Water Rocket goes rogue!

This morning we tried launching our rockets with water!  It was hilarious because it went rogue!  It shot all over the place and actually went backwards!  

It was really surprising that all the water shot out so fast!  There was literally nothing left!  

I wonder if you can recognise what went wrong and how it can be fixed? 

Rocket Straw Games

Remember those rocket straws?  Well today we printed out the games we made up and played them together! 

It was a great end to a fun 1st week back!  We really enjoyed being together this week and catching up with each other.

TED Lab - Tawhirimatea Engineering and Design Lab

Today we met Danielle for the first time in person!  She spoke to us about her job and how important it is to be able to work in a team with a diverse range of people and skills.  We really enjoyed hearing some of her stories and ideas! 

We formed teams of 3-5 people and. researched our roles within the team. This was really interesting - who knew that rocket teams need a meteorologist?  Or even a biologist?

We finished our session outside shooting our first raw PET bottle to see how the machine works!  Gee we are so excited to be designing, building and launching rockets!  

We can't wait until next week!  

Kotahi Raranga - Weaving together our lockdown experiences...

We have been remembering the people in our bubbles and activities that helped us to get through the 8 weeks of lockdown: 

Figuring it out.

We each made an aho (warp thread) of the people in our bubble and a whenu (weft thread) of the activities we enjoyed for the weaving and then joined them together with groups.  This has shown us how experiences can be similar and yet different. 

We are now going to look at the centre 9 squares and create a lockdown dance to interpret our raranga!  Watch this space for the video!  

Math thinking during distance learning...

We were using our online co-operative strategies with Mrs Mill over distance learning.  Each week we had a 3 parted problem to help us develop our thinking and understanding of what was going on in the problem. 

During the week we could see each other's thoughts and develop our understanding.  

This problem is about airplanes and using arrays to show multiplication and work out how many seats there are: 

This problem is the toothpick pattern and sequence activity. We had to try and find the patterns and rules - what would the 27th term in the pattern be? 

Clean Air around my house?

This week we have been looking at how clean the air is around our houses.  It is very interesting how far dust travels!  

Putting up the tape on the Trampoline

Peek - a - boo!

Curious Jono has been helping out and trying to be a scientist!  He has got into a bit of mischief but here is his map to show the data collection: 

Hero's Engine, class data.

Last week we studied Hero of Alexandria and his invention the Aeolipile. 

We made some out of soda cans and tested to see if we could get the maximum number of revolutions out of a can full of water!  

Here is our class data.  The most common number of holes was 5 and the highest number of spins for 5 holes was 18!  

Wow I wonder how Libby made her Hero Engine get 81 revolutions!  Head to her blog and find out!  

What other results in our class data surprised you? 

My Maps - Rocket launch

This week we have been making a Google MyMap of Rocket Launch sites!
I have colour coded mine -

• Red is Astronaut sites, 
• Green is Satellite sites,
• Yellow is interesting sites.  

How have you coded your Rocket Launch sites? 

Rocket Adventures with Miss Moat

For the art challenge this week, we were meant to make origami rockets! I was pretty excited because I love making origami, especially paper cranes. When I was younger I was able to fold a paper crane with my eyes close!

This is the paper crane I made at the beginning of the week. It is the first paper crane I have made since 2015. The paper was very thick and it made it hard to fold. 

To make my paper rocket, I first got a piece of A4 paper, and then had to turn it into a square. I followed a youtube video and proceeded to make my rocket. It was challenging as the video went very quickly. To overcome this problem, I had to keep pausing and rewinding the video.

Finally I finished folding my rocket. I know my folds are not perfect, and the rocket is on a little bit of a lean, however I am proud that I was able to face the challenge and fold an origami rocket. 

The white paper looked a little plain, so I decided to colour it in. I used blue for the fuselage. I then coloured the fins with yellow and orange to make it look like flames. 

The rocket then went on an adventure. Read through the slides to see what happened!

Try out our Space food!

We made our food look like it's from outer space!  It was super fun and delicious!  These creations are amazing!  I am blown away by the time you took to think of these and how you managed to create them! We shared at our meet this morning!

Izabella-Rose's Planet Earth Cupcake! 

Choose some of them to try out yourselves!  You will be blasted into outer space!  There's enough in here for breakfast, lunch and dinner!

Games to try with straw rockets!

Straw Rocket Games! 

As part of our straw rocket study, we tried to create games to play with them!  Here they are!  

I am so looking forward to trying them out and then when we are back at school having a class rocket game day!  Fun!!!! 

Great ideas everyone!  Thanks for sharing at our meet this morning! 

Rockets are Amazing Machines!