Some of the groups learned about spiders. Our before and after pictures show our increase in knowledge, although some of the children did decide to use the window. One of the groups was also learning about different crafts this term. This showed stump work for shading.

While Leon was writing about his terrifying holiday adventure, he started singing Dumb Ways to Die. The rest of the group were very interested in this song.

We watched the official video, talked about rail safety, and grouped up to write our own ideas of dumb ways to die.

Daniel’s group:

Die by coolness
Drowning in shallow water
Dying from eyes popping out
Die by fire
Stabbed by a stick
Stuck in a vending machine
Die by book
Eating week old chicken
Go to the moon without protection
Die by screen time
Eat your body parts
Choke by a pen
Get eaten by a shark
Forget your parachute
Set fire on your body
Dying when the gravity turns upside down

Jack’s group did it as an acrostic.
We talked about structure giving us more room for creativity.

Dive into a pool with piranhas
Under a triple bunkbed
Murder the king or queen
Be eaten by wolves

Whack a person
Attack a king
Yeet a wasp
Sell your brain

Tell your mum you hate her
Open a wasp nest

Drive into a wall
Invent a killing machine
Eat green rice

Here are our stories from the 2023 winter holidays.

During the holidays I went to Australia and we had a barbecue and a lot of my family members came. It was a lot of excitement. The day after that, in the afternoon, I had Froyo and Hungry Jack’s.
By Ayush

During the holidays there was a party. All the parents were talking so I went to Daniel. He was playing a game so I went back to the table. My brother and cousin were taking turns playing a game. I went to Daniel again.
By Jack

In the holidays, on the first Thursday, I went to Wellington and it was terrifying. The other cars were going down and I was going up and a silver crazy Karen was driving in the MIDDLE of the road and crashed at every car except my car because I was far from the silver car and that silver car just drove off like nothing happened.
By Leon

Ice Mountain – Cool
Last Thursday Mum, Dad, my brother, and I were packing to go to Ice Mountain. It took two hours to get there. When we were there I wore three clothes under my shirt with gloves and a beanie. We also had a sledge. Then it was -5°C. I went to eat first then I played with the snow. Also, I puked because of breathe in cold air and then I went to slide on the snow.
By Daniel

During the holidays, on Saturday, it was my uncle and aunty’s anniversary. I was singing and Nepali song to the whole of my family, and I was playing Roblox with my little cousin. After that I watched a martial arts movie and we all went home.
By Darshan

In the holidays I went to Auckland for two days. The first day I went to a friend’s house. Then, on the next day, I went to Rainbow’s End. I have been on the Fear Drop. If you go on there, you can’t breathe for two seconds. After, I went to a big white rollercoaster. It was scary. I almost vomited.
By Louis

In the holidays my brother and I played video games. Then the next day Inwoo and Matthew saw fish and we grabbed fish with our hands.
By Doha

In the holidays I went to Wellington and there were bunkbeds. I was my brother’s neighbour and I said good night when it was night.
By Daeun

In the holidays I saw the New Zealand plane. It just landed at Palmerston North and it flew away.
By Mia

The holidays I had my birthday and it was a party. I also had a good party. I got to lots of presents.
By Joy

In the holidays I went to Wellington and I saw a McLaren and an STO. The McLaren was a blue car and the McLaren was parking by the Lamborghini and the STO was red.
By Tyson

Holidays my mum left to China and I bought an STO. It was a red STO. I am a master at driving.
By James

In the holidays my mum went in an aeroplane. When she came back she gave me a surprise. It was a toy sheep.
By Ameerah

I went to the arcade. My mom and dad bought us cards to play. In the arcade my card ran out too fast and I still want to play more so I found my sister and beg her to play. I know how to get more points with the last bit of money on her card. She said yes.
By Schalk

In the holidays I went to Castle Point. It was fun. It was windy. The wind pushed me. I climbed rocks. I liked it a lot. Then I rode some paddle boats. It was fun.
By Ranvir

In the holidays I went hunting with my uncle and my auntie. I shot a big deer. At the place there were a lot of small deer. I came first with the biggest deer. By Dominic

In the holidays I went to Wellington. In Wellington I went to the beach and the beach was very close to the airport and the planes were very close to us.
By Ali

I went to Auckland and the Sky Tower. I stood on the Sky Tower glass. I looked down through the Sky Tower glass. I saw buildings and a bungee jump.
By Yena

In the holidays I went to Whakapapa. I skied. I played FIFA with my brother. Every game I won. I had play fights with my sister and I got sad because the school started.
By Lucas

We all have heritage languages apart from English. Some of us are fluent in these languages, some can say a bit, and some are aware that our parents speak something different to us. Our languages are important.
We wrote Puppy Trouble in English over a number of days.
We took our stories home.
Our families helped us to translate our stories.
We recorded our stories using as much of our heritage language as we could.

Those of us who are quite new to English had a big advantage and could translate without the help of our parents.

We will write another story soon.
Hopefully some of us will be able to use more of our heritage language in our next recording.

Ms Ouida sent Ms Finikin some Japanese masks from Japan.

We did a unit about masks.

We each chose a mask and added to its design.
We wrote character profiles.
We wrote plays.
We recorded the plays.

Here is our work.

This is Ms Finikin’s edit. Some of us have asked to be able to do our own edits.

Although we were reading a book about breaking eggs, we somehow got talking about the monsters under our beds. Ms Finikin assures us that the monsters will not be as scary when we are adults because we will realise they are not real. We wrote about our monsters and drew them. Here are some of them.

We watched the first two lectures Kermit the Frog ever gave back in 1969.

We recreated what we saw.

Look what I can do.

Tomorrow it will be my job to teach it to the group.

It is tomorrow.

Teaching is hard.

I have been teaching Ms Finikin about planes.

They have pilots, passengers, propellers, towers, and runways.

Here are some of our stories from our Easter 2023 holidays.