The Pump House Theatre

Laughter, giggles and smiling faces.

Yesterday afternoon some Ruapotaka students were lucky to observe the humorous performance of Tim Bray’s Production. The broadway show was great!

Through out the whole show a lovely lady named Kelly was on the side interpreting the actors roles in sign language. She had awesome expression on her face whilst she was translating.

I’d like to thank Mr and Mrs. Becroft for paying for us and giving us the experience of watching the show. They decided to pay for us and other schools so we could have the experience they felt the first time they sat in the Pumphouse Theatre.

We sat comfortably in our seats, enjoying Grandma Mcgarvey’s adventures about her life changing events and Grandpa’s  stuck up ways about him not having to wear new clothes and even going to the beach.

By Mira and Damien

My Role as a Manaiakalani Ambassador

The sight of my picture exposed on the projector signaled it was my time to speak. Eyes concentrated on me and waiting for me to begin. I took a deep breath and began presenting my speech loud and clear.

I wasn't really shy, thanks to the encouragement of my teacher and principal who helped me overcome my stage fright.

Hearing a whole selection of new subjects I didn't know existed was great. The other students there informed me well about what they did and I also enjoyed the humorous speeches and videos. I am looking forward to presenting my next speech.

Here’s the link to my speech. Check it out and give me a feedback on something I can improve next time.

Here is my speech

Kia Ora my name is Miria and I am a year 8 student who attends Ruapotaka School which is a full primary school located on Taratoa Street.

This year my class took on the task of hosting our Senior Syndicate Assembly. This meant we had to negotiate with each other and organise roles to present. The displaying of our work was to be included in our assembly. Making a selection of songs also needed to be added. This was difficult because we all had to agree with the song choices and they had to be appropriate for school-aged children.. We asked for requests from other teachers and classes and what they wanted to sing. We made a decision about a couple of songs as a class.

Next we made a Google document and shared it with everyone who was participating and contributing to the hosting of the assembly, so they had access to it and we could then begin our collaboration.. Then we inserted a table and laid out our parts of the speech. We had to decide what items we wanted included in our assembly and who was going to say what and in what order they were to be said. We inserted the links to the songs the google document so they were only a click away. We argued, agreed, disagreed, negotiated and finally came to a compromise on the schedule.

When this was completed, we had to memorize our speeches and present them loud and clear.

Finding students in my class who wanted to showcase their Independent Inquiry learning about Water Sustainability and Wastewise was simple.

Five students including myself volunteered to display our visual arts and google presentations. Each of us had a WALT to state that was relevant to our artwork, and we obtained these WALTs through our classroom’s daily planner.

Our teacher went over what we decided and double checked everything made grammatical sense. Our teacher provided us with her opinions and we made changes as a group. In our classroom we are independent learners.

The assembly was under way and I thought it went better than I expected. Teachers complimented us on how well we had done. Our teacher, other classroom teachers as well as an observer who had come to watch our learning were impressed by the  collaborative work we had done together and the co-operation that was needed in making this work for us.

Our assembly was done and dusted and each of us hostesses and hosts went into our Google drive and wrote a blurb about what we did to take part in our assembly. Our photos were taken while we were hosting the assembly and uploaded them to our class site. Each of us took a photo and inserted it into our blog.

Damien's Water Sustainability

Elizabeth's Wastewise

Miria's blogsite

Senior Syndicate Assembley

At the Senior Syndicate Assembly I displayed my water symbol. I was the second to announce one of our many Visual Arts WALTS. We also explained how and why we drew our symbols.

Yummy Chocolate Log!

Last week at Technicraft we decorated our chocolate logs with multiple brands of chocolate. I decided to drizzle melted chocolate over the top of my log. 
I thought that flowers would look nice on my log too. I created the flowers by cutting some white buttons in halves and I laid them out in a circle with the curves facing the right. Then for the ovary I placed little dark chocolate buttons in the middle of the chocolate petals. I scrunched a chocolate flake and dropped it from a height.

Preventing Illness

Rheumatic Fever

Rheumatic Fever is a serious condition which could affect your future. Rheumatic fever starts off as a sore throat which eventually becomes worse over time and can lead to painful nights in hospital.

Rheumatic fever often affects children between 5 - 15 year old children. Rheumatic Fever tends to strike boys more than girls.

The consequences of not checking your sore throat can lead to strep throat. Then widespread inflammation spreads in your throat. You'll get rushed into hospital and marked with a scar that will never disappear.

Things you can do to prevent rheumatic fever:

• Inform a parent
• Go to your local clinic and get it checked
• Don't drink cold water
• Stay in sight of your parents

Get rid of it before it's too late.

Water Consumption by Life Forms and Humans

If you were offered to have a never ending water supply or gold what would you take? Think carefully because humans have been taking water for granted over the past 50 years. Each day water goes down the drain litre by litre and humans are ignorant of not knowing how much water we waste daily.

    In your household washing dishes, showering, flushing toilets and gardening are some water necessities that humans require. Water keeps humans hydrated and it contains calcium, magnesium and potassium which is good for us.

    Agriculture uses the most percentage of water. It uses more than two thirds of the water  globally. Agriculture helps to raise livestock,, grow crops, and  food to feed the livestock. It also includes the process of watering the crops through sprinklers and trenches which is more efficient for farmers.

    In some countries water is precious and they are in need of water hydration to survive. Their water is either polluted or they have to walk kilometres in the heat to provide water for their families.They don't have access to the quantity of water they should consume.

    

    Another life form that needs water to survive is plants. Plants need to absorb  water to hydrate themselves, provide themselves with nutrients and keep themselves functioning properly just like humans.  

   Unlike humans, plants consume water differently, They have vascular tissues which help to transport water and minerals from the roots to the leaves. They can also get water through dew, irrigation and rainfall.

    Plants use photosynthesis. This is how they grow sugary foods for themselves. Photosynthesis starts of when humans breath out carbon dioxide. The carbon dioxide goes through the tree which then becomes oxygen. But while this is happening the sun provides nutrients and energy for the tree while roots provide the tree with water to keep it hydrated.

Water is important for all life forms. Please take what you have learnt and use it to preserve water.

               

Maths Strategy

Strategy 5 - Regroup and Combine Compatible Numbers

On the first day at school we used 56 litres of water, On the second day we used 89 litres of water and on the third day we used 14 litres of water. How much water have we used over the last three days?

Equation:/.;

56+89+14

= (56+14)+89

=70+89

=159

I used this strategy because its simple to calculate. We have been learning all the different strategies in maths.