Term 3 Week 9 Newsletter - Celebrating Learning in Room 1

The article below is from our school newsletter for the week 

In Room 1, the last two weeks have been amongst our most exciting! Tongan Language Week allowed some of our students to really take ownership of their heritage. We learned a lot about the Tongan people and their rich culture with daily snippets of learning, and during the morning quiz. Foli, Kingston, Iola and Lindarose showed great leadership to lead others through Tongan song and dance. Lastly, Room 1's film is finally completed. We can't wait to see all of school’s faces on the big screen at Sylvia Park in Term 4!  

2022 Duffy Role Model Assembly with Jack Tame

A few things stood out for me today when New Zealand journalist, Jack Tame, visited Ruapotaka School today as the special guest at our Duffy Assembly: 

1: Jack looks just as cool as our students good in the same royal blue we have for our school uniform, 

2: Jack speaks really good te reo Maori, and 

3: Jack is a very friendly and charismatic person. 

For those of you who don't know, Jack Tame is a famous New Zealander whose face you may have seen on tv. He was on Breakfast TV, lead the national news and even had a spot on Shortland Street. Jack's role as a journalist has taken him around Aotearoa and MANY other countries. Antarctica sounded like the most surprising place because it's not an easy place to get to, so it was even more exciting to hear he was able to use a helicopter while he was there. 

There is absolutely no doubt that Jack captured everyone's attention when he spoke about his travels and the famous people he'd met - Jay Z, Rihanna, Beyonce, Sonny Bill Williams, All Blacks, Warriors just to name a few. There were a few ooh's and ahh's from the students. 

What was even better listening to than Jack's list of famous people he'd met, was hearing how he got there and that was through reading. Jack loved reading the news in the morning before school and would read at night before he went to sleep. 

"I loved being transformed to the places I would read about"

"If you want to do some of the cool things I've done, read!"

We enjoyed meeting a famous kiwi. He took time to even come to each class for a photo. Big ups to today's prefect speakers, and Mrs T and Miss Clarken for setting up today's assembly. 

2022 Tongan Language Week at Ruapotaka School

Malo e lelei! 

The pics and video below are of Room 1 and Ruapotaka School celebrating Tongan Language Week. 

We hope you enjoy viewing these as much as we enjoyed learning about Tonga! 

Please note, video is currently only accessible by Ruapotaka School accounts only

Cybersmart Challenge #20, Email Etiquette and PB4L Respect

Today we learnt how to comment on Google Docs in different ways. For this task we had to make a comment on a random fact, comment a suggestion for a synonym of a word, write a positive thoughtful helpful comment and add in an action request for a friend. Below you can see my screenshots of my work. I found this task to be so fun and I learnt how easy it is to use commenting in Google Docs. 

Yesterday, Mr Goodwin joined in on our morning check in session. He lead a lesson on email etiquette. I enjoyed the lesson because it was another opportunity for my class to practise good habits when communicating formally and digitally. 

Our PB4L focus this week was showing Respect for others, ourselves and environment, in the context of Distance Learning. This is just as important as being face to face because we have to be clear in our actions and words, especially while online. Here are some things we are tying to show while learning from home: 

Room 1 Whole School Assembly

 

Room 1 were lead by Ray and Sefo in hosting the Week 5 Whole School Assembly. They showed a bit of nerves but spoke clearly in all of their parts to lead the acts, karakia and waiata. Room 1's class item was sharing their "wins" from the 2022 Commonwealth Games. I found it particularly interesting learning about the South Pacific Islands. Room 1 presented their learning on colourful A3 posters about New Zealand, Niue, Samoa, Tonga and a few other places. 

Mrs Hamilton introduce the Prefects with their new shirts. They look very nice with the white and reflective detailing. They also have "PREFECT" printed on the back. The prefects are allowed to wear these whenever they want or when Mrs Hamilton needs them to. 

My class did an awesome job to prepare and present. Everyone showed great leadership, teamwork and played their part in contributing to the assembly. Foli and I'Ola were great directors in the lead up, while many others stepped up to present, write a script or refine what it was they wanted to share. 

Ka rawe, Room 1! 

2022 Room 1 Visual Profile

 

This slide deck is a visual profile of 2022 Room 1 at Ruapotaka School. Each student and teacher took some time to present a page of themselves and the things we love. Shout out to Oaki College Y7&8 for the inspiration with this task! 

What commonalities do you have with Room 1? 

The World's Biggest Problems

This Padlet was created to share our findings for the statement "The World's Biggest Problem". We are looking at this statement as part of our persuasive writing and reading. We discovered some very interesting facts about the world, especially some misconceptions people have about these problems. The website we used is called Gapminder. You should have a look for yourself! 

Persuasive Writing: I find it annoying when ...

This is my persuasive writing for this week about a couple of things I find really annoying. The focus was to use emotive language to persuade others to empathise or feel what I'm feeling. 

What pet peeves do you have? 

PE: Flag Football

What was today's PE session focus? 

In today's session with Lucas, we played a longer game of flag football. We learned a bit more about the rules and how to play. We tried coming up with our own strategies for offense (attack). Red Dragons had "The Charles Special" and "Number 1". The aim was to try and run decoy receivers to trick the defenders. 

What did we do well in today's PE session? 

We learned a few new strategies about how to play the game. I showed the Red Dragons what 'play-action' offense is. This is when you fake handing the ball off to the runner; the quarter back holds the ball instead, then looks for a pass downfield or runs. 

Yellow Tigers did well to stay on the field and keep trying their best. They employed the run a lot and scored a couple of touchdowns from it. 

What can we do better at next time? 

* We can pass the ball to more of our teammates 

* Try not to run on EVERY possession of the ball 

* Make sure anyone we bump into by accident, we make sure they are ok before playing on 

* I think our skill needed some more work because whenever we threw the ball, most times it landed short or the receiver dropped it. I think we can get better if we had a few more skills practise sessions, and played in smaller teams. STILL fully enjoyed playing and running with my class! 

Solomon of Red Dragons, blazing up field for the touchdown; Yellow Tigers watching in amazement at his lightning flash speed. 

Google Drawing practise: mask selfie

This is my mask selfie I created today using Google Drawing. The tools we used were the line curve, ordering, shapes and colour. It is important to wear your mask so you limit the spread and possible catching of omicron, which is in our community. 

Room 7 Clock Out for 2021

Today is the last day of school in 2021 for Ruapotaka . I have successfully completed one year at only my second school to ever teach at. It has been a challenging, testing but FUN time as one of two Year 7&8 teachers. 

I would like to thank the students in Room 7 for making our class one of the best places to be in 2021. I got to know a very different group of people from where I last taught. I learned how much Room 7 loves a laugh, card games, sport, art, music, food, gaming, sleep and learning - all things which I love just as much. One of my best memories was the Y7&8 sailing trip at Okahu Bay. 

Lockdown really tested our patience and persistence with being online and completing home learning. Some people enjoyed working to their own time, while many of us missed being in an actual school or classroom. It's probably fairer to say we really missed seeing each other. 

While we are now back at school to finish the year, only eight of a possible twelve have been able to return. Those who have been back have enjoyed playing Monopoly Deal, the waterslide, free milk, volleyball and hanging out with friends (DJ, Renei, Ocean, Hone, Willie, Sonny, Malachi). Those who have remained at home do so to limit their contact with possible covid cases, a decision we all accept with great understanding. Huge thanks to those students who have been able to remain in contact and I hope to see you all again in the near future (Pita, Sosefina, Krista). If anyone sees Jairus and Solomon, please pass on our well wishes to them. 

The 2021/2022 Summer Learning Journey begins this week. Be sure to register and keep up your blog posting. There are some really cool ideas to help keep your writing levels up during the break. 

My thanks goes also to those who have helped me in my path this year to help Room 7 be the best versions of themselves in 2021: the school community of Ruapotaka; our Manaiakalani tutors; Belfast School as our Tuhi Mai Tuhi Atu partner school; Y7&8 Tamaki College Technology teachers; Ruapotaka School Board of Trustees. 

What have we been up to? 

Friday Fun Day took place last week. Class bubbles rotated through activities like the waterslide, sponge bucket relay, volleyball, dodging water balloons and a fan favourite - the bouncy castle! We had bbq sausages for lunch and an ice bl0ck to end the day. 

The Year 8 Day Out was a great way for our most senior students to let their hair down and have some fun. Mr O'Brien, Mrs Cardoza and I took a seven of the lads out to Okahu Bay where the boys played on the massive playground, some touch and rugby on the fields before cooling off in high tide. We brought the boys back to school where they had sausages for lunch and were hosted in the multipurpose room. Karaoke, Jumanji, milkshakes and the new playground were the order for the day. 

After a hectic day out, several members of the school staff had another surprise planned for our Year 8 students - Drive By Graduation! Level 3.2 means we still cannot have parents and families on site to school. Our principals planned an awesome evening where we would drive to each of the families of our Y8 students to celebrate their end at primary school, and moving on to high school. Parents knew we were coming but the seniors had no clue! We were like a little party crew of teachers, complete with a loud speaker, placards, decorations and party attitude like no other. We would park up at each student's house, blast the speaker and sing "happy graduation!" to the students. Many of those students were genuinely taken by surprise, each person a mix of excitement, embarrassment (the neighbours and police came out at one point), pride, humility and honour. Also a bit of fatigue from the day out of school. 

Congratulations, Y8 class of 2021. It has been a true pleasure watching you grow more comfortable in your own skin, gain confidence in yourselves and your abilities. Each of you has shown a considerably positive shift in your effort to become responsible, young adults. All the best for your years at high school! 

We recently had the 2021 Ruapotaka School Prize Giving Ceremony. This was a fantastic event which honoured many students for their high effort in class and home learning, as well as citizenship at school. Room 7 is proud to present DJ, Renei and Malachi as the newest Room 7 school prefects for 2022. All three students have displayed great teamwork and potential for leadership in the time I have gotten to know them. Something I really like about our prize giving is that student nominations for awards are shared at the ceremony. Ocean mentioned in his blog post that although many did not get an award, it is still important to recognise that all of us has made many achievements in 2021. Sometimes these go unnoticed but we still need to be proud of those moments. 

On behalf of Room 7, we wish you all the best for your summer holidays. Take care, look after yourselves and your families! Mr N