Anzac Day by Joshua

Anzac Day is celebrated every year on the 25 of April.
This event is a tribute to all the New Zealand and Australian soldiers that got shot down by the Turkish in poppy fields in Gallipoli.
For each dead person, people planted a single poppy and there were enough poppies to fill two poppy fields.
Each one is a memorial to the brave soldiers who died on 1915.
Out of the 16130 New Zealanders and Australians who went to fight at Gallipoli 2701 New Zealand soldiers and 7594 Australian soldiers died.
The red poppy became a symbol of sacrifice after a World War I poem.

Ranzau News - Term 1

Kendall's hunting adventures.

This morning Kendall shared some of her hunting photos and stories with us. This was part of her star challenge. She showed us lots of huts her and her family stay in when they go hunting and tramping. We learnt about some safety in the bush and the interesting sounds some animals make! She even gave us a demo of how to roar like a deer! Kendall also gave us some venison salami to try. For some of us this was really different. Check out some of the interesting facial expressions.

Faulkners Bush By Hamish

I jumped on the piece of cardboard and started to wizz down the hill.  Half way down I slip of my piece and slide without my card. I start to walk up the hill, its a fair way to the top. I see my younger buddy James going down, he was going well. I finally reached the top and Declan said it was our last go so me and Max jump on together.  We got half way down, so far so good.  We start to do a 360 motion.... Nek Minnit WAM! we smack into the tree.  We are both moaning and groaning with scrapes on our bodies. As we walk away Max and I start talking about it really excitingly. 

               

Our Dreams for the future of our country.

As part of our inquiry unit this term, we have been looking at being responsible community members. We have been thinking about what our dreams are for New Zealand in the future and how we can all have a hand in making it a positive place to be. We think we are really lucky to live here. Here is some of our art around this! What are your dreams for our country for the future?

Creative Problem Solving

Today we had to make an emergency stretcher that could carry a small child (a container of pastels)  We only had newspaper, cellotape and string.  Megan timed us to see how long it took us to carry the child to safety.  Zoe, Taine and Brooklyn won this week with a speedy time of 17 seconds.  It was quite hard to move fast and balance the container at the same time.

Year 6 - Camp Disco

On Thrstday night, the last night of camp we had a disco.  Every one had to dress up in a costume, even the teachers.  We played singstar and lots of other cool games.  It was heaps of fun and everyone enjoyed dressing up.

By Sophie

Year 6 Camp - Day 4

On Thursday we went down to the beach for the day.

We worked in our activity groups and did kayaking, sand sculptures and an endurance  swim. 

The group that went swimming first in the morning froze!

When we went kayaking we had to walk along kayak to kayak

and penny sue spread ball's out and we had to go and get them.

For the endurance swim we had to do survival back stroke.
At the end of the day we did a triathlon and Jazzy, Darren and Brett came first.

It was an awesome day!

By Zara & Zoe  

 

Year 6 Camp - Day 3

Day 3 was totally radical. Abseiling was awesome.  Walking down vertical walls, like come on.

We also did mountain biking which we've already reported on.

And of course the ranzau camp tradition, camp songs.

Everyone songs were looking pretty sharp.
That night we had a sleep out so we had to set up our tents.  This was quite a challenge as some tents came without instructions!

At around 9 o'clock we put on some warmer clothes and walked up to the burma trail.

It was pitch black.

And to top of it we got blindfolded as well.

Loads of people were freaked out but it wasn't that scary.

Over all today was one of the best days on camp.

Bring on day 4!

By Daniel and Joshua  

Year 6 Camp - Day 2

Every body's legs where aching after the Able Tasman walk. We stopped at Still Will bay to have lunch. The walk took us 4-5 hours. Everyone was smiling from ear to ear when the Anchorage hut was in site!  After we had afternoon tea we went for a swim in the freezing cold water but we stayed in for half an hour.  A group of girls tried to cover Dave's feet in wet sand. The Aqua taxi (a boat like a taxi) arrived and we all hoped in 7 kids got to go to Marahau on stead of Kaiteriteri and got driven back to Beathany Park while the other kids walked back. Thanks Dave, Declan & Megan for letting us go on camp and all we can say now is BRING ON DAY 3!

By Meg & Kendall.

Year 6 Camp - Day 1

Were driving up the drive way, I feel nervous and excited.   We hop out the car and rush to our cabins but we soon find out that they are locked! Our cabin groups run up and line up in our lines. We find out our count of numbers. Declan says "ready, set, go,"  we zoom through nailing it in the coolest 8 seconds. We head down to the beach and jump into the shimmering cold water. We jump out of the water and head to Kaka point and we had a rolling down the hill competition, it was awesome. We walked to another little beach where we played ball rush and then made some pa's.   The coolest group, group 1 had won the challenge. We walked back to the camp and we had a go on the huge water slide.  The water was freezing!  Later that evening we played some wicked games on the field like snatch the noodle and tug of war.  There was an adults vs kids tug of war and the adults won!

Bring on day 2 and the huge walk!

By Hamish and Harvey.

Year 6 Camp - Mountain Biking

Camp was EXTREME!  We did some awesome activites.
On Wednesday we did the Kaiteriteri Mountain biking track.  It was really challenging but lots of fun.  Jed came around a sharp corner and missed the bridge.  He ended up in the ditch next to the bridge!

Published by Daniel and Joshua

Year 5 - Big Challenge

On Friday while the Year 6's were at camp, the Year 5's went to Bridge Valley for a Big Challenge adventure.  It was awesome and we got to do some really fun activities.  I was first down the water slide and the water was brown and freezing!  The confidence course was challenging but everyone enjoyed it.

Posted by Leah and Ben

Tallest Tower

Today we had a creative problem solving task.  Megan and Dave did this at a course they went to yesterday.  Megan said their one didn't work very well.


We had to make a free standing tower as tall as possible.


The materials we had were:
Cellotape
Newspaper


To make our tower we rolled 4 sheets of newspapers together.  Then we placed the newspaper rolls inside each other.  This made them strong. 


Our group was the only one that stayed standing once our time was up.


We talked about it as a class and we decided that to make the newspaper really strong you have to roll it really tightly.


By Zara , Courtney, Leah & Harvey.

Creative Problem Solving

Today our task was to make a dolls house for a toddler.  All we had was newspaper, one piece of card come cellotape and string.  It had to be free standing, have 2 rooms, a window and have a door that would open and close.  It was quite challenging because the newspaper was flimsy so we had to strengthen it buy using quite a few pieces together. Kendall,  Liam and Allysa came 1st, closely followed by Willam, Taine and Zara.    

By Daniel

Writing in Room 8

Today we have started drafting character descriptions about ourselves . Megan challenged us to write powerful hook beginnings. Here is Joshua's first draft.

Maths interchange is underway!

Room 8 maths class working very hard already!

Ranzau Seniors Blog

The Senior School has created a blog with activites for your child if they are away on holiday or if you just want some extra work for them at home.  All the Star Challenge information is there too:

Click here for our Ranzau Seniors Blog

Self portraits in progress!

We are Back!

We are all excited to be back at school for 2012. It is going to be a fantastic year in Room 8 and at Ranzau School!