Girls Soccer

What a great time the Year 3 and 4 girls had going to soccer last week. Mrs S and a couple of wonderful mum's piled girls into their cars and headed to English Park on Cranford Street. Everyone was very excited but also a little unsure about what to expect. 

When we arrived we had to wait a little bit so we had some kia and water. Then the lovely people from Mainland Football called us all together to talk about what was to happen. We then lined up into groups of 4 and we were out on the field for some games. We played a game or a skill game. It was hot out on the turf and we had to use lots of energy to run around after the ball. Some of the teams we played were a bit older and had played before, but it didn't matter, we gave it our best. 

Soon it was break time and a chance to eat some more lunch and have some much needed water. We listened to the Mainland people talk about their experiences playing soccer and got to ask some questions. One of them had been to the Olympics twice! We were very impressed. 

Finally we got to play one final game, have our photo taken and get some posters signed. Amelia got given a t-shirt for trying really hard at something she hadn't done before. What an Open-Minded Explorer she is! Gosh it was fun! (Plus on the way home Mrs S brought us all ice blocks!)

We hope you like the photos.

Girls Soccer on PhotoPeach

Does Water Walk?

At the moment in Te Pihinga our focus for writing is SCIENCE! 

We love Tuesdays, this is the day we get to put our Einstein hats on and experiment. 

Yesterday we asked the question...does water walk? 

Our equipment: paper towels, water and food colouring? 

We watched a video to help us make our hypothesis/prediction- we didn't see the ending as it was a surprise! 

Our ideas: maybe the paper towels might absorb the water, the  paper towel might break, the paper might explode, and maybe the colours will mix together and make a rainbow. 

We also learnt a new word Capillary, our results in our writing describes this action- 

Our class result sentence: " The paper towel absorbs the food colouring and water and then they travel up through the towel to mix both colours to make a new colour". 

Below are some photos of us in groups working together and being open minded explorers during writing yesterday, we cannot wait to share more of our experiments with you. 

A special project

We are very lucky in Te Pihinga to have some wonderful adults helping out. We have our wonderful Judy, Connor's Ma, who comes in 3 times a week to help us and other classes with our Steps programme. And now we have Paul, Mrs S's Dad, who is coming in to work on a special project with some boys. 

Here are some photos from the last few days. I wonder if you can work out what they are creating?

What happens when Coke & Mentos meet?

Today for writing we did something a bit different. We got to watch a science experiment. We learnt a new word called 'hypothesis'. This means that we have to think about what might happen, a prediction. Each of us wrote our prediction. Some of us thought things might explode, some of us thought the coke might catch on fire or turn to ice. Some of us wondered if the coke might change colour. 

So we went outside to see what happened. Check out our video.

Creating our Solar System

We have been learning about the Solar System over the past few weeks. We have started working on a visual art creation of the Solar System. We are working in groups of three - four on each individual planet within the Solar System. We are creating the Sun, Mercury, Venus, Earth, the Moon, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and our dwarf planet Pluto. 

On Friday, we began using newspaper and paste by covering a balloon/planet in our groups, we created one layer. Once we had finished our first layer, we went off and lent a helping hand to other groups in Te Pihinga. We had a super morning exploring and working co-operatively. 

Below are a few images of our Fun Day Friday morning Solar System Space art. Watch this space for our next update on the Te Pihinga Solar System.   

Friday Fun

We had a wonderful day on Friday. We spent time creating a range of things around our Open Minded Explorer theme and our trip to Orana Park. 

Then Mrs S and Mrs G took us on an 'outing' to visit the school pool. It was such a hot day it was a relief to be able to dip our toys into the cool water.