Welcome to Room 13!

Submitted by Vanessa Campbell on 15 February 2010 - 5:19pm

A very warm welcome to all the new families to Room 13.  I trust you had a lovely Christmas and summer holiday and are now excited for the year ahead!

SUSTAINABILITY is the name of our topic for the whole year.

Topic - Tangata WhenuaEnglish version of treaty

Our topic this term is called Tangata Whenua.  It focuses on the New Zealand culture and we will be asking how do we sustain our culture? What is important to us here in NZ? How do we keep our history/Maori heritage alive?

First up we will be looking at the significance of Waitangi Day and why we have a public holiday on 6 February each year.   We will be discussing the need in society for rules, who makes them and what happens if you disobey them.  As a class we will be making our own treaty, with rules we think are important to abide by in Room 13.
During our holidays some of us will have travelled.  We are going to find out how to pronounce the Maori place names and what they actually mean.  For the non Maori place names we will also endeavour to find out why they were named these particular names.
We have a trip to the Museum planned so we can visualise what we are learning about in the classroom by looking through the Maori Galleries and attending the Maori cultural show.
In reading we will be looking at lots of Myths and Legends and in Te Reo Maori we will endeavour to  pronounce  place names correctly and incorporate Te Reo into our everyday classroom life.

Reading

Reading is part of our homework every night.  Some of us have a reader to read to Mum or Dad and some of us are able to choose our own chapter book.  Regardless, everybody must read outloud every night as it is very important for building reading mileage and confidence.  We all have brand new reading diaries that need to be signed by an adult each night.  In class we will be having a competition with prizes awarded once the certificates have been achieved.  While you are reading it would be a good idea to  practise your fluency or expression or get Mum/Dad to ask you some questions once you have finished reading.

 

Maths

Learning your basic facts is an essential part of Maths.  Below are some links of just a few games available to practise.  There are a whole load available both online and as apps on Ipod touches or Iphones that are fantastic practise.

 
 

 

Library

Our library day is Wednesday.   Bookbags are needed to be able to borrow books.  Please remind your child to put their library books in their bags on a Thursday evening.

Homework  

Homework goes home on a Monday and is due back on a Friday.  It is not any extra work, just some practise of things that need to be consolidated to help classroom learning.  Homework consists of re-reading your book outloud to Mum or Dad, practising your basic facts so that you have an instant recall and learning some spelling words.  It should take no longer than 30 minutes per afternoon.

Contact

If you have any questions or concerns my best contact is email, however if you would like to speak to me directly, please make an appointment as I often am busy setting up for the day in the morning and have meetings after school.