W1, T4 - He aha te mea nui o te Ao?

This term title of our inquiry is;

He aha te mea nui o te Ao? - What is the most important thing in the world?

Below is our brainstorm and word cloud of our answers to the question.

Thinning out our Fat Questions - The SQUID, T3, W7

This week we are having a go at connecting our Passion Projects to our Maths Statistics learning. Some of our projects might lend themselves to be connected to our statistics learning, some might not be. In our class we talk lots about the learning pit, this is a great chance to apply it to our learning!

Last week we talked about skinny/ thin and fat questions.

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We designed some fat questions using the resource above. Have a look at the padlet to see the questions we came up with.

Created with Padlet

In order to connect these fat questions to our Inquiry we used a design thinking tool called, The SQUID.

(Image source and instructions)

Students used the SQUID to delve deeper into their fat questions. At first glance it is as though we are 'thinning out' our fat questions. But What it allowed students to do was come up with some early assumptions that would be worth experimenting for, to either prove or disprove.

The questions and subsequent answers from our SQUID became our multiple choice questions for our surveys. This is one way we have identified as being able to prove or disprove the assumptions we are making for our Passion Projects. The data from these questionnaires will be the basis of Statistics investigations.

Look out for our individual blogs to see how we are progressing with our passion project!

Quality Blog Commenting #powerhive8

Today we looked at creating quality blog comments. We used padlet, read some blogs, watch videos of students who created quality blog comments, revisited our padlet and we are now working on our reflections about the learning we did today with +James Hopkins.

We are looking forward to the positive and quality blog commenting by PowerHive8!

Created with Padlet

Statistics, T3, W4 #powerhive8

In PowerHive 8 this week we are setting goals for our statistics learning. We did an eAsttle pre test to determine what we know. Each of us accessed our consoles to determine what our next steps are. We each chose 3 learning goals from the 'To Be Achieved' or 'Gaps' boxes on our consoles.

Without consulting with our friends this is what the data showed for statistics in PowerHive 8:

We then discussed what the bar graph showed about statistics knowledge in PowerHive 8. How would Mr Crowe decide what we should learn next? Will everyone need to learn it? Or just the people who have identified that particular goal from their consoles?

Interestingly the tallest bar graph was; "Make statements about data shown in a statistical display". We were practicing this as we discussed our learning as a class!

Our next step is to attend workshops which will allow us to tackle the learning goals we derived from our consoles. By the end we hope to become phenomenal Data Detectives!

What is exponential technology?

One of our reading groups in Room 8 is working on find and selecting information. They are looking into the topic of exponential technology. What is it? Who does it impact? Where to from here?

They will also be using a scanning grid to collate and present the result of their finding and selecting.

The first text they are looking at can be found at http://www.findyourbillion.co.nz/learn/.

Have a read and let us know what you think!

Mr. C

Challenges We Need Solutions To

We are looking at challenges we face and how we can turn that into a Market Day stall idea.

Created with Padlet

Look Who I Found!

Today we have James Hopkins in our class looking at our digital footprints. We are doing an activity called "Look Who I Found!" Our class is googling each other and place the images in the grid below. We won't be publishing the finished grids, but has created some interesting conversations and reactions.

How would you feel about being found online?

Using Stupeflix to Share our Learning

Today we had a go at using stupeflix to share our learning! The above video is about our Inquiry Learning in Power Hive 8.

Creating Squares - Going into the Learning Pit!

In Power Hive 8 we have had a go at this Maths Game.

Only 7 of us have managed to win the computer so far, including Mr. Crowe, eventually!

http://wild.maths.org/creating-squares

Have a go and let us know how you many tries it took you!

Week 7, Using Dialogue in Our Writing

Last week we completed our E-Asttle writing. One of the things that came up as a goal for almost all of us was our use of punctuation when writing dialogue. Below is the lesson we did with Mr. Crowe. We will be publishing our writing on our own blogs once we have received and acted on our feedback.

Becoming Human Centred Designers

In #powerhive08 we have started on the journey towards becoming designers. We watched the clip above and started to develop ways to becoming good problem finders.

The clip above says that 95% of products do not have a successful launch because they fail to include the end user, the people who will use their ideas, in their process. Over the next two weeks we will be seeking out pains, problems and opportunities within our community. This is our place and we want to be part of the solutions that can have a lasting impact on our community.

We will add more pics of the process and look forward to the ensuing feedback.

Turangawaewae - The People And Places We Are Proud Of

Answer these questions in the padlet below:

What are you proud of?
Who are you proud of?
What do you love about your community?

Created with Padlet

Our First Week in Room 8

Last week was our first week together as Room 8. We learnt so much about each other through creating a class treaty, learning about the Big Four and PB4L at Wesley Intermediate. We did some group work and brainstormed together what it would like to express the school values in different settings.

We also started some art that expresses who we are and the things we value and we will make sure we post some pictures when they're finished. One of our favourite activities was doing PE with Room 9.

We also looked at the Learning Pit and had conversations that got us to think about, "What is learning? What does it feel like? What does it look like?"

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We came to the conclusion that if we are not feeling frustrated, out of our depth, like we don't know what to do, then we are not learning. Over the next few weeks we will look at strategies, tools and skills that will help us to  overcome these challenges and progress our learning.

Welcome to Room 8's new blog

This is the first post of our new blog and we cannot wait to start sharing our learning with you. Check back regularly for updated content and feel free to leave comments on our posts, we'd love to hear from you!