Which Way is North East?

 We read about how to find Matariki and it mentioned it being in the North East direction. No one knew what that meant. Lots of us had heard about words like 'North' and 'South' before.

We did some research and learned about compass directions. We practiced using compasses and we found which direction Matariki would be! The compasses were very exciting and many children are keen to learn more about it. There is a compass app you can download on your phone if you don't have one at home and your child would like to explore further.

Matariki

 We have started finding out about Matariki by looking at the star Tupuanuku.

We found out the 'tupu' means to grow and 'nuku' is from the word Papatuānuku - it is the star associated with food grown from the ground.

We have been reading about how Matariki signifies the start of Winter and it meant that people had to make sure food was harvested and stored to last the cold months.

We learned about what a pataka was  - many of us had seen one at the Hamilton Gardens before!

We have done some foam printing star art and folded some paper pataka.

What else will dance?

 Today we tried our soda water experiment with some other items. We tried m&ms, lentils, pepper and beads.

We learned about the word PREDICTION and that it means to have a good guess about what will happen.

This is what we observed:

Did the m&ms dance in the soda?

- They only went up once, and then they stayed down. Jonas

- The m&ms skin peeled and the water burned it to pieces and then the water turned. Logan

- The water is wet and wet things peel off the skin if they're very fizzy. Keiva

Did the lentils dance?

- Yes and they danced lots. Alexis

Did the pepper dance?

- Yes it did but when we put them in, they just stayed on the top for a little while. Vincent

- It looked like a geyser. Lachlan

Did the beads dance?

- As soon as we put them in, some stayed at the top, some went to the bottom and some danced. Maisy

- The beads took a very long time to dance. Jonas

- The beads were twisitng all around. Because they all have sides and they're all circles so you can't really tell which way they're moving. Logan

Matariki - what do we already know?

We are beginning our learning on Matariki. We have been thinking like scientists to gather ideas and think about what we would like to learn.

What is Matariki? What do you know about it? What happens? What have you seen? What have you heard?

- It's when you sing - Hunter

- It's about the stars - Angelica

- You celebrate the stars - Ella

- Matariki are stars - Johnny

- It's a group of stars, a family and they all come together on Matariki night. - Maisy

- It's seven stars - Logan

- Everybody celebrates and have lots and lots of food and puddings - Alexis

- It's a Maori celebration of stars - Keiva

- It's when 8 stars come out and you celebrate them. It's Maori - Bonnie

- It's when you sing about the stars - Hunter

What do you want to find out /know more about?

- I want to know about how the stars were made - Maisy

- I know some stars celebrate different things, I want to know what the stars all mean. Ella

- I want to know how the stars got their names and why one is called Matariki - Jonas

- I want to find out about songs that people sing at Matariki - Hunter

- When did the stars get made? Alexis

- Why are the stars special? Bonnie

- Why are there nine stars? Will

- How did the stars get their shape? Are they the same shapes that we draw? Johnny

- Why do people think there are different numbers of stars? Ella

- Why are the seven stars called Matariki? Logan

- How was the Matariki celebration created? Keiva

- What shape and colour are the stars? Henessy

- How do space tornados make stars? Kyle and Henessy

- Why are the stars up in the sky? Tylah

- I want to know how big they are and how sharp they are - Lachlan

- Why is it bad luck if the stars are covered by the clouds? Sosaia

We are so excited to learn more about this special time!