Mato the Potato!

Kotare would like to introduce you to our new friend, Mato! Mato is a potato we are growing in a challenge between the three senior classes.

Mato gets watered each day, and has been growing. When he grows, we cover him back up with most potting mix.

Will Mato be alone in the bucket...or will he have grown more baby spuds! We will find out in a couple of weeks (W8 of this term). GO MATO!

Have you ever grown potatoes, or grown vegetables at school or home? We have a bath outside our class that we want to plant with vegetables soon.

My Digital Footprint

In our Manaiakalani lesson today we talked about our digital footprints, and why having a positive footprint was important for when we were older. We searched our names and found lots of things - photos (some were from when we were at Kindy!!), our Facebook accounts (even though it's against the rules to have an account if you're under 13 years old) and more interesting things!

What is your digital footprint like? Is it good? Are you proud of it? This is my digital map that shows what websites I've been on, on my laptop in the last 24 hours.



Today we learned about...how important our digital footprint is
The part that I enjoyed the most was...getting my buddy Brad to search my name on Google
I found it hard to…remember what websites I had visited in the last 24 hours.
Next time I need to...try something new and create wobbly arrows

The Weekly Countdown!

We do lots of different things during a week at school. Here are Kotare's TOP 10 activites...

1. BASIC FACTS! Every morning we do a self-selected basic fact sheet to help us learn basic math questions, trying to beat our time and our score!

2. Speeches! This week and last has been all about researching, writing and practising our speeches! We have fun and competitive options, as well as individual and collaborative.

3.  M3 Mindfulness! Each day we do Mindfulness, practising our breathing as well as our core strength and balance. We work all our muscles then stretch, and lie down to relax!

4. Ki-O-Rahi! Every Friday morning some people go over to the field to learn about and practice the game of Ki-O-Rahi, to trial for one of our inter-school teams.

5. Friday assemblies! Our school Leadership Group plan and organise our fortnightly assemblies and kids who make great choices earn Saltie Cards for their houses! GO RIMU! GO RATA! GO KOWHAI! GO KONINI!

6. OLOF! Our Learning, Our Future - we are busy researching our projects for the countries to plan an event that celebrates culture and diversity.

7. Nga Roopu Raapa! We go to our Roopu teachers on a Wednesday afternoon and have an hour doing our selected activities - origami, boxing, sewing, hip hop and HEAPS more options!

8. Chapter Books! We are halfway through 'Holes' and our teachers read a few chapters each day after morning tea

9. Individual chapter books! We each have a chapter book and read it every day during the week. We get a photo review when we have finished with thumbs up or down, so it will help others know if it is a good read or not.

10. Drawing! On Tuesdays we draw straight after eating time...most other days we are on EPIC!

What's your favourite thing to do at school?

Cross Country

Last week was our school Cross Country. Kids could either choose to be in the competitive race or the fun run. There was mud, water, hay bales, tyres, cargo nets and obstacles to climb or jump over. It was so much fun seeing all the kids, teachers and whanau involved. What does your school Cross Country involve? What would be your favourite part of our school cross country?

Projects in Kotare

Every day, we have OLOF time - 'our learning, our future' where we focus on project based learning. Last term our question was "As Kaitiaki of our school, how can we have an impact on our environment?" We had followed our project process (gathering voice, researching, designing, budgeting, and communicating) to create art, gardens, pets, new playgrounds and school uniforms projects. We wrote to our BOT in an attempt to persuade them...and we all got replies!

This term, our question is inspired by the Rugby World Cup 2019. "The RWC is an event that celebrates culture and diversity. How can we plan a whanau event that celebrates culture and diversity?" Watch this space to see where we go with our projects this term!

Check out the RWC promo video we used to unpack the meaning of culture and diversity...

Bench Ball

Last term we loved playing a game called Bench Ball...a game that focuses on catching and throwing  skills, as well as team communication and strategy. Have you ever played it?

Cybersmart Learning - Avatars for Help

Kia ora koutou,

In Kotare we have been learning about being Cybersmart learners.  One of the things we have been learning to do is how to get help if something goes wrong online.

One of the ways we know we can do this now is to take a screenshot of what we've seen that we don't like and to send it to our teachers, Mrs West and Miss Duncan.

For this learning, we created Avatars by making a mash-up of an animal and an element, like fire, water, air or earth.  Our slideshow below shows some of what we've created.

 One of the challenges was choosing a .png image so that it didn't have a background.  Not having a background meant that we could slot the two images together well.  One other challenge we had was trying to get the callout to be in the right position and with the tail of the speech bubble (callout) facing the mouth of our animal.

Next, we're going to be creating our own blog profile posts!  We're so excited!

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