Hero photograph
 
Photo by Ruth Faulkner

Pīwakawaka Hapori

Ruth Faulkner —

Our Pīwakawaka Team and tamariki have enjoyed activities based around getting to know one another. Learning and structure within our classrooms is underway, and it is delightful to see many the smiles that greet us each day.

The stars in our headline photo are in Rūma Tekau mā Toru. We have been busy reading the story of What's in my Lunchbox? To finish, we created our own lunchbox tower with much discussion around the storyline. As you will see in the photo below, many keen readers in this classroom are learning to hold a book the correct way and read from left to right, as well as for enjoyment!

Rūma Rima have been keenly observing the life cycle of a monarch butterfly, as we are lucky to have had two swan plants donated to us. Not forgetting that we have been great Math detectives, problem-solving using 'Frogs in the Pond' and writing our solutions as number stories. While getting into the rhythm and routine of being back at school.

Rūma Ono grouped numbers in ten, skip counting, and then created a class masterpiece with 130 paper chain links in total. We also read the Rainbow Fish story and wrote about what makes us so special.

Rūma Whitu had some fun making shape crowns with repeating patterns for Maths. We also undertook a problem-solving activity around how many paper links would be needed if everybody made a ten-link chain. 

Pīwakawaka Hapori's Project Based Learning focuses on who is in our classroom and community. Our journey began with ourselves and whānau, which involved self-portraits, class korowai, photos of our families, and learning our pepeha. We look forward to learning more about, with, and from one another.

Kā mihi nui,

Ruth Faulkner, Courtney Dunn, Paula Fisher, Nicole Wilson.