Update

Over the last fortnight we have been busy across the school working on our HEART values.

The Kākano team had a lovely visit from Marcia and her hearing dog Fergus. It was a great chance for our team to learn about what Fergus the dog's job is and how Marcia communicates using NZSL. Thank you Whaea Kayleigh for organising this talk.

Room 1 stretched a bike as part of our Inquiry learning around transport. You can see their finished work soon. We are looking forward to sharing our learning with you on Thursday 15 June 12:45 - 1:40pm. It has been awesome to see our students' passion shine in this area.

Kākano also took part in a Science in motion, Gravity and friction activity. We had to work out how many different ways we could move the marble in a hula hoop.

The Tipu syndicate have been focusing on our HEART Value Teamwork.

In their Waihanga sessions Tipu have been working as a team to create stop go animations to go alongside our Transportation Inquiry learning. A huge thank you to Miss C for all the work and planning you have provided to make our time in the Waihanga Centre joyful and engaging.

Every fortnight the Tipu team enjoys coming together as the Tipu team for Syndicate Assembly. At our assembly we celebrate learning, giving out heart awards and singing waiata together.

Syndicates have been enjoying their pūrakau (story) sessions with Mrs Viles in our new library space every fortnight focused on Te Ao Maori.

The latest pūrakau Koru explored was about the children of Rangi and Papa. Rangi and Papa had over 70 children and these children became guardians of the environment. One of these guardians Rūaumoko is guardian over the earth elements.

Our follow on activity was based around the earth's tectonic plates and how these move. We learnt what the words divergent, convergent and transform mean.

Koru completed numerous fun activities to help us cement this knowledge. First they had a go creating the movements using playdough. Then they learnt a quick rap and movement dance called; The Earthquake shake. Lastly the team tried to create a steady structure that could withstand a simulated earthquake using either playdough, duplo or lego.

On Tuesday last week eight Koru students represented the school at the Hutt Science STEM challenge. Koru Team 1 placed 3rd, and Koru Team 2 placed 6th out of 51 teams - a very strong result! Well done Adam, Daniel, Edmund, Harper, Laura, Luke, Molly, and Rose.

As part of our focus on the Active value this past fortnight, some students from the Ponga syndicate got out and about with their younger buddy class on a scavenger hunt around the school. This saw students working together to notice the finer details of our environment, problem-solving cryptic puzzles together to get to the end first!

It has been awesome to see so much happening for our tamariki in each area of the school.