"The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing. One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvellous structure of reality. It is enough if one tries merely to comprehend a little of this mystery every day." Albert Einstein
We get over half our oxygen from the sea, and it is also an important part of the water cycle. Some food also comes from the sea. So it's as important to people as it is for the creatures who live in the sea.
We thought about problems facing the sea and if we could do anything to help. We practiced kaitiakitanga (guardiandship) by going out to pick up rubbish to stop it getting into the sea - we were surprised at how much we found.
Children did various activities to learn more - learn to draw; researching sea creatures and some of NZ's most endangered, the Maui Dolphin and the fairy tern; finding out more about Tīkapa Moana (the Hauraki Gulf - the area of sea that surrounds Whangaparaoa Peninsula), and some even asked to go out and find more rubbish.
It's important for these tamariki to feel empowered and have a way to make a difference if they want to. They are often deeply caring individuals who can feel overwhelmed thinking about the issues in the world, so it's good for them to see people who are already helping, and to find a way that they can help too.
We did some thinking about what life would be like in a cave. If you couldn't see how would you find food?
We had a 'cave' set up in the room - under the tables - which children explored. I had some paper cutouts of cave critters in there for them to discover. Did you know that 'spelunking' is the name for exploring caves. Lots of fun big words this week.
We talked about glow worms (arachnocampa luminosa) and who had seen them before. Some had been to waitomo (wai = water, tomo= hole or go into). Did you know that we have glow worms at Shakespear Park? They can often be seen near the waterfall - go on a night walk and turn off your torches when you get to the waterfall. We thought about why they might glow. Here's a video about them.
Some animals live in caves their whole life (troglobytes - troglos = greek for cave, bytes from bios, life)
Some like to live in caves, but can live outside as well (troglophiles - phileos = love)
Some just visit caves (trogloxenes - xenos = guest).
We looked at adaptation needed to live in a cave.
People have lived in caves in various countries / times (some still do). We discussed why people might live in caves and what adaptations people would need to make - what would be difficult about living in a cave? We thought of advantages and disadvantages of living in a cave.
Some designed their own cave houses (thinking about how to see, how to get rid of waste, how to get water), some created cave creatures out of pipecleaners - such as the tokoriro or cave wētā, some researched animals that live in caves etc.
Welcome to Quest 2023! This term's concept is LIFE. We are going to be looking at a wide variety of topics that link to this concept.
WATER FOR LIFE
“Ko te wai te ora ngā mea katoa”
Water is the life giver of all things.
We looked at what we know about water and made a PMI (plus, minus and interesting) chart about water. I chose this as it was topical due to the recent floods. I wanted tamariki to think about different ways we have water in our life. We looked at being problem solvers - how can we try to find a solution to a problem? If water can be dangerous when we are on a boat what can we do? (wear a life jacket, know how to swim, be careful etc).
We looked at ideas for solutions to too much rain (floods) and too little rain (droughts). Children explored a variety of ideas from looking at how desalination plants work, permeable concrete design, to designing flood proof homes. Some played board games to learn more about conserving water, others found out how our wastewater system works, some thought about the many ways we use water every day.
We looked at the importance of water in different cultures.
"Freshwater is taonga (precious) for Māori.In te ao Māori (Māori worldview) each body of water has its own mauri. Tribal identity is closely linked to freshwater." environment.govt.nz
We have been looking at how change can be useful - firstly in drama - what can we change (looks, clothes, voice, actions). We used this topic to also look at emotions - how do we act to show different emotions? What emotions are there? When might we feel these emotions and what can / do we do if we feel these emotions?
A little bit of philosophy too - when is it helpful / not helpful to disguise our emotions?
I used these cute little 'kimochi' toys to start discussions on emotions.
We created 'blob creatures' from modelling clay to show just one emotion. Some children created stop motion videos with their blob creatures.
Anther week we looked at 'Spies, lies, and disguise' - looking at the story of Margaret Bulkley from the 1800's. She changed her name and appearance to become James Barry so she could go to university to train as a doctor, and became a well-known surgeon as James Barry. Lots of discussions from children here about how difficult that might have been and whether she should have pretended or not. We then looked at when else people might disguise who they are (undercover police, spies, people who are trying to hide for some reason etc). We created our own 'cover stories' and tried to keep to them - it was difficult to remember everything! Some children designed and created spy gadgets too.
We also looked at the learning pit and how mistakes and struggles in learning can be the catalyst for change and learning.
We looked at the recent launching of Artemis 1 and the difficulties they faced when trying to launch (engine trouble, fuel leak, tropical storm) and how they overcame each of these problems. We also tried to make an origami star each and thought about what we could do if we found something difficult and how we felt when we achieved something.
This term we are looking at the concept of change - it's a great one as we come to the end of the year, as some will naturally be a little anxious about changes as one year finishes and another begins. Hopefully by looking at change all around us in different contexts, children will have a chance to process that change is part of life, and along the way learn a few coping strategies if needed.
We started the term by looking at animals and change - metamorphosis, changing colours, and even looking at some cephalopods (octopus etc) that can change their skin texture!
I asked children to list as many different animals as they could think of. If they want to know more about how many animal species are in the world then Wonderopolis has a great page about this with information and activity ideas to take learning further.
We did a sorting and matching activity - trying to match pictures of young with adult animals. Kids were fascinated (and some disgusted!) by flounder / flat fish and how their eyes move to one side of their body as they become adults and go from an upright juvenile fish to an adult flounder.
We watched a video about amazing cephalopods (Octopus, squid, cuttlefish) and how they can change their colour, shape and sometimes even their texture. We thought about why they make these changes.
Some students created pipecleaner critters, some used the letters in the word METAMORPHOSIS to make words (how many can you find?), some imagined they could morph into any animal and gave reasons for why they would choose a particular animal, some researched different animals etc.
This term we have been exploring the concept of treasure - things that are valuable or valued.
FOSSILS - treasures from the past
Dinosaurs are often a poplar topic, but I decided to look more at HOW we know about dinosaurs for this session, rather than WHAT we know.
We role-played being paleontologists, finding paper 'bones' and trying to figure out what kind of dinosaur it could be. We thought about different ways paleontologists find clues - looking at the location of bones, similarities to other bones, other clues around such as trace fossils (footprints etc), discussing ideas with others. We also talked about skills paleontologists would need - patience, perseverance, observation skills, note taking skills etc. The large 'bone' in the photo is a life-sized 3D printed giant moa femur bone.
Next we looked at inference and ideas that could be gathered from looking at trace fossils (in this case footprints). What do we think happened here? What makes us think that? What other ideas do we have? Where could we find more information to help us understand more?
Children then explored this topic further in a variety of ways - by looking at the dinosaur books, finding out online about NZ dinosaur fossils and paleontologists, drawing their idea of a place to live if they lived in the time of dinosaurs (check out Sem's amazing detailed drawings below!), thinking about the pros and cons of having a dinosaur as a pet by making a 'plus, minus, and interesting' chart to arrange their thoughts.
And finally, here is a simple explanation of how fossils are formed.
This term we are looking at things that people treasure, noting that different people treasure different things, and not everything that we treasure costs money.
MEMORY
We started with a simple memory game - how many objects on a tray can you remember? We talked about different strategies people had used - some used repetition, some created a rhyme or song to help them remember things, some looked at objects that go together, some saved a picture in their head, some counted the objects so they could track how many they had remembered etc. It was very interesting chatting about varying strategies - great for children to see that there are many ways and to see others who might have the same strategies as them.
We looked at using mnemonics, chunking, song, looking for patterns etc with some other memory challenges. Did you know that most adults can store between 5 and 9 objects in their short term memory. So it is often difficult to remember a long phone number, but if we use 'chunking' (grouping numbers together) then we can often remember more.
We looked at how the brain works - encoding, consolidating, and retrieving information.
Then we read a great picture book called 'Wilfred Gordon Macdonald Partridge' - about a little boy who helps and old lady find her memories. This is a great conversation starter - it talks about how some memories are happy, some are sad, some are from long ago, some make you laugh etc. We thought about why memories might be seen as treasure.
GOLD
We acted out the Greek myth of King Midas and the golden touch, then talked about what the moral of the story might be.
We looked at where gold comes from and the history of gold mining, and gold mining in NZ today. We also looked at how gold was important in Ancient Egypt - looking a little at Tutankhamun.
MEDALS, AWARDS, AND SUCCESS
We looked at the Commonwealth games and how people are successful. We thought about other things people get medals and awards for, and how else we might know we are successful at something. Children brainstormed things that might help make people successful (eg people to support them - parents, friends, coach; having the right equipment; have a drive and interest to do something; health; luck; skills; knowledge etc)
We looked at the 'success iceberg' and saw that behind success are many things that we don't often see.
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