Family Fun Night

On Wednesday 13 February we had family fun night. This event was combined with a Meet the Teacher evening. There was a shared dinner of finger food at 6.30 and before and after that, parents visited teachers classrooms to talk about things like how to help your child at home. Meanwhile, there were some fun games happening outside. There were people playing various games and others playing cricket. There were also moonhoppers to bounce around on, sack races, and the always popular water activities. It was a fabulous evening of community fun and a great way to start the school year.

Swimming

We were all delighted to be able to get straight into swimming instruction right from the first day of the school year. We were also fortunate that the weather stayed fine for us! In this block of swimming, we focus on practising the basic swimming strokes eg freestyle and backstroke. We use equipment such as floatboards to work on our leg action and once we have mastered that we go on to work on arm action and breathing. Many children have made tremendous progress since last year. We will be off to the pool again at the end of the year when the focus will be on water safety.

2019

It's great to be back for what promises to be another exciting year for the students in Room 8. The children have settled into their work very quickly and our classroom routines are already well established. There will be regular updates to our class blog throughout the year including samples of the children's work and photos of the children participating in a variety of different events and activities. You are encouraged to make regular visits to the blog to check out any updates and leave a comment if you would like to.

Year 6 Camp

On 19 November the Year 6’s went off to Camp Tirohanga which is near Mosgiel.We arrived at camp and got our stuff unpacked then we set off to Dive Otago. The scuba diving and snorkeling was lots of  fun.The scuba divers enjoyed diving down to the bottom of the pool. Then we made our way to the Portobello Aqauriam where we went on a tour around the place looking at the different types of sea creatures. On Tuesday it was beach day.We went to the St Kilda Life Saving Club to learn about water safety and sun safety but unfortunately it was too cold and wet to have a swim in the sea. On Wednesday we did some activites around camp like rifle shooting, archery and orienteering and we also had a man from the Red Cross do a first aid course with us.The next day we built bivouacs which was hard work.We went on a bush walk and compared the pine forest to the native bush. You can really see the contrast.We did an obstacle course, a blindfolded activity called Nightline, some old fashioned indoor games, and bounced on the camp’s new trampolines. After that we had a go at the water slide. It was probably one of the most fun activities. On Thursday night we had camp graduation and we each stood up and talked about our achievements at camp. On Friday the man from Red Cross came back to do the second half of the first aid course and present us with certificates. We did some sketching of the camp, played a couple of final games, and then it was time to go home. We all had a great week at camp despite the atrocious weather.

Christmas Market

On 14 November the Year 5 and 6 children held a Christmas Market in and around the school hall. They were selling a wide variety of Christmas themed goods such as Christmas decorations, ornaments and many different types of Christmas sweet treats.

The purpose of this exercise was to explore with the children the concept of “Enterprise”. They had to do the maths to find out the actual cost of making their items and determine a reasonable selling price so that they could make the maximum amount of profit. Their incentive was that they got to keep whatever profit they made. There were some very high quality goods for sale and some children displayed considerable entrepreneurial skills.

It really was a very interesting and worthwhile project and we would like to thank all the parents who contributed to making the market such a successful venture for our students.

School Concert

On Wednesday afternoon and Thursday evening of the last week of the term, Milton Primary School students performed a concert at the Toko High School hall. The evening began with several items by the kapa haka group.  This year the items were performed in whanau groups rather than individual classes. The items on the programme consisted of several high energy dance numbers, an action song, some short plays and two songs performed by MP3, the school’s band. This was enhanced by some wonderful lighting, sound effects and digital displays organised by our amazing tech crew.

At the end of the night the seniors performed some entertaining syndicate singing for the audience.There was a raffle and several prizes were won. The hall was full to bursting on the Thursday night and nearly as full on the Wednesday. The concert was enjoyed by everyone. It was a wonderful afternoon on Wednesday and an even better performance on Thursday evening.

Art Gallery and Museum Trip

On 12 September we visited the Otago Museum and the Dunedin Art Gallery. The purpose of these visits was to support our conceptual focus for this term which is "Past, Present and Future." Our first stop was at the museum where we enjoyed our three quarter hour visit to the planetarium. We learnt many interesting facts about our solar system and about how to identify various constellations. Another context we have been studying is "Ancient Civilisations" and we were fascinated to learn about the Egyptian tradition of mummification.
At the art gallery we discussed many aspects of life in Space. John told us stories about Matariki, taught us an action song, and how to play the theme to "Star Wars" on bells. We looked through some 3D glasses to see the world as an alien would see it and we listened to some "alien" communications. We then returned to the classroom to complete a stunning mural depicting assorted spacecraft and creatures.
It really was a very interesting and worthwhile trip and we look forward to continuing our studies on these topics back at school.