Playground Designers

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Stage 2 have been investigating our built environment here at school – specifically our playground areas. They decided that our playground needed an upgrade and so went about deciding how they could change their environment so that it better suited the needs of the students at our school.

First they looked at the playground areas (Areas 6 & 7) and made a list of the things that these areas had, and the things that were missing (but necessary).

Next the students surveyed the rest of the school to find out the types of activities and structures that students of all ages would like to see in a school playground. The Stage 2 students then graphed the responses and were able to reach some conclusions about the types of activities that were popular across the school.

After that was the really fun bit – students worked in groups to design a playground area that incorporated the ideas that the rest of the school wanted. They could add anything they liked, as long as it fit the purposes of safety and need. The groups then used lots of recycled boxes and containers to bring their designs to life! Lots of glueing and taping and creating structures and play equipment!

Lastly students needed to present their model and ideas to the rest of the grade and then everyone would vote on the playground design that they liked the best. Groups had to write persuasive speeches to urge and influence the students and parents and teachers that their playground ideas were the best.

Congratulations to the winning team and their bid – Abdullah, Jessica, Nadia, Hennessey, Andrew and Adam from S2Magnolia.

Please have a look at the wonderful playgrounds designed by our students.

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Going Dotty!

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S1 Jacaranda class made their mark today by designing beautiful coloured dots to celebrate International Dot Day.
International Dot Day is a global celebration of creativity, courage and collaboration” and students get involved by designing wonderful dots and sharing these online.

We watched a film clip of the story “The Dot” by Peter Reynolds, and then had the chance to use lots of coloured papers to make our mark and our dots!

Here are our dots for you to enjoy 🙂

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Are You Ready To Be Awesome?

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Everyone needs some encouragement now and then, and today is the day you can create AWESOME!
Watch this pep-talk clip by KidPresident, and get ready to be the best you can be 🙂

Please leave a comment telling us what you will be creating, investigating or trying!

Our Very First Make It Challenge

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We celebrated Book Week with a Make It Challenge in the Library.

Students were asked to “Connect to Reading” by creating a model of some sort of a book they were reading.

We had lots of very creative entries – people used lego, boxes, wood, minecraft, glitter jewels, drawings and pipe cleaners to construct a model. Lots of interesting connections to stories and reading 🙂

Have a look at the entries below:

 

Leave a comment about your favourite entry in the comment section.

Origami Ninja Stars or An Information Text!

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Today Year 3 students watched a You Tube clip that showed and told them how to make a ninja star. Here are some of the interesting things they noticed about this text:

  • it was an instructional text – it showed you how to make something
  • it was a type of procedure, with steps to follow
  • you had to listen to the words as well as watch the pictures
  • the video was really helpful to watch as if you couldn’t understand a part you could watch and see what to do next
  • the video supported the words, you could watch the video over and over at each part – to see how the narrator was actually moving the papers and making the folds
  • the photos inbooks are static (they stay still) the video showed the movements to make with the folding
  • the spoken words + the written words + the video worked together to make sure we could actually make our ninja stars!

Here is the clip we watched:

 

 

And here are our finished ninja stars 🙂

 

We Love the Cat in the Hat!

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Stage 1 have been learning about important parts of books, and have come across some authors that they just LOVE.

Dr Seuss is probably their favourite author at the moment, so we celebrated Dr Seuss’ birthday by making some of our own “Cat in the Hats” from a paper plate!

As you can see, they look great and are displayed in the Library near our collection of Dr Seuss books 🙂 .

What do you think of our displays?

 

 

Fantasy Worlds

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All of the classes in our school this year have been named after Fantasy Worlds, and Term 4 saw everyone investigating and exploring various fantasy worlds they had read about, played in or imagined themselves.

Some classes made games, some made dioramas, posters, books, and puppet shows. Other classes made fun aspects from their worlds – such as papier mache models and paper craft designs.

All in all a very creative term and learning experiences.

Just lately a number of classes have spent some time imagining a fantasy world that could be designed using paper.

Paper doors, gates vegetation or props opened to reveal a huge variety of worlds – some based on stories or games or movies, and some purely from imagination.

Take a look at some of the work as we made it.

Toys, Toys, Toys!

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Kindergarten and Stage 1 students have been exploring scientific concepts related to toys this term.

We have

  •  sorted toys
  • grouped toys
  • classified toys
  • found out how different toys move
  • read stories about toys
  • labelled diagrams of toys and
  • made toys from paper and other materials.

Now, to finish off we are making a toy out of recycled materials!

First we drew a plan.

                                         

 

Then we found the materials we would need.

Next we started putting it altogether.

After that we will paint it and add features.

Finally we will speak about our toy.