Kia Hiwa Ra - a moving production!

This term Makaraka School staff and students embarked on a big project!  A whole school production! The story was about Cook's first navigation to New Zealand and retracing his first steps. 

Students were involved every step of the way from writing the script to making props and costumes and choreographing the moves to dances! 

Each class had a scene to work on which was a different local story:

Year 1/2 portrayed Maui's Fish - the fishing of the North Island

Year 3/4 portrayed Paoa and Kiwa - the establishment of Turanganui a Kiwa

Year 4/5 portrayed Paikea's arrival in Whangara

Year 5/6 portrayed Kupe and the naming of Aoteaoa

The little 5 year olds were the time travel portal which Captain Cook and his crew travelled through and portrayed the Great Pacific Garbage patch through oil, plastic, sea creatures and water. 

Each class also had an added project to contribute to their scene by incorporating plastic props!  This symbolised the presence of plastic in our lives and highlighted the need to be responsible about the use of it!  The plastic props were all lit with LED lights which made them look fabulous! 

Everyone who came enjoyed the production and we even got a letter to the editor!

Here is the whole video! 

Site dances

In Friday Programme we were looking at our special school places.  We really love to show off our school and we decided in groups to create a dance using these special places.  
We used the Pou which are for all our classes, the playground which we love to play on and the cycle track posts to play leap frog on. 

We were learning to include all our group members in our dance and use unison, canon stillness and movement.  We think we did great at all of this! 

The music was added in last to give it a really good feel.  This was so much fun and here are our videos: 

Pou Atua

Playground Fun

Leap Frogs

Youth Environment Ambassadors visit

On Thursday we had 5 Youth Enviro Ambassadors visit us to talk about fossil fuels, NZ's proposed law changes and to write a submission to the Government with our ideas on this.  Maya, Alice, Toby and Pearl and Sofia spoke to us about what they have been doing and how they developed their group.

After watching a video about fossil fuels, we then had a discussion about what we could do about it in NZ and put them together in a submission to parliament.

The submission process is an important way to have a say on what is happening with our law changes.  You can have your say without being 18 years old and having to vote. 

Here are some of our submission ideas: 

• Take alternative transport like biking or walking where possible.
• Buy Electric vehicles.
• Purchase products that are made by companies that are environmentally conscious. 
• Buy less plastic.
• Use reusable straws and bags. 
• Eat less beef and more chicken and lamb. 
• Write letters to politicians telling them how you feel. 

Be united and aim for the same goal!

PJ movie party

Today we were fundraising for Barnados through the Aurora Leadership in Action programme.  Isla and Max organised a fantastic morning with popcorn, lollies and a movie in our Pyjamas. 

June is the month for Jammies and that is why we chose to wear our PJ's and bring our snugglies.

We made approximately $400 to this worthy cause!  

Thanks Everyone! 

Yearly Nuhaka Exchange

Last Wednesday we went on our yearly sports exchange to Nuhaka.  Every second year we go there and on the other years they come to us.  It is a fun day which ends with a shared lunch. 

The scores were: 

Netball: 13 - 7 to Nuhaka

Chess:  26 - 14 to Nuhaka

Rugby:  57 - 24 to Nuhaka

We really enjoy catching up with our friends down there. It is also really neat to see the Year 7 and 8's who help with refereeing and judging the chess.  Thanks again Nuhaka! 

Chess Tournament Winners

Yesterday we had a chess tournament for our last session with the Eastern Knights.  The tournament was 6 games of 10 mins each.  It was fun and we all got to play different people.

We had 3 clear winners:


1st - Timana
2nd - Isla
3rd - Angus

We are all super star chess players now!  Nuhaka Exchange next week.  Yay! 

Students beating their parents!

Wow our class is getting good at chess!  Using these strategies our parents don't know what we are going to do next!  Keep up the great work!  

Here's what we are up to: 

Timed games change the pace and put you under pressure.  It is also a good way to make sure you finish up in a set amount of time for those who are in a hurry.  

Today we went over:

Scholar's mate: (Four move check): 

White:	King's pawn E2 to E4
White	F1 to C4
White	D1 to H5
White	H5 to F7 - Checkmate

  

Can you find out how to defend against it? 

Italian opening - focus on the white pieces: 

White	E2 to E4 (Pawn)
Black	E7 to E5 (Pawn)
White	G1 to F3 (Knight)
Black	B8 to C6 (knight)
White	F1 to C4 (Bishop)
Black	Moves into the game

• Control the centre 4 squares. 

Stalemate:  

When you can't move anywhere without going into check.  Game is a draw.