Welcome to our brand new school!

On Tuesday the 12 of November, we went into our new school. It was “amazing”  I wish I could have lived here, it was humongous it was 4 times bigger than my house, I was kinda freaking out of how amazing it looked. When we went inside it was full of colourful walls, it was like I was in a rainbow. We got to have a tour around the classroom they had a room that was almost fully soundproof. We got to have a tour around the whole school like we were visitors from a different country. We got to see into the office, staff room, printer the shower little kids room downstairs and the resource’s room, it was amazing after that we got to play cricket for kiwi sports, it was amazingly fun it was tiring. My whole team won every game except one because that team was quick and smart so were we but we were tired. Then we all went home after school.

By Josaia - Click here to read more blogs from Josaia

Click here to read Kamaea's recount on her first day in our new school!

Read Amihuti's recount of his first day in the new building!

Working in our new space

Women's Suffrage in Room 5

In Room 5 we learnt about Women's Suffrage and how it impacted women and men in New Zealand. We discovered that New Zealand was the first to allow women the right to vote. Kate Sheppard played a huge role and is largely celebrated in New Zealand. Below is Josaia's blog about Kate Sheppard and how her story influenced him. Watch the video below to understand some of the work Kate Sheppard did to help create equality for the future generations.

We have watched a clip about women suffrage and how Kate Sheppard stood up for women. Kate Shepard is very famous now she on the 10 dollar on 1 dollar  but she should had been on way more because it takes a lot of  courage to do what she did. I think every one equally in gods eye but that my option

Click here to see Monique's activities on Kate Sheppard

Click here to see Paula's activities on Kate Sheppard

Refresh Your Senses - Room 5's mindfulness

 In room 5 at St Pius X we have been learning to understand our senses and how our mind works through the work of mindfulness. Everyday after lunch we partake in mindfulness to help us reset and refocus after lunch times. Sometimes during the day we can have things not go our way or as we had planned. Mindfulness helps us to remember that we can always turn our attitudes and actions around for the better.

We have learnt many techniques about calming and refreshing our minds for example controlling our breathing by tracing our hand with our finger. We have also learnt that it is o.k for our minds to wander off and we now know how to bring ourselves back on track. 

What do you to refresh your senses and yourself if you've had a bad moment?

Refresh your sense slide brought to you by Arvay. To see more from her check out her blog here!

It's Movie Time!

It's almost time for our movies to be played on the big screen and today Room 5 had a play around with making some of our own movie posters. The key is not to give too much away but keep both the pictures and the words interesting to captivate an audience. This was a quick one thrown together to help get some ideas flowing. How do you think we did? What do you think our movie is about?

Have a look at some other posters from Room 5 and see if you can pick our movie theme!

Click here for Kamaea's poster

Kalisi's Poster

Click here for Elijah's poster

Te wiki o te reo Māori - putiputi making with Angeline

1. Cut a piece of harakeke (flax).	2. Split the leaf down the middle until the hard stalk	3. Split each half into 3 even strips	4. Take 1 outside strip to fold it at a right angle and weave it under and over the other strips
5. When you finish weaving all the strips, turn the weaving 90’ and begin weaving again.	6. Keep turning and weaving until you have only short strips left.	7. The pattern will be a square.	8. Thread the strips through to the back.

9. Hold onto the front woven piece and turn it to make a spiral.

10. When happy with the putiputi shape, tie the back strips tightly in a knot.

11. Cut the stalk shorter if needed.

Photos:

                                                           Check out Angeline's blogspot here!

How persuasive can you be? A blog by Beata

  Have you had to do persuasive writing to someone ? 

What was it about ?

Check out Beata's blog here!

Room 5's visit by a Neuroscientist - Josaia's recount

On Wednesday we had Brigid, a Neuroscientist, visit (us) Room 5,  A Neuroscientist studies the
brain to help solve sickness (the) to do with your brain, like forgetfulness or a stroke. 

She gave us activities that included testing our minds. We had to get a shirt and we had to use one
hand to try to do the buttons up. My time was one minute and three seconds with my right hand
but for my left hand, Twas a minute and a half. The  activity was about seeing if both of your hands
were equal, but the only way that's possible is if you are ambidextrous. Being ambidextrous makes
your brain ten percent bigger than usual.

The next activity was trying to trace a star without looking at our hands but we had to look  in the
mirror. That really was a challenge because by looking in the mirror different movements were the
opposite of where we

wanted to go,  left was right and right was left, up was down, down was up. This was so much of a
challenge. When I used my dominant hand, this was not  any more of a challenge, the thing was the
mirror was showing us the opposite direction so I was getting confused. Also when I took my
marker off the star, I couldn’t put it back on to the right spot.

The next activity was holding a brain and learning some facts about it, but we all knew
some already.  I learnt some new facts about the brain like 100 billion neurons are in a
baby when it is born, but it starts to lose those neurons as it is getting older. We realised that
monkey brain is almost as big as your hand if you were a kid, but an adult needs two for it to be
as big. We didn’t hold a slippery brain that could have diseases.The brains we held had been
injected with a serum that makes the brain as hard as plastic We learnt some interesting facts
but the thing I loved to do, was holding a brain. 

Right after we finished all the activities we got to ask questions. I asked so many like, 
‘How long does the brain take to form into plastic?’ The answer was a week and a half.

I asked so many questions I just stopped for one minute to ask more but then the bell rang then

we went home “ that was the best day ever. 

 To read more visit Josaia's site!

Kindness is Renewable

In room 5 we discussed and created our own slides about what it means to us. We want to tell you about ways in which we show kindness by giving back to others in our family, our school and our community. Follow the links to read some of our individual blogs.
Read Zenith's Blog about Kindness Here!
Read Josaia's Blog here!
Read Nasili's blog about what kindness means to him!

Sign Language Week

Each May, Deaf Aotearoa runs New Zealand Sign Language Week, celebrating one of New Zealand’s official languages. NZSL Week raises awareness of New Zealand’s Deaf community and provides a platform for Deaf people to proudly promote their language and culture.

In our classroom, as part of our reading activities, we practice our spelling words in sign. It is difficult at times but lots of fun. Can you guess what words we are spelling out without listening to the sound first?

Mothers Day

Last Friday we had a special assembly to celebrate Mary, Mother of Jesus and of course our dear Mums! We spent some time at our school statue of Mary to send her our prayers to thank her and help our mothers.

We then created our poems, letters and cards for our mums, aunties, nanas and the other important women in our lives. Here are some letters and poems to our mums.

K - Kind to me even when I mess up

E - Encouraging me to do my best

T - Too beautiful for the rest of the world

E - Everyone gets jealous because they're not as pretty as          

you and as loving as her

R - Really fun and awesome

A - Always Kind, fair and caring

By Iverson

Tupua, Josaia and Iverson making their cards for Mother's Day

Dear Mum,

I am grateful that you are my mum and that God gave me you. Thank you for being a kind Mum to me. You are so beautiful your eyes shine like gold like mine. You have a loving heart and I love you and you love me. Thank you for always looking out for me. Thank you for taking me to so many beautiful places. I am grateful that I have food and a lovely house because of you and dad. I am so happy that I have you in my life and thank you for looking after me and dropping me off to school and picking me up I will always love you. XOXO May God bless you

Love from: Kamaea Naden

What did you do to celebrate your mum?

Sailing at Okahu Bay

A big thank you to St Johns Rotary who sponsored our day out with yachting New Zealand

                                                                                  On Tuesday the 7th of May Room 5 headed to Okahu Bay to learn how to sail! We meet our instructors from Yachting New Zealand, Danika, Justin and Steven. With our wet suits and life jackets on we were given a few instructions on water safety and the important features of the boats (rudder and sail) and it was time to jump on the water! To read more about our awesome day out go to our personal blogs! 

The boys jumping in their wee P-class yacht

Paula and Justin making sure class are sailing the right way!

Mindfulness in Room 5

For our Re-build initiative at St Pius X we have been looking at how to rebuild ourselves. A huge part of that has been practising mindfulness. For us mindfulness is about being present, reconnecting with ourselves, our peers and Papatūānuku as well as helping us to self regulate and be grateful for what good we have around us every day.

It takes a lot of practice but every day we are improving and enjoying our time to sit and reflect for a few moments every day.

We created a Mindfulness slide to help others understand what it is we are hoping to achieve. There are also some fun mindfulness videos that have helped us so far!

Some of our classmates prefer to sit up others prefer to lie down.

We keep our hands on our stomachs to help us focus on our breathing. It is like blowing up a balloon.

Smart Learners

In term 1 we were working hard to make sure we are the best smart learners we can be! This Term (Term 2) we are learning about and exploring our DIGITAL FOOTPRINT.

Some tips for being smart learners are:

1. Hold your netbook with two hands
2. Post positive comments and blogs 
3. Keep personal information private

To read more about how to be Smart learners check out our individual blogs!

Quad Blogging

During our cyber smart lesson we decided to see what our buddy class was up to. We were organised into groups and given different blog posts to comment on.  We then commented on four different aspects of our buddy classes blogs.

Quad blogging!

We enjoyed our quad blogging session!

2019 Eastern Rippa Rugby Challenge Cup!

On Thursday 11th April 10 pupils from Room 5 participated in the Eastern Challenge Rippa Rugby tournament at Dunkirk Park.

We practiced most days during PE or at lunch times. Our first game we were a bit nervous but as the day went on we improved. We played 5 games and won 3. It was a really fun day out for those who went! We look forward to attending more local tournaments in term 2!

"Everyone back and defend!"

Warm up time with Josh

Dereon on our School Rebuild!

REBUILD

Rebuild is when it's a new year you could change your language, and recharge your mindset. You also become more mature and set a good example of what little kids should be doing. Rebuild also means changing our school and our community.

HERE'S OUR REBUILD ;)

For more interesting posts from Dereon have a look here!