Food Tech

This week Friday the year 8's continued food technology at Tamaki College with Mrs. Heka. Today we made Corn fritters with salad and sweet chili sauce in small groups/pairs. The recipe for this dish consisted of flour, baking soda, canola oil, eggs, corn, milk, spinach mix salad, and sweet chili sauce. We started getting out our equipment for the day and putting on our apron. While I stirred our dry ingredients in a medium bowl with a 1/3 cup of flour, and 1/2 tablespoon of baking soda, my partner Haylee whisked well 2 eggs, and 1/4 of a cup of milk in the large bowl. After a good mix, we added them into the large bowl and created a quite liquid paste. We made sure all those clumps were broken down and well combined. We added a whole can of sweet corn and put 1 tablespoon of oil onto the cooking pan. Using a ladle spoon, we created mini pancake like shapes and let them fry until a nice brown. Before topping them, we added a spinach mix salad and drizzled sweet chili sauce over the top. We all really enjoyed today's simple recipe.

Life Education Trust

This week we had the life education caravan come to our school. The class was split into two groups to have separate sessions but we learned almost the exact same thing. Over all we had 2 lessons on Tuesday and Wednesday but I was only there for 1 of the lesson. In the caravan we met our Life Education teacher Nicole. In these sessions we learn about the human body, like the different systems that support our body which is what we did the last year that she came. In that lesson we went of the 4 walls of Hauora which we have been learning about in class. And in small groups we collaboratively wrote about the definitions of Taha Tinana, Taha Wairua, Taha Hingenaro, and Taha Whanau and some positive examples of what they mean. We watched an interesting video that showed us an example of how our the walls of our Hauora are affected by everything that happens to us. What I took from this lesson is that it's really important to look after our well-being to live a fuller life.

Tech at Tamaki College (Coding)

This week Friday we went back to Tamaki college for coding with Mrs. Ferguson. It was my first day being back at tech, but the year 8's have done coding last year so I still have a lot of experience since then. So today we tried coding our robots to create a star shape. I got close to making one of the star points but I was struggling to get the angles and timing right. I had a lot of fun though watching Mrs. Ferguson tape markers onto our bots to see how accurate our bots were when they made the stars.

Starburst Ula loles | Daily Maths Challenge 3

L.I: To find the most efficient strategy to help you solve the maths problem.

For this last daily maths challenge for the week, Florence and I worked together to answer the three questions. This one was about Miss Niuula trying to make enough Ula loles using only red and green fruit bursts. But for every 5 red fruit bursts she used, she then uses 8 green. Our strategy for question 1 and 2 we used addition but for the third we used multiplication. I really enjoyed this one, because once we understood how we worked them out it was really easy!

Extra research: Haiku

This week for our distance online learning, we are exploring poetry. Specifically a form of poetry called Haiku, that originates from Japan. And to understand more about our learning topic, we have been completing some challenges. For this one I worked with Sakina, Haylee, Florence and Taheesha to come up with an interesting DLO full of extra research. Our presentation includes a map of Japan and some basic information, the structure of a haiku, what a syllable is + examples, the history of Haiku, and some interesting facts.

Harvesting Mussels | Daily Maths Challenge 2

L.I: To find the most efficient strategy to help you solve the maths problem.

 This is my second daily maths challenge I've completed for the week, and it's about Zion and his Koro harvesting mussels. Before answering the questions, it gives us a bit of context about the story. But the key information to remember is that for every 4 mussels Zion harvested, his Koro harvested 7. Under each of the three questions, you can see the process of my working out and my final answer at the very bottom of the box. The method to my strategies either involved multiplication, division, or addition.

Retell the Story | Haiku Challenge 3

L.I: To identify and understand literary devices used in poetry.

I worked with Florence again for this third challenge, and together we retold the story of how Maui slowed the sun in a Haiku (5 syllables, 7 syllables, 5 syllables) using 3-5 verses. The first thing we did was watch a clip from YouTube explaining one of the versions of the myth & legend. We figured out the main ideas in the story and retold those parts only. And we took turns writing a verse and uploaded an image and the video onto on the DLO.

Write your own Haiku | Challenge 2

L.I: To define and understand literary devices used in poetry.

This is another DLO I've completed for the haiku challenges, and again we just practice writing a haiku choosing a different idea this time. I've underlined rain and added an image with the proper the attributes for visual effect. Coincidentally, it was raining when I wrote the poem so I took inspiration from what I felt and seen when I looked outside. 

Write your own Haiku | Challenge 1

L.I: To define and understand literary devices used in poetry.

This week we look at poetry, and a style of poetry called Haiku. A regular Haiku is written in three lines. The top line with a maximum of 5 syllables, middle line is 7 syllables, and the bottom line is 5 syllables again. To understand more about this form of poetry, we completed 4 different challenges. As you can see, this is the first challenge I've completed. In this one, we can choose to practice writing our own haiku based off one of the listed ideas. I've chosen summer, and added a labelled for reuse image fit for the theme.

Te Reo Maori Poster (Words & Phrases)

For Te Reo Maori, we were asked to create a poster that helps people with the words and phrases in Maori to describe the weather and how we are feeling. I worked together with Florence to create this DLO, and we also tried saying some of these ourselves. This is a great way for students to practice basic language and learn more about Te Reo Maori. If I were to choose just a couple of these sentences in Maori to describe my day it would be...Kua Whiti te rā. He mahana. Kei te pai rawa au. Can you figure out what I said?

Kahoa Lole | Daily Maths Challenge 1

This week for the first maths daily challenge, we look at a story about Nana making Kahoa Loles for prize giving. I needed to figure out how many she would be able to make depending on the amount of lollies she had. You can see the way I solved each of the questions, using multiplication to find the amount of Kahoa Loles and addition to find the left over amount of lollies. I really enjoyed doing this activity because I can look at how I solve problems like these and see if there are other strategies I could've used.

McDonalds Daily Maths Challenge

For last weeks daily math challenge we looked at the McDonald's statistics for Day 1 level 3 of lock down. Using the information and story we were given, we answered the two main questions about how long it took to serve all the cars in total, and what time it was by the time they finished. Florence, Sakina, Haylee, and I worked together to create this DLO and made up three of our own questions as well. Can you find the answers? I really enjoyed collaborating with a few of my friends and solving this creative maths activity.

Composers: Researching Joseph Haydn

L.I: To use your smart researching skills to find information.

This is the interactive presentation I created on Composers. My last blog posts talks about who these people are and why they are important to the music we listen to today. Joseph Haydn is an example of one of these people. He was born in the classical period, and wrote 107 symphonies! In the DLO I talked about one of these symphonies, called "Surprise Symphony". I also went online and found 5 interesting facts about him for you to read!

Who is SZA? | Favorite Singer/Group...

L.I: To use your smart researching skills to find information.

This is a DLO I created on one of my favorite music artists, SZA. In learning, we have been looking at composers and some examples of them. These are the people who shaped and influenced the music today. In the poster I explain her music style and who she is. I also talked about why she is one of my favorites. I used my researching skills to find out three interesting facts about her. Fact 1 is most interesting to me, I myself and know many people who pronounce her name as S-Z-A.

Kelly Tarltons | Home Blogging Challenges

Before the school holidays ended, I decided to complete one last of the blogging challenges about Kelly Tarltons. This one was quite fun, especially researching about one of the sea life at their aquarium. One fun fact about the big-bellied seahorse is that they are one of the biggest species in the world. Did you also know that male seahorses can get pregnant too? In this challenge, I didn't end up doing the bonus activity just so that I’d be able to get this up as soon as possible. In activity one we looked at the prices to go to their aquarium and figure out how much it would cost us, and our family to go. And activity 2 was choosing one of the sea-animals to write a biography about. We had to include things like their diet, appearance, habitat and pictures.

Harbour Bridge | Home Blogging Challenges

Today I completed another one of the home blogging challenges about the Auckland Harbour Bridge. In the first activity I provided several fun and interesting facts about the Auckland Harbour Bridge like what type of bridge it is and when it was made. In the 2nd one I thought about the cost and requirements for me and a friend to go bungee jumping of the Auckland Harbour Bridge. I found out it would be 260$ which may be seen as quite a reasonable price. And for the bonus activity I had to compare the Auckland Harbour Bridge to the Sydney Harbour Bridge. This was really interesting, as I took a look at both their similarities and differences. I was able to list a couple things in each section of the Venn Diagram.

Taitua Arboretum | Home Blogging Challenges

This week Florence, and I enjoyed working together to complete another home blogging challenge. The place for this challenge of “Getting to know Auckland” was Taitua Arboretum, which is a garden/park dedicated to trees, and etc. In this presentation we put together, we have included 3 interesting facts about Taitua Arboretum, the time it would take to travel by car/bike, and a few of the trees we might see if we went to Taitua Arboretum. It was quite difficult to find particular information like the specific trees, but we were able to find out that they are well taken care of by the Park Rangers. This has been known as a great place to take your family or pets, and go on some of the walks!

MOTAT | Home Blogging Challenges

Today Taheesha, Sakina, Haylee, Florence and I worked together to complete another one of the home learning challenges. This one was about MOTAT, a Museum in Auckland which we’ve been on in a school trip before! It was really interesting getting to know about more about this place and why it was really built. In the first activity we were to locate where MOTAT was on google maps and its address. We really enjoyed the second activity, where we found out several fun facts about them. And the bonus was to find out some information on William Motions, the founder of MOTAT. Something we learnt is that MOTAT stands for Museum Of Transport & Technology. 

Leaf Art Challenge

Today Mrs. Anderson gave the class another exciting challenge to do while at home! This time, we needed to go outside and collect a few leaves of any sort and create a shape of an animal with it. Whilst trying to come up with something with my few leaves, I saw something that struck an idea. I split a leaf in half, and took two small bits off one of the taller leaves. And I was able to make a turtle! What else do you think it could be? Here are some interesting facts about turtles...

1. Some turtles can hide inside their shells in case of predators.

2. Turtles can live up to about 80 years, the oldest turtle aged to 187!

3 Antarctica is the only place turtles do not live other than that, they can survive in pretty much any conditions.

Auckland War Museum | Home Blogging Challenges

Today I completed another one of the home blogging challenges, this time independently. This one was about the Auckland War Museum, with 2 activities as usual and a bonus. I really enjoyed researching, and learning more about what happened in the battle of Gallipoli and also WW1. I enjoyed activity 1 the most, because I got to use my drawing skills and imagination to create a picture of what I thought living in a trench might’ve been like. Activity 2 was talking about one of the weapons used in the battle of Gallipoli and one interesting thing/fact we found out, and the bonus was talking about what the soldiers ate during the Battle of Gallipoli as well.. So far I am really enjoying “getting to know Aotearoa” and these challenges.