Autumn / ngahuru is well and truly here and this week we wrote poems to acknowledge the season. To begin our writing we had to stand outside on a cold autumn morning and look southward.  There in the distance we could see the Southern Alps and Aoraki, Mount Cook. To the west we could see the Tasman Sea rolling ashore. Our northern view was of the Twelve Apostles, the hills above Greymouth, also known as the two tuatara. We hope you enjoy our writing.

WALT use a range of language features such as simile, metaphor, alliteration and personification. Context: Autumn Poetry Success Criteria: We will write a free verse poem to express our experience of a Tai Poutini autumn.  The poem will include our choice of language features but it must also contain information that tells the reader where we are in the world. We may choose to use te reo Māori to enhance our writing.
Autumn/Ngahuru		Jayden	Summer	Aedan	Madison
Kade	Emily	Sam	Matthew M.	Allie	Mitchell
Poppy	Beau	Ben	Gage	Wil	Tara
Josh	Reuben	Fern	Lakshitha	Matthew R.	Jack
Bradley	Connor	Finn	Courtney	Ryan	Niamh
Aleece	Greanne	Guy	Lochie	Molly	Kieran

Kia ora and welcome to Term 2

Welcome back to Ruma Tahi Karoro School.

The term starts with three new students joining us. We all hope that Finn, Connor and Reuben enjoy learning, creating, and sharing with us for the remainder of the year. Ruma Tahi is a busy place to be and we are all focussed on making progress in our learning and enjoying the great feeling of success.

This term we have also linked in to a new initiative called "Tuhimaituhiatu". This will require all of us to share our learning with two other schools.  We are in a group that includes a class from a school in Hornby and a class from St. Patrick's school in Greymouth. Each class will be posting shared learning and D.L.O.s on their class blog. Then students will have the opportunity to comment on each other's shared learning, collaborating inter-school, and using our classroom blog to engage a wider group of learners. More on that later...

Striking the flint.

In the last week of Term One our class kicked off our involvement in the W.P.C.A. Our first challenge focussed on developing basic bush craft skills, beginning with 'how to light and cook on a safe campfire'. We had to work in groups to plan a shared menu on a fixed budget. We also had to create a safe campfire poster or information flyer. You will soon be able to access our shared learning through our class website RumaTahi  under our topic button. In the meantime here are some photos to show what an awesome time we had. The view from the kitchen bench was beautiful.

Top Chefs in the making.

Open plan kitchen.

Everything tastes better outdoors.

One of the winning dishes. Delicious!

Agapanthus Artworks

This term we created artworks based in our local environment. Around the western fence line of our school we have numerous agapanthus plants.  During the start of term one these plants are in full bloom. The agapanthus flowers were our inspiration and motivation for our artworks.

The process we went through for creating our artworks included observation, sketching in pencil, painting in acrylics and highlighting with vivid. We ended up with a wide variety of paintings and some of these are included in this post, along with photographs from stages of the process.