Check out our Team Seuss superstars!!!

These children have all worked hard to learn their alphabet sounds, letter names and jolly phonics blends. Some children have learnt all of these things and have finished their alphabet certificate!
Keep up the awesome learning :)

What have Team Seuss been learning this week?

Term 4 Week 8 (30th Nov - 4th Dec)

We have ...

• performed our assembly items in front of the whole school and our parents - Xavier
• been doing a special art project as a surprise for our families - Ataahua & Jamal
• been swimming with our buddies - Jamal
• written an invitation to our parents to come to our assembly - Caitlen & Ataahua
• been learning how to swim with floaties - Maddie
• been learning to gain confidence in the water - Xavier
• continuing to learn to read the calendar every day - Jamal & Kaila
• been counting down the days until the end of school with our chocolate advent calendar - Jodie and Caitlen
• noticed the beans growing and they now have flowers on them - Maddie & Jodie
• been continuing to learn our jolly phonics - Ataahua
• watched the senior performance in the hall - Rishika
• Practicing our christmas songs

ALSO check out how many of us now know all the letters of the alphabet or all the jolly phonics sounds.

Assembly Reminder!

Don't forget that Team Seuss are on school assembly this week.  We have been practising our songs and rakau sticks to show you.  

We hope to see you all on Friday at 9.05 in the school hall

What has Team Seuss been up to this week?

Term 4, Week 7 23rd - 27th November

We have

• learning to read the calendar - Jamal
• been swimming and we have been getting more confident in the water - Levi
• had a buddy swim with Room 8 - Deklan
• been doing some new jump jam songs this week. Our songs were 'who let the dogs out' and 'grease lightning'.  - Kaila, Xavier & Shyla 
• been practising our Christmas carols every day with Room 3 & 4. We are practising these for Northlands mall and the Cathedral. - Cameron & Jhade
• been reading with our groups and reading our Christmas carols - Caitlen
• been learning to read a play called "The Dragon" - Shyla, Natel, Ataahua
• had our junior Kapa Haka to practise for next weeks assembly - Maddie
• had discovery time where we practise using our CARE values - Jodie
• been doing some learning outside under the tress because it was so hot inside - Ataahua
• received a new letter from Barnaby Bear and he is in Italy - Deklan, Te Rau 
• learnt about how people celebrate Christmas in Italy and how to say hello - "Ciao" 
• been singing our Tena Koe song every morning - Cameron
• been watching our beans grow even taller. They are now taller than the bamboo sticks - Caitlen 

Don't forget there are lots of exciting things happening in the next 3 weeks.  Make sure you check the bags for any notices.  

9th December @ 10.30-11am - Cathedral Visit to sing Christmas Carols

10th December @ 4.40-5.30 - Fish and Chips Carol Singing at Northcote School 

14th December - Northlands Mall Christmas Carol Singing

Check out some of us swimming in Team Seuss!

What has Team Seuss been up to this week?

Term 4 Week 6 16th Nov - 20th Nov

We have ...

• been learning our numbers in maths - Maddie and Jodie
• been reading books - Shyla
• been continuing to learn new christmas carols like Snoopy's Christmas, Santa around the world, Grandma got run over by a reindeer and Winter Wonderland - Caitlen, Jodie, Ataahua, Shyla, Maddie
• been learning our jolly phonics and writing the letters f, b, ai - Xavier
• been reading Billy McBrown - Axel
• been learning to write our names on the whiteboards and we have been learning how to illustrate christmas pictures - Phoenix and Axel
• been writing letters to Santa - Shyla
• had a letter from Barnaby who is in France at the moment and he taught us how to say Merry Christmas in french 'Joyeux Noel' and he taught us to say 'Feliz Navidad' in Spanish last week. - Kingston, Caitlen and Ataahua
• been learning how to read a calendar - Alexander
• been learning how to swim and have confidence in the water - Pheonix and Levi
• been watching our beans continue to grow because we have been watering them and looking after them - Jodie & Caitlen
• been learning our routine for our Assembly in 2 weeks time - Maddie

Dont' forget Team Seuss are on assembly in 2 weeks so come along and watch us perform.  You wont' be disappointed.

Team Seuss

Here are our beans after 6 weeks

Where are the places that Team Seuss have been this week?

Term 4 Week 4 2-6th November 2015

This week we have . . .

• been learning christmas carols, my favourite is Santa you're too fat - Rishika
• received a letter from Santa and he has asked us to write back so we have been learning how to write letters - Ataahua, Caitlen
• been painting with our buddies.  We drew our hands and then painted around our hands. - Jodie
• been making fireworks pictures.  We coloured in a sheet of paper with lots of bright colours, then we painted it black and then we scratched it with the end of a pencil - Xavier, Shyla and Caitlen
• been learning all about Guy Fawkes.  He is a man called Guy Fawkes who tried to kill King James I of England, he was caught and the King was saved.  The fireworks are our way of celebrating the King being saved. - Maddie, Caitlen, Jodie and Shyla
• been learning our number in maths - Jamal
• been learning how to read a calendar every day - Levi
• been learning new jump jam songs like YMCA & 5, 6, 7, 8 - Kaila, Caitlen
• been learning silly sentences and d, n & m for jolly phonics - Jodi
• been attending our school assembly that Room 4 put on - Shyla
• been presenting our news like news readers about our favourite characters - Jamal & Caitlen

Our beans are continuing to grow.  What a great week of learning.

What have Team Seuss been up to this week?

Term 4 Week 3 27th - 30th October

We have . . .

• had a lovely day at home on Labour Day Monday - Jodi
• been learning e for egg and h for hot, hat, house, home etc - Shyla, Ataahua, Caitlen
• been learning about hippos and horses - Maddie
• Hippos have humongous mouths, they live in Africa, they eat plants and grass which makes them a herbivore and they really love water and playing in it - Te Rau, Shyla, Maddie, Jodi 
• Horses have a long nose and they have powerful legs.  They have long tails that swish and they have jobs to do like pulling carriages and helping the police - Axel, Caitlen, Ataahua, Shyla
• been writing descriptions about hippos and horses - Te Rau, Cameron
• been learning rotines with rakau sticks - Caitlen
• been learning 2 new jump jam songs called 5, 6, 7, 8 and Thriller - Caitlyn & Ataahua
• been making patterns for maths and had some testing done on our numeracy knowledge - Caitlen
• been learning how to read a calendar - Shyla and Jamal
• been reading the bog book called Greedy Cat.  He stole all the food that the mum was buying from the shops then mum got some pepper and that stopped Greedy Cat - Cameron, Shyla & Jamal
• been learning our alphabet and how to read books - Pheonix
• been growing beans - Shyla

Wow, look how much we have done in just this short week.  This is only what we can remember, there is still a lot more learning going on.

What have we been up to this week?

Term 4 Week 2

This week we have . . .

• been learning about measurement and we are growing beans, they have come through the soil and there are 15 and 2 little ones there.
• learning jolly phonics letters and sounds for e, p, n, c & k
• learnt the word family for dog
• been getting fit with car wash and coconut jump jam songs
• been reading and learning letters and words through puzzles and games
• been learning our jumping, runing and throwing skills for athletics next week
• been learning to run relays with our bussy class
• been writing descriptions about giraffes, lions, penguins and snakes
• learning that some snakes can swim and can climb
• been learning that penguins are birds but they can't fly, they swim instead
• been learning that giraffes live in Africa
• been learning that lions have a mane and eat meat

News Roster for Term 4

Dear Parents/Caregivers

This term Team Seuss are going to continue to learn how to be news presenters to help them with their oral language and present their news.  The children have chosen the topics for the term and they will be rostered on (see image) so they have a set day to prepare to share their news on their topic.  This will be every 2nd week of the term and the odd weeks they will be choosing their own oral language to share if they choose to.

Can you please look at the roster and help your child to prepare for their day to share?

The children will need plenty of chances to practise what they are going to say so they feel confident when sitting up the front and talking to the class, so the more chance you give them to practise at home the better.  You will also need to prompt them for things to say.  On the roster you will see some ideas to help you with this. 

Thank you for your support!

Cat (Miss Kincaid) & Tracie (Miss Jones)

Welcome back to Term 4!

Team Seuss have had a great start back to the term.  We have done some fun learning this week and we have been enjoying the nice sunny weather.  In Term 4 we all need to be wearing our hats at morning tea time and lunch time.
Here are some of the things we did this week...

- We read a new big book about "Cass the Colour Robber"
- In Maths we are learning about measurement and capacity
- We have learnt what 'full' and 'empty' mean
- We have also been talking about things that are heavy and light
- In our jolly phonics 1 group have learnt the letters s, a, t and i
- Another phonics group have been learning rhyming words with "cat"
- We have been building things before school
- Miss Kincaid has been teaching us a new Samoan song and how to use the rakau sticks
- During our buddy time we played some games outside

We also welcomed Jhade and Ruby into Team Seuss this week.  We are very lucky to have them as part of our team.

What did Team Seuss do for the last week of Term 3?

We had a Duffy assembly on Tuesday and Te Rau got a special Duffy certificate for awesome reading.

We had assembly this Friday and Ataahua got our class certificate for being such a super learner. 

We have been reading a new big book this week called “Pirate Polly” and on Friday we got a letter from the pirates and we got to go on a treasure hunt. 

We got a letter from Queen Elsa from Frozen to say thank you for helping them to spread the message about saving water. She sent us some biscuits and we got to ice and decorate them.

In buddy time we watched SpaceJam and we also got to eat some yummy popcorn. Everyone really enjoyed eating the popcorn.

We have started to practise for athletics. We are learning 3 key skills: running, jumping, throwing. Our athletics day is in Week 3, Term 4. 

We had Whanau time on Monday and we got to hang out with our Whanau groups and play games. Kowhai Whanau won for the term. 

What has Team Seuss been up to this week?

We have been… 

Practising our ABCs by doing some puzzles and games

Watching a science show with Richard the scientist 

-We learnt about penguins and how they keep warm

-Richard the scientist made a tornado in a bottle

-Jodi put a plastic cup on her head and the scientist used an air gun to knock it off

-We saw some science tricks 

learning our phonics letters “ou, qu, oi, th”

learning a new rhyming word family (pig)

hanging out with our buddies and getting to know them better by choosing some fun activities to do together. 

playing sport with Arne and practising our throwing and running skills.

reading a new big book called “Ratty Tatty Cat”

doing fitness everyday by dancing to the Hokey Pokey Song and the Birdy Dance

getting ready for our Wearable Arts Extravaganza by practising our performance, getting our costume ready and singing our song. 

We also had a new student visiting us this week. Welcome to Ruby who joins Team Seuss at the start of next term. 

See you all at our Wearable Arts Performance today!!! :) 

Class Notices

We have introduced drop at the door Wednesdays to promote the children's independence. They will be able to come in the classroom by themselves and unpack their bags and get organised for the day.

It is also really important that the children read everynight and they remember to bring their reading folders and books back everyday.

Please help ensure that the children get enough sleep every night, primary aged should have 10 - 12 hours each night.  They have been very busy at school and as we are nearing the end of the term they are feeling the strain of this showing signs they are very tired by being sensitive about little things.

It is also important that the children drink plenty of water so bring along a named drink bottle full with water so they can have a drink when they need to in class time.

We are performing our wearble arts next week so they children will need to bring in a named plastic bag with plain clothes that represent water colours, eg blue, white or green colours.  Every child has been working hard to learn a dance and will be performing at both the matinee and the evening performance so they all need to have these available.   Please look out for notices from the school with more information about our open day and this performance.  Make sure you get your tickets before they run out.

Regards
Cat & Tracie

My day at Northcote School

Check out what a normal day at Northcote School would look like in this video.

What's been happening in Team Seuss this week?

• We have been learning the under the sea song and the actions.
• Our Jump jam songs this week were YMCA and Candy Man.
• In maths this week, we have started learning about shapes, Circle, Pentagon, Square, and Triangle. We also made shapes monsters.
• Part of the wearable arts this week we have started to make our costume. We started on our sea creatures, and designing the cape and the skirt.
• Our letters this week in Phonics were - V, Y, NG, OOoo. Our word of the week was dog.
• Our big book this week was called "Another Mother".
• In buddy time we have been drawing on popsicle sticks and next week we will dye them and create a big piece of art work to share.
• Sport with Are this week was throwing and aiming with tennis balls.
• News this week was our favourite toy, thing to do and food. 

What has Team Seuss been up to this week?

• We learnt some new Jolly Phonics sounds this week.  They were ee/or, z, oi, ai
• The Kapa Haka performed at our assembly and they were fantastic
• Team Seuss were on assembly and we got to sit up the front of the whole school.  We taught everyone a new song called "Peanut Butter".
• Rishika and Musab got our classroom certificate 
• We read a big book called "Mice in the Kitchen" and the mice scared the big monsters away. 
• Some children have been learning a new word family.  We can write lots of words that rhyme with 'cat'. 
• We got to do sports with Arne - our new sports coach.
• We had buddy class and we did some GoNoodles. 
• The pentagon maths group have been learning how to add 2 numbers together. The circles have been ordering numbers from 0-10.  The squares and triangles have been playing around the world with 10s frames and learning the buddy numbers to 10.
• We have been practising our song for the Wearable Arts Performance. 
• Today was the last week that we have Miss Gardyne and Miss Parish in Team Seuss.  We have been lucky to have them in our Team and we will miss them! 

Remember that our Wearable Arts Extravaganza is coming up soon in week 9! Tickets are available from the office - get in quick as there are limited numbers. 

Superhero Day!!

On Friday we had some New World Super Stars come in to our school and cook us breakfast.  We were so lucky - they made us eggs and bacon, toast and cereal, smoothies and there was lots of yummy fresh fruit.  The best part was that we dressed up like our favourite Superheroes.  It was so much fun.  Thanks New World!

What has Team Seuss been up to this week?

We have been...

• We had a superhero breakfast at school and we all dressed up as super heroes.
• Reading the big book windy day about a king who loses his crown
• Counting backwards and forwards in maths
• Doing the jolly phonics sounds l, b, f, ai and j
•  reading the poem humpty Dumpty
• Singing and dancing to our under the sea song.
• Welcoming our new children Phoenix and Alexander
• Making Oobleck and writing about it.
• Making jelly fish, octopus and CD fish in visual art
• Practicing under arm throwing with bean bags.
• Writing using describing words.

What has Team Suess been up to this week?

We have been 

• writing about snowmen in summer and animals under the sea. 
• learning word families for pig and the phonic sounds of g,o,u,l
• to the show Maui and the sun. Maui was trying to slow the sun down. Maui had to take his time and work together with others.
• to see Ronald McDonald at the road show and we learnt how to be safe around the road- STOP, LOOK AND LISTEN!
• counting forwards and backwards from 20, skip counting, playing buzz
• reading bad luck duck.
• learning the poem hickory dickory dock and we made mice.
• learning to dance to under the sea.
• learning what sad and tired in Maori means- pouri and ngenge.
• reading books and learning words like and, up, is, I, that, in. 

We welcome Alexander and Phoneix for there final visit and Manaiah started in Team Suess this week. 

What have we been up to this week?

We had a great week in Team Seuss!  This is what happened... 

       - Our buddy class taught us a new Go noodle activity called ‘Hey Joe.’

       - We listened to a song and then we all created a new story using our describing words about winter.

       - We read a new big book called Shoo Fly.

       - Our Jolly Phonics sounds were m,d, h, e.

       - We learnt rhyming words that rhyme with "en".

       - We went for a walk to Redwood Library and we decorated CDs for wearable arts.

       - In PE we played skittles, crazy tag and learnt how to under arm throw.

       - Shyla and Maddie finished their alphabet charts. 

       - Te Rau now knows all of her letters and all of her sounds. 

       - Deana stayed until lunch time and played in the playground.

      This week we were really lucky as we had Miss Gardyne and Miss Parish teaching us.  We also had 3 new students visit us on Friday - Phoenix, Manaiah and Alex.  We can't wait for them to start school and be part of our team.  

What have we been up to this week?

This week, Team Seuss have been doing lots of fun, exciting learning.  Here are some of the things we have learnt this week...

- Making beautiful, colourful elephants
- Our buddy class taught us a new song which also includes counting in Maori
- Caitlen taught us a new game to play called "Mr Brown is out of town"
- We did jump jam with the whole school
- We went to our assembly run by Room 4 and Levi got our class certificate for his awesome learning
- Xavier and Mrs Alabaster made rice bubble cake and then we all got to try some
- We all created a new story this week about a Dad who lost his favourite toy in the dark forest. These    are published up on the wall for everyone to come and see
- We read a new big book called "The Giant's Ice Cream" and the giant got stuck in the door because    he ate too much ice cream
- Our jolly phonics letters we learnt were c/k, e, b and f
- We did PE and played octopus and space invaders

This week we welcomed Musab into Team Seuss.  We also welcomed Miss Parish and Miss Gardyne who will be in our class for the next 5 weeks.

News Roster

Dear Parents/Caregivers

This term Team Seuss are going to learn how to be news presenters to help them with their oral language and present their news.  The children have chosen the topics for the term and they will be rostered on (see below) so they have a set day to prepare to share their news on their topic.  This will be every 2nd week of the term and the odd weeks they will be choosing their own oral language to share if they choose to.

Can you please look at the roster (maybe keep a copy on the fridge to help remind you of when they are rostered on) and help your child to prepare for their day to share?

The children will need plenty of chances to practice what they are going to say so they feel confident when sitting up the front and talking to the class so the more chance you give them to practice at home the better.  You will also need to prompt them for things to say.  On the roster you will see some ideas to help you with this. 

Thank you for your support!

Cat (Miss Kincaid) & Tracie (Miss Jones)

What have we been up to this week?

Term 3 Week 1 (20th - 24th July)

Team Seuss have been ...

• learning the letters s, a, t and i for jolly phonics
• writing silly sentences like a big fat cat sat on the mat because they are our rhyming words
• learning word families
• learning kapahaka songs for our mihi whakatau
• sparking our brains and pumping our blood by doing some jump jam each morning.  This week we learnt superstar and you should be dancing.
• writing about what we did in the holidays
• making get well cards for one of our team who has been in the hospital, Jamal
• learning to skip count in 2's
• learning to count to 25
• learning to order our numbers to 20
• to the library with our buddies and read together then did the matariki macarena
• getting books out of the school library to have in our class
• using the playground as an obstacle course
• learning new words that we can recognise in our reading, Kingston learnt 'is'
• learning the poem twinkle twinkle little star and making our own stars
• reading some books that we can take home and read to our families

We also welcomed 5 new students to our class this week.  We now have two 6 year olds in our class.

Join us to find out what we are going to learn next week.

Welcome back to Term 3

Welcome back to another exciting term.  We have quite a few new children starting in Team Seuss this term so a warm welcome to all the new families.
As an official welcome please come along to our Mihi Whakatau this Friday at 10.20am.  See school notice for more information on this.

Just a few reminders... 
With these cold winter months we have a lot of runny noses so please help your children learn to blow their nose at home.  While you are at it can you please teach your children how to tie their shoelaces, or provide them with velcro shoes.

There are still come outstanding library books.  Please make sure that you bring back the school library books each week.  Our library day is Wednesdays.

For this first week, Fruit in Schools will not be providing fruit for the children.  Please make sure there is a piece of fruit in the children's lunchbox that they can eat during fruit time.

What's happening this term...
Week 1 - Mihi Whakatau
Week 2 - Hearing and Vision testing.  If you think your child needs this please see the office.
             - Welcome to our Student teachers, Miss Parish and Miss Gardyne
Week 3 - Redwood library class visit
Week 4 - Maui in the Sun performance
Week 6 - Team Seuss Assembly
Week 7 - Kapa Haka Cultural Festival (Seniors)
Week 9 - Arts Week - open day and wearable arts performance
Week 10 - Last week for the term

Every week we will be updating the blog on a Friday so you know what the children have been learning for the week.  Team Seuss will help us write this so check it out!  Reminders and other notices that affect our class will also be published on this blog.

Have a great term!
Tracie and Cat

Waltz

Team Seuss have been learning dance as part of The Arts New Zealand Curriculum.  We have also been learning our colours and our theme was rainbows.  Along with learning the sign language for the Rainbow song we learnt to waltz to Kermit the Frogs Rainbow Connection.  We invited our buddy class to help us out too.  Check out how we did.

Rainbow Song

Team Seuss have been learning all the colours of the rainbow and also NZSL (New Zealand Sign Language).  We decided to combine these two teachings and learn how to sign to the Rainbow song.  Below will show how we went.

Term 2 2015

Term one was an exciting and eventful term seeing our class numbers increase from 7 (who were pre enrolled for the year) to 16 by the end on the term.  We have been very lucky to have welcomed two fabulous teacher trainees, Miss Johnston and Miss McLean in the latter half of the term. Unfortunately they were only with us for a short time so we had to say goodbye to them on the last day of the term and sadly, also to Zachariah who is moving on to another school.  You will be missed by us all Zachariah as you are such a happy and strong personality in our team.

Term two is a long 11 week term with a lot of learning packed in to it.  We will be celebrating ANZAC in our first week finishing with our mufti-day on the Friday to help fundraise for Poppy Day, please make sure you wear your mufti and bring a gold coin to donate to receive a poppy on Friday 24th April.  We are lucky to have some special guests come and visit us where we will begin some hockey skills training run by the Women's Black Stick's team during the term and then later we will also have some representatives from ASB to help teach us all about finances and the importance of saving our pocket money.  Later in the term we will be having the parent/teacher conferences (16th & 17th June) so make sure you keep an eye out for more information and notices about that.

Come in and check out our environment and see why we are called Team Seuss!

On Friday of week 4 (15th May) Team Seuss will be sharing in the running of the school asembly so we would like to invite all friends and family to come along and share in our celebration here.

We have an action packed term of learning ahead as well as continuing to learn our basic facts for maths, our phonics and alphabet for literacy, essential high frequency words for reading and keeping fit with our daily fitness and weekly physical education and health lessons.  We are also learning a lot about reusing, recycling and reducing for our sustainability topic.

Keep checking our blog to find out what we have been up to and what we are learning.  See you at the conferences. :-)

Cat Kincaid & Tracie Jones