Study of the bridges in our local area

We have started to investigate specific bridges. The students were allowed choice as to which bridge to study and how to present it. Such differentiation...The students loved the idea. Working collaboratively...another PLUS.

Here are some of the presentations.

Poem in your Pocket

As part of National Literacy and Numeracy Week, we decided to celebrate by encouraging the students to come to school today with a poem in their pockets to share...

Students could write their own poem or read one that they had found in a book or on the net.

The rain held off for us. 

Classes buddied up and got the poems out of their pockets to participate in the activity..

Please enjoy these photos of our class sharing...

Setting Up a Class Parliament

Today we set up our class parliament. Students chose a counter which told them which party they would belong to. The largest party was the government and the smaller party the opposition. There were two independents that joined the government.

We sat in a horse shoe like in the House of Representatives. 

The students then started to plan their campaign speeches for leader of their party.

These students wanted to be the Prime Minister.

These students wanted to be the Leader of the Opposition.

We completed a secret ballot and then preferential voting.  

Our Prime Minister is...

The leader of the Opposition is...

The leaders then appointed their cabinets and shadow cabinets. 

The students then started to investigate who actually held the roles in the House of Representatives. 

They decided to email the members to ask them about their jobs. 

Two students have already had a reply.  

The students are so excited about having a parliamentary debate. The speaker will have to be organised to control the house!

Here are the students researching their roles.  

Thinking about Bridge Structures.

We have studied types of bridges, famous bridges, and local bridges. We are now looking at the various structures in an attempt to plan and construct our own bridge. The students worked in groups to create a bridge out of Connex materials.  

I will show you the products in the next post.

Learning about Federal Parliament

We worked on learning about Federal Parliament by implementing a Jigsaw Activity. Groups of four students studied a particular topic and then we formed Expert Groups to teach the other students what we had learnt. 

Here are our two sets of groups.

Groups learning and planning to teach. 

Expert groups.  

WORLD OF MATHS

Yesterday we enjoyed an afternoon of Mathematical reasoning. 

Please enjoy.

Grandparent's Day

Today we invited all grandparents and older friends to come to see us at school. They arrived early and came into the classroom. 

The task in our classroom was to read an essay that we had been working on about 'Homework'. We had thought about many good points and some bad points about the subject.  

The next task was to interview our grandparents about their thoughts about Homework.  

Then we could show our grandparents around the classroom before having a picnic lunch with them.  

Please enjoy these photos.  

Our grandparents were very enthusiastic...

There were many comments about school being soooo different in their days.

I look forward to our discussions about what grandparents think about Homework.

Stay tuned...