Rippa Rugby

For Kiwisport we are learning how to play Rippa Rugby. As most of us are pretty big rugby fans we are really enjoying increasing our skills and knowledge of this sport.

Today we worked on defending; trying to rip a flag off the person carrying the ball. We started by getting into pairs and taking it in turns to act as the ball carrier and the defender. It was harder to take the flags off than we first thought and we realized that we had to be quite quick to grab the flag - it was easier to take a lunge to the side of someone and make a grab than to run behind them!

After practicing these skills we launched into a quick game which we really enjoyed. We focused on getting used to the way the game is played and working together to be strong attackers/ defenders. We look forward to introducing more rules and positions into these games as we develop our skills and understanding further!

Grease is the word!

Today room 8 and the seniors at Glenbrae School were fortunate enough to watch Auckland Girls' Grammar school's production of the musical Grease. Check out AJ's review of the show!

Grease is about a girl named Sandy from Australia who is an intelligent nerd. She likes a boy called Danny who is in a group of cool boys. A group of girls help Sandy to be with Danny.

My favourite part of the play was when they sang Grease Lightning because I liked the dancing. I liked that the actors all had a lot of confidence and they were talented. I would recommend this play to high school students as the story is set in high school. I'd tell them that it is about a nerd who wants to fit in. I would say that it is very funny and also very realistic.

English High Society

We learnt that it is polite to eat the scone as two separate halves

Today we compared the differences in cultural protocols between the Māori and British during the 19th century. We looked at tikanga last week and discussed these before we made our Takakau, so we discussed English cooking and protocol this week before we made scones.

Trent illustrating correct napkin use

This morning we baked the scones in the oven and learnt about the English upper class and high teas. We discussed etiquette and how many rules the British had around having afternoon tea - even regarding which direction to stir the tea! We then practiced these as we sat to enjoy our scones.

Keeping our napkins on our laps we take small bites!

Keeping elbows off the table!

This was very timely as we were off to watch a play soon after - another English tradition that was around in the 1800s (and before).

How to make Takakau

This week we made Takakau after being inspired by Room 5 at Kawakawa Primary School.  We then learnt how to follow the structure of a procedural text. This is what Mathew created:

Takakau is a Maori bread that was first made when the Europeans came to New Zealand and they brought flour to the country. You can eat it with butter and syrup or you can have it with a boil up or hangi.

 Ingredients
1 teaspoon salt (to your taste)
2 cups flour
2 teaspoon baking powder (optional)
100 ml milk or water


First mix the flour,salt,and baking powder together

Then sift or mix all the ingredients together.
Slowly add in the milk to the middle of the bowl and stir it.

Then knead the dough.

Place the dough into a pan and make it flat

Then it is ready to be cooked in the oven for half an hour at 200 degrees Celsius and eaten.

Geography Challenge!

While we have been looking at the history of New Zealand in our inquiry lessons, we have come across lots of information about other countries as well. This made us curious about the different cultures, countries and continents of our planet.

Miss Stone set up a Geography inquiry challenge where we had to use Atlas' and maps to find different information.We had to use lots of our reading skills as well, to skim and scan for information and to use the contents and index pages.

Handling our emotions

In Kiwican today we discussed how to manage our emotion. We need to be able to recognize and respond to our emotions so that we make logical decisions about things.

In one of our activities we had to act out a series of emotions, can you guess what we are trying to display in each of these pictures?

Te Reo

This week in our te reo lesson we learnt how to ask someone for a drink. Check out the cartoon that Alex and Trent made below: