Visiting Linwood Library

Due to the renovations happening at our school this year, we are unable to use our school library.  Luckily for us, we have an amazing library at Eastgate Mall just down the road which we are visiting once a month.

The staff at Linwood Library are always so friendly, helpful and polite.  They even come to help walk the tamariki to and from the library!

Last week was very exciting as many of us had filled out forms to receive our library cards which meant we were able to issue some books!

We spent lots of time exploring this week - checking out the different sections of the children's part of the library.  Some of us even got to grips with using the computers to search for texts that we were interested in.

Andrea (one of the Librarians) has asked if we would like to create a display in the library!

We are excited to put our heads together and come up with some ideas for what we might create to go on display at our local library!  

The New Pītau 1

Although we've only been back at school for just over a week we have managed to pack a lot in already! 

As we have moved into a new room this year we first had to spend some time becoming familiar with our new environment. We completed a scavenger hunt to find out where everything was, and learn a little about our new learning spaces. 

Next we began the planning stages of our self portraits which we are hoping to make out of clay and fire them in the kiln. We used mirrors and photos our ourselves and tried to draw accurate sketches. 

We watched a video about revisiting and improving on sketches. So we made multiple attempts to improve on our sketches. 

The video also discussed how peer feedback can help you improve on your work. We got into pairs and gave constructive feedback to our buddies. 

We also created some art around something we had done in the holidays. We shared our work with the group using visual talking prompts. Some of us then constructed some writing about these which you can find on seesaw. 

Keep checking back to find out more about Pītau 1's learning! 

Caring

A few weeks ago, we began our journey around what it means to be Caring.

Caring is one of our Bromley School Values, and is an area that Miss Gardner and Mrs Smith noticed needed some thinking around.

We began by noticing tamariki that were showing Caring in different ways. We celebrated how they were showing this value and began to note them down on Post It notes.

This then turned into the children nominating their peers for being caught Caring throughout the school day.

We talked about 4 main areas within which we could show Caring at school - People, Work, Class and Environment.

One afternoon we split into small teams and brainstormed as many ideas as we could for how we might show our value of Caring within each of the main areas...

During one of our Kiwi Can sessions we looked at goal setting.  This gave the teachers an idea...what if we thought about setting our very own Caring goals?

Whilst brainstorming possible ideas for our goals, we needed to be quite reflective about ourselves and think about an area that suited our individual needs.

Check out what we've decided on...

Pītau 1 had a sneaky peek at how Koru 1 display their goals and saw that they used a continuum to monitor how they are going towards achieving their goals.

We have set up our own continuum and are starting to reflect upon how we are tracking with our goals.

“My goal is to move away when I’m getting distracted.  I put myself on number 3 ‘cos I’m doing it sometimes.”  Jyuvana

“My goal is to put my reading folder in the basket every day.  I’ve put myself on number 3 because I’ve been doing it lots.”  Manaia

“My goal is to use my manners.  I’ve put myself on number 3 because I’ve been showing manners wherever I go.”  Leo

“My goal is to pick up rubbish in the classroom.  I’ve put myself on number 2 because I’m doing it sometimes.”  Kahu

“My goal is to put my reading folder in the right place.  I’ve put myself on 2 because I’m still learning how to do it and sometimes I forget and sometimes I can’t find it.”  Jaydi

“My goal is to move away when someone is annoying me.  I’m still on number 2 because I’ve done it sometimes.  I did some today as well.”  Alex

“My goal is to move away when I’m getting distracted and I’m on 1 because I’m starting to do it.”  Serena

“My goal is to put sheets in my book correctly.  I’m on 3 because I always do it.”  Xavier

Where to next?

We will continue to monitor our goals on a weekly basis - thinking about how we can improve.

We will look into how this value links with some Key Competencies set out in our National Curriculum.

We are looking into 'what makes the perfect friend'.

Connecting With Our Environment

This week we have had lots of fun connecting our garden inquiry with our reading, writing and mathematics learning. 

Pītau 1 have been very passionate about picking up rubbish around the school. Every morning tea and lunch time there is always a group of children out there collecting rubbish. We decided we have a rubbish problem at Bromley school! 

During Maths this week we took some of this rubbish and began sorting and grouping it. 

Check our our seesaw journals to learn what we discovered! Each group found different ways to sort and we began making statements about the data we had collected.