The River Story

A site for the holidays

As part of our new "National Study Week" program all of the students at your
school will have free unlimited 24 hour access to Smartkiddies from home next
week.

Our National Study Week will start on 1st of April (Thursday) and end on the
8th of April.

To take advantage of this special access opportunity, just let your students
know to login from home using their normal class login. Then click on the
"Study week logo" to enable "unlimited home access" for the week.

We have included a letter to parents you may wish to use.

www.smartkiddies.co.nz/flash/pdf/StudyWeek.doc
www.smartkiddies.co.nz/flash/pdf/StudyWeek.pdf
a text vesion is included at the bottom of this email

Mophies Water Story

Room 17's Boot plants

Last week we painted old shoes and planted pansies inside. They will look great in the garden.

Week 9

This week Room 17 are going to continue to look at water and the water cycle. We will also finish the week with some Easter activities. Homework this week is to visit Year 3 Home Learning Blog and try some maths and spelling activities.The school address and your goals for next term are in your homework book. Don't forget to keep reading every night
For news you are giving a short talk on things that move in water. If you have pictures you want to bring to help describe your vessel that would be great.
I hope you all have a well deserved holiday it has been a very busy term.

Week 8

This weeks news is sharing a favourite poem. We are trying to say a poem with a clear interesting voice. Some parts of the poem may be loud some soft, some parts may need a high voice and some a low voice.You could also use actions.
Also for homework is spelling words and sentences and a basic facts sheet.
We are spending the next 2 weeks learning about the water cycle and how it affects our environment.
Simon from Wanaka Wastebusters will be visiting on Thursday  to share some water experiments with us.

Next week for news is about moving through water - tell us about one way (boat, hovercraft, wakeboard, etc) that we  move through water.
This Friday at 1.30pm is a House Partcipation Afternoon and will finish by 3pm.
Don't forget the school Fair is this Saturday so bring in any used books, clothes or toys for us to sell.

Week 7

Swimming this week is in the primary school pool with each group having a 20minute slot.
Our times are: Monday 11.05, Tuesday 11.45, Wednesday 9.05, Thursday 9.05 and Friday 11.45. If the students could come in their togs on the days we swim at 9 it will save time.
Homework this week is a maths sheet, spelling words and sentences and news of their choice.
We have Ronald McDonald on Thursday to discuss road safety.
Next Monday Room 17 have half a day of health with Mrs Western. They will be focusing on the circulatory system of our body. The children will bring home their books on the circulatory system to discuss this week for homework.

Books Home

Last Friday your child brought home their maths book for you to look at(5th). This Friday, (12th)they will bring home their reading book and next Friday,(19th) they will bring home their writing book. This is for you to watch their progress and is instead of the Learning Journals, that used to come home each term. You are welcome to comment on the Parent Comment sheet glued into their books.

If your child wishes to order a book from the Scholastic Book Issue 2 they can bring their order to school by next Tuesday(16th).

Week 6

We have 2 more weeks of swimming but our times are different each day.
This week we are swimming in the High School pool.
Monday 8th - 11-11.30
Tuesday 9th- 11.45-12.15
Wednesday10th - 10.05-10.35
Thursday 11th - 9.45-10.15
Friday 12th 11.00- 11.30
Next week we will be back in the Primary School pool with different times.

Homework
This week there is a maths sheet, spelling words and sentences and a T.V.survey linking to our statistics we did in class last week. Your child should also have a new reading book each night. Let me know if there are any problems with this. We mark and discuss our homework activities on Friday's, so the homework book needs to be at school on Friday. The book bag needs to be at school every day. If your child wishes to do other activities go onto Year 3 Home Activities Blog Page. We have added a Key Competency Challenge on here.

Gondala /SkylineWalk

Last week the Year 3 Team walked some of the Gondala track with teachers and parents. Thanks to all those parents who were able to come and help us we had a great day. Here is what we looked like.

Welcome to Term 1 2010 Room 17

Welcome to Room 17 and Mrs Gray's Blog for 2010.
This term the important weekly events are P.E on Monday's,Library Tuesday's and lunchtime swimming for Year 3's is on a Monday.
This Thursday is Bike to School Day which means you can bike to school with an adult.
If you wish to follow the school Winter Olympics page http://qpsphotocover.blogspot.com/ will show you Abby's Dad's photos(he is working in Vancouver covering the skating and Bob sleigh.
Homework is starting this week with reading each night, a maths sheet and some Maori place names, finding the Maori words within the place name. For example Kaikoura - Kai-food,Koura-crayfish.

How to look after our worm farms.

Our worm farm needs to be in a shady and sheltered place.
Worms need protection from the sun.
We need to put 3 capfuls of water into the worm farm every 1-2 weeks.
Shake or turn your worm farm every 2 weeks.
Feed your worms every few days. They eat as much as they weigh.
Worms don't eat much bread. They don't eat citrus fruit (oranges,lemons,mandarins,grapefruit),kiwifruit,meat,dairy products(yoghurt,butter,milk,cheese).
Worms prefer their food chopped finely.
After a few weeks you could collect the vermacast .To get it out, put holes in the bottom of your worm farm, or pour it out of the top.
The vermacast is really good for the garden.

Music

Today we had a musician who showed us different styles of flutes, mouth organs and other things which became instruments such as spoons. Room 17 were lucky enough to get to play the ukulele.

Worm Farms

Room 17 have been learning about worms and worm farms this year. We have a worm farm that we feed and look after with the other Year 3 classes. Now that we are experts on Tiger Worms we have been designing our own worm farms. Today we made small worm farms with our Enviro School facilatator. We learnt how to layer the carbons and nitrogens and what we need to do to keep these worm farms healthy. We are going to write a "How to care for our worm farm" instructions which we will post soon.

Here are some of the photos of us making our worm farms.

Term 4

Welcome back to Term 4.
This term we are spending the first 2 weeks studying time in maths. I have put some time sites below if you want to practise time at home.
http://www.teachingtime.co.uk/draggames/sthec3.html
http://www.teachingtime.co.uk/clock2/clockwordsres.html
http://classroom.jc-schools.net/basic/math-time.html
http://www.softschools.com/time/tellingtime.jsp
We have a busy term with athletics and swimming which I will keep you informed of the times and dates.

Room 17's Assembly Item

Last Friday we presented our ideas about Recycling,Reusing and Redusing Rubbish.We are hoping that our ideas will grow in the school. Here are some photos of us.

Other Sites to explore and learn

Breathing EarthThis is incredible! http://www.breathingearth.net/Hold your mouse over a country to see the population size, births and deaths and CO2 emissions.

Free Rice
For each question you get right rice is donated to the hungry people in the world. http://www.freerice.com/index.php

Spelling Sites www.spellingcity.com/

Other Sites to explore and learn

Breathing EarthThis is incredible! http://www.breathingearth.net/Hold your mouse over a country to see the population size, births and deaths and CO2 emissions.

Term 3 2009

Welcome back to Term 3. Our topics this term are Kia Kaha which covers bullying issues and we are planning to design and build a worm farm as well. Our Maths this term is focussed on fractions and I will add some websites which students could use at home to practise fractions and basic facts.
In Physical Education we are skating on a Tuesday in Week 4,5and 7. We are also going cross counrty skiing in week 8. The day is still to be confirmed. We are also doing Jump Jam at school.
I will add other information, useful websites and photos as the term progresses.

Highlights of Term 2 2009

Room 17 have been looking at rubbish in our school. We have looked at recycling and reducing our rubbish too. Room 17 visited the Recycling Depot here are some of the things we saw.
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