Sunday, June 30, 2013

Tweeting Adventure

This is what the Twitter chat looked like (click to enlarge)

On Friday at 12, we connected with two classrooms through a quick Twitter chat. Cameron and Nikitah J volunteered to be our tweeters and they did a fantastic job representing @Room16Parkvale. They were chatting with @Rm1HNS from West Auckland and @Room2Smarties from Whangarei. Here is one minute video capturing Cameron and Nikitah on Mission Control.


Before we chatted, we had started discussing and generating our own ideas about adventure learning. We had looked at this video from  NZ Adventure Learning which happens to be Simone Gentil's blog, who is the teacher of Room 2 Smarties. Her students certainly knew what Cameron and Nikitah were talking about! The video is taken from the movie Up.


Monday, June 24, 2013

Building Exciting Sentences

The other day we were writing about our caving experience. We have built up our signs of success for moment in time writing. These are to make it exciting to read. For example beginning in the action, short sharp sentences, strong verbs, using the senses and showing personality. As the students typed their first sentences into their Google document, some of them read them aloud into the Explain Everything app on the iPad. We listened back to the sentences and chose our favourite words. Check it out!



Caving Sentences from Kieren Moriarty on Vimeo.

Friday, June 21, 2013

Rufus Escapes

Today, I was lucky to learn together with lots of enthusiastic teachers and some wonderful students at Richmond School. We got to explore many ways iPads can be used to enhance learning.

One app we had a quick go with was Toontastic. Mrs Roil thought my attempt was very silly and dared me to put it on the blog... So here it is!


Thursday, June 20, 2013

I Infer...

Today, we discussed the reading strategy of inferring or making inferences. It means reading between the lines to wok out hidden meanings in the text. You need to combine good thinking with clues in the text and your own prior knowledge. We had a go making inferences from descriptive sentences using Padlet. I think the students did very well! Here are our first two examples.



Saturday, June 15, 2013

Waterfalls and Rain: Aniwaniwa


Aniwaniwa from Kieren Moriarty on Vimeo.

Looking at the map, we gain an idea of the places we have been and the places we will go. Rain falls quite heavily, but we are all dressed for it. I say for the 100th time, "well, it is a rainforest" and we head into the bush. Sure enough, the canopy of the Te Urewera rainforest cushions us from direct rainfall, as our enthusiastic troop hikes up the damp track. I love the smell of the forest - I can't quite describe it. Almost nourishing or spiritual. I take a giant whiff like that boy in the story "Beans".  It spells out to me A-O-T-E-A-R-O-A. I feel at home.

First stop, a weta house. Unexpectedly, there are two at home. Maybe they are wiser than us and know when to take shelter. The students converge on the superstar wetas, like rugby players after the loose ball.  A couple of kids manage to annoy each other in their excitement. Time to move on. We can hear the waterfall loudly now and glimpse it through the forest. Piwakawaka (fantails) follow our footsteps, no doubt enjoying the insect snacks we are inadvertently providing them. The track comes to a detour. We stop. This is where we descend to catch a great view of the waterfall. It's slippery and the track will be a challenge. I know Room 16 are up to it. Carefully, we step down, clinging onto roots and looking after each other.

At the bottom is a big flat rock. It makes the perfect viewing platform.The noise is loud and wonderful. It matches our excitement. Everywhere, I see smiling, laughing , enthusiastically chatting faces, with eyes wide open. Children and adults. My camera tries to capture some of the magic. It's good to be outside, in the bush, in the rain, at the bottom of a waterfall. Aniwaniwa translates to rainbow. For a moment, it feels like we have found our own pot of gold.

Wednesday, June 12, 2013

Explaining Subtraction Strategies


Subtraction Strategies from Kieren Moriarty on Vimeo.

Yesterday in Maths, I used the iPad app Explain Everything as we were going through some subtraction strategies. It is a great app and this was my first go - I can see immediately it could be used in much more wonderful ways than I have here. In our class, we can also use AirPlay and put what is happening on the iPad onto our class widescreen. It's great how you can pause and play back learning and this app suits it very much.

Anyway, hopefully there is something in the captured video that you can play back to help you understand and use subtraction strategies. Thank you to Inderpreet and Tyrone for their contributions on the last slide!

Tuesday, June 11, 2013

Perfect Pancakes




On the second day of camp the children cooked all their meals. Each meal was part of the Master Chef competition. We had a Master Chef competition for the groups throughout the day. There were even special judges from Italy and the USA. Watch the video below to see some highlights from the brunch part of the competition. Although it is simply titled "Good Pancakes", these pancakes were in fact perfect!

The extra music in the video was created on GarageBand by a teacher (me) playing with the app and by a student (Samuel) using his guitar skills with the app.


Monday, June 10, 2013

Onepoto Caves: The Interviews




We are back from Camp Kaitawa and we had a wonderful time! A big thank you to the parents who came on camp: Anthony, Bridgit, David, Jason, Narelle and Richard. Without you we couldn't have had a camp and you all helped make it great! Another big thank you to the wonderful Mrs Hill (Mrs H) and her American student Miss Patel. You both helped make our camp enjoyable for everyone! We must also thank the Camp Kaitawa expert, Miss Hill. She came up as a guest during our camp, as she was helping a teacher from Haumoana School learn all about Kaitawa. Her expertise in the Onepoto Caves was much appreciated!

Here is a collection of interviews I captured while waiting in between caves.