Stuff that happens in Room 8 : )

On Tuesday 17th February we had a pretty exciting day. We had Nicole and Tracy, two surf life saving women, in to talk to us about how to have a fun, safe time in or around the water.

To be safe we need to remember:

• Always have an adult watching you when you are swimming
• Never swim in a rip
• If there are life guards, always swim between the flags
• Be sensible when swimming, check for currents, rocks and rips
• Slip, slop, slap and wrap

Tracy and Nicole took  a session in the pool and they held two boards on top of each other and we swam through the waves they made with the boards.  We then got to put two boards together and stood on them. We got into groups and practiced rescuing one another with life guard flotation belts.

 That was in the morning and in the afternoon we had a scientist called Richard De Hamel talking to us about how the Māori survived, made fish hooks and how they made carvings. He told us lots of  stories about how he proved that the Maori fish hooks were an effective, clever design. It was a funny story because he was a bit naughty - he fished in the aquarium.  He did release the fish once he proved that the hooks worked.

By Ashlee

Room 8 Wonders!

On the last day of the holidays we were all thinking about what tomorrow would bring.

When the Room 8 students arrived at school the next day, they all saw what was going to be their classroom for the next year. It was the same Room 8 as last year on the outside, but the inside was amazing!

There was a bookshelf bulging with books on every subject possible! There was music blasting from the awesome interactive whiteboard. We all started dancing when we heard the awesome song. There was welcome to Room Eight 2015 written neatly across the normal whiteboard!
After our awe had passed on, the bell rang and we all sat down at our neat, tidy desks. The music stopped and our new teacher emerged from behind her desk. Mrs Hosie walked swiftly to the front of the class and introduced herself by telling us her Mihi (a Mihi is a Maori introduction).

Two minutes later we were all settling down to learn how to create quick, eye-catching title pages. They looked awesome! At the end of the day we all went home to our parents and told them of the wonders of Room 8.

By Jacob

Tackling the tryathalon

Wheeling in your bike through the gate, looking around for the line to get the safety check to make sure your helmet was sitting in the right place and so nothing will happen when you're doing laps of the field. Some of us feeling anxious, some feeling excited and some feeling quite confident that they were going to do well in this year's triathlon.

Looking down the row,  everybody taking their positions - on your marks, get set, go! We were off running hard forgetting we were meant to pace ourselves, everybody wrestling for the front. Parents filling up the side lines, clicking away on their cameras. People were zooming past on their bikes from the race before us. Coming up was where you had to jump on your bike and do three laps of the field (if you were a Year 5 or 6 student.). Once you had finished biking, you had to jump into the ice cold pool and swim four lengths. Then, it was off to the finish line to join your friends.

Finally it was time for awards. Everyone was talking excitedly about who would get what.
Then the microphone piped up and everyone fell silent as Mr Chalmers started saying what a great day it had been. Finally, first, second, and third were read out for each age group.  After they were awarded their certificates they posed for a photo. After that it was all over for another year and we were given a long morning tea.

By Emma