2NR Portal 2009

Over the next few weeks you have been asked to create a form of land transport using a balloon/s for it’s power source. You also need to do a speech about your creation.

Your design must be made out of scrap and can not be made from lego, meccano, etc.

In class we have done some experiments with balloons and you have also been shown several examples of things you could try in your design.

Remember: The heavier it is the more power you will need to move it.

Due: Friday, Week 1, Term 3.

Marking Criteria

Your land vehicle will be marked out of 20. I will be looking at effort and creativeness, each worth 10 marks.

Your speech will be marked out of 10. This time I will only be looking at Clarity and Topic, each worth 10 marks.

Tags: Transport

This week we had some fun learning about measurement while drawing our portraits. We used half a photo to get the correct measurements that we could then try use on the other side. We also learnt about shading and how you often draw the shadow rather than a particular feature.

The lesson was a great success and everyone had a go. It wasn’t an easy lesson and I am amazed at the fantastic results. To see more of the portraits you can click the brilliant portrait or hyperlink below.

See more portraits in the Gallery.

Choose one of four procedures and write the instructions to complete the task correctly. You can choose from: Making a Jam sandwich, Make a robot, Put up a tent, Put a cover on a duvet.

This term we will be learning some basic Auslan. We will use Signbank, an interactive dictionary of Auslan (Australian Sign Language). Auslan is the language of the deaf community of Australia. 

We will use it to help us learn to sign language. Your first task is to learn how to say ‘ My name _______‘. Once you can do it without looking try to learn some common words. Try: school chair, car, bicycle, house, table, computer, yes, no, hello.

Click here to learn the Alphabet.

Click here to learn words.

Click here to learn numbers.

Today was a very special day as we had a visit from Zoe’s aunt, Jo. Jo works for the National Gallery of Australia in Canberra and did a fantastic lesson with the students on mapping their story. I would like to again thank Jo, and Pip, for providing such a fantastic opportunity for the students and of course myself.  The lesson was, obviously, a fantastic success.

The lesson was based on Warlugulong, one of five massive canvases that Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri produced in the 1970s, mapping his ancestral lands and their creation stories. It is regarded as one of his greatest works and as one of the outstanding paintings of the 20th century.

click the picture above to use the ZOOM feature
on the National Gallery of Australia’s website.

The painting’s central story is that of the mythical Blue- Tongued Lizard Man, who started a bushfire after his two sons killed a kangaroo but failed to share the meat with him. Other sacred stories are woven around it.

More photo will be added to the gallery

All Year 1 and Year 2 classes will be going to the Sydney Opera House to see a live theatre production of ‘Pigs, Bears and Billy Goats Gruff‘, an energetic and humorous adaptation of three traditional favourite tales by the Patch Theatre Company.

Date: Wednesday 29 April (1st Day of Term 2)
Venue: Sydney Opera House
Dress: School summer uniform with school hat (raincoat if raining)
Food: Bring morning tea and lunch with enough water or juice in a labelled excursion bag, a library bag is ideal. 
Transport: Travelling by bus leaving school at 8:45am and returning at 2:30pm. 2NR students are to assemble on the amphitheatre steps outside the main office at 8:30am.

The excursion supports teaching and learning in:

• English - story telling, reading and viewing texts and talking and listening.
• HSIE - Transport (This terms HSIE unit).
• Creative Arts - drama, music and singing.

This excursion will also form part of the writing assessment (recount) for the first semester reports.

UPDATE: Below are a few images from the excursion.

In Term 2, as mentioned before, we are learning about Transport. This is a great topic and I am sure we will have fun learning about it. To help get us started we had the Squeeze Rocket task and now the Google Street View Treasure Hunt.

The google image below is a an interactive map starting from Macquarie St in Sydney (where the bus will drop us off on our excursion). Click on the white square in the top right hand corner, this will make it full screen, and then use the white arrows to move around the city. If you want to turn around click on the arrows in the top left corner. You can only go were the roads are.

The Treasure Hunt
While navigating through the city you need to find each of the following transport items. Once you find an item record the street number, if available, and the street name (top left corner). Post your answers in the comments and points will be awarded. When someone finds an item they receive the points and then the item is crossed off the list so no one else can earn points for that item.
Prize for person with the most points (You can work in teams if you like as the prize is shareable).

5 Points: white coach (bus), blue car, red car, white car.
10 Points: public bus, station wagon, green coach (bus).
15 Points: truck, motorbike, taxi, garbage truck, 
20 Points: ferry, train, green car, person walking with white hat.
30 Points: ship, sailing boat, bicycle, red tourist bus.
40 Points: hot air balloon, aeroplane (l still can’t find one in the sky).

Early next term (Week 1) we will be doing our writing test for the half-yearly report. The test will be a recount of the Opera House Excursion. I thought it would be a good idea to have one final practice using Easter as our topic.

Type your recount into the comment box. It doesn’t matter if your are a good writer or not, it’s about improving what YOU can do.

I am looking to give out our fantastic reward stamps as well as smilies/ gold bars.

Things to Remember

Title: Choose something appropriate.

Orientation: Who, What, When, Where, Why.

Sequence of Events: First, Next, Soon, After, During, Later, Eventually, Finally.

Conclusion: What did you think, feel or decide about the events that happened?

Try to use paragraphs (use the [ENTER] button to go to a new line).

During the holidays try create a nice bracelet, necklace. hat pin. etc using the UV detecting beads you received today in class. The picture on the right and below may give you some ideas.

Things we learned in class:

• UVA, UVB, UVC are all dangerous. They are at their most dangerous between 10 am and 2pm.
• Sunglasses that do not have Polaroid and UV (100%) protection can cause problems with your eyes. They often just have dark lenses that cause your pupil to open and let more harmful light in to your eyes.
• Protective clothing and sunscreen are very important.
• The ‘No Hat, No Play’ area is not the best place to be if you don’t have a hat.
• UV Beads can tell you when your sunscreen has come off and therefor you know when to put more on.
• UV Beads are cool!!

Questions:

What places had better protection than the No Hat, No Play area?

What can we do to improve the No Hat, No Play area?

The ‘Cartesian Diver’ Aquarium is a fun science/ craft activity that we created this week in class.

The Cartesian Diver works because the pressure compresses (squishes) the air in the bottle (water does not compress). The compression of the air makes it more dense because you are forcing the amount of air in the bottle (and diver) into a smaller space. In order for your diver to sink, the density of the diver needs to become greater so that it will become heavier and less buoyant. The more dense the air becomes, the further the diver will sink.

More photos can be found in the Gallery

Making a ‘Cartesian Diver’ Aquarium

You need:

• Bottle
• Soy Fish
• washer (1-3, it needs to fit around the neck of the fish)
• plastic cup
• food colouring
• water

What to do:

1. Empty the soy sauce and rinse the fish well.
2. Add water and a few drops of food colouring to a cup.
3. Suck the diluted food colouring into the fish - as full as possible.
4. Add 1 to 3 brass washers to the screw neck of the fish.  Screw the lid on.
5. Fill another cup with water. Place the fish in the water, head first. It will probably go to the bottom of the cup.
Take it out, dry it, unscrew the lid and squeeze a few drops of dyed water from it. Screw the lid on and try to
float it in the water.
6. The object is to barely float the fish.
7. Repeat this action until the fish barely floats in the water in the cup.
8. Now transfer the fish to the bottle, fill it right to the brim with water and seal it tightly.
9. The fish should float at the top. Squeeze the bottle and make the fish dive!
10. If all works well then you can add a drop or two of blue colouring to the bottle and seal it tightly.