Reflection

The Solar System Song

How many planets are there in our Solar System?

 

 We fastened our seatbelts and prepared to watch the magic school bus to find out about the planets.

We found out...

Rotating Earth

Day and Night are caused by the sun shining on the rotating Earth.

Exploring shadows

We went outside out looked at our shadows. They copied us.

Our bodies needed the sunlight to make a shadow. When the sun was behind a cloud we couldn't see our shadows
Our bodies block the sunlight.

A shadow is a place where no light can get to.

Then we came inside to the 'dark tent' and shone torch light at the Earth.


Half the Earth became light, making it day time and the other side stayed dark, making it night time.

We thought it was funny that while it is day time here in New Zealand, on the other side of Earth in Scotland, people are sleeping in the night.

My Shadow

Our Place in Space

How does the Earth orbit the Sun?

The Sun stays still.
The Earth orbits around the Sun.
The moon orbits around the Earth.

Explore Galore

Taking turns Explore Galore

We had fun exploring space

We explored moon rocks.

We lined up patiently for a turn on the moon hopper

.

We used our words, "Can I please have a turn?"

We created milky way planet surfaces
 which moved and mixed like gaseous winds.

Watch our planet surface moving and mixing here.

Ezekiel did 'paper scissors rock' with Aditya to see who would get the next turn with the binoculars.

Sam lined up to wait for his turn on the moon hopper.

Adam said, "Can I please have a turn".

Art Calendars

We have been working really hard this week to finish our calendar art.

Our artwork is about a trip into space.

We created different colourful papers by dying wax crayon rubbings and by painting with cardboard combs and sponges.

We created stripes to show planet rings, blobs to show bumps and craters, and spirals to show gaseous winds.

We then cut out round planet shapes and glued them onto the background.

Next we created a rocket from different coloured papers. We knew the rockets needed blasters to blast fire out to help the rocket to move.

We have been singing some songs about zooming to the moon and bopping in the rocket as well.

We are looking forward to learning more about space in the next few weeks.

You can view our finished art in the classroom in a folder.

Force and Motion Reflection

How can a rocket balloon fly?

We made a rocket balloon using a balloon, a straw and some string.

Predictions:  Will it fly?   Yes - 17,  No -1

Prepare for blast off......

Wonderings and Questions:

•  "What would happen if we blew it up bigger?"  - Rithush

  We tried it out and the balloon went further.

• "What if we point the balloon the other way?"  - Gabby

    We tried it out and saw that the balloon went the opposite way.

• "I wonder if we could fold the balloon up?"  - Ezekiel

     It went really slow. The air couldn't get out very fast.

• "How about we tie up the balloon and put a wee hole?" - Ody

     Would it go faster or POP?   It POPPED!

The air coming out of the balloon pushes the rocket the opposite way.

 

Parachutes and Boats

  

Who can make the fastest boat?

"I think blowing bubbles in the water will help my boat go fast", said Ezekiel.

How can we make our parachutes float
 slowly to the ground?

Why do some things go faster down the
ramp than others?

Click here to explore pushes and pulls.

How can you make the horse travel further?

Exploring the forces of push and pull

Our first exploration into how we can make air move.

A floating ping pong ball?

We are learning about force and motion and how things move.
The floating ping pong ball was very mysterious and made us question how air moves.
We predicted what might happen to a pencil over the hairdryer.
Adam thought it would fall down because it was too heavy. It did!