The Yellow Miracle

Many of us, think that a banana is nothing but a worthess fruit. But if you think about it, the banana is much more than just a yellow fruit.

First off, cartoon artists. Have you seen more than 5 cartoon series that don't include a banana? Slipping on the skin of a funny shaped fruit is one of the basics of humor.

Then, we have the fact that it is two things from Mother Nature. First of all, it is a delicious fruit, that we all know and love. Then there is the fact that it is a flower. Not many people look at a banana this way, we need to learn how to appreciate our surroundings, and not take them for granted. God has given us countless blessings, lets not waste them.

Library Visit

This afternoon, we are going to the St Heliers library. We often go there every Friday with our teacher, Miss Garden.
The few people who go with her browse quite a lot of books. The librarians there are very lovely.

At the moment, they are having an art competition. You can go and vote for he best painting, and just by doing so, you could win a whole basket of goodies.

During Matariki, we learnt how to make a six plait flower! It was very fun.

St Heliers library is a great place to be after a long day's of work.

Life Among The Sea

Life must be so hard for a crawling litle crab. Their shells always getting tossed in to the sea. Children shrieking with excitement when they crawl out of their shells. Hiding underneath thick grey rocks, forever hoping that no one will find it. But then being lifted in the hands of an excited toddler.

Then everything changes when grown up. Being shoved around in the sea and then shooed away on shore by angry parents or scared children. From being lifted up to being pushed away.

Life must be so hard for a crawling little crab...

....and Mrs Tele'a relates to a map, how?

During one of the extension sessions, Mrs Tele'a (the extension teacher) sat in the middle of the room, while the Yr 5 and 6 extension crew had to draw her from different angles. In this activity we only had five minutes to finish the complete drawing. The entire extension group have drawn a picture of this and on it, have put a few friends' drawings.

If I were to repeat this excersise, I would concentrate on my view, and not try and make up things I didn't see into the drawing.
We all had our own type of style. Every artist has their own type way of drawing. That explains why everyone's drawing looked different. No one had the same as any one. We all enjoyed this short project. We used hyperstudio to do this and only had about 10 minutes. Before this activity, we have all drawn a map from the school to our home, and a map of the eLearning centre. We looked at reference points when drawing maps and scale.

We did this because we tried to experience how difficult it was to be a famous explorer, find land, and then having to draw the country, with only a feather, ink and a piece of old paper. To get everything in the right proportions and scale things correctly. How hard it must have been to be one of the greatest explorers in the world.

My Friend Roger Wagner

I would like to take this opportunity to thank Roger Wagner, the man who invented HyperStudio, for the lovely disc he sent. I am very grateful for this. I was very excited when I received this.

Thanks for your comments and feedback. It's exciting to think that my work might be used for examples of hyperstudio around the world. I never knew that the inventor of my favourite multimedia programme, would be watching my blog. Thank you Roger Wagner for the wonderful gift. I'm looking forward to learning more about using this fabulous programme!

Vaka Voyagers

Maori myths and legends tell us stories of how the first Polynesians got to Aotearoa New Zealand. Yet, no one knows where they came from. Most think from the island of Hawaiiki, which is around all the other Pacific Islands. The movie above explains what they would've taken along for the journey. Imagine trying to pack food for 50 people, for 3 months!!! These polynesians sure are Mighty Mariners. 

 Too bad no one else can do the same as these brave warriors.