Aria's Tech learning story

Aria’s Tech learning story

12:30 to 2:30 on a Thursday is the time when the year 7 & 8 go over to Brandon Intermediate where your favorite subjects may be there. Art, Sewing, Cooking, Woodwork and music. Cooking is my favorite because you get to make delicious food that you share with friends and whanau.

Woodwork, is the first class I was put in when I came back to Brandon Intermediate. Not one of my greatest skills because I am not great with wood e.g I always seem to drop a piece of wood and it would make a huge noise. But that didn’t stop me making a box.

The purpose of making a box was to put in something that is valuable to you or just storing something in it because you have nowhere to put it. I achieved that by working with people that can help me to achieve my goal to make a box e.g Gabby, Titi and Ata. We helped each other to accomplish the goal by giving each other a helping a hand and reminding each other what the next step was.

What I found difficult was that I had to use a block plane. “Are you talking about a flying plane?” Well no. A block plane is a small woodworking hand plane that has a blade on the bottom.it’s designed to carve the wood as you push it along. Yeah so as I was pushing it, I did it at the wrong angle and that would prevent the shape to be a bit crooked but by practising over and over I knew that I would get better at it.

The k.c skill I used really well was managing self because I always listened to the teacher so I can get finished and done with the things that needs to be done instead of just mucking around and being left with a piece of wood which nobody ended up with. I also used relating to others really well by helping somebody if they were getting left behind so they can catch up and move on.

When I finished creating my box I felt proud of what I made with all the hard work I put into to it. Everytime I look at it, it always reminds me of how I never gave up and just kept going until I have achieved creating something that needed to be done.

Now woodwork ticked off.

On to the next subject… Sewing

Aria's Art learning story

Aria’s Art learning story.      Success Criteria

We all don’t know what's real and what's not real but we do know that it comes from our imagination.

This is Surrealism art. Just before you ask “What the heck is surrealism art” I'm going to ask you guys some questions. Have you ever imagined combining a bridge as your eyes on your face? Or on the other half of your face there’s a tiger? Actually that’s what surrealism is, combining two or more pictures together to create something extraordinary  instead of ordinary.

I was good at putting in something that was important to me that told you about my identity e.g as you can see there is a cat, you might just think “Oh I guess she like cats” Which I do but I drew a cat because he’s been with me ever since I was like around 6 yrs old. He’s taken care of me whenever I am feeling emotional or sick but later on he is just being lazy!

Fact: Surrealism was created in 1920 and there were many artist that was doing this kind of art like Pablo Picasso.

What I felt about my surrealism art was like, how can I explain it. It was like a cheery feeling that just make me smile whenever I looked at it. How? Well it reminds me of how much hard work I put into it by making it how I want it to be.

What I got better at was not going all random. What I mean is that the first art I did was just putting a bunch of stuff on my face and that turned out to be quite messy so then what I did was just do rough drafts and putting less than two things on my face. Each time I had to think carefully about how my art communicated important things about my identity. This was the hard part.

Tip: Always do a plan and by doing a plan you have to draw fast so then you can  move onto the next draft. Also try not to do bold lines because it’s meant to be quick and done. You can do that on your perfect draft.

My next steps is maybe to include something that seems impossible because I want to try and take some more risks and also see what I can do. I will achieve that for next time. I will think of something that is nearly impossible for me and I shall draw it and see where it will go.

Aria's P.E learning story

Aria’s P.E learning story.

“This is where I lose weight isn’t it” “Oh  geez”

P.E. is where it makes us all excited to play games and trying our best to either win or lose. Or it’s the total opposite where you get exhausted and you lose a bit of weight. Well I think that all of us agree with the second reason but let’s stick with the positive things here everyone.

Over the past few weeks room 12 have been focusing on the purpose of trying to expect the best from ourselves and also from each other when we play team games. But by achieving this purpose we had to encounter a few games. T - ball, Softball, Rounders and dodgeball.

First, I want to talk about dodgeball. Dodgeball is a game where you hit people below the waist and get them out. The main goal is to get every player on the opposite team out so your team can win. My team was good at…

• Using clever strategy e.g catch the ball so you can get the other team players out
• Talking with each other so we know what to do.
• Always trying our best.
• Working together as a team e.g sharing the ball with each other so everyone gets a turn.
• Not caring if we win or lose
• Being a good sport to the other team.
• Including everyone so no ones a passenger.

By using these I was mainly good at including everyone on my team so no one is a passenger by sharing the ball with them so everyone can have a  go so we can all have fun and enjoy the game.

The K.C skill I used was relating to others seen as the paragraph above is how I used that K.C skill. But there were other ways I used relating to others by..

• Cheering for everyone that is giving their best shot
• Always caring for someone that gets hurt.
• Being a good sport to the other team so they know that I am not the type of person to just shame the other team because we win some games.

Experiencing these skills I used helps by letting everyone know that we can trust each other whether I am in their team or not so I could use these skills to help everyone e.g Always caring for someone that gets hurt.

My next steps are to use the strategies that the other team is using e.g aim at the foot instead of going high up because if I can see what they are doing then I would talk to my team and then use it against them to try and win.  

Aria's Writing learning story

Aria’s Writing learning story.

Writing is full of passion. Writing is full of emotion. Writing is full of hard work. Once you use these elements you can finally start.

The purpose of a good but interesting piece of writing needs to entertain the reader, make the reader visualize and make them read on.  If you didn’t do any of those things then you need to use the success criteria.

Here is an example of my personal profile and you may see that I have used some of the success criteria to complete and achieve my goal to write an interesting piece of writing for the readers and to communicate ideas about my identity.

Our Purpose: To communicate someone’s identity effectively, as writers we can…

• Use a hook
• Use other ways of making our reader want to read more, like …(ellipses), or only giving a little information at once.
• Make our readers work something out (infer) by:
• giving clues and not stating directly (Show not tell)
• using anecdotes and examples. Stories from our past.
• Use a creative and interesting writing style (poem, news report…)
• Use clever dialogue.
• Carefully choose language to create a picture for our reader.
• Use punctuation to help your reader make sense of your writing
• Use informal language - everyday language/ Language we use with our friends.
• Rhetorical questions.

One of the success criteria I was mostly good at was using hooks e.g“The whole book was a great read!” “To sum this book up in one word: Brilliant.” That was from my reading learning story. I used a praise that someone said about the book so I used it as my hook also so the reader would probably know that it’s a brilliant book and would want to read it themselves.

What I found hard was to make a piece of writing interesting so the reader can be entertained. So I had to get some ideas from the help of my friends and then use their feedback to improve my writing e.g “About 12 years have passed and many things have happened since. Until now Aria knows that there is still more adventures that await her”. (Personal profile)

What I need to improve on is to use show not tell in my writing. Why do I need to work on that? Well, what I am doing right now is just stating something directly so I am just giving you facts. Instead, I should give the reader clues so they can infer and work something out. This helps them to think more about what I’m saying.

“If you have a story”

“It has to come out”

(Quote by William Faulkner)

Aria's personal writing

Do you know me??

2005 Nov the 6th was the year a young girl started to experience the things that surrounded her when she first opened her eyes. Instead of her mum, her sister gave a little girl a name that she will cherish until the end  - Aria Jury. About 12 years have passed and many things have happened since. Until now she knows that there is still more adventures that await her.

A family of four lives in New Zealand's Capital city, But currently I am living in Porirua where everything was about to change my whole life. Corinna school is where I go to learn about things I never knew in life. Sadly this is my last year at this school so I will be off to college, oh yeah!!!

Being the youngest is great but being with the oldest sister is even better. A while ago I asked one of my teachers, Kate Collins, a question, “Did you teach my sister back then when she went to Corinna” the answer was pretty surprising, actually she didn’t even say anything because when I saw that surprising smile on Kate's face I knew the answer straight away.

In 2016  I was all like “I don’t know what to do” only because I was stuck every time I did something but everything changed ever since I joined Martial arts where they help me to be more confident in myself.

“It’s okay to be afraid that it’s better to be brave”. After I heard those words I was all motivated, I could finally do something instead of just sitting there and doing nothing.

Kō Taranaki te maunga,

Kō Patea te awa,

Kō Tainui te waka,

Kō Nga Ruahine te iwi

Kō Ngati Tama Ahuroa me Titahi te hapu,

Kō Oeo te pa.

All of that just now is apart of me and my family. I am not any other culture except Maori.Just Maori and I am proud of that.

My goal for this year would be to participate in things I haven’t tried before or haven’t played in a while more like talking about flag, started when I was a year 5, now starting it again on my last year. The only reason that this is my goal is that I want to spend the year being a leader by participating in sports and other things.

You may think that this is the end but

there is still more things that await me.

Technology learning story

In 2017 the year 7 and 8 go to Branden Intermediate to do technology with Nga tone school. You must be wondering what kind of technology we do well it’s not like we use electronics there, we simply do cooking, music, art, hard materials and sewing.  We are all in six group and we do different activities.

Sewing

Currently, I am in sewing class and in sewing class, we created a fluffy miniature sized pillows and buttoned small bags. I was really good at measuring accurately by being focused on the measuring I am doing. All I need to work on is to sew straight lines because some of my work has been a bit wonky.

Cooking.

The first class I was in was cooking when we first came to technology this year. I wasn’t really sure if I could cook healthy food because at home I usually I bake sweets yummy sweets but I knew one day I would learn how to cook healthy. I was really good at listening to instructions because I and my buddy’s food turned out great because I listened and if my buddy was to get stuck I would tell them what they need to do next or what they did wrong.

Music.

In music, we played lots of instruments e.g drums, keyboard, and our voice. I was good at planning before I do something because I knew if I was stuck and didn’t have a plan I wouldn’t know what to do so I thought and made a plan. I got better at playing with the keyboard by getting taught by a professional, Titi. I had lots of fun being taught to play the keyboard because I kept on messing it up.

Art/Soft material.

Art isn’t my thing because I always mess it up but it's something that I am working on. I am good at sharing ideas because everyone in my class agreed to it and also some people added on to it. I got better at talking about what to do because usually, the teacher would ask me what we are doing but I just can’t remember but I got better at it.

Woodwork/ Hard materials

In woodwork, we created a lot of fun things like a mini shield, a wooden key. They were fun but they weren’t easy to make. It was hard to hammer down the nails because I can’t really hammer down straight, it always seems to go crooked.

Technology is a fun place for me to learn new skills that I have never witnessed before e.g sewing. I can’t wait for Thursday.

Athletics learning story

The world tells you to “give up” but hope whispers “try it one more time”.

I am a very confident person. And a confident person always tries and tries even when they fail they keep on going. That's what I did in athletics. I tried my best by staying calm and I didn’t panic. I Stayed focused and ignored distraction. I struggled in things but that never stopped me.

First up was the resting station.It wasn’t really a rest station for me because I was shouting and cheering on  people to do their best so they can feel hyped and excited about what they were going to do.

My favorite event of all was high jump. In high jump I was so happy that I got a gold for it because high jump is kinda my thing. I was good at not hesitating when I was near the jump bar because I practiced high jump and in those practices I didn’t hesitate. Hesitating isn’t really a good thing because if you start to hesitate in high jump you won’t jump very high.

More jumping is coming up but this time it’s long jump. It is hard to jump and then land on two feet because I like it when I landed on one foot, I didn’t really like it but I had to deal with it anyway. I was pushing myself to the limit so I could at least get a silver for it and I did.

This time throwing came up that meant vortex. I am terrible at it! When I throw the vortex it doesn’t really go very far. While it wasn’t my turn I was thinking of a strategy and that was to look up at the sky and pick a cloud to aim it at. That was my strategy because I have noticed that a lot of people throw the vortex like they are going to hit the cloud.

Shot put is definitely not my event either because the shotput is REALLY heavy!. Every time I held it my hand I felt like my hands were going to drop on the ground because of the weight. I got better at holding the shot put properly because I remember when I held it wrong it nearly landed on my foot.So then I would practice how to hold it. After I threw the shot put I had some feedback that I needed to improve and by having a good stance so the shot put could go a bit further. That’s what I will do next year.

Discus is another throwing event but this one was a bit easier for me. The only hard thing was when we had to hold the discus on our palm and that was a bit difficult but I got better every time it was my turn. I was really about to give up but all my friends had faith in me so I that made me keep on going until my turn was done.

Run run run you can’t catch me I’m the gingerbread man. Sprints was very unexpected because I came forth. Usually I always last or second to last person in sprints but I have improved. I felt proud of myself because I got a gold for sprints, I knew if I kept on going I would at least have a chance.

Long distance was my worse one yet because it was a long run I knew that I would get a bronze because I don’t usually run that far. I decided to jog really slow so that I can catch my breath. It still made me exhausted. The thing that was hard was to keep on going so at the end you would feel really tired and you would need to catch your breath.

After a long hard day it came to an end. Then we had regionals next. I wasn’t really excited because I was like “ Oh no! There still more”.