The Wicked Fairy phoned Mrs Kruijer

Oh dear, Mrs Kruijer got a very angry phone call at 5 o'clock (5 am) yesterday morning! You know how much the Wicked Fairy does not like children especially after Hansel and Gretel nibbled on the gingerbread cottage and then shoved the defenceless witch into her own oven! Well, she was very upset because the children had done so much work researching, writing and acting about using manners but they were not remembering to use them all the time. Especially when Mrs Western took them for a Health Lesson about being a good friend this week! Everyone had forgotten their manners! The class thought we had better do something and so we are writing instructions about how to use good manners.

Later in the day we had a visit from Mr Turrell (DP) and he had a very important message from the Good Fairy. She had emailed Mr Turrell and told him to take a look at Room 23's blog because they had been doing so much wonderful work learning about manners. So Mr Turrell thought he would pop in to share this with Room 23. He told us we were a wonderful class and we used our best manners when he visited. That was really good news! We hope the Fairy Godmother will tell the Wicked Witch!

We are a little worried because the Big Bad Wolf is visiting the Three Little Pigs next week. We must get our manners instructions written before he goes!

Parents
Using the inquiry model through drama, art and literacy we have extended the manners theme through to using the traditional Fairy Tales because of the use of messages throughout the stories. If you some time free Tuesday or Wednesday afternoons to read your favourite Fairy Tale you are welcome to come into the class. It will give the children an opportunity to use their manners too!
We are also looking at geometry in maths and through that we will explore the artist Picassso and Maori colours. The children are investigating mask making for the Three Little Pigs play and will look at integrating all these ideas together. Masks from home are welcome as examples. The end product will be a paper mache mask. Our work afternoons on the masks will be Tuesdays and Wednesdays. Please come in if you can :)

Homework
Click on this wiki link
You will be taken to our continuous story using spelling words.

Maths Books are going home today

Maths books are going home today. Please check the bookbags for these. I haven't put in a comment sheet this time but if you feel you would like to leave a comment for your child please do!

No school tomorrow. Teacher Only Day. Enjoy the long weekend :)

Plays and Drama

We have made our Manners doco-drama. If the children bring in a DVD disc I can burn a copy for you. Although you probably do not need to because here it is. Enjoy!



Thank you for the work you put into helping your child to get this information together. It is all very interesting and we have all learned so much!
We have peer evaluated our doco-drama and here is what we thought:
1. Parents and grandparents need to write down the information using language we can read and understand.
2. Parents need to help us at home to practice reading the information.
3. Talk clearly and with expression. Not too fast and not too slow.
4. Remember to pause and stop at the commas and full stops.
5. When in the drama remember to stay in the role of the character.

The doco-drama is based on the style of a German playwright, Bertolt Brecht. Here are some examples if you are looking to know more about our drama.




Jerome Bruner's notion of forming concepts through a three modes of representation and to use these three modes as a useful way of understanding:

Symbolic: mostly words, spoken or written, but also maths symbols, musical notes

Iconic Paintings: drawings, photos, videos, diagrams (visual representation)

Enactive Doing: engaging physically

Hopefully you can see these ideas coming through in our Manners doco-drama. It would be fantastic if you could leave us a comment!

Speaking of Change

Week 4

There have been lots of great stories about manners and etiquette come in from Mums, Dads and Grandparents. The children will be reading these so please get your child to read your story to you at home. Talk to them about reading your story fluently and clearly with expression.

Don't forget the home learning activities. I do not see many ticks on the sheets?? Are you forgetting to use your manners at home?

Under the Sea news week 2

Well done everyone who presented their homework this week. Here are some we videoed:


We were trying to be clever with how we videoed and we tried to have the video picture behind the speaker but it hasn't worked! Maybe try something else next time.