Earthquake Drill

Room 4 had an earthquake drill on Wednesday morning, and although it was not real, it was quite scary. Read our recounts to see how each child felt during the drill.

CRASH, BANG, SMACK

“Get under your desk!” Mrs May shouted. Then the desks shook and shook and shook. We held on to the legs so they didn’t fall on us.

Glue sticks fell, pencil sharpeners and rubbers falling. Rulers and pencils falling everywhere. I couldn’t believe my eyes.

The chairs fell over BANG! SMASH!

“AHHHHHH!!!” we shrieked.  - Emma

CRASH, BANG! Went the desks as we huddled under them. We all started screaming our heads off like headless chickens. The chairs started rocking all over the place like wild broncos. Then my desk started to move and I was stupid enough to lift my head up, then thump there was a funny noise as head hit my desk. While I was shivering my head off with fear the rest of the class were still screaming. Then the earthquake suddenly came to an end. To my relief it was only Mrs May and Grant doing it so we had something to write about!

By Kate

Bang! Bang! Crash! Crash!

“Get under your desks,” my teacher screamed. Who was scared? Not me. It was an earthquake and it happened at school but it happened at 10:00 on Wednesday. I heard my friends screaming, drink bottles falling, pens and desk lids crashing to the ground with the chairs. The fire siren had gone off and people were scared. I thought to myself ‘What happened?’ but then the teacher said it was just a fake. Thank god.   - Blake

Smash! Bang! Off goes a siren. It stopped. Suddenly everything was shaking. Books, pencils, pens and drink bottles fell on the ground. What was happening? Desks and chairs had fallen over. I can’t believe it was an earthquake. - Max

“Quick kids get under your desk. It’s an earthquake.” I could smell dust falling from the ceiling. It smelt like expired pizza. Room 4 were clutching onto the desk legs and everyone one was screaming like a little girl in pain. Everything was falling  off our desks and being thrown about onto the floor. The desks were crashing, banging and shaking. Luckily it was only the teachers. It was a drill!  - Hamish

The fire siren went off.

Mrs May said, ‘’Get  under your desks, there is a earthquake .’’ Everyone in Room Four got under their desks quickly.   We all got down and held the legs of our desks. Chaos, chaos. Drink bottles were flying everywhere. Desks were shaking and books were falling off the desks. - Lucy

“There is an earthquake,” said Mrs May. I was scared and terrified. “Quick get under your desk and hold onto the leg.” I heard screaming, thumping and a siren and desks were crashing and banging . Drink  bottles scattered everywhere. Pencils were falling on the ground . Suddenly it was all over. We stood up and looked around the room. Desks were moved, drink bottles had tipped over.      - Venessa

Woooooooo!!!!!! “Earthquake get under the desks!!!!” Bash, bash, crash, crash. I rush under my desk like my pants are on fire. We heard the crashing of desks. “Eeeeeeek!!! Eeeeeek!!!” The screaming of girls was unbearable. Things were falling like boulders falling off a cliff. Closer, closer, nearer, nearer. Whosh! Ryan caught his falling writing book. Finally the earthquake stopped. I was so confused. Why didn’t we go to the tennis courts? Why didn’t we hear a rumble before the earthquake? Why wasn't anything broken? I may never know.  - Toby

I was curled up under my desk then suddenly it started shaking. Everything fell off the desks and all the chairs tipped over then…

About a minute earlier a siren went off. Mum yelled out

“Earthquake get under your desks.” We all got under and held onto our desk legs. I was laughing and talking to Jenaya. But just because I was laughing doesn't mean I wasn’t scared.

At least it was just Mum and Mrs Grant shaking the desks and knocking things off them.  We all knew it was them because we could see their feet. - Alyssa

“Get under your desks there is an earthquake,” commanded Mrs May. Desks were shaking. Every single person was screaming and the fire siren was going very, very, very loud around Lawrence. Shake, shake, shake went the desks. A glue stick fell down, then Mrs May said

“Ok, it is safe now.” - Rubie

“Whooh’’ went the fire siren.

’’Get under your desk!‘’ shouted Mrs May. ‘Its an earthquake.’’ Bang! Crash! I could hear everyone’s desks crashing and banging. People were under their desks , clinging. Mrs May shouted out

“Don’t come out until it’s safe.” So, when it was safe Mrs May said that we could come out. We looked around. There were felts and pencils everywhere. The desks were bare. In the end it turned out to be fake and the fire siren was a sound off the computer.  - Samara

A siren went off and Mrs May said

“Get under your desk, it’s an earthquake.” I jumped under, holding my desk leg and all I could hear was screaming and then desks crashing. People where moving right under their desk. All the desks were moving. I could see people curled up right under their desk. - Paris

“There’s a fire,” I said to the people beside me. Mrs May told Room 4 to get under our desks because there was an earthquake. The sirens were going off. Desk lids were banging, things were going everywhere like pens, pencils and gluesticks. I could hear screaming but I was not. I knew that the sirens were off the computer. I saw my gluestick beside me. I picked it up with my hands trembling, I thought it was real. Mrs May said,

“You can come out from under your desk now.” I think to myself I glad that it was just Mrs Grant and Mrs May.   - Lucie

WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE WEEEE went a siren. I looked around. Where did that come from? Then Mrs May called out of the blue

“Get under your desk, it is  an earthquake.” We all scuttled under our desks like crabs. The desks started to rattle like pompoms. One shook here, then another there. We all started to laugh because we knew what they were doing. Mrs May and Mrs Grant were trying to make us experience an earthquake. We all tried to get out from under our desks but Mrs May just said

“Just wait until we tell you that it is safe to come out. Ok now.”

We all crept out from our desks. We stood up. All of our things were scattered in all directions. Our desks were crooked. Luckily it was just Mrs May and Mrs Grant but they had me scared a little. - Abby

Bang! Bang! We get under our desks. I could hear the lids banging on the desks. I could hear screaming and crying. My desk was the wobbliest desk and it almost fell down. I was shocked. I bit my lip. Someone in my class screamed the loudest .I could smell and feel blood coming down my desk. We were under there for ages. Then I saw lots of sparks on the desk. Then the windows smashed and there was glass everywhere. The chairs were down. - Lanie

Crashing, screaming, banging. As the siren went off everyone got under their desks. Things were bouncing off the desks and onto the floor. It was so noisy! The desk legs were cold as I gripped them tight. Then CLANG!! I had to scream. My desk lid was clanging everywhere. I could see the blue carpet and the people beside me.  I was wondering what was happening? And why weren’t the teachers under the desks? Luckily It was just a earthquake drill. - Jessica

We were sleeping but then BANG! BANG! CRASH! CRASH! I woke up with a thump. My Mum rushed into my brothers room and Dad ran as fast as a ROCKET into my room.

“I think I’m awake now,” I said.

“’Well that sure was an earthquake, I'm wide awake,” complained Dad.

It was shaky so hard that I keep on falling over like a newborn lamb. It was that hard to stand up! I think I needed to go on a wheel chair. - Ryan

As the siren went off Mrs May said

“Get under your desk.” I was scared as well as  excited. All the desks started to move and all the chairs fell down. My gluestick fell on my head. As everyone started to get up Mrs May was not under a desk. Mrs May said,

“Do you all know that it was a fake?”. - Jenaya

Bang, crash! Ahh, ohh! ”Whats going on?” I said in my head.

”Under desks,” Mrs May said. My foot was all squished very tightly into Jenaya. A worried feeling came into my head. Shake, shake went the desks. Ohh, there goes a glue stick. Shakier and shakier, scarier and scarier. Lots of kids were screaming. Then it was over. We got up. Once we got up there were pencil cases everywhere, drink bottles scattered under desks, books everywhere and pens all around me. - Josie

“Get under your desk!” the teacher yelled so we got under our desks. I thought I was going to DIE!! Then I could hear people screaming like pussy cats. Pow! Whack! I got a kick in the face with a shoe by Ryan.

“Ouch! Get back here now you little brat!” Then I saw a quick flash of red pants. What the…? The a horrible smell went, mmmmm, how do I put this? - Alesana

Sports Extravaganza

WOW - what a super fun day we all had in Balclutha today at the Sports Extravaganza.  We were in mixed teams with several other Y0-4 students from around South Otago, competing in 12 different challenges throughout the day.  Most activities involved some aspect of teamwork, particularly the relays.  It was great seeing so many children having so much fun, participating actively in a range of different activities.

Venessa, Zoe (Warepa School) and Aaron compete int the team board walking challenge

Samara aiming her beanbag at the target

Tyler from Waitahuna, squeezing every last drop from his group's sponge into the bucket

Sofia passes the sponge to Rubie to empty

Connie throws the wet sponge to her team member to squeeze into the bucket

Connie and Grace at the water bucket

Alesana's team trying to keep control of the balloon

Ryan in one of the scooter relays

Room 4 students - leave a comment telling us about your favourite part of the day.  Which station did you like the best and why?

Sunflower paintings

Room 4 students were super-excited to learn that we had been asked to produce some art work to help decorate the South Otago Theatrical rooms for the up-and-coming play that Mrs O is involved in. We got straight to work yesterday and created some visual masterpieces. Firstly, Mrs O showed us a sunflower painting that her grandmother had done and we talked about how the artist had made the painting look really effective - the use of space, shape of the sunflowers, colour-mixing... The first step was to draw out our design with chalk and then we painted our background first, using a variety of tools - sponges, brushes and fingers. After lunch, when our backgrounds were completely dry, we set to work to complete the sunflowers. We focused really hard on trying to mix colours as we painted.

The motivation - Grandma Jean's sunflower painting

The boys' table

The girls' table

It's exciting to know that over 700 people will see our art work over the next two weeks!!

Pencil sketching

We have been working on developing our pencil sketching skills in Room 4 since the beginning of Term 4. We try really hard to use 'ping-pong' eyes looking up at the object that we are sketching, then down at our page, up, down, up, down... We are getting lots better at sketching what we actually SEE rather than what we think is there. Some of us have been experimenting with shading too. Check out our great sketches!

The other students in Room 4 all knew who our 'Student of the Week' was this week.  Lanie has been working extremely hard on her writing, with very pleasing results.  Ka pai Lanie.

Student of the Week - Alesana

Alesana has been producing some outstanding pieces of writing lately.  We have been particularly impressed by the exciting vocabulary choices that he is making.  It certainly makes his writing a delight to read!

Here's a little taster of Alesana's work....

"Do I have to go Mum?" I whinged, as we walked into the doctor's waiting room.  Mum was too busy reading a magazine.  We were there for 13 minutes.  Then a person came out.  

"Can I please have Alesana".  I sank.  But I got up and limped.  We got into the doctor's room and I could see sharp tools.  "Please hop on the bed".  I could hear my heart pounding and I grimaced in pain.  She picked up a pointy tool.  It got closer and closer.  Scarier and scarier.  Then POP!  A one second flash of blood splattered everywhere, like an open sea.   

"Ahhhhh" I yelled.  But it did not really hurt.

"Here's a lollipop" said the doctor.

Student of the Week - Paris

Paris is our well-deserving Student of the Week this week.  We have been impressed with how she settles quickly and quietly to her reading activity tasks.  Top job Paris!

Student of the Week - Rubie

Super well done to Rubie for the greatest progress for the class during our latest Statistics maths unit.  This is what we LOVE to see Rubie - it doesn't matter where you begin your learning journey, it's how much progress you make along the way.  Top job!

Evelyn and Millie visit

It was great to have our drama friend Evelyn back at Lawrence Area School this week.  She brought with her a young girl 'Millie' who had been to several different schools and was looking for a new school to attend. Millie was not very keen to be starting at yet another new school as in the past she had got into trouble at school.  All she really wanted to do was to go and live with her Nana but she wasn't allowed.   Millie was wanting to know if Lawrence Area School would be a good school for her and why.  The junior school came up with lots of good reasons why our school would be a good place for Millie, including:

• friendly kids who don't bully
• nice teachers
• we play lots of different sports
• girls can play rugby (which Millie was really pleased to hear about)
• cool camps and trips

The day after Evelyn and Millie's visit, Room 4 explored what life was like for Millie.  We produced some frozen images in of what Millie looked like and then created spoken thoughts - where we said aloud what Millie was thinking.  After that we got into small groups and came up with a situation that may have caused Millie to be feeling like this in her old school.  Once again, spoken thoughts were used to convey Millie and the other students' feelings in these situations.

See if you can spot Millie in these group frozen images and think about what might have happened to cause this situation...

Interestingly, we discovered that sometimes other children were just being plain mean and picking on Millie, some times Millie totally caused the problem, while other times Millie had good reasons for behaving the way that she did.  

For example, in Jenaya, Connie and Emma's group, who were eating lunch when Millie (Paris) came along and stole a sandwich, we found out by talking to Millie that she was actually starving, didn't have any lunch and also hadn't had breakfast.  We helped Millie to try to change her behaviour by asking the girls if she could have something to eat.  By simply changing one behaviour, the rest of the group changed theirs in response to this.    

Thursday 24th October

We re-visited Millie, creating a 'Role on the Wall' where we explored all of Millie's feelings, writing these inside the outline of her body. We had fantastic discussions about why she was feeling like thisat certain times. Around her body we wrote everything else that we knew about Millie. There was much debate about Millie's age, but eventually the majority of us agreed that she was most likely to be the same age as Room 4 students - 8-9 years old.

Friday 25th October

The students 'became' Millie and wrote a five minute quick-write diary entry.  These were a mixture of feelings about Millie's first day at Lawrence Area School - it was pleasing to note that they weren't all negative experiences.  Here are a select few for your reading pleasure...

Dear Nana,

I’m not sure if I want to go to this school.  I’ve already been to lots of schools and I really hope that this is the right one for me.  I know that they play lots of rugby.  Why can’t I come and live with you?

Love Millie (Blake)

Dear Nana,

Mum MADE me come to a new school.  I’m not sure if they will like me.  Children said that some teachers let you away with things and there are lots of boys that like rugby. 

From Millie

P.S.  Hope I see you soon  (Rubie)

Dear Nana,

I haven’t made any friends yet but I hope I will because they have all been quite nice to me.  I’ll have to remember though it is only my second day so I might still want to live with you.

Love from Millie  (Alyssa)

Dear Nana,

I went to a new school today.  It was called Lawrence Area School.  I actually quite liked it.  It was a good school with nice people.  I think I might go to this school and maybe stay with you for a holiday.

Love Millie xoxoxoxoxo   (Josie)

Dear Nana,

I don’t think I am ever going to find the right school.  I didn’t make any friends today.  Maybe school just isn’t the right thing for me.  I want to go and live with you but Mum won’t let me.  Everyone was laughing at me today.  Mum said I had to talk to them in their assembly.  I hate school.  I think I’ll never see you again.

Love from Millie  (Jessica)

Dear Nana,

You are the only one that I could trust.  You are the only friend I have and I really want to come and live with you.  I don’t want to go to school.  I do not like school.

Love Millie   (Jenaya)

To Nana,

My first day in Room 4 was very cool because I made some new friends.  The teachers were cool but I did not like the work.  I feel much better at this school because there are good people

Love from Millie   (Lanie)

Dear Nana,

I am not sure about this new school.  I’m nervous.  It just doesn’t feel right for me.  I feel lonely.

From Millie   (Alesana)

Holidays Challenge

 Room 4 students love a challenge, and what better time to sink their teeth into something fun than in the school holidays. These holidays they were given a number of options to choose from, and they could do as many of them as they chose, or they could choose not to do any of them.

 Toby chose to create a fantastic board game called 'Lawrence Cup'. It was based on the America's Cup racing. If you rolled the dice and landed on a picture you had to pick up a card and do what the card said. Some of the examples were, 'You have capsized, go back 4 spaces.' 'Racing is cancelled, everyone must go back to the start'. 'Great racing, go forward 2 spaces.' It is a terrific game with easy rules and everyone enjoyed playing it today when it was raining at lunch time.

 Jessica completed two of the challenges. She created a board game called 'Question Climbing.' You had to correctly answer a question based on TV programmes to progress to the next sqaure. The person who answered the questions the fastest and climbed to the top was the winner. This was a cool game. Jessica also completed the matchbox challenge, and she had filled her match box to bursting point. Her match box was filled with things starting with the letter P. It contained - passport photo, plaster, postage stamp, paprika, pepper, putty, purple order stamp, picture, purple lollie, pink hairclip, picture hook, pie wrapper, paper tape measure, plastic bread tie, panadol, pink eartag, peg, pink pom-pom, purple nail polish, purple mini drop, peppermint, purple plastic, pink highlighter, pumpkin seed, penny, plastic fuse, pink paper clip, pink magnet, plumbers wire, purple pansy, pea, pink bead, plastic aeroplane, purple hair tie, pencil, pen, purple DNA sampler, potatoes picture, pink sticker, purple ribbon, plastic sleeve, polish, purple glitter, pin, pink piece of lego, pink paper, pasta, pink nail polish, picture, purple bandage, purple key, purple earring, pipe cleaner, pop timer, plastic tie.  

 Abby completed the Matchbox challenge, she chose to fill hers with things beginning with the letter C. It contained - cracker, card, cup, lolly crumb, candle, crown, cotton, coin, copper, clasp, clip, paperclip, charm, clutch purse, corn, chewing gum, chocolate chip.

 Lucie completed the Matchbox challenge, she chose the letter M. It contained - magnet, movie ticket, money, match. Lucie also completed the blogging challenge, commenting on our class blog and others as well.

 Alesana completed the Matchbox challenge, he chose the letter P. It contained - pea, person, pencil, playdough, paperclip, pear stalk, pin, purple playdough, pip, piece pf paper.

He also made a fabulous musical instrument. He created a drum out of a plastic baby wipes container. He filled it with letters from 'Letto-gram', so it rattles when you drum on it. It can also be used as a shaker. Great job Alesana!

Josie completed the Matchbox challenge, she chose the letter P. It contained a post stamp, pasta, pink popcorn, pip, paper, paper clip, pink paper, pin

Josies also created a drum set for the musical instrument challenge, and she completed the blogging challenge, commenting on our blog and other blogs too!! Great work Josie, glad to see that blue cast didn't stop you from doing lots of homework!!!!

 Lanie completed the Matchbox challenge, she chose the letter L It contained - Lollipop, lolly, lettuce, ladybirds, letter, leaf.

Lanie also made a set of musical shakers. She made these instruments using drink botlles and rice. Well done Lanie!!!

Samara created a fabulous wordfind about dinosaurs. She had hidden the name of 12 dinosaurs in a massive grid of letters for others to solve. Terrific effort Samara!!

 Lucy completed the Matchbox challenge, she chose the letter P - her matchbox contained -

pipi, peel (mandarin), pin, pencil, petal, pip, plastic, pea, pasta, paper, pink and purple

Lucy also made a musical instrument - It was a shaker, made from juice bottle and rice.

Alyssa completed the Matchbox challenge, she chose the letter P - her matchbox contained - pencil, pink paper, letter p, pink paper clip, pin, pink pyjama button, pebble

 

Rubie also completed the blogging challenge, leaving comments on our blog and other blogs as well.

 

This was such a terrific effort and we really enjoyed seeing all of your presentation this morning. Great work everyone, and good luck to Mrs O as she chooses who gets the prizes!!!!!