Swimming Fun

We had a wonderful time at the Paraparaumu Pools today. Due to a double booking by Waikanae Pool there had to be a quick change of venue but the main thing was the children still got to have their end of year swim and they had a great time as you can see in the photos below.

Room 20 End of year events and dates

It’s hard to believe it is only 10 more school days until the end of term! We are busy doing Christmas activities in Room 20 and we have a lovely Christmas tree that the children are helping to decorate.

Today (Thursday 3^rd December) is the last day the children will bring home reading books. The Room 20 children have been very good this year at returning their books but if you could have a look at home for any stray books that need returning we would greatly appreciate it.

I will start sending home some of the children’s artwork and books next week. I like to send home a couple each day so that their bags are not too heavy and also so their lovely work doesn’t get squashed. Please keep bringing their book bags for one more week so I can put these things inside.

To celebrate our lovely year together in Room 20 we will be having a Christmas dress-up day (costumes, colours – anything you like!!) and a shared lunch on Wednesday 16^th December. I will send home a reminder note at the beginning of that week.

Here are the key dates / events happening in the last few weeks of term:

Monday 7^th December                  Teacher Only Day

Wednesday 9^th December            Last gymnastics session

Thursday 10^th December                Swimming Fun Day at Waikanae Pools

Tuesday 15^th December                 Te Waharua Athletics (afternoon)

Wednesday 16^th December          Room 20 Christmas dress up day and shared lunch

     Final Whole School Assembly

Thursday 17^th December                Last day of term – 12:30pm finish

Christmas has arrived in Room 20

The children were very excited to arrive on Tuesday to find a Christmas tree in Room 20. We have been busy decorating it and will be adding lots more decorations before the end of the year.

We also have a big snowman which the star of the day gets to move the little snowman on to show the date and help countdown until Christmas day.

Grasshopper Tennis

We had two sessions of Grasshopper tennis on Thursday which was lots of fun. We have 2 more sessions to go before the end of the year,

How Maui slowed the sun

Last week we listened to the story about "How Maui slowed the sun" and then we drew our own sun pictures based on the book by Peter Gossage. We have been learning about warm and cool colours and used these to make our art more dramatic. We shared them at the Te Waharua assembly. Ka pai Room 20!

Cooking

Here is a picture of our special cooking group this week who made some delicious chocolate crackles for us all.

Check out our seeds!!!

There is high excitement in Room 20 this week as our seeds are starting to grow.

These are our alfafa seeds:

And a few sunflower seed shoots are starting to peak through:

Planting Seeds

This week we have been busy continuing our learning about seeds and growing. We have each planted our own alfafa seeds and some sunflower seeds. Here are some photos of us planting our sunflower seeds in our individually painted containers. We will be making sure that they get everything they need to grow over the next few weeks. Keep checking our blog as we will post photos once we see some growth!

Rippa Rugby

On Thursday Room 20 were lucky enough to have a rippa rugby session with Dion from the HKRU. It was good to get outside and have a run around after having quite a few wet days earlier in the week.

We started with a warm-up game where we moved around and then Dion called out a number and we had to get into a group with that number of friends.

Next, we got into 3 teams and practised passing the ball to each other and having our hamburger hands up ready to catch the ball.

Then on to relays where we raced to the cone and back to our team practising scoring tries and doing different ball skills.

Lastly we played a game of rob the nest.

Seeds

Today we started our topic about seeds and growing. We looked at lots of different seeds and brainstormed about what we already know about seeds.

These are some of the things we already know about seeds:

* They need sun and rain to grow
* They can grow
* Seeds can grow into different things
* Seeds come in different shapes and sizes
* Some seeds grow into trees
* You can plant them in the garden
* Cara planted seeds in her garden and they are beginning to grow
* Seeds can grow into trees, flowers, vegetables and fruit

We are looking forward to planting our own seeds later this week and watching them grow.

Fire Truck Visit

After the fire truck visit being rained off on Friday Room 20 were really looking forward to the visit today. Unfortunately the truck got called out to a job so only arrived at school close to the bell so we had to rush out but we got to see one of the firemen dress up in all his fire gear.

Then we all got a turn to try the water hose - we tried to get Mrs Schimanski as she took our photo!

Remember to talk about your fire safety plan at your house and if you see a fire shout "Fire! Fire! Fire!" and get down, get low and get out.

Cooking Fun

This term Andrea is taking a small group of children every week to do some cooking activities. Today the children practised their cutting skills making vegetable sticks and a delicious dip to go with it. Then we shared it together just before morning tea. We all enjoyed the healthy delicious snacks with some children trying some vegetables they had not before.

Firewise

Room 20 and Room 21 had a visit from a group of firefighters from the Paraparaumu Fire Station today. They talked to us about how to be firewise.

We talked about what to do if we find matches and how important it was to give them to an adult and for the adult to put them up somewhere high so our little brothers or sisters couldn't get them.

 They shared a story with us and asked us lots of questions about what we would do if it was us. They were very impressed with the amount the students knew about keeping safe and reminded all the students that when they call 111 they need to say who they need (firefighters) their name and their address.

We practised what to do if we saw a fire. We practised calling out "Fire! Fire! Fire!" so everyone would know there was a fire and then getting down, getting low and getting out. We also practised crawling under the smoke blanket and getting out quickly to our designated safe meeting place.

It is a great time to talk at home and make sure everyone in your family knows what to do in a fire and where the safe meeting place is at your house.

We can't wait until tomorrow as the firefighters were so impressed with how much we knew and what great listeners we were that they are going to bring their fire truck tomorrow for us to look at. Make sure you check the blog again over the weekend for the photos!!

Gymnastics Fun

We were all very excited about our first gymnastics session and it was SO much fun. We started the session playing some games where we had to move around in different ways and then freeze when the music stopped.

Then we practised our safe landing motorbike stance and landing with safe hands. Next we were into the equipment stations set up around the hall. 

A big thank you to our parents and Year 8 helpers. We can't wait until next week to go again.

Reminder gymnastics tomorrow

Reminder - We have our first gymnastics session tomorrow (Wednesday). Please ensure your child is dressed appropriately to participate. For example, t-shirts with track pants, shorts or bike pants (no loose pants), no zips or buckles on clothing and long hair must be tied back.

National Earthquake Drill

Today Room 20 and Waikanae School took part in the National Earthquake Drill. We practised what to do in an earthquake and talked about what to do if we were in different places around the school for example the field, library or playground.

We also watched this clip about being turtle safe:

Welcome Back!

Welcome back to:

It is all set to be an exciting last term of the year in Room 20. We will be learning about fire safety with a visit from the firefighters scheduled in week two. We have gymnastics, rippa rugby and grasshopper tennis this term. We will also be looking at plants and growing and of course Christmas fun to finish off the year. A newsletter will be sent home in the next week or so with further information on all these exciting learning opportunities.