Taranaki
Welcome to Taranaki, we are the year 3 & 4 classroom here at Midhirst School. There are 23 of us in the classroom and we are taught by Meg Hunter. We are extremely lucky to be taught Mrs Rosewarne on a Thursday and have help from a range of lovely teacher aids.
Structured Literacy
In Taranaki we follow a structured literacy approach to help teaching and learning of Reading, Writing, Handwriting and Spelling. Structured Literacy involves clear, methodical, and step-by-step literacy instruction at various levels, including phonemes, letter-sound associations, syllable patterns, morphemes, vocabulary, sentence structure, paragraph structure, and text structure.
In Taranaki ākonga follow structured literacy through learning specific rules to apply to both reading and spelling from 'The Code', which is explicit teaching of morphology and syllabication. Ākonga explore a range of different texts such as novels, decodable text, classic colour wheel readers and picture books to help build their knowledge.
Term One Swimming
During term one, we have swimming at our school pool with instructors. Our Swimming sessions are Tuesday afternoons at 1p.m. Swimming lessons are vital for ākonga to learn how to be safe around water and build their confidence in the water as they learn swimming skills. Swimming is one of my passions and I love seeing tamariki get involved and having fun.
Swimming sports
This term we had swimming sports at Wai o Rua in Stratford! The tamariki loved racing each other in the events, and had heaps of fun in the pool! It was awesome to see all of the whānau who came down to support the tamariki during this event. A big thank you to all of those who participated it was incredible to see everyone having fun.
PR1ME Mathematics
Here in Taranaki class we follow the PR1ME mathematical approach to teaching and learning. PR1ME is a structured programe that guides tamariki from years 1-8. Depending on the needs of the tamariki they get to attend workshops, and follow independent work to help them apply their knowledge.
In Taranaki we also use rich math tasks which are open ended questions. Ākonga can explore their knowledge and apply it to a range different contexts in a way which fully engages them in the learning. It provides an opportunity for tamariki to use prior knowledge and develop new knowledge.
Term 1 Korowai
We are learning about our school values KAHA and that we all have responsibilities and rights as members of a community. We know that belonging to groups is important and we have responsibilities when we’re members of a group. We are learning that to build a safe community we have to be a good friend and created these friendship clouds to show how we are good friends. This links in to the KAHA vlaue of Hauora as we learnt, that relationships can be both challenging and rewarding and their are many things we can do when we are having problems with our friends. To further our learning about Hauora we are also learning about the Te Whare Tapa Whā and how this model supports our wellbeing. We have even created a book about the aspect of Taha Tinana which sits proudly on our bookcase.
Kapa Haka
On Mondays we are lucky to have Whaea Raewyn come in to take us through different waiata, karakia and tikanga. The tamariki are enjoying getting involved and learning abour different waiata that we then practice in class. We are apart of both the junior Kapa Haka and the whole school one as well.
The tamariki love when Whaea Raewyn comes to visit us and are enjoying being the leaders in the junior Kapa Haka and helping the younger tamariki from Panatahi and Ngā Motu.
Term 1 Cricket
We are lucky this term to have Ross from Stratford cricket club visit our kura fornightly to give our three junior classes some cricket lessons! We love trying a new sport working on our hand-eye co-ordination and having some fun in the sunshine! Check us out!
TRYathlon
During Term 1 the tamariki participated in a TRYathlon where they ran around the field, swam in the school pool and biked on the bike track. This was an awesome experience for the tamariki who had lots of fun giving it a go and trying their best. Everyone was proud of themselves for completing it! Thank you to all of the whānau who came to support the tamariki.
