Kingdom Kids Times Two!

It was wonderful to celebrate 2 special awards for D1 children at assembly yesterday. Jonathan and Jimin were both given Kingdom Kid awards - Jonathan's was from the end of last term but he was away and we had to keep the BIG secret from him all holidays (well done, mum and dad!).

Here they are:

Two awards? Twice as nice!

Jonathan's award says:

Jonathan has been an outstanding example of someone who is focused on improving himself as a learner and will honestly say if he truly understands, gets ideas a little bit or needs help to work something through. That’s integrity in action.

Jimin's award says:

Jimin is a wonderful example of our value of Kindness. She is often the first person to offer help to someone in need and is a kind friend to new members of our school family. She truly is one of D1’s ‘Good Samaritans’!

Life Ed with Tim and Harold

We have FINALLY had our first visit to the Life Ed (Life Education) truck to see Tim and Harold the giraffe. We are learning about how unique we all are - God made only one of each of us!
Here are a few photos from our visit:

We started off by doing some 'talking tennis'. That's when we take turns to speak...
Tim makes even talking sound like fun!

Later he taught us a 'personality haka'. 

Personality haka:

My personality...

controls the way I think

controls the way I feel

controls the way I act

controls the things I do!

Tim doing part of the personality haka - he really is an Action Man!

Mufti and Wacky Hair Day

We had fun at school today...and everyone looked a little bit different!

Here are our wacky hair people!

Samantha's hair was really quite beautiful - not wacky!

And here we all are in our mufti! We look so colourful!

Time to Celebrate!

We are celebrating some amazing learners in D1 this term. Here they are:

These wonderful people learnt every memory verse all term and where it was from in the Bible!
Well done Jimin, Mach, Samuel and Sam T (who was away).

And here are the awesome people who knew every spelling word in their homework all term!
Great job Jimin, Tayla, Samuel, Caleb, Mach, Matthew M and Sam T (who was away).

How many people can you see who got BOTH certificates? What super brains they have!

More Super Serving!

Our serving challenge this term has been amazing - children taking the opportunity to learn a new job to help at home. Here is Caleb sharing his idea:

What a great helper, Caleb!

Every little thing we can to do help others makes their day just a little bit brighter. Keep shining, D1!

Stu Duval - Artist!

The day after telling us a story, Stu Duval came back and taught us a little bit about cartoon drawing. He use some of his books to learn about drawing in D1. He showed us how EVERYBODY can draw amazing pictures by just following some simple steps. Here is a video of the children following Stu's example:

Stu was great at teaching us step by step how to draw some awesome pictures. This video made Mrs Sutherland laugh a lot - our heads look funny bobbing up and down!

Here are some great D1 artists at work!

You rock, D1!

Serving Challenge!

D1 have had a special serving challenge as part of their homework this term. We talked about jobs they may already do at home to help...and challenged them to learn something new that they could do to serve their family.

We have all been amazed as each week children have come to tell us that they are helping cook, doing the washing, bringing in or taking out the recycling bin...and more!

Jacob's mum sent us this picture of him setting the table. Nice work, Jacob!

Keep up the great work, D1! You are amazing servers!

Groovy ukuleles...

It has been great to see D1 trying hard to learn the ukulele this term. Each week we look at new songs and new chords but this is one of the first (and favourite) songs we have done.
Apologies...the ukuleles probably needed tuning again but we ran out of time!

Netball

We have been learning netball skills on Wednesdays with Whitney. Here are a group of children practicing their passing techniques - you can see we have been learning to jump and land with 2 feet as we catch the ball and also to keep moving to where our team mates can throw easily to us.

Sounds like it is FUN, doesn't it!

Brilliant Buddies!

D6 is the Buddy Reading class for D1 this year. The other week though we had Buddy Games, not Buddy Reading! For Science this term, D6 have been learning about electricity and they made games that used a circuit for us to play. Have a look!

What was your favourite game, D1?

We Like To Move It, Move It!

If you were walking past D1 last week, you may have seen some strange sights and heard some excited sounds! We were doing Science! We have been thinking about how things move and so we had some fun experimenting with parachutes. Some were made out of plastic bags, some were made out of paper and some were made out of cardboard. Each 'pilot' had to watch their parachute then we talked in our groups afterwards about what we had noticed.

Let the fun begin...

We had so much fun that we couldn't help but 'move it, move it'!

Opposites...

We are learning that God Never Changes. This week we thought about what it would be like if this was NOT true.

So...

if God is the maker of everything and he could change... he would be the maker of nothing!

if God is good and he could change... he would be bad!

if God is mighty and he could change... he would be weak!

if God is the one who loves us and he could change... he would be the one who hates us!

if God is kind and he could change... he would be mean!

if God is faithful and he could change... he would not be faithful!

if God is in control and he could change... he would be out of control!

if God is our Saviour and he could change... he would be our destroyer!

Do you believe that God Never Changes? WE DO!

Three in One!

How do you teach about the 'Trinity' to a class of 7 and 8 year olds? You rely on God for help! Let me set the scene...

D1 are learning that God never changes. One of the Bible stories we are studying is about Job - not the usual kind of kid's story but through it we could see that even though Job's life changed from good...to bad...and back again, Job didn't stop trusting God because he knew God hadn't changed even when everything else had!

So D1 made a list of all the things we could think of that 'God is...': Big, good, mighty, kind, perfect, holy, in control, patient, creator, everywhere, saviour (the list went on for TWO PAGES!).

One of the children said God is three in one... What does that mean we wondered? God gave us this idea of how to understand it:

Is there one?

No! There is three!

We know there is God the Father, God the Son (Jesus) and God the Holy Spirit. They are not separate 'people', they are ONE! Together they are strong and think and act as our one true God.
If they were separate, it would be like this:

If God the Father, Jesus and the Holy Spirit were 'three', we thought they would not be so strong and they could not think the same way or do the same things because each one would be on their own.

Our learning journey continues... :-)

Super Science

We have been doing some fun Science Experiments in D1 and D2 lately.  We are learning to ask the big question WHY? does something happen.  We have been making fabulous observations and enjoying Science along the way.

Last week we explored the idea of walking water.  We placed a paper towel bridge into seven different cups.  Three had no water in them and, four had coloured water.  It didn't take long before the paper towel soaked up the colours and the water travelled up the paper towel.  We also observed how the colours mixed and a rainbow of colours appeared.

This experiment showed us all about CAPILLARY ACTION.  A big word but we love learning big words in year 3!  It simply means how water moves into the spaces of a holey material.

We decided to test this idea with flowers.  Check back next week to see what happens!!!

Easter!

In devotions today we thought about Easter...from beginning to end. We had a lot of pictures that we put in order to tell the Easter story. Some were a bit confusing but we got there in the end! We have some real Bible experts in our class!

There was a lot of discussion...

We had to look at each other's pictures and think about which one came first...

...and at the end, we had the whole story in order!

We used our thinking skills to work out some of the answers - looking at the pictures and finding clues by who was there and what they were doing - and then the rest was with our Bible knowledge.

Zerowaste

Over the last week, we have been learning about rubbish! We have had a special teacher, Mrs Goodall, and she has made us think about how much rubbish we make and how we change reduce that. We have learnt about recycling and reusing things to cut down on what we put in the rubbish bin.
Here are some photos of us working:

Do you know what 'sensible shopping' is? We can tell you! It is when you choose BETTER things to buy - like a big container of yoghurt instead of lots of little ones. You can put your yoghurt in a reusable container that can be washed instead of a plastic one that goes in the rubbish.

Here are some sensible shopping choices.

 

Do you make compost at home? We learnt about carbon (dry or brown plant material like old leaves or newspaper) and nitrogen (wet or green plant material like vege peelings and lawn clippings) and how you have to put them in layers to make really good compost!

There are some things that just can't go in the compost. The girls have put these on the side of the chart.

Recycled Art in D1

On Tuesdays,  D1 have been busy using different materials to create an awesome piece of art.  It is going to be a beach scene made up of materials that have already been used for something else.  Here are a few pictures of our work so far.

Elina painting the sky using bubble wrap bought in by Samuel C.

Jonathan making the sand dunes using old coffee sacks from Mr Thompson.

Sarah using lots of glue to hold it in place.

Samuel using dye to make his ocean.  The fish are made from newspapers.

We cant wait to see what they look like all put together!

Amazing Authors in D1

On Tuesdays in D1, we learn to use really interesting words and sentences in our writing.  We often look at a clever piece of writing and use this as a starting point for our own writing.
Today we read a piece about caterpillars turning into butterflies. We explored all the juicy words and sentences and then D1 started to write thier own  fabluous ideas.  Today Matthew Y and Jonny were chosen to publish on the blog.  Each Tuesday there will be more delighful writing to share :)

Matthew Y

A caterpillar is an amazing animal don't you know?  A caterpillar eats and eats until he can't eat another thing.  He waits and waits then he wraps his slippery skin and turns into a chrysalis.  Inside there are lots of juices.  The caterpillar sucks on them in his spare time. He forms into a butterfly then pushes out and look at that!  It is a beautiful butterfly.  

Jonny 

One day a caterpillar crept out of its egg.  Then it started munching away.  The caterpillar left lots of holes in the leaves.  The caterpillar got so fat and full.  It slithered its paint right off.  It dropped into the grass.  It formed a cocoon for two weeks.  Then it hatched like a new life was beginning.  Suddenly it flew away with freedom and excitement.  It was beautiful.

Toku Whanau

D1 have been doing some wonderful self portraits with Mrs Thompson on Tuesdays. Please do come in and see them if you can! The children have also been completing a mihi about their family and this is hanging below their portrait. Here is Jimin's work:

Jimin said "I look just like my mum!"

Ka pai, Jimin!

Our Second Art Lesson

Last Friday we went off to the high school art room again. D1 did a great job of remembering how to behave and what to do to be ready. I think Mrs Sneddon was pleased!

Our new learning goals...

...and another example of what we are aiming for!

Phoebe concentrating hard...

Samantha going from her practice page to the publishing card...

Sarah W doing a creative design...

Jonathan looks pleased with his progress!

Keep thinking about your letters and what you want them to look like, D1!