Term One Interest Projects: What Makes A Hero?

What does make a hero? 

Over the next few weeks Team Te Harakeke will be exploring this question. We have begun interest projects for the term, which we were introduced to in a team assembly last week. The focus will be around heroes, where all children are choosing someone of interest to them who they believe to be a hero to find out more about. Some children will choose people they know, maybe in their families or in our school community, while others will be investigating people who are well-known around New Zealand and the world.

Every Thursday morning we will have an interest project (IP) workshop. This will be class time designated to be working on our projects. We hope to encourage collaboration, run inquiry and ICT workshops, and promote a community of independent inquiry where we can foster the development of some valuable learning skills and attitudes.

We have a 3-step format for our interest projects that all children will follow. (1) They need to create a plan for their project, (2) they need to document their progress each week, and (3) they must share their learning with us at the end.

We can't wait to see what everyone discovers and shares with us. With so many examples of people who we consider heroes, we hope to answer the big question together... "What makes a hero?"

IP introductions

Some of us have been meeting with our teachers to make our plans and get 

our wheels in motion.

Keep an eye out on our blog and Twitter accounts for updates.

School Triathlon

We had a fantastic time participating in our school triathlon yesterday.

Most of us competed in teams, with a different person doing the cycling, swimming and running legs, but there were a couple of courageous students who took on the challenge of doing all three parts on their own. All children managed themselves so well, especially at the changeover points, where they needed to transition to the next leg.

It was great to see so many parents coming down as spectators. Thanks to Ms Baker and the other teachers who were in charge of organising the event. The hard work our community put into building our bike track is really paying off. An awesome day on our calendar!

Game Creation @ Coding Club

Over the past couple of weeks our Coding Club have been busy learning how to create some of our favourite games.  Last week we created our own version of Crossy Road,  with a fully coded control panel.  This week we looked at Geometry Dash and discussed two new coding terms - 'debugging' and 'concurrent code'.
Check out this video clip of Tayne explaining the game he created today:

Instead Of Saying...

You may have heard people talking about the importance of having a 'growth mindset' as opposed to a 'fixed mindset' recently. These words have been especially popular in many schools, as we look to encourage children to view the effort that they put into their learning as a path to mastery, rather than seeing their level of ability or intelligence as 'fixed'.

Carol Dweck is a popular researcher in this field. You may like to listen to one of her talks on the subject here.

Last Friday during assembly Room 14 shared an animated video presented by Class Dojo that tells the story of Mojo, a student who discovers that his brain is like a muscle that can grow and improve with effort. All of the Class Dojo videos in the series can be viewed here.

After the story about Mojo, Room 14 shared some of ways we can rephrase our responses to challenges in our learning. We found the ideas online and hope they made an impression on our assembly audience!

More Than Names And Faces

This week all of the children in Room 14 were asked to bring to school a personal treasure to share. As we get to know each other better, we want to look past the names and faces that make up our classroom community, and learn about what really makes us unique.

It was fascinating to see and hear about what each of us considered to be a 'treasure'. Some of us brought to school our current favourite toys or games, while others looked to more sentimental items such as old soft toys or artifacts and photos that remind us of loved ones who have passed away or special experiences we have had.

The back-stories behind the items were so interesting and it was a great opportunity to learn something interesting about each other. We learned that many treasures we have actually cost very little, even though we can sometimes think that expensive stuff is important to have for us to be happy.

We talked about how something that is a treasure to one person may hold no importance to someone else, and we discussed the reasons why this might be. These are great understandings for us to have as we look to further explore our diverse cultures and identities this term.

What is one of your personal treasures 

and why is it special to you?

(Feel free to share in a comment!)

Our New Ariki For 2016!

At this week's assembly it was great to see our new Ariki (student leaders) introducing themselves.

They perform a number of important duties around our school, including running Te Harakeke assemblies, peer-mediation in the playground and speaking in school assembly each Friday to share notices and Hapu points. They were chosen by staff and students for their community input and the way they live our school values. We're sure they'll do a fine job this year.

2016 Ariki: Brayden, Kamryn, Tayne, Malaika, Reuben, Stella, Jack and Eti.

Maths Inquiry

As part of our maths inquiry we started designing individual quilts. The quilts are going to show our culture/heritage, who's in our family, our favourite sport, favourite food, favourite book, favourite game, any pets we have and the meaning of our name. We will gather information from the quilts and present it in a variety of different ways.