Worm farming in Room 1

In Room 1 we have been learning about worm farms. Natalie came to teach us what worms like to eat. Did you know the Tiger Worms in the worm farm don't like onions, garlic or spicy food?
We went outside to look at our school worm farm and Natalie showed us the different layers.
We even got to make our own mini worm farm. First we put in wet newspaper and wet leaves, next soil and then some Tiger Worms. The worms started wriggling into the soil, where it was dark and cool. On top we put a piece of banana skin for the worms to eat. Natalie put air holes in the lid then we put them in a cool dark place. 
We think our worms will be very happy in their new homes!

ASB

Every Friday this term Rooms 1, 3 and 4 got on the bus to go to the ASB Centre. We were split into two groups. One group worked with Will, who taught us ball skills, and the other group worked with Zoe and Emilia on gymnastics. To begin our ball skills session we did lots of warm up activities and played fun games like Octopus. We practised lots of ball skills such as how to kick the ball correctly and how to stop it quickly.  We did individual skills, then we worked with a partner and finally we played a proper game of Futsal. Who knows, maybe one day one of us will play for the All Whites.

Part of our gymnastic session included learning the basic movements such as pike, tuck and straddle and how to land in the "motorbike" position. It was fun playing on the different equipment including the climbing frames, balance beam and the swinging bar.  We also practised doing a forward roll.

Here we are doing our warm up activities and lots of different skills such as climbing, balancing and jumping.

Football

This term we were lucky to have some coaching sessions run by the Wellington United Football Club. The coaches taught us the basic skills needed to play football. We practiced our dribbling, passing and goal shooting, while playing fun games like stuck in the mud. When it was fine we used the top field and when it was wet we used the hall.
Playing football was really fun and we hope they come back to our school again.

Waste Heroes Performance

Last Friday we watched a performance in our hall about Ngake and Whataitai, the two taniwha of Whanganui-a-tara. The story was told with the two taniwha moving and dancing around the hall. Some of us were a little scared of the taniwha costumes until we realised they were just actors dressed up. The taniwha shared some good messages about looking after the earth, by recycling, composting and reducing our use of plastic. 
After the show the Taniwha presented a Taonga to our school which was accepted by Joe Barry. To thank our visitors, the whole school sang Ko Toku Marae Tenei which sounded so powerful and beautiful. 

Matariki Celebrations

Today at Kilbirnie School, we celebrated Matariki, which is the Maori New Year. We were all given the opportunity to choose 3 activities to do throughout the day. Some of the choices were cooking kumara, making lanterns, weaving Harakeke (flax) flowers, koru patterns, making stars, Maui and the sun art, a matariki mural, making a Poi, harvesting and cooking kai (soup).  It was fun because we got to work with different students and teachers.

At 5.00pm some of us came back to school to watch the Kapa Haka group perform in the hall. They were amazing. After the concert we shared kai including a sausage sizzle and homemade soup with bread.

                                    

Run-a-thon

The week after our cross country, our school held it's yearly Run-a-thon. It was a dress up event and it was wonderful to see all the different costumes the other children and the teachers were wearing. Before the event, we were asked to set a goal, telling the teacher how many laps we thought we could run in five minutes.  Then when the big day arrived we all gathered on the bottom court and lined up in our class groups. We were so surprised to see so many parents supporting us.  Rm 1 children ran first and we had to run around the track as many times as we could in five minutes.  Although five minutes is not a long time, it certainly seemed like it, when we were running.  Rms 3 and 4 followed, then we went back to class and our teachers called out the number of laps we actually did. Lots of us scored the same laps as we expected we would and some of us ran even more.  When Whataitai Hub and Matairangi Hub had run their laps around the outside of the school, all the children gathered in the hall and they announced the winners of the dress up competition and also spot prizes  Tom Oscroft from Rm 4  and Clara Bannister from Rm 1 were the winners of the dress up competition but we all agreed everyone looked amazing and we had so much fun.

                                                                   

The money raised from this event will be used for the development of the playground and equipment for lunchtime activities and extra curricular groups.