Here are some photos from this weeks PBL adventures. Our theme of the week was ROBOTS. We are continuing our Theme next week.

Last week on Friday Te Rōpū Whakaute hosted our whole school assembly with Te Rōpū Manawaroa from the Senior School. All of the students were so brave standing up to speak and share in front of the whole school and I was so proud of how well they all did! They all spoke so clearly and were 'showing five' fantastically! Congratulations also to all of the award winners! Check out our slide and photos below.

Cultural Diversity Day 2019 Gilberthorpe School held its first Cultural Diversity Day on Wednesday last week. We were amazed that we have 24 different countries represented. It was a great celebration of many different cultures. We started the day with a parade representing each country followed by a shared lunch and then the cultural performances in the afternoon. It was great fun celebrating and getting to know many different cultures. Harsirat from Te Rōpū Wawata performed an Indian dance which she learnt all by herself by watching youtube. We all admired her performance and her beautiful Indian dress.

Exploring Nature Features This week, some children spent time having a close up look at stones, sands, volcanic rock and leaves using magnifying glasses and also magnifiers that are attached to the iPad. The children were amazed to find out what they could see through the magnifiers. Some saw holes and sparkles on the stones others tiny seashells in the sands.

This week during one of our reading sessions we went on a reading adventure. We were reading a book about classroom pets so Miss Corry thought it would be a good idea to go on an adventure to the senior hub and visit Miss Waho. Miss Waho has pet fish. We loved this! We also got to feed them. There are lots of little fish in this warm water tank and there is also one bigger fish who we think is awesome. Thanks Miss Waho!!!

This week we have had a big focus on making friends with others and what we can do if us or someone we know is being bullied. Some of our wonderful Gilberthorpe Gurus made a great presentation about what we can do if we're being bullied. It was particularly awesome to learn about how we can be upstanders, to stand up for those we see being hurt by others. Te Rōpū Kura Pounamu,  Te Rōpū Whakaute and Te Rōpū Wawata have continued to learn about friendships this week and we even did some writing about what we can do to be friends with others, because you can't have a good friend without being a good friend! At the end of the week we all came dressed in our pink mufti to join with the rest of New Zealand to end bullying, check out our awesome outfits below!

Over the last two weeks we have welcomed 8 new students to Kura Pounmau class. A big warm welcome to them all! They all have a great sense of humour and slotted into our class and hub extremely well. Theses students have also been super lucky as Sistema has donated a lunch box for all our new students starting school this term. Look at our amazing little treasures with their lunch boxes. A big thank-you to Sistema for these. Pictured from left: Siagigi, Sana, Sunshine, Azariah, Harley, Sopich, Aroha and Charlie

This week we decided to try and use the sandpit for something other than building. During maths time we got out there and started writing numbers in our sandpit! We had a competition to see who could write the biggest number, that's why you can see so many 3 digit numbers in the sand. I wonder what other cool maths activities we could do in the sandpit this week?

Making Music The KWW children have been learning to make sounds using their bodies, instruments and other objects. Last week, the children at Wawata had a go at making music using their voices. This week, we made sounds using our hands and feet. The children had lots of fun making rhythms by clapping and stomping, some children also added body movements to make rhythms.

This week is New Zealand Sign Language Week. We have learnt how to sign the names of animals. Here is a video showing what we have learnt...

We play Beep as a maths game. We are learning to skip count in 2's. Soon we will be experts. What are your favourite maths games?

Here are some photos from our new sandpit and our Sport Canterbury visit. Enjoy