How to train your Hippo

This task really stretched the children’s imaginations!  As expert pet hippo owners, they had to write a hippo manual in which they convince the reader that it is the best idea ever to own your own hippo.  They also had to explain how best to take care of your hippo and how to train it.  Everyone was totally engrossed in the activity, mostly because they all think that it would be really cool owning your own hippo!  What made it even more exciting, is that the children created their hippo manuals on the iPad, using Book Creator.

Here are two examples of our hippo manuals.

Tatum hippo

Nieka Hippo

Researching Useful Plants

As one of our Natural Sciences tasks, the children researched various interesting plants to find out how they are useful to humans.  The research was presented in the form of a poster, which explained where these plants can be found, gave us their scientific names and elaborated on their uses.

Tatum shows off the Fennel plant.

Jordan made a stunning poster of the Wild Comfrey.

The Alfalfa is a very interesting plant and was researched by Nieka.

Cameron drew our attention to the Cacti.

The first month of the third term in Grade 5 is behind us!

T

 

This week we enter our fifth week of school in the third term 2014. Our weeks in Grade 5 are filled with a substantial amount of learning, exploration and fun. The Fridays seem to come and go- each one bringing a generous sigh of relief for all, but also one of immense satisfaction.

On one of the Fridays, we hosted a Maths enrichment day and invited 3 other schools to join us. The children thoroughly enjoyed themselves as they pondered over puzzles, built shape towers out of matchsticks/ Jelly tots , analyzed tangrams and made new friends. The children were put into groups of four, each from a different school, and had to put their heads together to come up with a plan of action.

We had a great outing to Three Streams Trout farm, where the children learned about the lifecycle of trout and they were able to explore the factory and visit the fish farming section of the farm. We were fortunate enough to be allowed into the hatchery where the children could see the various stages of the trout’s lifecycle.They were also informed about the various difficutlites involved with this form of farming. The beautiful mountains of Franschhoek were the backdrop for this outing and we enjoyed a picnic on the lawns and some of the courageous explorers managed a walk up a rather steep and muddy hill.

The children have also learned new Afrikaans vocabulary about sandwich making and their favorite toppings. They created a written piece in Afrikaans and then prepared a Mondeling for presentation to the class. These demonstrations were well prepared and there were some delicious outcomes and some interesting ingredient combinations. It is admirable to see how the children’s Afrikaans has progressed since the beginning of the year.

There will be less homework on the cards this week as many of our children will take part in the West Coast Choir Festival. Elkanah House will be hosting this event at the High School theatre and we look forward to some harmonious entertainment from the various schools who will be taking part.