Training with the Silver Ferns

Such excitement for Mary, Kuini, Bella, Shakaia, Leanah and Katrina today ... they were driven to St Kents for some netball coaching ... with some Silver Ferns ...

Leana de Bruin, Cat Tuivaiti, Maria Tutaia and Grace Rasmussen shared some of their amazing skills with these lucky netball players from Ruapotaka.  It was especially exciting for Mary who wants to be a superstar like Maria Tutaia one day.

Sustained Silent Drawing 2016!

How silent and sustained the sketching when learners can choose their own drawing lessons from Youtube! Room 10 students are loving sketching various animals in different styles this week.  I think there is even more focus than at SSR time!

Working together to face our challenges

We are back at Ruapotaka School but learning in the library instead of Room 10 at the moment. To help us think about working together as we face our latest challenges, we completed a teamwork challenge. Each team was given 25 straws, one strip of Blutak and five minutes to see who could build the tallest tower.



It wasn't really about the tallest tower, it was about taking turns to talk, listening to others, co-operating and collaborating as each team came up with a plan. It was wonderful to see three-quarters of the teams face this challenge successfully!

How will reading change your life?

Henry entertained us at our Duffy role model assembly at Tamaki Primary School this afternoon with his hilarious stories about reading at the library when he was a kid. The first book that he can remember reading at the library was Where the wild things are and by the time he was a teenager he was reading Shakespeare - which led him to drama school.  Henry says that reading changed his life!

Robati was excited to receive a Goosebumps book from Henry. It'll be hard for Robati to put that down until he's finished!

Mālō e lelei!

As  manuhiri at Tamaki Primary School, it was a privilege to watch a special assembly this morning to celebrate Tongan Language Week.  Beautiful costumes, beautiful speeches and beautiful singing and dancing! Thank you for letting us share this wonderful event with you.

A warm welcome at Tamaki Primary School!

School and learning were a little different today ...  We are learning in the library at Tamaki Primary School with Room 9 for the rest of this week while our rooms at Ruapotaka are cleaned.  It was pretty cool running around the bike track for fitness too.  Thank you, Tamaki Primary School, for such a warm welcome and sharing your space with us.

Just like Steven Adams!

Last week Coach Marco from Kiwisport came to Ruapotaka to begin teaching us how to play basketball like Steven Adams!  We had loads of fun dribbling the ball with our finger tips and practising our triple threat stance.  What will we learn next?