Graduation 2016

Here is our slide from Graduation 2016. What a day! Farewell to all our amazing Year 6's!

Fixed-Mindset Personas

We have been exploring 'Growth Mindsets' recently and within this analysing our "Fixed-mindset triggers". When we are faced with a big challenge, receiving feedback, seeing others doing better than us or receiving a setback in our learning sometimes this "triggers" a fixed-mindset persona (someone inside you who makes you act or behave differently than you usually do).

As part of our innovation fund research we created some movies to initiate a discussion about our FMPs.  Who is your FMP? What do they say to you? How do you overcome them so that you can be the best you you can be?  Please share as a comment :)


Fixed-Mindset Personas from Nic M on Vimeo.

Fixed-Mindset Personas from Nic M on Vimeo.

The Power of PrEP!

PrEP has been such a wonderful experience for our learners!  This week has been a particular highlight.  Let me share a story with you.

We had 2 teachers visit us from Tuakau Primary School on Monday.  They overheard the music that Jack, Angus and Shaiv have composed.  They asked if they could buy one of their CD's.

Jack had a great idea and gave these ladies his email address asking for feedback.

Well, today Janice and Hera responded...

Kia ora Jack and co.

Tino pai rawa atu to koutou mahi! Your groups work is outstanding! Kei reira!!

I really liked the beats. Furthermore, I really liked how each track had a different beat/sound. Your long tracks I think are especially clever.

A couple of things you might want to check before sale day are:

- when you guys inserted the back cover it was upside down to your front cover. I remember you guys did this in a hurry so totally understandable.

- you might want to consider adding the titles to each track on the actual kopae/C.D. As a consumer I would like this as then I would be able to see the title of the track without having to refer to the C.D. case...and the titles are sooooo apt!

My teenager children, and young adult nephew were also impressed by your teams work. My nephew commenting, "hmmmm that sounds like a future D.J. in the making."

No reira tama mā, ngā mihi nui ki a koutou me to koutou mahi kounga - so boys, big ups to you all and your most excellent efforts!!

Mauri ora,

Janice

Tuakau Primary School

Ngaa mihi o te ata ki a koe Jack me ngaa tamarik/kaiako o te whaanau o Poutama. (Greetings of the morning to you Jack and children/teacher's of Poutama) 

Firstly, thank you all for having us in your class yesterday. Janice and I thoroughly enjoyed being a part of Poutama. You tamariki are so clever, talented and not to forget...you have a cool class with some of the 'best' teacher's!

We 'blasted' your group CD yesterday when we got back to Janice's kid's whare (house). Omg, we found ourselves dancing around the table, head banging actually (ask Troy to demonstrate- head banging). 

The CD beats are awesome, I have 2 teenage daughter's who I can honestly say would enjoy the  CD, like I did. I appreciate the time and effort you all put into creating your product, "he mihi nui ki a katoa" WELL DONE BOY'S"!

He kai kei o koutou ringa

There is food at the end of your hands

Said by a person who can use his/her/their basic abilities and resources to create success.

Ngaa mihi

Hera

Awesome boys!  What a great result!  

Red Fox and Marly

Some of you may remember Bella and Ana from Poutama last year. During iTime, they started writing a collaborative story about two girls (based on themselves) who were secret agents able to control animals.

The story never got completed last year and Red Fox and Marly sat on the shelf (in a google drive) stuck at Chapter 6. After nearly a year long break, the adventure continues and they want YOUR feedback. Troy has read a few of the chapters to some of you and those who have missed out or want to read the full story can check it out here.

If you have any feedback/feedforward for the girls, I know they would love to hear from you. Post a comment and who knows, maybe Bella or Ana may write your ideas into their story.
 

Here are some of the animals that pop up in the story so you know who is who.

Being persuasive! Writing and Oral Language

http://www.trademe.co.nz/antiques-collectables/other/auction-1184530187.htm

As you do, I came across this hilarious trademe auction in the weekend and it appeared to fit our "learning to persuade" genre perfectly!  The above example is kind of like persuading to entertain... but it has been hugely funny persuading people to buy a useless item.  One person was trying to sell me! Any way, these are some success criteria when writing to persuade.  

Copy and paste your writing to the comments section so we can read and laugh at each others!  

Tony Hawk : Never Give Up!

Tony Hawk was someone I looked up to when I was a teenager. I loved skateboarding, but was never very good at it. When I watched Tony Hawk skate, he made it look easy. When I did it, I was clumsy. I gave up on trying because I felt it was too hard. I wish I showed perseverance when I look at how many times he failed just like I did, but he kept pushing himself to the limits. Our current value is Ngakau Tapatahi or Integrity. How does Tony Hawk show integrity in this video... Tweet your responses.


This reminded Nic of a quote:
“If we create a culture where every [one] believes they need to improve, not because they are not good enough but because they can be even better, there is no limit to what we can achieve.” —Dylan Wiliam

Finger print characters Rm 9 Buddy time

Kia ora!  We had a blast on Tuesday creating all of these little finger print characters with our buddy class.  Aren't they super cute?  I used an app called "Adobe Spark" to create the movie.  It had some cool features to it... you might like to download it and try it out?

Anyways... Check it out!

Northern Cluster Performing Arts (NCPA) Dress Rehearsal

Today the Kapa Haka and School Band (not yet named!) performed their item for the NCPA in front of the school. It was an amazing performance from these gifted performers!  Thank you everyone who helped bring this collaboration together.

PrEP planning

What a great afternoon of PrEP today! 

Researching...

Advertising...

Market Research...

Prototyping...

Surveying...

Bottle Flipping Boys

We were inspired by Dude Perfect and the recent bottle flipping phenomenon.

 

We decided to create our own video with our Russell St School trick shots. Check out our video. We would love to get 500 hits by the end of the year.

 

 Jonty, Louis and Jacob

Bottle Flipping Boys

We were inspired by Dude Perfect and the recent bottle flipping phenomenon.

 

We decided to create our own video with our Russell St School trick shots. Check out our video. We would love to get 500 hits by the end of the year.

 

 Jonty, Louis and Jacob

Buddy Time with Room 9 and 13

Room's 9 and 13 have been working hard together to showcase the things that we show excellence at.  We have been learning to use different camera angles to make our video interesting.  Here are a couple of finished (or best finished in the time we had to complete them!).

Maths construction a climbing frame

We have started our latest maths learning unit around geometry: 2D and 3D shapes. Here are some of our learners investigating the biggest climbing frame they could make with a budget of $100. 

Nic's Writing Quick Write

Today we used a movie as a quick write to get ourselves ready for writing!  We stopped this at different parts of the movie to write about what we thought would happen.

The Present from Jacob Frey on Vimeo.

Paper Dolls

In Troy's Writing Group we read "The Paper Dolls" and here is the online link for it to watch.

Excellence - an excellent example!

Wow!  If you are looking for an excellent role model, look no further than our very own Telaina!  She is really striving for excellence!  Check out her ET Reo post that she has done on her blog.  Well done Telaina.

Season Turbos passes!

Congratulations Louis and Camden for winning the Turbos Season Passes (with free food) for their rugby matches at Arena Manawatū! 

Home Led Conferences

Kia ora koutou! We have been super busy making a excellent progress on our Home-Led Conferences.  Well done everyone!  Remember you can make comments on your child's learning at anytime, if you are unsure about how to do this, please see your child's teacher.  

Boys Club

Boys club are going to be focused on creating an ebook. We looked at one of the apps and this website for inspiration.

http://success-for-boys.tki.org.nz/Teaching-learning-resources/48HR-SLAMs

Above is what we need to learn and do.

Girls Club

In Girls Club we have been performing plays. We were in two groups. One group did the play called The Red Hen and the Sea Crocodiles. Yassmine, Zoey, Kayla, Phoebe and Kiana performed this play. Here is a video of their play:



The other group performed Anything is Better. Naomi, Azahra, Tayla and Rebekah were in this group. Here is a video of their play: We have some stunning actresses here! Watch out Shortland Street!

Art

Wow Mayson! What an incredible likeness you have drawn today! The close observations that you have made are spot on! 

Assembly

The first assembly of the year was held on Friday - were you there?  It was a great celebration of learning from Room 12, 2 and 10.  If you missed it, you can watch it here.

RSS Band

We were SO lucky to be at the very first gig for the 2016 RSS School Band!  Check out this awesome talent!

Welcome Back to Term 3!

DanceNZ Made 2016

Mural Art Group with Carolyn

To all Year 6 students,

On Wednesday, June 1, I will be running a lunchtime workshop to help me select six wonderful artists who will paint a mural as a gift to the school before you leave for intermediate.

You need to bring your lunch and a pencil all sharpened and ready to go!

While you eat I will explain a bit about what our mural is about this year - and where it is going to hang. After that we will do some sketching exercises so that you can show me what you can do!

See you then! Showing that you can get organized and be there on time is a really important part of the process. 

If you have any questions you can email me at carolyn@russellst.school.nz

I can't wait! 

Developing Learner Agency through Visible Learning

Weather Inquiry

For our Weather Inquiry we made a barometer to measure the air pressure and see if that has an effect on the weather outside.

We watched a video on how to make one if you would like to make one at home.



Here is a picture of us making our one at school. We will be keeping a weather diary and checking it against our barometer to see if there are any similarities.

Having a Sense of Urgency

We know that having a sense of urgency means to move with purpose. Some examples are... 1. When we put our brainfood rubbish away, we need to do it quickly and get back to our learning. 2. When we are moving around the class, we walk quickly to get to where we need to be. 3. When the music is on, we come to hui and we get there quickly. 4. When there is a fire drill, we walk purposefully to the meeting spot. 5. When we need to line up to go somewhere, we line up quickly. In our learning, we will see... 1. People sitting next to drivers not blockers. 2. People meeting their deadlines. 3. People having everything they need to get their work done. 4. People getting straight to the learning task. 5. People knowing when their workshops are and getting to them on time. We want to maximise our learning time!

The Learning Pit

How do you know if you are in the learning pit?

You don’t think you can do it.

You might be struggling

Feeling frustrated

Can’t do it yet!

You will feel challenged

Have a growth mindset - You might say “This is really hard but I can’t do it YET!

There will be some Cognitive Wobbling

It’s really hard but you will try a range of strategies.

How can you get out of the pit?

• Never give up
• Talk to other people who are ‘drivers’.
• Keep persisting
• Learn from your mistakes
• Practice, practice, practice!
• Trial and error
• Keep making decisions and choices and actions that might not get you straight there
• Step by step by step solve the problems.

Monday's Goal

Today's goal is to deal with challenges without getting upset and accept mistakes are a part of our learning.

Post Easter Goals!

Yesterday, we had REAL cognitive wobble trying to understand what cognitive wobble is!

Yay!  That's what we want to happen all of the time!  Kids making their brains work hard in their learning.

Wednesday's goal was to be open to the cognitive wobble.

Thursday's goal was to respond to any feedback and feedforward that is received.

This was a great opportunity to go through the comments left by students and teachers on our blogs to respond to them.  

We decided that 'to respond' means...
* to reply
* to acknowledge
* to answer

Check out the responses that we have made on our personal blogs.

Thursdays Goal

Todays goal is:
" I know what my Blockers and Drivers are"

Things to think about:
-What to do if you are sitting near a blocker. How could you let them know.

-The things make you become a driver for others.

Do you think Donkey is a Blocker or a Driver for Shrek?

Wednesdays Goal

Our goal today is:

"To have a growth mindset. To understand that if I don’t know something yet, they I can learn how to do it"

Some of us did a lot of work around having a Growth Mindset last year in Poutama. We found this video called the Death Crawl from the movie Facing the Giants. 
In what ways do you think a growth mindset is shown?

 

Tuesday's Goal

Our goal today is:

"To use and move around the learning space using appropriate volume with an awareness of other learners."

We think that this is an important goal so that people can concentrate and get their work done. We think that this goal will help us to focus and get our work done.

We think that this will sound different at different times of the day.  We might hear a low flow hum so that just the people around you can hear.  We might hear formal normal so that a big group can hear.  We might hear loud crowd if we are presenting to the whole class.   We might hear silence is golden when you are in flow.  We will hear on-task talking.

We will be aware of people around us and if they are in the flow of their learning, we won't disturb them from this.  We want to help people be a driver not a blocker.

Monday's Goal

Today's goal is...

To have a can-do attitude and come ready to learn. 

What does this look and sound like for us in Poutama?

Friday's Goal

What a great start to our goal focus today in Poutama.  Have you had the opportunity to browse through the tweets on the sidebar?  I'm sure you will enjoy reading through them.  

Today you have walked the walked, now can you talk the talk (make any changes that you need to make)?

Friday's goal is...

To make good choices about your independent learning activities so you can meet the weekly requirements.

We think that we will see...
* People being drivers and sitting next to drivers
* People being on task
* People being courageous learners - some of us need to be by ourselves.
* People being focused on their learning
* People showing active listening

We think that we will hear...
* low flow hum
* on task talk
* people responding to learning conversations
* silence is golden in some areas
* good questions being asked
* conversations about learning

Guess what...

Now that we are back from camp, we are starting something new!  We will be having a Poutama goal of the day.  We will be talking about it, pulling it apart, looking for it, reflecting on it and aiming for it!  

Our first goal is....

To be ready to listen, share and contribute when you join the class or a group.

What examples will we have of this tomorrow?  Who will shine?  Who will we learn from?  What will the result be when we do this together?

Watch our Twitter accounts (on the sidebar) for our reflections just before lunch each day.

We decided that this will look and sound like the following:

Look like

• Looking at the person talking (active listening)
• Everyone contributing
• Silent hands
• You are prepared with everything you need
• Sitting in places where I know I can focus
• Taking turns, being patient

Sounds like:

• Asking questions
• Quiet (or one person talking at a time)
• Collaborating, talking to each other,
• Low flow hum / focused and on task
• “Piggy backing” ideas or adding to others’ ideas
• Sounds like giving comments / feedback / feedforward
• Accepting ideas

Enviro Wednesday

Each Wednesday, 3 of our students spend time with Joy's Enviro class to work on a special project to enhance the environment at Russell Street School.  This week Gaby, Angus and Caitlin had their turn!  They were busy making signs for our class/buddy gardens.  Have you spotted any of these around the grounds yet?  Perhaps you could go on a hunt to see if you can find them all! 

Active Listening

This morning we had some powerful discussions about how to listen actively.

To be a good listener, we need to...
* Make eye contact
* Put down what we are doing
* Ask for clarity (if we are unsure of what the speaker is asking)
* Ask questions (to show we care)

We realised that it is ok to ask them the person to wait if we are in the middle of something or talking to someone else.

We will be pracitising these skills at school.  What about at home?  How are your listening skills going?

We are learning about how to deal positively with conflict

Kia ora koutou, as part of our ecology of learning inquiry, we have been exploring the term "conflict" - what it is and what might cause it?  We have been discussing these in our whanau classes.  Here is a summary of what we came up with.  Could parents discuss with your child/ren what triggers might cause conflict the most,  What are some strategies to overcome the conflict?

What is Conflict?

What might cause conflict?

Tane's Treaty of Waitangi Video

Ka mau te wehi Tane!  This week we are completing our self-selected Treaty of Waitangi assignments to show our understanding about it.  What do you think of Tane's? I like how he has made connections with the things around our school.  Bomb-diggy Tane - great job!

Homelearning Expectations

Thank you!

Kia ora koutou!

Thank you to all of the whānau who made the time to come in to meet the Poutama team in person or who have dropped us and email over the last few days.  We especially enjoyed hearing and learning more about your children as people. Please make sure you contact us for any questions or concerns.  And remember to comment on our class blog!

Ngā mihi nui!

Troy, Nic & Elly

Like music to my ears!

Some beautiful sounds coming from the Art's Space today!

Room 13 respond musically to poetry. from Nic M on Vimeo.

The Treaty of Waitangi Rubric

Kia ora koutou, below is a google slide Poutama has created about The Treaty of Waitangi.  It has been a used as a tool for research, questioning and creating.  Today we set the challenge to create some thing to demonstrate our knowledge or understanding (or both!) about our founding document. 

This rubric will help us push our thinking.  'Au' means that we can find some facts and create something that will have impact on ourselves (Self-Agency).  Mātou means that you are connecting what you know or understand.  You will use your facts, knowledge and understanding to create something that will have an impact on our school community (Group Agency).  Tātou means you are thinking and acting beyond our school to create something that will have an impact the wider community, city, country or world (Learner Agency).

Habitual Readers

In Poutama we have a goal to develop habitual readers of ALL our students before they leave for intermediate. Here we are making a fabulous start to the year. 

Poutama Math Chat

Kia ora koutou, last week Poutama has been using "mathematical argumentation" to communicate ideas in maths.  We used the Rio Olympics medal prediction from the paper to use numbers in an authentic context.  Children worked in small groups to create a "gold winning performance" (the most efficient strategy) to add the total number of medals for a country.  But you can already see the total already you say?  This activity is heavily embedded in the strategy section of mathematics, where the answer is not the goal.  Children then debate which strategies are gold.   

Trust Fall

Abby is showing a huge amount of trust in her whanau class!

We need to be able trust each other this year in all aspects of our learning. How can we be trustworthy to those around us?

Team Building

We've all been learning about team work, trust and communication. What are the most important skills we need to show when learning together?

Welcome to 2016

Nau mai haere mai to 2016!  The Poutama team are pumped - all is set for an exceptional year of learning.  Below is the link to our team letter.  Looking forward to getting to know you all this year :)

Here are a few things you may need to know about our class:

Swimming instruction  is for the first 6 weeks of term 1. We swim on Tuesday, Thursday and Friday.

We will be visiting the hub on Tuesday. Please ensure that library books are returned on this day so that the children can issue new books.

Reading folders are an essential item for helping keep books and notices safe and ready to be shared at home. Please ensure that these make it to school every day.

We have a Meet the Teacher evening coming up on Monday 15th February. More information will be coming home about how to book a time for this.

Ngā mihi, 

Nic, Elly and Troy