Week 5

Kia Ora All,

Welcome to week 5. I hope all the students have recovered from camp and are ready to rock 'n' roll for another week.

• This week I'm aiming to set up Reading Eggs. Students can be continuing with Maths Buddy at home and will be using it daily at school as part of our regular maths programme.
• Students need to be reading daily at home. If you want your child to bring home a levelled text for them to read to you, they can grab one out of their book box at school. Otherwise, a novel or similar reading material of interest is ideal.
• Don't forget the Triathlon on Friday!
• Here is a neat writing activity that I did with the students the other day. If you're after something fun to get them writing at home, you could try it out. 

Rock On,

Mr M

Slater Websites

Read 10 Fascinating Facts About Slaters

Roly-Poly Slaters.

Camp Update 13/2/17

Welcome to Week 3

Kia Ora All,

It's week 3 already and the mighty Room 5 is plowing on like a giant unstoppable learning juggernaut.

• It was great to see so many students and parents at the BBQ on Friday, don't forget meet the teacher evening is on Tuesday. If you'd like to pop along to get a rundown about the class programme, it'd be great to see you there. 
• Maths Buddy has been up and running for a couple of weeks now. The students all have logins. I've noticed that many of them haven't logged in at home yet. If you participate in home learning, I recommend getting them to bring home their login and checking it out. You can find a short instructional video that I made here on the learning site.
• If your child isn't able to swim or do fitness due to injury or similar, could you please send along a note or send me an email to let me know that they need to be excused from the fitness programme.
• Last week I helped the students create a password for their school Google accounts (we're still in the process of signing everyone in). I showed them the below video about the importance of having a strong password and how to create one. I strongly feel that keeping ourselves safe online is an essential skill in this day and age. Viewing this video with your child and having a conversation about what sites they enter passwords into and games they've created profiles for online may be something you'd like to consider.

Rock On,

Mr M

Welcome to week 2

Kia Ora All,

Welcome to week two, I hope everyone has had a great long weekend and the students are reading to rock 'n' roll for another week. Here is a heads up for the coming week.

• The school BBQ is Friday evening, it would be great to meet/see you there if you can make it.
• If you haven't returned your child's camp permission slip to me, could you please do so this week. 
• I'll be kicking into more of my reading programme this week. An important part of becoming an excellent reader is having enjoyable reading material on the go at all times. Please ask your child what novel they are reading at present. If they don't have one on the go, I'd encourage you to help them choose one at the town library, school library or similar. I did a quick whip around during Get Lost (silent reading time, meaning: get lost in a book) - only about half the class had a novel on the go so it would be great if you could check in with them to see what they're reading.
• We'll be continuing our inquiry about slaters. This week we'll hopefully be setting up a slater habitat. Wish us (and the slaters) luck!
• We've started using Maths Buddy in class, below is a short video I made about how to use it. I'll be adding more videos throughout the year. You can find these under the Rewindable Learning tab on the learning site.

Rock On,

Mr M

Room 5 Term One Newsletter

Kia Ora All,

Welcome to the start of the school year. For those of you who don't know me I'm the new year 4/5 teacher here at Motupipi School. My family and I moved here in early January from Greymouth, where I've been teaching for the last three years. We're stoked to be living in Golden Bay and have been enjoying all the area has to offer!

Class Programme

Maths: We're starting off the year with a statistics unit. We'll be surveying the class and school community about various favourite things, organising the results, graphing them and interpreting the graphs. If you're looking for home learning to fit in with this you could create a survey with your child, record the results on a tally chart and create a bar graph showing the results.

Reading: For the first two to three weeks I'll be doing some group work with the students and also the usual testing to see where they're at so that I can determine what their learning needs are. I aim to set the scene for a positive year of reading and actively model the enjoyment of books. 

Writing: The first few weeks of the writing programme I have some fun and engaging writing activities planned as well as some activities that will help me determine student needs. As with reading, the first few weeks are about getting to know the students as writers and setting the tone for a fun year of writing. 

Communication

One feature of my teaching is that I share a lot of my planning through my learning site. You can visit here to see many of the activities we're doing in class and to check out what I have planned. You'll also find the weekly overview, which is useful for knowing what we're up to in class. I also have a resources page, which I'll add to throughout the year. As the year progresses I'll continue to send out more information and activity ideas for home learning via the site. 

If you want to get in touch with me, email is the best point of contact. Alternatively, you're welcome to ring me at school. I also have an open door policy for my classroom, so please feel welcome to pop in to say hi or talk to me about any concerns that have arisen. 

Extra curricula

• There will be a school BBQ on Friday the 10th - more details to follow in the newsletter.
• Information evening / meet the teacher is on Tuesday the 14th.
• Camp is in week four. We're heading off to Bridge Valley. I'm super excited about this one; I've been to Bridge Valley with a class before and it was one of the best camps I've been on. If you haven't received a newsletter from your student, and they can't find it, you can find a digital copy here on my learning site. 

ICT within the class programme

I've signed the class up to Reading Eggs and Maths Buddy. I'll be showing the students how to use the programs over the first few weeks at school. We'll be using both of these programs on a daily basis in the class, and I highly recommend them as a part of your home learning programme. Below is a short information sheet about Maths Buddy. Please click the arrow button on the top right of the page to enlarge it.

Homework

I don't have a hard and fast rule regarding homework. I will send out a homework checklist on Friday (due back on Friday). If you decide not to participate in home learning your child will not be penalised in any way. If you want to know what I think a solid home learning programme looks like here are my suggestions:

• I highly recommend 20-30 minutes a day of reading time.
• Reading to your child daily - a novel or similar.
• Spending some time on Maths Buddy or Reading Eggs weekly as suits.
• If you want more than that, the homework checklist will give some other options. 
• I also do spelling on Fridays so they will have a list on the go sometime in the first few weeks as I get tests done them.

I aim for all of my newsletter-style communication to be through my blog. I find that it's the easiest, fastest and most reliable method of getting information out to whanau. Please leave a comment below or email me to let me know that the email address I have for you is current. 

Rock on,

Mr M