Thank You Letter by Britelle - Year 3

Dear Ellen,

I would like to thank you for coming to Motat and looking after our group.

My favourite thing at Motat was the mirror-maze. My second favourite thing was the shadows. I liked making the simple machines. I also liked the earthquake cafe. I liked going into the olden days houses and the jail. I loved it when we took a photo standing by the painting of the Town Hall because it looked like we were really in town. I loved it at Motat and I liked having you with us.

Would you like to help us at our Whanau evening on 8 November? We will be making a boil-up.

Yours sincerely
Britelle
Room 12

Room 12's Field Trip to Motat

Fears & Phobias Recount by Jayden

Two years ago I had a visitor in Australia, it was a snake! I did not know what attracted it to come into my house. I was terrified to have a snake inside.
So I got a broom and tried to get it out but it was no use. It just kept on biting the broom. So I woke my nanny up and she called our neighbour. When he arrived at our house, he had a dustbrush and a bag. He used the dustbrush to put the snake into the bag. Then we took the snake to the animal control and they told us why it came into our house. It was very hungry and it was pregnant.
Being face to face with a snake has made me overcome my fear of snakes.

By Jayden
Year 4
Room 12

Simple Machines Link

http://www.edheads.org/activities/simple-machines/index.htm

Mrs. Raman's Reflections on Ulearn07 Conference

Hi,
Hope you have all had a good break and are feeling refreshed for the 4th and final term – only 79 days to Christmas J
I spent the first week of my holidays entertaining visitors from South Africa – it was wonderful catching up with two of my neighbours from Durban, who I have known since the age of four. The second week kept me busy with spring-cleaning and the last three days I was fortunate to attend the Ulearn07 conference at Sky City. What a fabulous conference it was with three inspiring keynote-speakers and some amazing NZ teacher/presenters.
I have learned so much and by the last day I was on overload. The biggest message for me was about networking, collaborating and connecting with others in order to prepare our students as lifelong learners of the 21st century. I have learned that one of the aims of teaching is to develop and extend students' thinking and learning by catering for pupils’ individual learning styles, multiple intelligences and providing meaningful assessment which informs learning. Computers and the Internet has revolutionized the world we live, learn and teach in. There are numerous exciting programmes, tools and software for teachers and students that can make learning fun. ‘Many computer applications have been developed explicitly to engage learners in critical thinking.’ ‘…computers should be used as tools to help learners build knowledge…’ If teachers have an attitude of: ‘Please don’t give me any more information; I already know what I think!’ (Longworth, 2003) then I believe today’s classroom is not the place for them because learning is a lifelong process and it is forever changing. According to Tony Ryan, in this Information Age of the 21st century, computers are rapidly overtaking many of our analytical functions. Occupations for future generations will probably require a strong imaginative and personal component that computers are not capable of doing. It is therefore important to integrate a variety of creative teaching strategies into our classroom practice in order to prepare students for success in their learning as well as in their uncertain future.

Below are some links that you may find useful:

Keynote speakers
http://blog.core-ed.net/derek/

Conference Photos
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ulearn/

Kree’s Ulearn Pics
http://www.flickr.com/photos/kreeraman/

Kree’s twitter
http://twitter.com/kree4sai


Kree’s favourites/bookmarks
http://del.icio.us/kree12

Ewan McIntosh’s Blog
http://edu.blogs.com/

http://newzealand.takingitglobal.org/

Tonnes of valuable resourceshttp://www.tki.org.nz/e/tki/

Evolution of Communication
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/evolution_of_communication.php

http://aucklandregion.takingitglobal.org/connections/stories/story.html?MemberID=25064

Free Books on the Internet
http://users.erols.com/jonwill/freebooks.htm

http://www.linkedin.com/home?trk=tab_h

Have a great term y’all.

Kree Raman
Room 12 Teacher
Kelvin Road School
Auckland NZ