Summer Learning Journey Day 2 Activity 1

For this activity, please create four new similes. You can use the starters below or you can make up your own.

… is as fast as… (eg: The brand new Ferrari is as fast as a lightning bolt)

… is as tall as…

… is as small as…

… is beautiful like...

On your blog, share the similes that you have created with your readers.

Day 2 Activity 1

The sun was shining on the water making it reflect like a crystal. 

The fog was as thick as a blanket. 

The gem was as blue as the ocean. 

The wind blew as fiercely as a wild dog waiting to eat. 

Year Eight Girls Cannibal Gorge Recount

On the 9th of December the year eight girls went to the St James walkway to walk to Cannibal Gorge hut. 

We left school at 8:20am in the morning. We had to drive to Reefton and buy a hut ticket. Then we drove to the start of the St James walkway, and the first thing we had to do was fill in the intentions book. 

The walk is about 3 hours long and about 7km long. We had to walk through lots of avalanche zones and creek crossings.

When we got to the hut we put our bags down and went to the river which was right by the hut. The water was really cold but very refreshing. Lots of the girls went all the way under and some only went half way under. 

After the swim we had some lunch and then we got ready to walk to the next hut called Ada Hut, which was another 3km from Cannibal Gorge Hut. The walk was really nice but the ground was really wet and soggy and it was hard to keep dry feet. Once we were at Ada hut we had a look around and walked back. 

When we got back we set up where we were going to sleep and get our dinner ready. I was in a group with Mackenzie and Grace and we made pasta for tea. We used a gas cooker to boil some water. The food we were cooking was just where you had to add boiling water to it and close the packet. For desert we had apricot crumble and chocolate. 

After desert we had a go with Mrs Kemp's slingshot. Mrs Kemp put a paper plate on a bush and we had to stand some way back and put a rock in the slingshot and fire it. I was quite close to hitting the target. Then we went inside to play a game. 

Once we finished playing games we got ready for bed and then told some stories. Mrs Kemp told a scary story and scared us all. After that we went to bed but we heard some noises and it turned out to be mice. They were looking for food in our bags so we had to move all the bags to a higher surface. Once we we in bed it was really hot and we all had trouble getting to sleep. 

In the morning when we woke up it was really cold. We got up and made breakfast my group had savaloies and a muesli bar. After breakfast we went down to the river to fill up our drink bottles. 

Then we packed up and began the walk home. It was a really nice walk home and the weather was nice. We stopped and had lunch just before one of the the swing bridges. It did not take us long to get home. 

Once we were back at the cars we had a break and then headed home. On the way home Mrs Kemp kindly brought us all and ice cream. Then we came back to school just in time for the bell then headed home. 

I really enjoyed the walk and being with my friends. It is a really nice track and we were lucky with the weather. 

Digital Collage

Today we worked with Mrs Mineham. We made digital collages on our Chromebooks on a google drawing. We inserted images from the explore tool and made them into shapes. By layering them we made a NZ bird. I used the poly-line to help do some of the harder bits and layered a texture on top. I chose to make a Tomtit. I enjoyed making the collage and I think I did pretty good at matching the image. 

Scratch Animation

Scratch Animation

Measuring Angles

Toki Pounamu Film Festival

Toki Pounamu Film Festival
Have you ever seen a robber at Paroa school? Well, at the Toki Pounamu Film Festival you will. Today on the fourteenth of November  the whole Karoro senior school went down to the regent theatre. Many other schools like St Patricks, Kaniere, BlakeTown and Paparoa Range who are also in the Toki Pounamu cluster were invited. 

A group of adults selected a range of films that had been sent in from lots of different schools. The videos were around one theme which was our place. Some schools created a movie about  their school and some about  their town. The videos were filmed and produced by children from those schools.

I liked the first one, which was a video created by Paroa School. It was filmed by Sammi Fahey, Caitlin Body and Pippa Robb. They chose to film a news report about a crime. The video started in a news station and then went to a news reporter and then to a detective. There was news music playing quietly which suited the theme of the video. Their video was very entertaining to watch and the footage was well filmed. There was also some slow motion and different angles. The sound was very good as well, it was easy to hear and understand because they spoke clearly.

I liked that there was a clear storyline that made sense. The music that they added also built up some suspense which made you want to keep watching it. Their video was also quite funny and enjoyable to watch. In my opinion I didn’t think that the video quite fitted to the theme of Our Place.

The film festival was a good experience and our school was lucky to go. I think that they should do it again next year, with a different theme. Next time instead of selecting only some of the videos they could play all of them, and have a whole day where you go and watch.

Angles DLO

Kōrero O Te Wiki

Pet Scratch

We are learning to represent a te reo message through visual language. I chose to do it on scratch.

He Kakano Kowhaiwhai Artwork

Our Kowhaiwhai Artwork 

By Billie & Hannah 

This year in He Kakano we have been learning about Kowhaiwhai patterns
and our challenge was to design and create our own Kowhaiwhai pattern.
Before we could paint on a canvas, we had to practice what we were going
to paint. We chose to do a very modern design with a 3D aspect. We are
very happy with how our artwork turned out. 

The top pattern means strength, to be strong when things are hard and
to be strong when you believe in yourself. The bottom one means to be
strong for other people when things are hard for them, and can also
mean journey. 

The design with the diamonds stands for everyone being different and
who you are. Is means everyone has a different body shape, personality, looks
and the way that you do things. 

The pattern in the middle with the flower means flourishing life. Things are
going well and the environment around you is doing well. Above with the
koru means family and friends or the people you are close with. 

This design with the rectangles means that you accomplish new challenges
and skills and they stay with you for the rest of your life.

Animation Slide Show

Today we worked with Mrs Minehan. She showed us how to make an animation on a slide show. I chose to do a snake eating a mouse. To make it work you have to duplicate the slide and each time make the character move a few paces forward. 

Then when we had to put it on our blog we had to embed it then copy and paste it onto the HTML section. Next we had to change where it said false to true and the speed to how slow or fast we wanted it. 

Scratch Animation

Scratch Animation

Adding And Subtracting Fractions

Food Chains And Food Webs

Statistical Investigation

How many (and what species) of living creatures
around/in/on the Pohutukawa tree?

Creatures	Tally	Total
Sparrows
Blackbirds
Spiders	11111111	8
Ants	111	3
Stick insect
Worms
Spider Mites
Slater	1	1

We will record our findings on a tally chart, with some options
of what there could be. 

We went out to the pohutukawa tree at the back of the school
and found eight spiders, three ants and one slater. We used a
magnifying glass and searched on the tree, around the tree and in the
tree. We noticed that we would only find the spiders on the bark of
the tree. 

We wonder if we did this in summer  would we have more
luck finding a variety of living creatures such as birds, cicadas,
crickets, lady bugs and other things like bees and wasps. 

  

Wild Things Reading Response

DRS ABCD Lesson

Personal Device Speech Recording

Kia ora, Ko Hannah toku ingoa. 
If you are always on devices it’s really hard to put it down, right?
Some side effects of continuously being on personal devices are that people  become extremely
indolent, they can be involved in serious accidents and there are other grave risks to personal health. 

First I would like to talk about the health risks that transpire from being on your personal devices.
The blue light in your screens plays a big part in health risks. Blue light is everywhere and your eyes
can’t block it out very well. Some blue light is good, like the sunlight but some is bad and adversely
affects the eye. Scientific studies show that blue light agitates sensitive cells within the retina, and too
much of it can lead to the loss of eyesight. 

Blue light also affects your sleeping patterns. For example when we first wake up in the morning we
see blue light, which is the sun, and once we wake up in the morning we shouldn’t fall asleep again
until nightfall. When it gets dark our body starts to produce melatonin a few hours before we
go to bed,  melatonin helps to trigger sleep. But if we go on a screen before bed, or have white
lights on it confuses your body and therefore you could have trouble sleeping. 

There are also physical health risks that come with being on a device. Hunched over a device
alters your posture and weakens your back which becomes a big problem and one day your back
will always be hunched over.  When you have an uncomfortable seat and you slouch in it, it will
make matters much worse. Your shoulders and neck become sore because when you type you pull
your shoulders up. Wrists, hands and fingers can also be victims of pain, cutting off blood supply
to the nerves and causing injuries like carpal tunnel syndrome. If you move your mouse awkwardly
you can put a strain on your wrist and injure it, the same occurs to your  fingers from typing too much. 

People are spending too much time on devices. Parents are using ipads, phones and computers
as babysitters. When parents want to complete something they just throw their child in front of a screen.
Studies show that children from the age of 2 - 5 should only be spending a maximum of 1 hour on a
device a day. Children from ages 8 - 18 should be on a device for the maximum of 2 -3 hours a day.
If young children have been used to being on a device since they were babies they forget how to
entertain themselves. Instead of going outside to play or playing imaginary games with friends they
sit inside in front of a screen.   

There have been many fatal accidents that have happened in New Zealand, and guess what the
cause was? Being on a device! Last year there were 12 car crashes when the end result
was fatal, 155 serious injury crashes and 956 minor injury crashes. Being distracted as a driver
is a very hazardous  road safety risk. Even taking your eyes off the road for a few seconds could
lead to a crash.

There have also been accidents where people have been absolutely careless and walked across
the road and and train tracks with headphones on or being distracted on their devices. To prevent
death people should take out headphones and get off devices when they are crossing the road and
train tracks to avoid distraction. 

In conclusion I think that we should have limited time on devices. I think that being on a
device too much can have a serious negative impact on your health later on in life and that
we should be careful. Parents should also limit the time that their young children have on
devices because it could affect the children later on in life. As Arianna Huffington said, 
“Disconnecting from our technology to reconnect with ourselves is absolutely essential.”  

Kea Poem

Kea

  Glorious and glistening, te Ra rises 

over magical mountains

Majestic manu awakes

 Kea, expanding  wings, 

a burst of sunset colours fill the morning air

Diving down, gliding  peacefully through the crispy cold air 

                                        Warm colours like  burning lava, 

                               cool colours like the deep, dark moana

Squawking echoing above the maunga

Landing in an alpine larch in search of kai

Dark beady eyes lined in yellow look down

Eyes as black as thunderclouds

Sharp, curved beak opens 

Dispensing  a piercing sound

Knife like talons open 

Swoop down and grab food  

Looking curiously at the sinking sun

and speeding cars

Then spreads out its wings and flies silently home.

Embedding Screencastifies

Today we worked with Mrs Minehan. We learnt how to put a screencastify on our blog by embedding the item. This way is a lot quicker and I will keep using it. This video is me doing a voice over of one the poems that I wrote called Life Of A Tree. 

The Amazing Adventures Of Super Stan

On the 7th of August on Wednesday, Karoro senior school got invited to see a Grey Main school production. We went down on a bus at 12:40 pm and were seated in their school hall. We were invited to see their dress rehearsal performance.

At the start of the production there was a boy called Staggering Stanley or Stan for short, who was daydreaming about being a superhero. His friend DC told him to “Stop daydreaming” and come back to the real world.

The Candy King came to Proton Park to meet with the Mayor. Everyone thought that the Candy King was nice but he was secretly evil. He made these new gobstoppers and fed them to the townspeople and they became his slaves. Stan and his friends found out that the Candy King is evil and go and tell Stan’s Granny.

When they tell Stan’s Granny she tells Stan that he is a superhero and he can’t believe it because that is what he has always wanted to be. She tells him that when he was a baby she accidentally mixed up him milk with formula 44. At the park she gives him the other half of the formula and he turns into Super Stan. Super Stan wears his Grandfather's old undies that Granny these undies give him the power to fly.

Stanley and his friends go to the Candy King’s palace and find him. Stanley fights the Candy King’s minions and his two new sidekicks called Curly and Wurly. Then once Stan defeats the minions he fights the Candy King and the Candy King uses his powers on Stan but they backfired and he ended up shrinking himself.

When Granny picked up the Candy King, Stan finds out that the Candy King is his Grandfather, but Granny is not happy with the Candy King and takes him away. The whole play is filled with songs that move the action along.

I enjoyed watching the production and I think that they put in a lot of effort and it paid off. Maybe next time they could turn the microphones down because it was really loud at some points,

Te Aitanga Pepeke

Jake Bailey Speech

Today the 31/7/19 Jake Bailey, a former head boy at Christchurch Boy’s High and  a cancer survivor came and talked to the senior school about life lessons that he had learned. He was brought to the West Coast by Life Education. 

He talked about resilience and that you should not give up. Jake talked about not worrying about what other people think about you and to save your worries for the bigger things in life. 

Jake talked about some leaders and that the leaders that lead in the worst of times are remembered the best. 

Bravery was another thing that he talked about. Jake said that bravery reminded him of the ANZAC soldiers because they were brave because they went to war to fight and they kept pushing forward. He also said that when he was in the hospital getting treatment for his cancer his visitors said that he was really brave and that kept him going. 

Jake also talked about happiness. He said that you have to practise the skill of being happy and to think positively.  Jake  also told us to keep doing what we love to be happy. 

His message to us is that we have to live our life to the fullest and  give everything a go, and do it for the people who did not survive cancer and those who can’t and to be the very best of our ability. 

I think that Jake is a very inspiring person, because he takes the time to talk to other people life lessons. I really enjoyed his speech and how he talked about bravery and what it means. 

Equivalent Fractions Diamond

In maths we have been learning to find and show equivalent fractions. 

He Kakano Term 2 2019 Location and Direction

In He Kākano this term we have been learning how to give basic directions in Māori. I worked with Billie and Grace and this is our work. 

Fractions DLO

Scratch Animation

Here is my  animation for the phrase of the week, Koia kei a koe, Good on you
Click Here To See My Animation

Introducing Myself In Sign Language

We had to learn how to spell out our name in sign language and do two things that we like. We filmed the video on an i - pad and then put it on I - movie to edit it and put in subtitles. 

Here is the video that shows me signing my name and things that I like. 

Click Here To See My Video

Prism And Pyramid DLO

A prism has rectangular faces apart from the front and back
faces. A pyramid does not have rectangular faces and they
have a point at the top, which is called an apex. 

We got a clear prism and went outside to try and see if
we could make it a rainbow. We used the drinking fountain
because it is made of metal and it was reflecting. 

Cuboid Volume

WALT: To recognise and find the volume of cuboids. 

Here are three videos of us measuring 3 different cuboids. 

Measuring Scissors Box

Length = 34cm ㎥ x  Height = 11cm ㎥ x  Width = 20cm ㎥ = 7480 ㎥ 

Measuring Plastic Container

Length = 18cm ㎥ x Height = 11cm ㎥ x Width = 12cm ㎥ = 2376 

Measuring 

Length 1.9m ㎥ x Height 1.6cm ㎥ x Width 1.9m ㎥ = 5.776 ㎥ 

Life Of A Tree Connections Poem

Life Of A Tree

Seedlings blowing through raw air
Sprouting in dark clay
Years pass
Twisted and tangled roots dig deeper into the earth
sunlight seen seeping through gaping gaps
 in pear green leaves
wind blowing softly
talking to whispering leaves
Cherry pink flowers blossoming
shining in the light
Petals cover the ground in
a thick pink foliage
Bark rough, textured to perfection
Soft spongy moss grips on to hard bark,
Crisp and cracking from lack of water
Sunlight sparkles onto dancing leaves
This is the life of a tree

Book Review Librarian Of Auschwitz

Librarian Of Auschwitz
By Antonio Iturbe

Do books about war, courage and hope  interest you? If they do this is the book for you. This book is about the courage and experience of Dita Kraus.

The Librarian Of Auschwitz is set in Auschwitz Poland Europe,  in a concentration camp run by the German Nazis. Later on in the story many people including Dita  proceed to move to another camp in Hamburg.

Dita Kraus is the main character.  Dita is 14 year years old and, along with her family and many other Jewish families, she was captured and forced into the concentration camp. Fredy Hirsch is another main character. He is the Jewish leader, but he was also captured. Fredy helps Dita to keep the library a  secret.

Dita is very independent and does things on her own but sometimes with the help of other characters. She is kind and intelligent because she thinks about things carefully and she helps other people.

Her family was put in a camp instead of being sent to gas chambers. Dita was put in charge of looking after eight ancient books, in a secret library,  hidden from the camp guards, as books were prohibited. Running a school in the camp is also risky and they must keep it a secret, because the guards are watching their every move.
Things get more hectic when thousands more people join the camp. 

The Librarian Of Auchsiwtz reminds me of Refugee by Alan Gratz because it’s also about war, and courage because a young girl must travel in a homemade boat across the open ocean. 

I enjoyed reading this book and I would recommend The Librarian of Auchsiwtz to children 12+. I enjoyed this book because it was full  of action from the very start.

Connecting To Texts

Scratch Animation

This is my scratch animation, I used all three phrases in this one scratch. The three phrases I used, He aha te kupu Māori mō, what is the māori word for..., ka pai tō pangarau, good job in maths and ka pai tō panui, good reading. 

Maths Hexagon

Today in maths Sasha, Jennae and I made a hexagon. First we had to cut them up they were made up of triangles. There were questions on some of the sides and there were answers on the others and we had to match them up. 

Analogies DLO

Lake Daniell Walk Review

On the 12th of June Ruma Tahi and Ruma Waru tramped the Lake Daniell walk that is in the Southern Alps. We were learning to manage any type of risk that could happen and how to help or prevent it.

We drove to Reefton in our car groups which took about an hour and we all met there to go to the toilet and stretch our legs. Then we drove past Springs Junction and drove a little bit further, then we took the Marble Hill turn off which led to the start of the track.

Once everyone was there we started the walk. It was a pretty easy walk because it was flat and the track was leaves and gravel. We stopped after the first fifteen minutes and numbered off then we kept going for the next half hour. After the half hour we stopped to have something to eat.

The bush around the track was very dense with trees. We had to do a scavenger hunt and we had to find a long tailed bat. One of the dads who was walking with us told us a little bit about the long tailed bats. He told us that they liked to nest in the beach trees which grew all around us. We tried to find some but we didn’t. There were other things to find on the scavenger hunt like the Blue duck and the Kaka.

Once we got to the lake we had our lunch. There were people working at the hut sight because they had taken down one of the other huts to build a new one. The hut is in memory of Phillip Nicholas, Brian and Sharon Manson who were killed in a landslide. There was a jetty that went out a little bit out onto the lake. We were only allowed seven on at a time. The lake was surrounded by mountains covered with trees. The water of the lake was freezing but it was pretty, shallow and clear. I enjoyed going onto the jetty to look into the lake.

It had started to rain when we got to the lake so we had to put on our rain jackets. I really enjoyed walking with my friends, and we would not have been able to go on walks without the parent help that we had. There were lots of parents that gave up their time to come with us.

Overall I think that the Lake Daniell walk was great. In total it was around 18.6 kms. I think that everyone should give it a try.

Hypothermia "Umbles"

      Hypothermia “Umbles”

Mumbles is when the victim with hypothermia is mixing up words
and having trouble speaking.    💬💬💫

Stumbles is when they are having trouble
with moving, it might also be that they might feel like
falling over. 👇👈👉

Grumbles  is when they  have a bad temper. The person
with hypothermia might be saying or doing unkind things to other people.
😠😡

Fumbles is when the victim might be having trouble moving their hands.
Also might be hard to do up a jacket, or other simple tasks. ✊

WALT: manage risks on a winter tramp in the Southern Alps / Ka Titiritiri
o te Moana 💭

Picture Book Study

Triangle Area

We are learning how to find the area in Triangles. We had to do a work sheet, and then we had to draw some triangles in our book that match the instructions on the sheet. To figure it out you have to half the base and times the height. 

NZ Giants

This is me against the NZ Dino Novaezelandiae moa.

Scratch Animation

Here is my second animation on scratch. 

Scratch Animation

We had to make a animation on scratch. We had to turn one of the comics that we made for the phrase of the week and turn it into an animation. I choose the the comic with the phrase E Noho ra. Here is my animation.