Happy Holidays

The children would like to wish you all a very 'Happy Holiday'. For all those celebrating Christmas they would like to wish you a 'Merry Christmas'...

Maori: Meri Kirihimete

Samoan: La Maunia Le Kilisimasi Ma Le Tausaga Fou

Tongan: Kristo abe anduwe muciindo ca Christmas

Tokelau: Ke whakamanuia te Kirihimahi & Tauhaga Fou fiafia 

Tagalog: Maligayamg Pasko. Masaganang Bagong Taon

Thai: Sawadee Pee Mai or souksan wan Christmas

Yoruba: E ku odun, e ku iye'dun!

Russian: Pozdrevlyayu s prazdnikom Rozhdestva is Novim Godom

Vietnamese: Chuc Mung Giang Sinh

Arabic: Milad Majid

Chinese: (Cantonese) Gun Tso Sun Tan'Gung Haw Sun

Chinese: (Mandarin) Kung His Hsin Nien bing Chu Shen Tan

Farsi: Cristmas-e-shoma mobarak bashad

Hindi: Shub Naya Baras (good New Year)

Hungarian: Kellemes Karacsonyi unnepeket

Indonesian: Selamat Hari Natal

Japanese: Shinnen omedeto. Kurisumasu Omedeto

Korean: Sung Tan Chuk Ha

Philippines: Maligayang Pasko!

Duri: Christmas-e- Shoma Mobarak

Somali: ciid   iyo sanad cusub oo fiican 

Malayan: Selamat Hari Natal

Prepositions - Where is Bingo?

Check out some of the children's great preposition pictures.

Grammar Rock Preposition

We have been learning about prepositions this week. We watched this movie, then we went out into the playground and took our own preposition pictures. We will publish some of these soon.

Adjectives

This week we are learning all about adjectives. We played a game called ‘Tell Me More’ where we had to use an adjective to describe something in a picture. We were able to come up with lots of interesting words. We took turns to say a word and then we used it in a sentence. We then said to the next person ‘Tell Me More’. 

Bao, Neelofa, Miracle, Isabel, Vincent, Niumalee, Sofi and Kabir

Wow!!

Hazel and Amanda check out the amazing panels at Rongomaraeroa Marae Te Papa during our recent visit to Wellington. 

Horton has the Addington Attutude

Yesterday we read the book, ‘Horton Hatches the Egg’.  Afterwards we talked about all of Horton’s qualities. 

We thought that Horton would be a GREAT role model for our school. 

Horton showed the following qualities...

Integrity

Responsibility

Resiliance

Passion

Respect

Acceptance

Risk Taking

Caring

We would love to have Horton at our school.

Sofi, Niumalee, Vincent and Kabir

We're Back

We are back. After all our earthquake disruptions and holidays we are now on board and looking forward to another event full term. 

Since the 7.1 magnitude earthquake we have had the grand total of 1908 aftershocks. The last one today was magnitude  4.41 at 9.28 am.  Consequently we are still having very regular earthquake drills. 

Last term our school took part in the Christchurch Primary School’s Cultural Festival. We had three groups involved Te Tipuranga, Nga Matikao and our school Ukulele Orchestra.

We hope you enjoy the pictures of the children performing on stage at the Town Hall on Thursday 2 September.

Earthquake Stories

Addington children returned to school on Monday 13 September. They began the week by catching up with friends, sharing stories and practicing their "Drop, Cover and Hold" moves. Here are some of their stories...


We got in our car and drove and drove and drove. We were looking for a safe place.

My mum was saying “God please stop this” in our language. We didn’t know what was happening. We slept in our car. Our car kept rocking. I saw some smashed roads and houses.

I didn’t know what was happening. I was shaking and couldn’t stop. I thought a monster was coming to get us. I sleep under the table with mum every night now. I don’t like sleeping in my bed anymore.

When the shakes come my mum cuddles me.

My big brother jumped out the window and cut his arm. 

We put our mattresses all in one room and sleep together now. We like sleeping with mum and dad.

We know what to do if it shakes in our classroom and if we are in the playground. We are good at being Tommy Turtles.

My friends house fell down but ours is OK. It just shakes some times. We don’t like that. 

My chimney fell down but only on the outside of our house. 

Since the 7.1 original earthquake we have had over 700 aftershocks. 

School Re-opening after Earthquake

School will re-open tomorrow - Monday 13 September. We look forward to seeing you all again. 

Earthquake - School Closure

School closed until Wednesday at least because of the earthquake. Things look OK but waiting on all the buildings to be checked over by the experts.

Cultural Festival Dress Rehearsal

On Friday the children from Te Tipuranga and Nga Matikao got together after lunch for a dress rehearsal for their performance at the Cultural Festival next week. They were all very excited. 
They will be performing at the matinee on Thursday 2 September. 

Cultural Festival 2010

YOU ARE WARMLY INVITED to CULTURAL FESTIVAL 2010! Over 3,000 children are getting ready to ‘make a splash’ at this year’s festival which explores the wonders of one of our most precious resources – water. Showcasing a fresh lineup of multicultural performances, visual art and wearable art pageants from some of Canterbury’s most talented primary and intermediate schools, Cultural Festival 2010 is not to be missed! Tickets @ Ticketek or check out www.culturalfestival.co.nz<http://www.culturalfestival.co.nz/> In the words of one of last year’s attenders - “…absolutely fantastic, the standard of performance was extraordinary!” 

Addington ESOL Television presents...

This week we have been reading Fairy Stories. Yesterday we read the story of Little Red Riding Hood. Then made up some questions to ask the characters. We put them onto a big chart using ‘post-it’ notes.

Today we pretended to be in a television studio. Sofi was the first to be the television interviewer and asked a very funny grandma Kabir some of the children’s questions.

We then all took turns at playing the different roles. 

Digital Dialects

We have been using Digital Dialects in our first language programme. It is a website that features lots of free interactive games for language learning.  It is a great way to learn new vocabulary or to just practice what you already know.  Our Tongan children really like the 'Numbers Game', they like to try and beat the timer. 

We are now patiently waiting for them to add Samoan to the growing list of languages available.

Check it out at http://www.digitaldialects.com

Diving, Dancing Raisins

Materials

Raisins

Lemonade

A glass jar

First we half filled a jar with lemonade, and then we added a handful of raisins. We then waited to see what happened. 

The raisins danced around in the jar; floating up to the top and then diving down to the bottom again. The reason the raisins floated to the top of the jar was because the bubbles in the lemonade, stuck to the sides of the raisins. This made the raisins more buoyant. If things are buoyant they are able to float more easily.

Once the raisin coated bubbles reached the surface of the lemonade, the bubbles popped, and the raisins sunk down to the bottom once more.

Magic: Run Away Pepper

We used a bowl of water, a sprinkle of pepper and detergent to experiment with surface tension.

We put some water in a bowl and then sprinkled it with pepper. Next we put a drop of detergent into the centre of the bowl. What happened?  Did the pepper change?

Yes. The pepper zoomed away from the detergent.

This is because the soap breaks the surface tension of the water and the tension on the rest of the water pulls the floating pepper away from the soap. 

Using our Prior Knowledge

This week we have been learning about using our prior knowledge to help us with our reading. Using the information that we already know helps us to understand new information in our reading books. Today, before we began reading ‘A quilt for Kiri’, we looked at the cover and some of the pictures. Then we recorded all our thoughts and ideas: “what we already knew” onto a chart. Using prior knowledge made the book easier and more interesting to read.
Tasi, Rachana, Line and Ahsan

What is Change? What Makes Things Change?

Our topic this term is "Sharing our Stories" and learning how these stories have changed over time. 

As part of this topic, we are learning all about change. We will be learning what is change, and what makes things change. We are beginning by observing some very simple science experiments that show how things change.

 (Thanks to Mrs Douglas from Room 4 for sharing her experiment information with us).

Swirling Whirling Milk Patterns

For this experiment you will need

Whole milk at room temperature

Food colouring

Dish wash Detergent 

A shallow dish

We poured some whole milk into a shallow dish

Next we added a few drops of food colouring into the milk

Then we added in a drop of dish wash detergent

What Happened!

The fat in the milk is broken down by the detergent. This caused the food colouring to swirl and whirl and make amazing patterns. It was like looking through a kaleidoscope. 

Wow!

Compound Words

Rachana, Tasi and Line have been 

learning all about compound words. 
They have to match the two word 
cards to make up a compound word. Once they have done this they then have to make up sentences using the words. Big ups to Cherry Carl for her wonderful resources. Check out her resources on the link above. 

Water, water everywhere...

As part of our topic study on 'Sustainability', we have been learning about the Water Cycle. We looked at some National Geographic Readers on Water as well as some great information that we found on the Internet. A favourite of all the children was the Water Cycle Song. They especially liked the catchy tune and even made up their own actions.

Today they worked together to put water cycle pictures and words into the right order. Great work team!

Good Bye Caroline - We're going to miss you

Today the ESOL team said farewell to our wonderful year 5 student Caroline, who is moving to Auckland with her family. 

Caroline started at Addington in year 1 and has been an active member of our ESOL group, as well as a founding member of the Addington Green Team. 

When interviewed for the blog, Caroline, who loves to read and grow vegetables said she will miss her Esol friends, the library, the Green team, Ms Loveridge and Ms Mac.

Caroline always role modeled the Addington Attitude and she will be sorely missed by children and staff alike. Her Auckland school is very lucky to have such a outstanding young lady join them, and we wish her all the very best for the future.

Water

 This week we have been learning all about water. First read a book about water and learnt that water can be liquid, solid or gas. This book helped us understand all about water by showing us pictures of water in these three different forms.

Then we sorted some pictures of water in different states to show that we had remembered what we had learnt.

World Refugee Day Christchurch 20 June 2010

World Refugee Day is an opportunity to reflect and acknowledge the courage, resilience and strength of refugees. Global attention is focused not only on the plight of refugees and causes of their exile but also on their determination and the contribution they make to their host communities.

The global theme for World Refugee Day in 2010 is “Home.” 

See the poster above for Christchurch Celebrations.

For more information go to

http://www.refugeeservices.org.nz/home

Tongan Colours

Amanda has finished her wonderful Tongan Poster. Great work Amanda.

Samoan Language Week: Teaching the Teachers

Tasi and Line check out the teachers' Samoan Workbook

The Samoan children have had a busy week, teaching the teachers at our school some Samoan words and phrases. We think that these children are all wonderful teachers and thank them for the enthusiasm they have put into this task. Well done Faalagi, Fili, Peiai, Miracle, Venus, Izaia, Dupri, Jeremy, Utu, Tasi and Line. We are all very proud of you.

Miracle, Tasi and Line help Mrs Barr learn her Samoan numbers

Samoan Language Week 2010

We began our Samoan Language Week by taking some beautiful posters that we made in our ‘First language Group” to our junior classrooms so that the children can learn some Samoan words. We made them on the computer using KidPix.

Trees are Treasures

We Love Trees

We have been learning all about trees. 

'Go Fish' Tongan Style

 At our First Language Group on Friday, the children used some of our 'Tongan Colour Cards’ to play a game of ‘Go Fish’. This is a great way for them to practise all the colour words that they have learnt. We now need to make some cards for all the other languages that our wonderful children can speak.

A Trees Life

This week in our ESOL Groups we have been looking at the life cycles of trees.

First, we read the book’ A Trees Life” together and then went for a walk around the playground to look at the big and little trees. We also looked at different types of seeds and how plants disperse their seeds: either by wind, water and animals.

Now we know all about a tree’s life cycle and can put all the words and pictures in the right order.