New Zealand Land Wars

Over the last couple of weeks we have looked at an article on the NZ Land Wars. Today we visited the Te Awamutu Museum to learn some more about them. It is a terrible part of our national and local history but so important for us to learn about. It has affected our identity and history and has had a massive impact on the relationships between Maori and European.

It was shocking to learn about just how much land was lost by the Maori.

The advantage was heavily weighted towards the Europeans as they had a lot more experience, resources, and numbers of soldiers. The British army swelled to about 14 000 men. The Maori could only gather about 4000 men, and only some of the time, as they had to also provide for their families. 

We also learnt about kupapa who were Maori that supported the British and fought for them. It was fascinating to hear about how Duncan Cameron and his troops snuck, under the cover of darkness, past the well defended pa at Paterangi and onto land (Rangiaowhia) that kupapa had recommended. 

Approximately 2250 Maori died (250 kupapa) and 560 European.

The students got to handle some weapons used by the Maori - patu, taiaha, and muskets. The students also got to put on special gloves so they could handle 150 year old artifacts from the wars. A real privilege!

Next week the students get to visit two of the war sites - Rangiaowhia and Alexandra Redoubt.

Disguised day!

Well done to the student council for running the Westpac helicopter fundraiser. The whole school got in behind it and we raised over $150. Ka Pai!

Treaty of Waitangi

Today we had a fascinating trip to the Te Awamutu Museum to learn about the Treaty of Waitangi.

We firstly looked at the situation before the treaty and the students got to dress up in costumes to represent the tangata whenua, sealers, whalers, traders, convicts, Busby, and Hobson. People were getting unruly and the Maori wanted change to the way their land and people were being treated. Busby and Hobson were expected to acquire land for immigrating British. The students then were shown the steps that led to the treaty.

The Treaty of Waitangi was signed in 1840. Maori were shown the treaty and then given the choice to sign. Hone Heke was the first to sign and eventually over 500 Maori signed. The problem was that Maori were unfamiliar with the language of the treaty and signed without understanding exactly what their signing meant. They thought that by signing they would get greater protection and that decisions about land would be made in partnership with the British. However, the British saw the treaty as giving them the right to govern, buy, and administer the sale of land. This difference is what has led to all the struggles around land ownership in NZ.

The students looked at a massive version of the treaty. It was discussed that the overarching principles of the treaty were participation, partnership, and protection. The students then decided if they would sign to commit to these three things and then got to sign the treaty with a quill.

So much learning and it felt like we only scratched the surface.

Dialogue in writing

We have been looking at the value of dialogue (speech) in writing and strategies to use it effectively so it isn't confusing, boring, or irrelevant. We had a look at the below example of good dialogue and discussed the strategies the author used.

We discussed the importance of breaking up dialogue with detail, description, and action which tells us how the characters are acting and feeling during the dialogue. This is a good example of the power of extra information:

We discussed what it would be like if the only thing you used was dialogue (example below). It is important to not overuse it! We also discussed strategies to avoid confusion over who is speaking. One is indicating who is speaking and the other is when there is a change in speaker, give them a new paragraph.

 We will spend some time practicing these strategies as well as looking at how to correctly punctuate dialogue.

Sentence singing!

Today we looked at the power and effect of varied sentence lengths. Have a read of this:

The students took a piece of writing and counted the words in each of their sentences. They then tallied up the number of sentences under 5 words, the number between 5 and 15 words, and the number of sentences longer than 5 words. It was great for the students to discover what the variety is like in their sentence lengths. The students also worked out the average length of their sentences and what that said about their sentence lengths. Tomorrow we will do a piece of writing with a focus on varying sentence lengths.

Identity

Identity is a rich word with many meanings and contexts it is used. It is a tricky word to understand so we spent some time today exploring it. The students analysed some different sentences that used it and then looked for common threads to come up with a definition. Here is an example of the analyzing.

Here are some of the students definitions:

• Your identity is the way you or your group act. It describes your personality. Your identity is what makes you and your group who they are.
• Identity is your personal information. It's something that divides you from everyone else.
• Identity is who you are. What makes you, you. (your looks, personality, history, background, roots).
• Identity is what you are recognised as. It is like your personality. It makes you yourself.
• Identity means your personal details or your countries culture.
• Identity is something that is part of you.
• Identity is the reputation of a person, place, or thing.
• A person or place can have an identity. An identity is what you are and what you do.
• Identity is something you own which makes you who you are.
• Identity can be a social, mental, physical, or emotional thing.

I am looking forward to more discussion around the above sentences and definitions. We will also look at our New Zealand identity. What makes us different from other cultures? What is our 'personality'?

Plastic pledge

One of our awesome Kokako parents sent me an email from National Geographic which gives the opportunity to make a pledge regarding our use of plastic. It could be a great thing to do as a family. Check it out here:

National Geographic - Planet or Plastic

St Johns First Aid

Today we had St Johns come and teach some first aid to the students. They learnt the basics of:

Danger
Response
Send for help
Airway
Breathing
CPR
Defibrillation

The students learnt to put each other in the safe side position (traditionally called the recovery position), call for help, bandage each other, as well as do the compressions required for CPR.

Lots of great learning we hope they never have to use!

A Plastic Ocean

Over the last week we have watched and discussed a powerful documentary about the use of plastic by humanity. It powerfully showed us the impact plastic is having on our environment and us. Look out for the students blogs to discover some of the problems with plastic. Here are just a few things:

• Plastic doesn't go away. We have the mistaken idea that when we throw plastic into the rubbish it just magically disappears. It doesn't. The plastic ends up in the ground or in the ocean. It breaks apart in the ocean into micro plastics (little pieces). Toxins from commercial waste attach themselves to the micro plastics. The micro plastics get eaten by fish and then we eat the fish.
• Scientists who study the leeching of chemicals from plastic have discovered a number of chemicals that leech from plastic into foods. BPA is one of these chemicals, however, it is just one of many.
• Plastic in the ocean dramatically affects wildlife. Many seabirds and other animals are dying from ingesting plastic (Photo example below).

The documentary also explored ways we can reduce the impact of plastic. Here are just a few things.

• REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE - We discussed how the first one in the list REDUCE is the most important. Often we can avoid the use of single use plastic.
• Germany has made plastic recycling the problem of the retailers. If you sell something plastic you are responsible for the recycling of it. People can recycle their plastic, get cash for it, and in the process who made the plastic is identified so that they pay for the recycling.
• Rwanda is the first country to go plastic bag free. Paper bags are their go to storage bag.
• Put pressure on our government and retailers to reduce plastic use.

The shaping of us!

As part of our inquiry this term we are looking into our identity as New Zealanders. We are shaped by the country we live in and so it is important to inquire into what has shaped our country. We explored what significant events the students already knew about. Then they attempted to put them in order. This helped us see that we know of some things in our history but also that there are many things we don't know about. Here are the events the students identified:

Taupo eruptions
Maori arrived in NZ
Moas became extinct
Europeans arrived in NZ
Treaty of Waitangi
Mt Tarawera eruption
Wars between British and Maori
Kate Sheppard got women the vote
World war 1 and 2
Edmund Hilary climbed Mt Everest
Auckland Harbour Bridge was built
Rugby world cup
Dawn raids
East coast earthquake
Christchurch earthquake (by far the event students were most familiar with)
Kaikoura earthquake

We are going to explore a number of events in NZ's history and identify how those events have shaped our culture and values today.

Lit Quiz

Well done to the Te Pahu School Literature Quiz team! The competition was on Tuesday night and they managed to answer enough questions to get 13th out of 52 teams! Awesome. Thank you to Mrs Kewish for all the hard work she put into training them.

Bringing things to life! - Personification.

We have done some more learning on the language feature personification. In pairs the students described the below photos. I have combined them into a description of someone approaching a house on a hill (with a little tweaking by me for flow.)

There a hill stood, guarding her prized possession. The house stood still, with her trusty guardian tree, waiting patiently for her guest. The wind rushed by, whistling her favourite song.

I approached the tree. Radiant lime green leaves smothered it, engulfing its spider like limbs in a tangled web. Though once a mighty king of the forest, the ancient tree was coming to the end of its days. As time passed, the tree sunk into a deep sea of thought, remembering the days when he was a great king. The old twisted tree sadly sat and lowered its arms and green afro. 

I came to the old twisted gate. It was bashed and tired, leaning on its side, embarrassed by any one passing.

The crawling plants threatened to invade the old, battered window. The ragged, old window groaned in dismay and felt lost as it was overtaken by the cunning ivy. As it slowly decayed, the house was drowned in plants.

As I opened the rustic old door it clung to its hinges and groaned. The wind whipped her worn out bones.

I wandered through the old haunted house and came across a room with a creaky lifeless old chair that sat there, depressed. Abandoned by the world around him it sat staring out the window as the years went past, rotting and fraying.

The right to vote!

As part of our inquiry into our identity as New Zealanders we are looking at things that have shaped us. One significant event was NZ women being the first women in the world to vote. We explored the suffrage movement have looked at how and why NZ was the first country in the world to achieve this. We looked at the characteristics required to pursue something like this against all odds. We looked at the impact this has had on New Zealand and the world. Many countries were influenced by NZ's decision.

We had a fascinating discussion today around equality between the genders in New Zealand today. We explored how although the vote for women has brought more equality there are still places where more equality is needed. Some students brought up the gap in pay between men and women. Someone also brought up how the All Blacks get lots of promotion, attention, and money when the women's rugby team, which is also world class, doesn't get the same attention.

Personification

We have been learning to use the language feature of personification to give life to words and create personal connections and reactions in the reader.

Personification is when you apply human characteristics to something non-human. We have looked at examples and the students have begun to practice using this writing tool.

Here are some of the students sentences describing the above photo:

The ragged, beaten letterbox sat in sorrow, watching the vines twist around him.

As the post box sat, lost in sadness, green loving vines grew to wrap around her with a comforting hug.

The post box precariously balanced on the rotten post as if it had given up all hope.

The sharp lime green leaves strangled the wounded mailbox with a vice grip.

The groaning letterbox gave its last breaths.

The wounded old mailbox groaned and refused to stay intact.