River Walk

Here are some pictures of our river walk last term, and our writing about the walk.

We went to see two historic boats that are an important part of Hamilton's past - The Rangiriri, which was built to be a gunboat, but spent its life carrying freight and goods up the river, and Te Winika, a waka, that is in the Museum.

In Memorial Park

Isla: Yesterday our class went for a walk to the museum. First we saw Rangiriri the gunboat. It is the oldest surviving paddle steamer. The Rangiriri was built to be a gunboat but the war was already over so it spent its life pulling big barges. Then we walked over the bridge and saw Te Winika.

Te Winika has two big round eyes and they have feathers.

Karannpriett: On the walk to the museum I saw a red bucket in the river. Then we went inside the museum. We saw the waka. It was exciting.

Blake:  We went to the museum. I saw some pigeons under the bridge. We saw the waka Te Winika. It had two round eyes and they had feathers around the eyes. I like the trees by the river.

Teegan: People used the river for a road before they had roads.

We were very interested in the passing kayaks

Thea: Te Winika the waka was once in the land wars. There was another ship called the Rangiriri but it was too late for the war.

Here is the hull of the Rangiriri

Evanijah: The Rangiriri sat in the mud for a hundred years and we saw the rest of it on the riverbank.

D-Sharn: The Rangiriri lay on the riverbank for a hundred years.

 

Te Winika in the Waikato Museum

Rongo: Yesterday my class went to the museum. We saw Te Winika. At the front there were eyes made out of white feathers. The waka was ginormous. I was amazed.  The walk was painful for my legs.

Zari: Yesterday we had our river walk. We walked to the Museum. We saw Te Winika. She has two round feathered eyes. She is beautiful! Te Winika was once in a war. The waka is very old.

Lunch below the museum by the river

Hot air balloons

Last week we went to Marion School to see a hot air balloon up close.
Here are some pictures of the event:

Ready to set off.

 Watch the balloon grow

 And grow!

 And grow ...

 Until it starts to head upright ...

Turangawaewae

We have been learning about the great migration, when Maori first came to Aotearoa in their waka.
Here are some parts of the wall display we are creating in our classroom.
Come into our class and see our display.

We looked at this painting by William Goldie, that showed how hard it must have been for the people coming over the sea to Aotearoa. It inspired our writing.

Next we will be learning about when Pakeha came to Aotearoa and settled in Hamilton.

If you can help us with any pictures or information, we would welcome your contribution.

Swimming Lessons

Its been wonderful being able to go swimming every day in this hot weather.

We are very fortunate to have three swimming instructors from a community swimming organisation called Find Your Field of Dreams. 

Community Swim give free lessons to primary school children. Their goal is to teach all children basic survival skills.

Here are some photos of them in action with Room 13 children.

 

A new year

Hello and welcome to Room 13s blog.

This year we are part of Totara Team. We are mostly Year 3 learners but there are also some Year 2 children in our class. We are  six or seven years old.

Important things to remember as we set up our school year:

• We need to get our stationery bought and into the classroom.
• We need our togs because we swim almost every day. We can leave our togs at school during the week as we have a great deck for drying them ready for the next day's swimming.
• We need to complete our homework sheet about our names so they can go up on the wall with our photo.

We will start bring home reading books next week as well as a homework book to learn things like our basic maths facts and spelling words.

Here are some photos of us doing things in our classroom.....