Week 9

Wow! Week 9 is here already, that makes it 7 more days in the classroom until a well earned break arrives!

Apologies for the sincere lack of 'blogging' lately...

A few reminders and bits for you to remember while I'm at home with a poorly Thomas...

• You should be working on your ASPIRE at home and at school. Your clear file needs to be going to and fro so you can work at home and during class time. Remember presentation of these ASPIRE units is due next Tuesday! YES! that's not long away!
• We have our annual Year 7 Small Balls Skills tourney on Friday, you may wear (CORRECT) PE gear to school on Friday! You will be in house groups rotating around 8 different small ball games, it will be a BLAST!
• Don't forget that on Monday you need to meet me at the Early Settlers Museum by 8:45am, PLEASE DON'T COME TO SCHOOL FIRST! and you need to be collected from the museum (Anzac Avenue) by 3pm. I will be sending a note home to those parents who have offered to help at the museum when I get back to school.

Have a fabulous week everyone! Be good and hopefully I'll see you on Thursday!

Ms D

Mackenzie's recount

THE HIGHLANDERS COME TO BALMAC

We hurried over to the field excitedly, all set and ready to go watch our very own Highlanders train on our own school grounds.

We were honoured to have them at our school, extremely proud of the local Otago rugby team. As we approached the field, we watched in awe as the Highlanders chased eachother around with the ball, tackling each other to get it. I went and stood by the sideline, chatting with my friends and watching the Highlanders pass to each other, and try and tackle their way past the try line.

Unfortunately, our class, Room 7, ruined it for each other and go to go inside early. We trudged inside, disappointed that we weren't able to watch them train anymore.

As we waited eagerly in the class for three of the Highlanders to come into our class room and answer some of our questions, we just couldn't contain our excitement. We were all grinning at each other, some of us bouncing around in our seats in excitement.

Finally, three very cheerful-looking and sweaty men came into our classroom. They stood at the front and introduced themselves as Lucky, Israel and Hayden. Hayden was very tall with a little goatee and the others were darker skinned with dark hair. We listened as they talked about training, only interrupting them to ask questions. We had some very good questions and they had some very good answers. We found out all about how the team worked, and how they trained mostly every day of the week. Playing rugby for the Highlanders was their full-time job.

The bell rang for morning-tea and the three Highlanders offered to sign their autographs onto a special Highlanders card for us. We filed along beside them, watching them signing our piece of paper, amazed by them. We thanked them nervously and ran outside with our morning-tea, running around after the other Highlanders, high-fiving them and asking them for their signatures.

It was a great morning and I just LOVED it. I hope they can come again soon!

By Mackenzie Reeves

Week 6

Swimming sports!

Swimming sports are on this Friday at Moana Pool, don't forget that you need to be dropped off at the pool at 8:45am on Friday!
It's the first big event for the houses this Friday, I wonder what house will take it out? Highgate probably ...

Tomorrow Mitchell and Mackenzie will both be publishing their wonderful recounts about the Highlanders visit, they were both excellently crafted using the skills of Show not tell as well as using very descriptive language and a touch of humour....watch this space.

I hope we have a good week!
Ms D

The Room 7 Librarians in action!

Taly, Mitchell, Jacob & Kirstin!

Week 5 is here!

Half way through the term already!

Can you believe it is week 5 already! Where is the term going?

Did you all enjoy house sports on Friday afternoon? I had a great session playing Capture the flag with a Highgate and a Shetland team, we all had a great time until the Southerly rolled in! brrrr.

What's on this week? We have the HIGHLANDERS visiting tomorrow! I hope we ask lots of interesting and valuable questions, no doubt we'll take a heap of photos too, so keep an eye out for those!


We have our final swimsation session on Tuesday at 11:30. We'll also be having a challenge to see who can swim 200m without stopping. I think that is 8 lengths.

Well done with your first spelling test on Friday, most of you got top marks! This week you are in spelling groups (The peas, carrots, corn and tomatoes!) you will get your list words for the rest of the term and each week you will receive an activity for your current list to work through for the week.

You are also now in maths groups, these groups are based around what strategies you already have for working out addition and subtraction problems.

We also start our PE unit this week focusing on small ball skills, we will be playing lots of games too that will help sharpen up your ball skills!

And finally, congratulations to Liam Guthrie our Class Councillor, and Emma McDonald our Deputy. To Kirsten Reid, Taly Holley, Mitchell McCutcheon and Jacob Craig who are our trained librarians, well done all of you!

Have a great week
Ms D