Museum Trip

What a great trip we had to the Museum, looking at the beautiful stained glass windows.  Nicki did a great job sharing the history behind them and we loved making our own windows while we were there.  

Here's Room 1's very own stained glass window.  

Talented Ballerinas

We have some wonderful dancers in Room 1, who gave us a private performance of the butterfly dance they did for their ballet exam.


Butterfly Ballerinas from Kathryn Robertson on Vimeo.

Arrt in the Octopus' Garden

In Art this term, we are learning how to draw native birds.  We need to study a picture of the bird and note the features it has - beak, body, wings, legs, feet, feathers.  We then practise drawing the bird on white boards before sketching our own bird.
Native Birds on PhotoPeach

Keep an eye out for our finished art in the next few weeks when we have completed our paintings.

Saints in the making

In Room 1 we have been learning about Saint Mary, the mother of Jesus.  Father Tony visited us today and taught us that a Saint must be dead and have gone to heaven.  We can be Saints in the making if we follow the life of Jesus.

We will be caring, loving, helpful and respectful to others.  We will always try our best and do what our parents ask us to do.

A Room 5 invitation for some more Indian culture

Thank you to Room 5 and one of their dads who treated us to some folk music from Rajasthan.  We were fascinated to watch how long it takes to get dressed in traditional clothes.  Then we listened to the wonderful loud drumming, trying our hands at dancing by following our young experts!

Thank you for letting us have a turn at playing the drums as well.  We had a great time.
India comes to St Joseph's on PhotoPeach


 Check out the clever dancers from Rooms 1 and 5


Dancers, Rajasthan style from Kathryn Robertson on Vimeo.

DIscovery Time and the Three Little Pigs

What a great job the narrator did, and the hand puppeteers were amazing - this performance was without any rehearsal time.  I think they are stars!


The Three Little Pigs from Kathryn Robertson on Vimeo.

"Absolutely Not!" say the Stingrays.

The Stingrays reading group have enjoyed practising, and eventually performing, their play, "Absolutely Not!" to an audience of their friends.  Well done to you all!



Stingrays - Absolutely Not! from Kathryn Robertson on Vimeo.

Library Time in Room 1

Our Library Day is on MONDAYS.  Many of the children forget to bring in their library book from home, which means they are not permitted to check out a new book when we visit the library.

We love choosing books from the school library as you will see from these photos  Please help your child to remember their book so they do not get disappointed.

Heather's visit to the Octoous Garden

We love having Heather come to room 1.  This time she helped Petra and Lochy make some delicious scones.  They included lots of vegetables from our school garden, like celery, broccoli, silver beet and spinach.  We popped open pods and tried the juicy peas.  We love Heather's visits and think the chefs did a great job.

Brook Waimarama Sanctuary - Our Taonga

We had a wonderful time at the Brook Waimarama Sanctuary a few weeks ago.  Thank you to all the parents who came along and shared this special trip with us.  We raised enough money from our koha to sponsor two fence posts.

This was the ignition for our Topic this term where we will be learning about our native trees and birds and how we can help protect them from those pesky pests.

Our Taonga from Kathryn Robertson on Vimeo.

Hockey skills with Mr Skeeping

We are lucky to have Mr Skeeping, an expert cricket player, teaching in our Syndicate.  He has started off our skills sessions with great advice.  Cup our hands when we catch the ball and look at the target front on when we throw under arm so we can be really accurate when we field.

Happy Diwali Day

What a treat we had last week, when we learnt about Diwali, the Indian Festival of Light to celebrate the beginning of the Indian New Year. Thank you to Sonia and Little Indian for sharing some kai and the expert dance moves.  Please call in to the classroom to see our beautiful Rangoli patterns.



Celebrating Diwali from Kathryn Robertson on Vimeo.

Meditation time is a time to talk with God

Every Friday the whole school stops to meditate at the start of the day.  In Room 1 we use this very quiet and still time to talk to and listen to God.

Discovery Time

We had lots of fun on Friday discovering about New Zealand's native birds. We can't wait for the trip on Tuesday to the Brook Waimarama Sanctuary.

Cultural celebration in the Octopus' Garden

To end last term we invited parents, grandparents, friends and caregivers to share in our learning about our cultural diversity.

Room 5 and a number of adults watched as we shared where we were from, and what we have learned about some of the different cultures we have in our class.

We performed a dance to one of Micol's favourite nursery rhymes from Italy and demonstrated our skills at dancing the salsa, taught to us by Luca's dad from his Latin America roots.

Cultural Diversity from Kathryn Robertson on Vimeo.

A well earned reward for Room 1

In the Octopus' Garden the students work together to earn scales for their Reward Chart.  When all 100 numbers have been covered with shiny scales the students get to decide how they will celebrate.

Term 3 saw them having a two part reward.  The first was a delicious shared lunch with our Buddy Class - Room 13 at Queens Gardens.  Then, on mufti day we had a movie and popcorn afternoon.  

Well done, Room 1 and you are already racing towards the next 100 scales.

Calendar Art and holiday wishes

We hope you are having a safe and happy holidays with your children.  Many of you are going away for a time, so travel safely and we hope you return to school rested and ready for the final term for the year.

Your child has come home with an order form and information around the Calendar Art Fundraiser.  If you cannot call into the classroom to check out your child's finished art at the start of next term, you can check out our budding artists here ......

Octopus Garden's Calendar Art on PhotoPeach

Spuds, spuds, glorious spuds!!

Thank you, Mrs P, for inviting Room 1 to help you plant the potato crop.

The students learned a lot about compost, how potatoes have 'eyes' and sprout shoots and then becomes lots of new potatoes. We can't wait to help you dig them up next year.

We think you are awesome!

Here are some stories we wrote about our exciting gardening session.

Micol wrote, "Yesterday we planted potatoes. First we put them in the holes.  Then we covered them with soil.  Then it will grow into a big potato."

Maxi wrote, "On Tuesday we planted potatoes and we got a shovel.  We dug it so we could put the potatoes in the soil.  They will grow."

 

Charlotte O wrote, "I planted potatoes with Mrs Pearson.  I got my shovel.  I dug a big hole.  The potatoes had eyes on them.  I put the soil on the potatoes."                                                              

Culture from Italy

Thank you Daniela for coming into the classroom and teaching us some favourite Italian songs of Micol's.

We loved doing the actions to La Bella Lavanderina.

Singing along to Giro Giro Tondo was a lot of fun too.

Breakfast in our PJs

Thank you, Room 2 for inviting us to have breakfast with you last Thursday.  We were very excited to come to school in our pyjamas and have Milo and toast in the staff room.  What a treat!  The photos say it all - we had a great time.

Breakfast at school on PhotoPeach

Dancing Argentina style

Thank you Ricardo for taking the time to teach Room 1 something about the culture we find in Argentina.  We really have fun learning how to do the salsa - especially the twirls!  Maybe we'll be as good as you one day, if we practice!

Spring picnic with our buddies

What a great way to celebrate reaching our class goal of 100 scales.  Thank you to Room 13 for sharing our picnic at the Queen's Gardens with us.


Spring In The Queen's Gardens from Kathryn Robertson on Vimeo.

The culture of Brazil

Thank you to David for teaching the children a little bit about the Portuguese culture of Brazil.  We learned how there is a lot of poverty there and people have to build their houses on top of each other in a place called Favela.  There are no gardens or playgrounds  

David also explained why the flag has yellow, green and blue colours - yellow represents the gold found in this country, the green represents the Amazon rain forest and the blue represents the sea.  The people of Brazil love the beach, family and soccer!

Class Photo

The class has certainly grown since the school photos were taken at the start of this year.  I have produced a class photo this term and if anyone would like to receive one, please see me.

To cover the cost of the colour photocopying and laminating, these will cost $2.  One is displayed on the notice board in the cloakroom for you to see.

Junior Syndicate Assembly

Well done to all five classes for performing exceptionally at Assembly last Thursday.  They did such a great job, we hope you enjoy watching the following video.



Junior Assembly from Kathryn Robertson on Vimeo.

The story of Sinterklaas

On Friday we were lucky to have another Room 1 parent, Inge, come in to tell us a story from her homeland of the Netherlands.  She shared with us how Luca continues her childhood tradition in New Zealand, and leaves his shoes and some food for St Nicholas and his horse on the eve of 6th December.

Sinterklaas sails to the ports of Holland and, on his white horse, the Black Peters and St Nicholas deliver presents to the children.  Thank you for the lovely photos showing this colourful tradition.

St Nicholas and the Black Peters arriving on their ship. 

Sinterklaas greeting one of the many children lining the streets.

The famous white horse.

The colourful Black Peters.

Gala Mufti Day

Once again, Room 1 got behind the Gala fundraising efforts and came to school in Mufti clothes on fun day Friday.  Next week we need to bring in a lucky dip prize as the Week 6 contribution.  We have also been asked to make up a gift basket.  The theme for our basket is anything red, so get creative!!

I think you will agree we make a colourful bunch.

Celebrating our cultural diversity

Thank you to Sushella for helping the students in the Octopus' Garden understand how lucky we are in New Zealand.  We learned what "culture" means and how we can celebrate the many cultures we have in our back yard because we are all connected.  

We can see the diversity in our communities, through the food we share, the sports we play, the fashion and clothes we wear and the languages we speak.

Thanks to Maxi's family's generosity we now have two giant maps so we can appreciate how big our world is.

Buddy Time

Today Room 13 visited the Junior courts and brought along their skipping ropes.  They were amazing at teaching us new games, tricks and skills.  Here are a few comments Room 1 students made after our fun.

Joe said, "Maxi and I jumped over the skipping rope lots and didn't miss many out."

The following students played a fun game called "Helicopters", but you had to watch out for those stinging ropes!  Tegen, Archie, Petra, Micol, Freddie, Rocket, Luca, Armaan, Maxi, Jackson, Ruby, Charlotte O, Amelia, Georgia and Joe were the lucky ones!

Hymmynie told us, "Mine and Ruby's buddies helped us jump over the really high ropes."  

Georgia said, "My buddy, Tegan, gave me some really good advice - slow rope and small jumps."

We hope you enjoy seeing some of the talent Room 1 and Room 13 have.

Buddy Skipping from Kathryn Robertson on Vimeo.

Heather visits the Octopus Garden

We were spoiled today with a visit from Heather, who teaches the Junior Syndicate so much about our school gardens and how we can cook delicious foods from the produce we grow.

Two students were very lucky to go with Heather to create some culinary delights.  They fed us mini quiches, carrots and apple.  Yummy!!  Some students showed how grown up they were trying quiche for the first time AND they liked it.

Our Buddy Class

We are so lucky that Room 13 are happy to meet us once a week for Buddy Time.  Thank you Mrs G for fitting this in to your busy timetable!

Here we are with our buddies, who helped us make our days of the week paper chain - they are awesome and we can't wait to see them again soon.

Our Wonderful Room 13 Buddies on PhotoPeach

Marama time at the Suter

Thank you to the parents who came along to the Suter and shared the wonderful time we had exploring the art work.

We had a great time with Esther, creating collages of the animals we would most like to be like.  Watch out for these on display in class very soon.



The Students From The Octopus Garden from Kathryn Robertson on Vimeo.

Marama at the Suter on PhotoPeach

Medieval Fair by the Upper Middle Syndicate

We were treated to a step back into medieval times when we were invited to a majestic display by the Upper Middles.  

First we watched the students dancing as they would have done all those years ago.  Sir Timothy (Mr Cross),  Lady Pauline (Mrs Wallace) and Maid Evelyn (Mrs Muncaster) directed the proceedings very smoothly.

Then, we were treated to some puppet shows - what a talented bunch we have at St Joseph's.  

Wind Power = Energy

Room 1 enjoyed the first fun day Friday for the term with a Discovery Time all about "Wind Power".  We made kites, paper planes, wind chimes and experimented with straws and ping pong balls to see how fast we could go around a track.

Watch the fun we had with our kites outside on this beautiful, sunny day.


Wind Power = Energy from Kathryn Robertson on Vimeo.

Library Day is MONDAYS

Hopefully you are looking forward to returning to school tomorrow.  Just a reminder that Monday is our Library day so if you have any outstanding library books, please pack them in your bag.