Book Collecting & Delivering

The Grade 2s collected books last term for the needy. We delivered these books to God's Little Lighthouse today. The children loved playing with each other.  We sang some tunes from the upcoming musical "The Giant Slayer".

Our Grade 2's loved it so much that they're already planning an outing back to play with the little ones!

After that we went for a Spring Walk to the beach where we had a Treasure Hunt and a "Boys vs Girls" Sandcastle-Building Competition. 

Great fun was had by all!

Snail Mail

In the world of instant email, it was interesting teaching the children about "Snail Mail" and how long it took for an envelope with a stamp to be sent to another person.

To illustrate the lesson our Grade 2s designed their own postcards this week.  They learned how to address them correctly and where to place the stamp.

Then off to the mall we went, stood in the loooooong queue at the post office and bought stamps.   Here are some pictures of the children posting their post cards.

We had a lot of fun on our outing!

Going for Green!

"Let's Go Green".... this is an initiative started yesterday to give our playground a "green facelift!"

It is our aim to have artificial grass laid during the September holidays BUT we still need to fill 120m2 at a cost of R100/m2.   Together with King of Kings and our fundraising drives of Market Day & Spellathon we are already well on our way!

How can you help?  By pledging R100.00 per m2. For every R100 we fill a square on our wall so that we can see how far we are.

There will be lots of prizes for the children who bring in the funds:

• 10 great spot prizes in a lucky draw when the squares are filled
• Fun prizes every time you bring in a pledge
• A yummy prize as well if you raise more than R500!

What do you need to do?
All you need to do is to bring in your R100 (or more) to buy a piece/s of grass which will then be stuck onto the 120 block chart and receive your prize.

Our children are already very keen and we congratulate Hannah G (R1000), Amy B (R300) and Michaela G (R200) for their contributions already.

Prizes will be handed out every morning during line-up.  If anyone is able to donate prizes for the lucky draw, please contact the School directly or via our website.

If you, (dear reader), whether you are a parent, grandparent, godparent, aunt, uncle or just someone wanting to donate, that you do just that!  You can donate via our website or hand it in at school.

Well done and let's see how quickly we can

"Get it Green!"

Flat Rosie Skype Chat

If you read this post recently, you would be waiting for details of of the Skype chat that our Grade 2's had with the Grade 2's in Australia.

This all happened on 5th November 2012, the webcam and laptop were all set up in the Grade 2 classroom and an excited class waited for their phonecall.

Questions had been swapped between the classes previously to ask one another so each child would have something to both ask and answer.

You can watch the chat here - it's quite long, but very sweet to watch!

Magical Mystery Men

Last night we had an absolutely wonderful time at our Intermediate Phase Production of The Magical Mystery Men.

Mrs Brink and the Grade 4-8's put on an enthusiastic production of two children who were dissatisfied with life as they knew it and who thought that it would have been better to be around at another time.  The Magical Mystery Men and their team grant their wishes to live in different times and countries, until one day, they realise that "Home is Best!'.

The audience participated in getting Reeve and Melanie (the two children) to their next destinations by standing up and doing various actions, while the younger Grades lent their voices to the choir.

It really was a MAGICAL time enjoyed by everyone who was there!  Below are a couple of the photo's but please see our Facebook Page for lots more!

Rosie's Adventure Continues!

We are well into Flat Rosie's adventures now! She has been home with almost everyone in the class! She has had staring competitions, climbed trees, been ziplining, jumped on trampolines, been spider hunting and learnt to ride a scooter! She has even been to a few birthday parties!

Rosie is getting around Cape Town and we are loving hosting her.  The next exciting part we are looking forward to, is our Skype Party with her class in Sydney. Their class is actually COMING BACK to school at 6pm just so that we can try and fit in the same time zone! Parents have been invited to come at 09h00 if they would like to be part of this Video Chat.

This is the second time this year that our Grade 2's have had a Skype Video with an international school and I think they must be looking forward to it!

Feel free to have a look at their Wiki for more photo's of Rosie on her adventures!

Watch this space for the Skype Clip!

Arboretum Outing

On Wednesday 24 October, the Grade 1,2 and 3's donned their civvies and headed off to the Tokai Arboretum for an educational walk in the forest.

Some of the Grade 1's decided to dress for the occasion and we had woodland fairies and bright little bunnies bouncing along the way.  The weather was just perfect, and everyone had a great time! 

To see more photo's - please visit our Facebook page!

Reduce, Reuse and Recycle

The Grade 2's have been learning about the 3R's: Reduce, Reuse and Recycle.  Today in Assembly we were treated to their own songs that they made up to remind them to be wise in how they treat the environment.

Well done Grade 2's!

eMzantsi Assembly

Our final assembly for the term we were treated to a wonderful musical show presented by the children from Rock and their partner School in Masi. For months now they have been getting together, creating their own instruments, props and costumes, as well as learning dance sequences and scripts. This all came together on Friday morning where parents were invited to come and watch what they had been doing. Here is a cast photo and a clip of their production.

Psalty & The Rock Kids

This term there has been a lot of singing heard in the school. 

It has been the term of our Musical: "Psalty & The Rock Kids".  We had a matinee and two evening performances that were well attended.  The show was bright, cheerful and filled with colour and catchy tunes that many children (and parents!) may have found themselves singing along to!

It was a fun evening and we thank Mrs Brink for putting it all together for us, and for the team who supported her in every way.  We do have a DVD available of the complete show! Contact the school for a copy.

Don't forget that in November we have the Senior Musical: The Magical Mystery Men - A Story about Family Values.

Flat Rosie Arrives!

If you have been following our Blog, you will have noticed that we have embarked on a journey with an Australian school, where we host "Flat Rosie' for a period of time.

Grade 2D waiting for Flat Rosie to arrive!

Flat Rosie is a paper friend, who has travelled around the world together with her koala bear companion and a book about Australia and an "I Wonder" book of questions about South Africa, which our Grade 2's will answer.

Flat Rosie arrived on Friday last week, and spent her first weekend with her Grade 2 friend.  Today, the class has been busy learning about Australia, colouring in pictures about it and watching some wonderful You Tube clips on Ralph Harris' Australian songs, which of course, if you remember them, were a lot of fun!

Flat Rosie Arrives!

Our Principal. Mrs Oelofse, is being shown Rosie's new friend, an S.A Bokkie!
He and Koala have become good friends!

Keep your eyes open for updates!  You can also follow Flat Rosie's Blog and see what she is up to in other parts of the world!

Collaborative Projects!

• The Peace Project Returns

Some may remember the Grade 4 Peace Project last year and we have been invited to participate again. This year we have been asked to show us "Building or Doing Peace."

We will be using our interaction with eMzantsi as our contribution. We will be taking video clips of their workshops, talking to the children and staff involved, and will then create a short clip of their time together.

 We are looking forward to it being as exciting and as successful as last year.

• Grade 2 Flat Friends

The Grade 2's will be receiving a parcel in the post soon! They will be hosting a FLAT FRIEND from Australia.  The friend will be accompanied by a notebook with some interesting things about Australia and the areas that Year 2 class live.  In turn, they will have an "I wonder" section, asking us to answer some questions about where we live.

We will then return the parcel to Australia, and follow up our interaction with communicating via the Australian Year 2's Class Blog, Voicethread and possibly, Skype.

So, soon, the parents of the Grade 2's may have a FLAT FRIEND over for the evening, and be asked to take some photo's of our friend visiting our lovely City.

We will send more news home about this project as it unfolds.

BookWeek!

We have recently had BookWeek which is always such a treat for everyone!

Mystery Readers, cosy corner reading, paired reading, poetry recitals and dress-up!

We hope that you will enjoy these photo's!

eMzantsi Carnival Workshops

At the first eMzantsi Workshop we spoke about our family and who was in it. It was interesting to see how different children's family units look! If your child is attending the Workshops I am sure that also know the words of "Ntombi had a ball" and "Hey Marlaina!" ~ catchiest song and coolest moves ever!

 ~Michelle Gatley-Dewing~





Video Skype with Switzerland

The Grade 2's had an exciting day yesterday. It began with an email a week or two ago where they were asked if they would like to help a Grade 2 Class in Switzerland understand what our weather was like.  Of course, we jumped at the invitation!

They gave us some questions that they had asked of other schools and we did our best to answer what we could.  Yesterday we got the Video Call and everyone was very excited and eagerly waiting their turn to answer their questions. Each child had 2 questions to answer. In the clip, I have only used one per child and chosen to include the last couple of minutes which were really spontaneous interaction between the classes.

They had a couple of Dutch children and so we were trying to see if we understood Dutch and they wanted to know what Afrikaans sounded like. Mrs Dooley and her Grade 2's got to recited their Een, Twee, Drie poem to the class in Switzerland. 

It was a really memorable event and I am certain it won't be the last of it's kind! 

My Klere - Afrikaans with Gr 2

Much hilarity when the Grade 2's had to "live out" their Afrikaans Woordeskat of

 - My Klere! -

They had to bring the clothing items to school and dress up in them to practise.

Some interesting looks we have there.