The Countdown Is On.... But We're Still Busy!

We took the opportunity in Manuka to do a little 'data analysis' after Pet Day.  We created a pictograph based on what animals Manuka brought to pet day.  We found that the most popular pet Manuka brought was a dog, but there were lots of lambs as well.  However, there was only one spider - a truly unique pet.  We explored what a pictograph is, it's features and purposes, before trying it out ourselves.   When asked what sort of other graphs there are, Mrs Webb was expecting answers like 'pie graphs' and 'bar graphs' but she had a wee giggle when one clever cookie answered with 'photograph'! We then moved onto bar graphs.  Question forming, tally charts and making conclusions kept us busy during this unit and we learnt lots about how to make general statements about the 'data'.

 There are lots of things that just happen in Manuka that don't seem very exciting.  Handwriting is one of those things.  However, Mrs Webb has found a way to spark our interest.  She sometimes spends time teaching us on how to correctly form our letters, and how to make our writing as neat as we can.  Sometimes we get to practice our writing independently because, as we all know in Manuka, 'practice makes progress'.  If our work is the best we can do, it earns us a sticker.  Three stickers in a row can be traded for some 'choosing time'.  We get to choose something quiet to do like reading, drawing or craft instead of handwriting.  This is a coveted reward and we all strive really hard.  It certainly makes for a quiet classroom!

Another thing we do each week is Basic Facts.  Usually we do them first thing on Monday morning, and work on them at home (and at school!) during the week before we do them again on Friday morning.  The goal is to improve our score by 4 or more which is sometimes a real challenge.  During Week 5 we were only at school for three days as there was a Teacher Only Day followed by Show Day.  Instead of Basic Facts Mrs Webb gave us a Basic Facts activity.  We had to make our way through a series of mazes by calculating the answers to a number of maths problems.  This was a lovely change to our usual routine, but there were a few students who were pleased to be back to the usual Basic Facts Challenge!

BUT..... one of the highlights of our week is when we get to do 'Garden to Table', and we were so lucky to get to have both a kitchen and a garden session in Week 5.  What a treat!  The 'silverbeet' group went out on Monday afternoon to harvest some delicious looking vegetables from our gardens.  Hats on, gloves on and off they went to discover what wonderful produce had been growing.  Then on Tuesday it was 'all systems go'.  We are so lucky to have Cherry and her team of helpers who have everything laid out and ready to go when we arrive at the kitchen after our smoko.  This time we were preparing spinach pancakes, broad bean dip, vege sticks, and to top it off there was apple crumble and ice cream!  What a treat!  The pancakes were a very definite green colour, the perfect size for spreading with the broad bean dip and they went down a treat.  Not a single one left!  And nobody said no to crumble and ice cream.  Delicious!

And then on Wed we were off with Rachel and another wonderful team of helpers to work in the garden.  We planted our sunflowers that we had planted earlier in Literacy Hour, mulched, weeded, watered and tended our vegetable beds.  It was a beautiful day and a lovely way to spend an afternoon.  It was also a special occasion as Emma and John were presented with their prize packs that they had won from Young Gardener of the Year.  They looked pleased as punch and we are all very proud of them!  Did you see them in the paper a few weeks ago?

It's athletics time of year and we have been making the most of the beaut weather to get out and practice our running, jumping and throwing (and just quietly, we're getting pretty good!).  We'll keep practicing for a wee bit yet, but you're more than welcome to come and see us display our talents at our Junior Athletics celebration!  Make sure you're prepared to be impressed!  It's on Friday 1st Dec at 9am.