Visit from the Minister to launch the Pasifika Education Plan.

On Thursday last week we had the minister of Education Hekia Parata come to our school to launch the Pasifika Education Plan. We had a special assembly after lunch. We were very proud that our Manaiakalani Film Festival movie got shown. Crusader and Jarna did an amazing job introducing our movie for us.

Manaiakalani Film Festival 2012: I Can

Here was our entry into this year's Manaiakalani Film Festival.
Our inspiration for it came from a special visitor we had to our school, Joshua Iosefo. Joshua is a prefect at Mt Roskill grammar and a poet. He wrote a poem called Brown Brother which he recited to us. His poem said said not to listen to negative stereotypes but that you should aim to be whatever you want to be. We thought this would be a cool theme for our movie.

Thanks to Crusader, Darius, Awhina, Kingston and Jarna who were the main lyric writers, to Vivienne for the videoing and last but not least a huge thank you also to Jarna who edited it for us.





We would like to acknowledge that this song idea came from "I Can" by Nas from 2003. We took some of the original ideas in his music video and incorporated them into ours. Here is a link to his video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLmRoVMfsD8

Joshua Iosefo

 Inspiration. It comes in many forms, words, people, films, books, but today, my thoughts on inspiration have changed drastically. All it took was a visit from a young man, standing up to all those who create and believe in stereotypes. Joshua Iosefo. A young polynesian boy who has changed my thoughts, and prospect of the world that we live in. It made me think twice about how my family, friends and I are judged. Though I am not a brown Samoan, it still hits hard.

‘Brown Brother’ The poem that would change the way we think and feel. It deffinately changed me. My prospect of the world, was that there were good guys, and bad guys, and I did understand that, but I always thought that if it happened to me, it would always be someone elses fault. That all changed a few weeks ago.

My class had been watching a movie of Joshua speaking at his school, Mt Roskill Grammar. He was doing his prefect speech. We observed and then had to write a bit about our thoughts on his speech. A few days later, there were comments on our blogs from Joshua’s Mum. She had read some of the students blogs from our class. We exchanged a few messages, and eventually we asked if Joshua would be able to come and visit us. A message was sent back to us. The answer was YES. We were so happy with this reply that we had to organise a date. 

That is how this day came about. Questions were asked, and excellent answers were given. I asked one question, and I think that the answer that was given, was better then any explanation I have heard in my life. I am so appreciative of what Joshua and his whanau have done for us. We have all been very privileged with this visit and I have had a very thoughtful message sent to me. I have learnt a lot. For example If want to be a lawyer, then I can be a lawyer, all I have to do is to keep going even if no one thinks that I can. There is nothing that I can’t do.

A big thanks to Joshua and his Family, I have learnt a lot and I can’t wait to see more from you. :) Thank you!!! 

Animation Workshop

Our extension students took part in an animation workshop run by some of the animating directors from  Bro' Town. Here is a account of what they did by Darius.

Animators Apprentice

“I can’t wait to head into the Tusitala room to meet the Bro Town animators” I thought excitedly. When we got in the room it looked really cramped because of all the people in the room. The three instructors introduced themselves their names were Maka, Nills and Ali.  Ali was the main speaker telling us all about what they do and what they have done. Maka was like an assistant  always popping in saying something then going quiet. While Nills was the silent one taking photos

One of the favourite parts in the presentation was when they were teaching us about splitting lines, once I had figured out how to do the technique properly it became a really interesting thing to learn. It took a few tries but when I learnt how to finally master it everything became so clear.

I really like drawing and hope that when they come back they will teach us more about splitting lines and so that we can move on to more sophisticated drawings.


 

Animation Workshop, Darius from SchoolTV on Vimeo.

Check out this link to the article the Auckland Museum has written about the workshops too.

Brown Brother Response

We were very pleasantly surprised last week when Room 20 received an email about our responses to Joshua Iosefo's Brown Brother poem. And can you guess who the email was from?....Joshua's mother. We greatly appreciated her taking the time to write to us and the encouragement she gave us. Perhaps we might have some budding poets in our class too.
Here is the email she sent us.

Talofa Ms Squires and Room 20,

My name is Fetaui Iosefo and I was reading your classes blogs on the Joshua Iosefos  'spoken word-brown brother'.  We as a family read Osana, Kingstons, and today I read Sylvia and Melvins and decided that I would take some time out and email your class and your teacher to say how very proud I am of you all for showing great understanding of Joshua Iosefo's 'spoken word'.

I am Joshuas mother and it wasn't so long ago he was the same age as yourselves.  He didn't have a blog like you all do but he would write into a journal all his thoughts some were like poetic prayers and others were scribbles of inspiration he would pick up from people, or books he was reading.  We were encouraged by reading your blogs of the inspirations you all had chosen to keep in your heart and mind from Joshuas 'brown brother-spoken word'.

We think you are a fabulous class and have super fabulous teacher, we wish you all the very best for the future.

Kia Manuia

Fetaui Iosefo

Brown Brother Response by Crusader

Joseph Iosefo "Brown Brother"

Joshua Iosefo, a prefect a Mt. Roskill Grammar, wrote a motivational speech called “Brown Brother”. The first time he performed it was at his school. When he did his speech, his mate Rashad made a video and put it on youtube which then got the attention of Campbell Live. After that,  he got the opportunity to perform it on live t.v.

This speech had a message to it, and it was telling the brown people especially to stop limiting yourself by listening to the stereotypes because they are not true. Some messages in his speech relate to some of the messages that we have at our school here such as, Strive to succeed, Champions never Give Up and much more.

 My response to this speech is that, brown people like me can do anything you want as long as you have determination in what you do. It doesn’t have to be a sportstar or a music person but you can be anything else like a lawyer or even the next Prime Minister.

Here is the link to Joshua Iosefo's poem "Brown Brother"

Brown Brother Response by Lesley

Brown brother

Standing on the stage  was a Mt Roskill grammar prefect, Joshua Losefo preparing to say his talk. It came to the time where he had begin his speech but instead he had written up a poem called “Brown Brother”.While he was saying it some people were inspired. One of his friends  put up his poem on Youtube where we were lucky that it came  to the attention of Campbell Live.

The title of his poem was  "Brown Brother".He started his poem off with describing about his colour skin then he got into his main message it was to not listen to stereotypes, stereotypes is about a group of people whereby we attribute a set of characteristics to the group. In part of the poem  it relates to our Point England School korero (it our way to succeed ) which are : Champions Never Give Up, Strive to Succeed and most of all Herenga ki te Whetu which means Reach for the Stars .He also mentioned that some positive things about stereotype like we all love P.E,music,dance and drama.

When I watched it I thought I knew the meaning will be that  we should not limit ourselves and try our best, also to not be afraid to change and that you don't need to be like everybody else because if you do you won’t have a chance to shine. I felt inspired watching him saying that poem.

Art Alive

In term 2 we had an art focus. Our task was to think of a special place, either at school or some place else. We had to take photos of our special place trying to be creative - showing different perspectives and viewpoints. From our photos we took we had to choose the one we liked the best then create an artwork using a particular artist as our model. We had to paint trying to use the same techniques, colours, textures and style.
Here is a slideshow of our finished work.

Smart and Legal

This is a movie about being cyber smart by Vivienne, Chante, Ashleigh and Osana. It is about being smart and legal.

Smart Surfing

Here is another of our movies about being cyber smart. This was made by Crusader and Darius.

We have been making movies in groups to illustrate the different cyber smart categories. Here is one about smart money.

Here is the first chapter in the novel The Giver by Lois Lowry. Read it and see if you might want to take it out of the library/

Positive Online Footprint

This term we have been looking at different ways we can be cyber smart. One way is to make sure we always leave a positive online footprint. We have made animations to convey this message to others. Here are a few.



SchoolTV Part Three, 30th March 2012 from SchoolTV on Vimeo.

The Amazing Race by Ashleigh

“Ohhh The Amazing Race,” my group said in excitement as we were siting under the Marquee waiting to start our activity. Suddenly Mr Barks announced, "Your first challenge is to get into a group of 4 and make a sling shot out of a piece of wood shaped like a Y, some rubber and string. Also you will need to to make missile out of newspaper and masking tape.”  He then  went on to explain, “Once you finish making it you will have to go to where the buckets are and shoot for points. The further the bucket are the more points you get. If you hit the bucket you get the amount of points on the bucket, but if you get it into the bucket you get double the amount of points. Your time to make the sling shot starts now". 

It sounded like a slingshot was quite easy to make but when you tried, it really was quite a challenge. It took our group a couple of tries to make it but luckily we finally had success. Now we could shoot for points.

I have never really played with a sling shot so it was quite hard to hit the buckets. Also I found the missile was too light to get any points. On my 3rd go I finally got 100 points! "Yes!” I said with joy. After a while it was time to play our next challenge.

We had a map of our school which had things we had to collect to make a hobo stove. A hobo stove is a big empty can upside down on top of a fire. So then you can cook things on top of it.

Once again we had to get into a group of 4.We decided to split up and collect the things we needed. We had to search for signs saying Amazing Race. The places we went to were the office to get matches, all the way down to the reserve to get a bag of wood, the pools to get the fire starter, the trees and the bakery to get a egg. Finally we had to come back and get our    

                                                                          fire started.

It didn’t take long for the can to heat up so we put our egg on the can and watched it cook. It was exciting watching it. A couple of minutes later our egg was cooked. We had succeeded.

 

Hydroslide- (A Show Not Tell Paragraph)

I rambled about before I walked up the stairs. As I stared down at the people on the ground they looked like ants. “My turn,” I said with a cheeky grin on my face, full of excitement.

I propelled down the dim, dark tunnel full of swirling cold water. It felt as if a river had taken hold of me. Suddenly I heard a very high pitch scream, at that moment I knew it was Selena H (my friend) coming down behind me. The water twisted and twirled me around as it doused my face. Then I saw a light coming towards me, could this be the end of my journey down this tunnel full of water? It was. As I was emerging out, the water greeted me with a smash in my face.

By Mino

Twisting and turning down a pitch black tunnel I was trying to sit up. As I went around a corner I slipped making me slap my face on the bottom. That felt really sore. After zooming and sliding down rapidly I finally made it to the bottom of the slide with an almighty splash. When I opened my eyes all the water was swirling at the bottom.

By Awhina

Warriors on camp... from SchoolTV on Vimeo.

On our final day of camp we enjoyed a great time at camp. As you can see in this video clip the best NRL team showed up to swim-a-rama. Our school was stoked as the didn't leave while we chanted! That was most of our highlights of the camp!

Crusader's Poem

I am a millionare dreamer

One day, I will win the lotto with my lucky numbers

I am a League Star

Best forward in my grade

I am a son

I want to make my parents proud

I am a brother

Love to make my siblings laugh

I am 11

Turning twelve this year

I am a joker

Making people laugh is what I love to do

Awhina's Poem

Ashleigh's Poem

I am the youngest out of my siblings

I like to make my parents proud.

I like to play my ukulele

but only at home by myself.

Touch is my favourite sport

I love it when I step somebody or  get a try.

I am a game freak 

I love playing strategy games and adventure games.

I love to listen to music

All of the different beats make me feel happy.

I go to church

I am a christen and I am proud to be one.

Aliza's Poem

I am a netball player 

who likes to play center.

I am a sister 

who like to chat to my brothers.

I am a a family member 

who likes to go out to dinners with them.

I am a animal lover 

who wishes for a dog.

I am a singer 

who like to liesten to music.

I am a dancer 

who likes to make up moves.

I am a reader 

who likes to read interesting books.

I am a swimer 

who likes to have races with my sister. 

Cybersmart

Too often these days people post on pictures, information and many more things that aren't cybersmart. The consequences for this is hurting people, never finding a job and dodgy people might know everything about you. I urge you to think before you post, here are some information for the consequences. 

If you want a job in the future you would need a positive footprint. Future employers will google search your name and see all the things you have done in the past. If you have a negative footprint, like bad photos, bad comments they will defiantly not except you.

You never know that a dodgy person can connect you, show your post to anyone and to share your photo to other people. Some people put there settings on private, but are they really?

Many people have been hurt by what people say and do online. Some of the things that people say can start an argument. So if you can’t say it directly to there face then why would you say it online?

The Internet is a cool tool to use for learning, and finding out things. But if you do the wrong things on it, things can go wrong. So once again I encourage you to THINK BEFORE YOU POST!!!

Be Cybersmart

BE CYBER - SMART MY PEEPS

Too often these days, people post photos on face book with little thought of the consequences. WE WANT YOU...TO BE CYBER-SMART!!!

 The reason why you should listen to me is because unfortunately, in the future, you might not get unemployed because of the negative footprints that you have left behind. Because of one photo that you have posted, people might think that you have a bad background and the job might not go to you.

Another reason why you shouldn’t post up photos of yourself is because other dodgy people might pick it up and try to connect with you (in a bad way). You might think that your settings are on private, but really it is not. From one press of a button, that photo will be exposed to the world. You might have to face some serious ramifications.

 The last reason why you should listen to the man himself is because, when you talk about someone on face book dis respectfully, you are actually making them feel bad. The person that you are saying it to, might do some bad things to them selves because of what you said about them. If you can’t say it to their face, then don’t say it on face book or to anyone else.

 So I urge you to listen to what I have been saying or else you will be facing some really bad consequences. THINK BEFORE YOU POST PEOPLE.

Chante's Poem

I am a Lawyer,

This is my aspiration in life.

I am a Role model,

My younger siblings look up to me.

I am a daughter, to two very wonderful and talented people.

I try my best to make them proud.

I am a Samoan, and Tokelauan Girl,

I love both my cultures. They are very special to me and my family.

I am a Dancer, Productions for Santerelli, is what I used to do.

I am a friend,

I help my friends and classmates, also students from my school,

that need help in any sort of way.