Here is the latest news from Kōwhai team.
TOP TEAM EVENT- PARENT HELP STILL NEEDED
On Tuesday 12th March, Sport Canterbury is coming to school to run a Top Team Event with the children in our team. Thank you to those parents who have already offered your assistance on for this morning event (9-11am). We still need the help of another 6-8 parents to enable this event to happen. If you are able to help please let your home group teacher know by Wednesday 6th March.
READING
This past week has seen us beginning or formal reading programme. We have worked in pairs for this which currently has Kate and Rowe's home groups working together and Paulette and Nick's home groups teaming up. This is enabling us to target the needs of the children much more effectively.
If your child is reading Level 21 (gold) or below, then they should be bringing a reading book home each day to read. This book will be one they already know, with the aim to develop their reading fluency.
Library Each teacher is taking their reading group to the library each week and we are encouraging the children to issue a chapter book to read at school or home.
WRITING
During literacy, we have had a focus on using figurative language to 'show' not 'tell' the reader. We designed our own 'wild self' using this website and the children wrote character descriptions to vividly describe the character they created. We were highly impressed with the quality of the language the children were using.
This week, we have focused on writing poems using our senses to describe an emotion. Some of these will be displayed in the hub for your viewing. We will try and post some to the blog for you to see they types of poems the children have created too. This coming week, we are carrying on with our exploration in the use of figurative language by describing an unusual food.
DMIC- Maths
We have been working in our DMIC maths groups over the past to weeks. Our focus has been around having robust discussions and challenging people's thinking when they are solving a problem by asking questions like: "How do you know this is the correct answer?" "Is there another way you can solve this problem" "How did you get this number?" We have been working hard to establish our norms on how we can effectively and collaboratively solve a maths problem.
The children have been working in pairs to solve number problems that involve adding. It has been great to see the children asking for more challenging problems! Here is an example of the types of problems that we have been solving.
Levi is making a lego ship. He needs 237 red lego bricks for the ship and 37 pieces of black lego for the cannons and 84 white bricks for the control room. How many pieces would have been used in total?
PASSIONS
To enable our children in Kōwhai team to have agency with their learning, each Friday they have been able to select a passion to pursue. This term the children have been given these options:French
Hungarian
Green Thumbs
Coding
Thorrington Resthome
Origami
Our Passions Time, runs from 11am-12pm each Friday. It was great to see the children on Friday having fun in their first session.
Gardening Gloves and Newspapers Wanted
Kate would love for the children in her group to bring along some gardening gloves for her sessions with the children. If you have any gardening gloves that you would like to donate to her Green Thumbs group she would love to hear from you! Also if they have any spare seedlings or pots, they are very much welcomed too.
She is also on the hunt for any old newspapers from home. If you have any spares please feel free to send them to school.
25th March - Art gallery trip (9am-2.30pm, Kate and Rowe's home Group)
26th March - Art gallery Trip (9am-2.30pm, Paulette and Nick's Home Group)
That's all for now
Kōwhai teaching team
Up and Coming Dates:
12th March - Top Team Event (9-11am, at school)25th March - Art gallery trip (9am-2.30pm, Kate and Rowe's home Group)
26th March - Art gallery Trip (9am-2.30pm, Paulette and Nick's Home Group)
That's all for now
Kōwhai teaching team