Basic Facts News

We do basic facts each night as part of home learning, and then do them super quickly in our Maths books on Friday each week.  We also do a speed basic facts test every month.  In July, Jeremy won the jackpot - he was the only person to score 100% - which means that he made ZERO mistakes. 

It was very pleasing to see that everyone has made improvements.  Basic facts testing is a little bit like playing golf - everyone has their own personal best to work on.

Charlize has gone from 4/60 to 30/60 (She is now half way there, with two terms still to go)!  Some people have moved from the year 3 'out of 60' basic facts test to the years 3-8 'out of 100' test.  This is much harder as it has multiplication and division, not just addition and subtraction.  Other people have even changed the time they have to finish the test.  Taylor now has only six and a half minutes to do the year 6 test.

Jeremy has gone from 25/60 to a powerful 60/60.

Charalize has gone from 4/60 to a fabulous 30/60.

Pirate Maps to Find 'Buried Treasure'

The Bears and the Elephants studied Junior Journal 53, in particular the play called 'Buried Treasure'.  They made pirate maps so they had the right props for the play.  We used a compass to make sure that the compass directions on the maps were correct.  When they were finished, we tore the edges carefully and painted them with strong cold tea so that they looked like authentic pirate maps.

Shared lunch to celebrate term 2

Room 18 had a shared lunch on the last week of term to celebrate the end of term 2.  The day was made extra special by Alyssa, who won the shout out prize at our School Assembly.  She chose to have a mufti day, which we had on the last week of term.  Yikes!  We are half way through the school year already!

Potato People - Self Assessments

Our potato people have been on display in the classroom and everyone has had a chance to have a look at them.  We did a self assessment of our own potato person.  We are now waiting for them to grow shoots, just like the potato people in the book, so that we can plant them in our garden and grow potatoes of our own.  Maybe we will cook chips or wedges, or make a potato salad in a few months' time.

Here are two self assessments, but you can read them all on the Visual Arts page.

Andrew wrote a very thoughtful reflection in his self assessment of his potato man.

Maryanne thought carefully about her potato girl when she did her self assessment.

Publishing our Potato People procedures (that's a PPPP!)

After much rubbing out and re-writing, we have at last finished publishing our procedural writing which tells you how to make a potato man or potato woman.  There is a sample one here, but you can read them all on the Writing Page.

This is Juwon's published work.  You can see his smart handwriting, coloured diagrams and clear labels.

Rock Bottom stories

One of our longest pieces of writing this term was our reflections about our production, 'Rock Bottom'.  Here are a couple of our stories.  You can read them all on the Reading page or in the 'Rock Bottom' folder when it comes home in your book bag.