in to show Room 8 and Room 4 some really cool things using Google. She is New Zealand's only Google Certified Teacher, and since we are learning all about Google we thought she'd be perfect to teach us!

First she showed us how Mr Google knew all about what we had done in the holidays. We went on a tour of all the places us kids had gone! Then she showed us ways of using google for our basic facts and spelling. Did you know Google can do some of your homework for you?!

If you want to see our tour, then here are the instructions (You will need Google Earth version 5 or higher on your computer to play the tour. If you don't have it, click here to download it):

Click on this image to download the Google Earth tour of our holidays.

• Click on the Google Earth image
• Your computer will begin to download a file called a .kmz (it might ask your permission to do so first) If you have a flash computer it might ask you right now if it can open Google Earth. If not, go on to the next step....
• It will save the file somewhere eg on your desktop or in a downloads folder
• Look for the file. This one is called "Grey Lynn School.kmz"
• When you find it, double click it and Google Earth should start up for you - it will probably look quite like the image you see here to begin with.
• Now you can explore our tour on Google Earth
• Don't forget to tell us what you think!

Writing to explain: What is an air guitar

What is an air guitar?

An air guitar is an invisible guitar.

An air guitar is something like a real guitar but invisible and makes no sound. With an air guitar you can do lots of stuff like impressing your friends.

This is how to play an air guitar: Hold your left hand out as far as you can like you’re holding a guitar and use your right hand for strumming. If you want sound get a stereo and put music on in the background so it sound like you’re playing to the music.

The air guitar was first invented in the late 1970’s. People used to do lots of competitions by acting with air guitars. Lots of good guitarists are good because they have had lots of practice with a real guitar.

An air guitar is a guitar that is invisible and makes no sound.

By Oli and Arlo.

Did they explain to you exactly what an air guitar is? If they did, leave them a comment telling them that they met their success criteria!

Writing to explain: New World Records at the 2008 Olympics

How did athletes get to be so quick?

Athletes get to be quick by keeping fit and healthy.

To become an Olympic medalist, training is important. You have to train ever day. You still have to train when you are sick or tired. You need to train hard because that’s how you win.

Athletes wear special clothes to make them faster. Swimmers wear tight fitting togs to swim faster because then the water can’t slow them down runners wear light clothes to run faster. Cyclists wear light and tight clothes to go faster. Basketballers wear clothes that are loose and have little holes so that they don’t get too hot.

One way athletes get faster is by eating the right food. Athletes eat the right food to get more energy because otherwise they would be tired in the middle of the competition. For example eating fruit and vegetables is good to keep you healthy. Athletes don’t eat Junk food or else in the competition they might get a tummy ache.

Athletes become quick by eating healthy food, wearing the right clothes and training every day.

By Juanita, Toby and Josie.

Can you see their identifying statement, explanation sequence and summary statement? If you can, they reached their goal!

Writing to Explain: Technological Changes

What came before CD’s and Phones?

Before CD’s and phones, people used records to listen to music and letters to talk to people.

Before CD’s, people used records to listen to music. They also listened to radios which played music, commercials and had stories to listen to. Another thing people used were tapes. They put them in tape players to listen to music.

Before phones were invented, people used the home post to share their thoughts with other people. They also sent telegraphs. Most things were written down and sent because people couldn’t talk to each other unless they were in the same place.

CD’s and phones won’t be around forever. In the future we might use a thing that sits on your head instead of a phone.

Before CD’s and phones there were lots of different things people used. In the future, we might not use CD’s and phones and might have different cool technology instead.

By Kate, Ernie and Anetema.

Writing to explain: Who was the first space tourist?

Who was the first tourist in space?

Dennis Tito was the first tourist to go to space.

Dennis Tito was a billionaire businessman from California. He became the first paying person to go to outer space. Dennis Tito was born on the 8th of August, 1940 in Queens, New York.

On the 28th of April 2001 Dennis Tito paid $2,000,000,000 to go to space. He set of from Kasakhstan at 1.38pm.

Before Dennis Tito could go to space the United States would not let him because they thought it wasn’t right. Russia thought he should be allowed to go because he paid $2,000,000,000 so they fought over him going or not. In the end Russia won and he was allowed to go to space.

Dennis Tito was the first tourist to go to space but only after the United States and Russia let him go.

By Maddy, Nina and Isobel.

This is the answer to one of the questions we came up with when inquiring about big events that happened in our decade. We have been learning to write explanations and have worked in groups to write one as the answer to our research. Look for more great explanations this week and next week!

Jump Jam Inside: Blame it on the boogie

Guess what? Today Room 8 did Jump Jam inside! It was amazing. I couldn't even believe we were doing it. It was the best thing that happened since Term 3 started. It was so fun I even thought I'd burst. That's how fun it was. It was raining outside so we stayed in the warm, dry classroom. We did the Coconut song and Blame it on the boogie. Watch the video if you want to know how we do it.

By Jack

The Finished Timeline

After our second painting session, our timeline on the windows is finished! We think it looks pretty cool. What do you think?

Important events in the 2000's

Our learning this term is centered around the upcoming school production. For the production, our class and Room 4 are presenting the 2000's. We're really excited since all of us (except for our teachers) were born in the 2000's.

So far, we have created a timeline of the important events of the 2000's. We got into groups and we are busy researching our events. We decided to draw our timeline too, and now we are painting it on our windows! This has the added bonus of blocking the sun so that it isn't in our eyes when we're trying to work.

We are halfway through painting the windows. Take a look and see if you can recognise what the major events we picked are. If you can't, GOOGLE IT!!!

Sneeze Safe - The Final Recount

On Friday Room 8 learned how to sneeze safely. First Mrs Hamilton sprayed us with water so we could see how fast and far germs travel. Soon a lady called Sally came in from Sneeze Safe to watch us. Secondly we had a little talk about how to sneeze safely. Soon after our talk, we went on the internet and used google to look up sneeze safe. We found out it had a website. There were some very gross facts on the website about snot rockets! After that we watched a short clip about how to sneeze safely. It was quite gross. There were four sayings: "do trap it, bin it, wash it and don't eat it." Then Sally took photos of us pretending to sneeze. She said some of us might be in the newspaper. Soon she had to leave. I felt glad that we learned how to sneeze safely.

By Isobel.