Storylines Tours

This Thursday, the year 5, 6, 7, 8 extension groups will be going to the Vodafone Events Centre in Manukau for the Storyline Tour. We will be watching 4 New Zealand authors such as Jill MacGregor, Paula Green, Juliette Maciver and  Cath Mayo.

For those who don't know much about Paula Green, she is a New Zealand author who writes poems and children's books. Most of her books include animals, the weather and season. At the moment, she is based west Auckland.

Catherine Mayo, also known as Cath Mayo is a children's and young adult author. Her latest book is The Bow Win or lose?. If I were to describe Catherine in 2 words I would say 'Musical' and 'Outdoorsy'. Mayo is in a band called Gentle Annie.

Jill MacGregor is a Pacific Children book writer that many New Zealand School teacher should have heard of. Most of the pictures in her books capture children using environmental resources to maintain the tradition's of that particular country.

Last but not least is Juliette Maciver, another very talented New Zealand writer. Juliette is a children's book writer and has been writing stories ever since she was young. She has written books such as 'Toucan Can', 'Queen Alice's Palaces' and 'Little Witch'.

I am looking forward to listening to all of these writers. Hopefully I will learn something to use for my future stories.

Life Education

Because we are growing up, we spent the first 4 weeks of term 3 at Life Education.

Drugs are one of the worlds most committed crimes and at the Life Education Caravan, Lynn and Harold taught us about the effects it has on people that take drugs at a young age. The first thing we learnt was that taking drugs doesn’t help you reach your full potential. One drug in particular is Marijuana, also known as the gateway drug. ‘Gateway Drug’ means when you take this drug you would want to have more and it is easy to get and very, VERY addictive. Remember that drugs do not choose people, people choose drugs and always be careful.

My Made up Mascot

Recently in Class 1, we have been learning about what a mascot is and what its purpose is. I found out that a mascot is a person or thing that is meant to bring good luck, especially one that is linked to a particular organisation or event.

We studied past mascots such as Shera, from the 2010 Commonwealth games and Clyde from this years Commonwealth games. After the we all had to create our own mascot that represented New Zealand, if we held the next Commonwealth games.

It took me a long time to choose what I wanted to draw because New Zealand has a lot of very beautiful things that is significant to New Zealand. In the end I drew a kiwi and named him ‘Wairua’, in translation, ‘Spirit’. I chose this name because I think New Zealand has a lot of team spirit.

Astria Countdown to Impact - Take 2

This afternoon, Jorja and I played again this afternoon and we were able to complete our mission and save the Earth. 

I thought because we've already played it that it will be easier but I was wrong. This time I found figuring out what the clues meant was very, very hard. From this game I have learnt a lot of very big words that I didn't know. I really enjoyed it and I am hoping to play it more in the future.

Astria Countdown to Impact

Today at Extension, we played a game called Astria Countdown to Impact that was made by a man named Steven. We first had to take 2 tests, a vocabulary test and a test the involves us pretending to be detectives looking for clues. It wasn't until we started playing the game that I realized that the test really helped.

The most difficult part of the game for me was trying to understanding the information that was given to us by the game. I also thought that finding the clues was hard. Even though Jorja and I found three of them. I found completing the Solar Sail (the first room we completed) easy because it wasn't as complex as the Nuke Lab.

Before the next time we play I want to try and remember all the words we learnt and and the clues that we were given. Stay tuned because there are more posts to come about the amazing game - 'Astria Countdown to Impact'