Tuesday 23 August 2011

Book Week Dress- Up Parade



The classroom buzzed with excitement today as we celebrated some of Australia's inspiring authors and illustrators. This year's Book Week theme was 'One World, Many Stories'. Not even a wet lunch could dampen the enthusiasm of Zac Power, Fancy Nancy, Pearlie the Fairy, Amber the Orange Fairy, Yvette, Too Cool, Harry Potter, Wally, Flower Girl, Super Woman, Super Cam, a Viking and a clutch of obedient owlets. Miss R was voted the best Thumbelina ever!

A certain good natured young teacher even dressed up as Captain Underpants! Now that's brave!

Saturday 20 August 2011

Egg and vinegar experiment- Yeju's blog post

Apparatus (Things you need): an egg, boiling vinegar, plastic cup
Method: 
1. Put the near boiling vinegar in the plastic cup.
2. Put the egg in the vinegar.
3. Wait for 2 days for the shell to dissolve.
4. Then take the egg out carefully so it won't pop.
Results:
You can only see the membrane and the egg will get bouncy...


A bouncy egg!
Conclusion:
The egg was bouncy because the shell dissolved.

By Yeju

Friday 19 August 2011

Sidewalk Chalk- Georgia K's Blog Post

What happens when we mix water, paint and Plaster of Paris?
Apparatus: toilet roll, cookie cutter, baking paper, electric tape, acrylic paint, plain cold water and Plaster of Paris.


Method:
1. Get a toilet roll.
2. Get electric tape and stick it on one end.
3. Get the baking paper and wrap it inside the toilet roll.
4. Put the mixture of paint, Plaster of Paris and water in the roll.
Results:
We left it and it went solid. You can write with it.



Choosing our spelling words.


 We practised writing our spelling words.





By Georgia K

Bouncy Egg- Toby's Blog Post

What happens when we mix warm vinegar and an egg?




What you will need: white vinegar, an egg and a plastic cup.
Method: 
1. Heat the vinegar in the microwave.
2. Put the vinegar in a cup.
3. Put the egg into the cup.
4. Wait about 2 days.

 The shell dissolves.


Result:
There are gas bubbles. The egg will get swollen and it will feel a bit  like a balloon.

By Toby

Scenic Slovenia

In the computer lab today, we visited this blog: http://iskriceskolezije.blogspot.com

Their teacher is an amazing photographer! What a glorious landscape!

Using the pictures on their blog, we had time to write one quick comparison between Slovenia and Australia.

The kids wear any clothes and we wear school uniforms- Jordie.
They often eat big bowls of soup and we don't. They have tall, skinny trees in their woods whereas we have rainforests- Yeju.
In Slovenia they have more flowers. In Brisbane we don't have as many flowers- Liam.
In Slovenia they have lots of hills- Sean.
Australia has lots of eucalypts (Gum Trees) and in Slovenia they don't.
They have lots of pretty flowers- Toby.
They have beautiful Pine trees. In Australia you have to especially plant Pine Trees- Ashley.
They eat big bowls of soup. We do not have lots of hills- Luke.
In Slovenia, they have Pine Trees- Tyson.
In Slovenia there was porridge and beautiful flowers blooming. They have a blog like us!- Amber.
Slovenes often eat soup- Georgia K.
In Slovenia they have pretty flowers- Georgia S.
Slovenia loooks good. Australia is the best! That class also has a blog- Aiden L.
In Slovenia they have tall trees. In Australia, Pine Trees are not native.
Slovenia is different to Australia- William

Thursday 18 August 2011

Buried Shapes

Can you recognise 3D shapes when they are hidden in sand?

Click this hyperlink:  Sand Shapes


Tuesday 16 August 2011

Number Pairs

While some students were out with Mrs Charchalis, we looked at our rainbow pairs and we used those skills to work on our number pairs to 20. Here is a fun activity that you can try at home:

Number Pairs

Click on this hyperlink: Crickweb

Saturday 13 August 2011

Physical changes to matter



We made 'oobleck' or 'gloop' in science on Friday. It elicited genuine 'oohs from ahhs' from the Explorers. We added small amounts of water to cornflour and kept stirring gently and slowly until we had paste. 

When we poured the gloop, it flowed and dripped like a liquid. We noticed that when we stirred quickly, the gloop became hard. When it started drying out, it became powdery again.We added more water and watched the gloop flow like a liquid and we pushed the gloop to make it act like a solid.

We thought that if we added a few drops of green food colouring, the gloop would look even more exciting!



The gloop made a bit of a mess because we had so much fun pouring it from one hand to the other. (Thanks Mrs Hillier for your terrific idea to make it outside!)

Using precise vocabulary






We've been exploring the use of precise vocabulary to make our writing more detailed and interesting. Flicking through junk mail, we found and cut out samples of colours such as olive, mauve, scarlet, beige and crimson.

After inspiration from this video of my (well, actually Mr Wilson's) marine tank and using their imagination, the class drew a fish. Next they are going to write fabulous sentences with their new colour words.

When the video starts playing, ask Mum or Dad to show you how to shut down the advert by clicking on the white circle with the cross. Never click on the hyperlink in an advertisement.


Sunday 7 August 2011

"The best thing a child can do with a toy is break it !"

Visiting class blogs around the world to find ideas to share with you is always fun. Today I found a great site and I didn't even 'travel' very far at all!


Ms Dowling in NSW has been showing her class how to make toys from trash using  the Arvind Gupta site. If you click on the blue name, Arvind Gupta, you'll find it's a hyperlink to the activities.

Look what Nellie made:


Georgia K made these:





I had heaps of fun making these:
Dancing eyes:


Balloon rocket:


Climbing Man:

Which ones will you try at home?


Which one should we try during our next wet weather lunch?

Wednesday 3 August 2011

Ma Ma Ree

Mrs D, a delightful grandmother, read Mem Fox's Wilfrid Gordon McDonald Partridge to us today. This is a beautiful, warm book about inter- generational friendship, helping and memories. A certain grandson had heaps of fun role playing climbing through a fence and collecting props such as a feathery puppet, an egg and seashells.



We also had a surprise visit from a lovely big sister who couldn't possibly have missed out on the treat!