Room 1 Class Treaty

 

Exploring our School

 

The Office and Sickbay

The Library

Our Swimming Pool

The Hall

The Redwood Tree - Stand Tall, Reach High
Tū Tangata Tū Māia!

Kia Ora, Welcome to Room 1, 2021

Kia Ora, ngā mihi nui ki a koutou

No Matamata ahau

Ko John tāku papa

Ko Carol tāku mama

Ko Hendry tāku tane

Ko Thomas tāku tama

Ko Emily tāku tāmahine

E noho ana au ki Kirikiriroa. 

My name is Rhonda Follows.  The children can call me Rhonda or Whaea Rhonda.

My background is in early childhood education, and teacher education.  

I have been teaching New Entrants at Hamilton East School for 5 years.  

My passions are transition to school and learning through play.   

I am the leader of the Kiwi Hub which is part of the Kowhai Team.  

If you have any questions I am available each morning from 8.30am to 8.50am, alternatively, I am available some afternoons after 3.00pm.

I look forward to getting to know you all this year. 

Week 1 term 4

 Kia Ora Whanau

We have had a great start to Term 4.  All learners are engaged, and happy to be back at school.  

This term is very busy, with the main focus of a trip to the zoo in Week 6.  We have started to talk about wild animals and their habitats, thinking about how animals move, and if they have fur, skin, paws, claws, etc.  The zoo trip and associated learning is always a fun and engaging topic for the class.

Week 1 has been a chance to talk about what we did in the holidays, and to play.

Hairdressers (or barbers) has been the ongoing game this week, which also included taking phone calls and making appointments.  Literacy and numeracy are woven into play, as well as developing social skills such as turn-taking.  Language is being developed, and children are making sense of something that happens in their world via play.  

After the play, we talked about who can really cut our hair, the hairdresser, barber, or Mum or Dad.  Important to know the difference between play and reality! 

We finished the week with a focus on learning new skills with pallet painting.  This is a process where the brush has to be dipped in water and then applied to the block of paint, the cleaned before choosing another colour.  A very calming and soothing activity.

Children could choose what they wanted to paint, but rainbows seemed to be the interest!

Exploring Rocks

 This week we were lucky enough to have the Rock Kit from the House of Science.

We started by looking closely at rocks/stones with a partner - what could we see?

There were many types of rocks, so we saw lots of colors and shapes.

Then we went on a rock hunt of our own.  We know that vulcanologists look at rocks, but we also learned that geologists study rocks too.

When we had found our rocks we washed them and looked at them closely with magnifying glasses.

In the Rock Kit were samples of fossils.  We spent time looking closely at these fossils (5 - 10 million years old!!), talking about how fossils had formed, and what was in them. 

Volcanoes

We have had a very busy 2 weeks back at school, welcoming new children into our classroom, and starting our science inquiry.
We are beginning with exploring volcanoes.  Already after 2 weeks, children are engaged and confident scientists, gathering and interpreting data we have so far found out about volcanoes.
Whaea Georgia has also been helping us explore volcanoes, I think everyone has probably come home using the word vulcanologist!
We already knew many things about volcanoes.

And these are the things we would like to find out.

We studied lava closely, as that is possibly the most exciting part of a volcano!  We learned that lava is called magma inside the volcano, and lava once it reaches the outside.

Drawing a picture of a volcano and labelling it:

A group of volcanologists reading about volcanoes!

This is the volcano poem we published this week:

Painting the volcano ready to go on the wall

Writing in a Play Based Classroom

Over the lockdown period, I attended online professional learning about supporting children's writing through play.
This has been a big focus of our school day. 
Children can choose from a variety of writing tools - pens, pencils, sharpies, clipboards, old exercise books, etc to write what they need to for their play.  Some of the writing has been signs, shopping lists, letters to Mum or Dad, etc.
Children are enjoying writing for a purpose in their play, this makes their writing meaningful and authentic.  Children choose to write by themselves, or with me to support.   There are specific stages of development that occur with children's writing, and writing this way enables me to see these and support the child to the next stage.