Dia de los Muertos

On Friday Oscar brought Mario to school to talk to us.
Mario is from Mexico.
He told us about this Mexican celebration.
It is a time to remember people we love who have died.

It takes place on the 1st and 2nd of November.

Photos, flowers and food are put on a special table.

Decorations include colourful 'papel picado.'

 Decorations also include 'sugar skulls.'

We all wanted to touch the sugar skull decoration. 

Family get together and have fun.

We wanted to know how the sugar skulls are made.

The sugar is melted until it is liquid. Then it is poured into a mould. 

When it cools it goes solid again.  

Thank you for sharing what you know with us and answering our questions.

Totara Tahi

Today Totara Tahi visited us in Rata block.
They showed us their dance for the school production.
A sneak preview on PhotoPeach

Enjoy our re-telling of...

We are so excited about the production!

Kauri toru performed for us today. 

We wonder what they will look like in their costumes?

We made party hats.

We made party hats. - Video Maker

We made party hats.
We changed this sentence to make it more interesting.
Do you like our WOW words?
We decorated our own party hats. (Zia and Max)

We made fantastic, awesome, good, great, ultra-awesome, magnificent party hats. (Grace, Ashton, Max, Caleb and Lucas)

The Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle

What is the symbol for a half?

We cut this orange into two pieces.

Is it cut in half?
How do these shapes show 1/2.

 We coloured and cut out a shape.
We worked out which bigger shape it would go on to show half of the big shape.

Sunshine and handwriting.

This week we took our handwriting outside.
These letters all start the same way: go down, straight back up and over.

r, n and m. - Video Maker

I wonder how I would I say 'Happy Birthday' if I was living in Japan.

I wonder what Rata Rua would like to know about birthday celebrations around the world.

Birthday Celebrations in Rata Rua.

New Zealand children celebrate turning five. 

Why?

"Because we can go to school,"said Rata Rua.

How did we celebrate?

We pictured ourselves on the day we turned five.

We talked about something we did.

We used this to write an action sentence.

Can you work out what Caleb was doing?

I was waiting for the music to stop. I wanted to unwrap the paper so I could get some sweets. Caleb

What do you do on your birthday?

Dot Paintings

On Friday the four classes in the Rata block create great art together.
Come and see our bright and colourful paintings.
We used water colour paints and a vivid to make them.
 Dot Paintings on PhotoPeach
 The finished artworks. on PhotoPeach