Compliments

We have finished our compliment caterpillar and had a fantastic compliment party today to celebrate! We had lots of fun on our wheels this afternoon and had lots of delicious food. Sadly, we were having so much fun that I forgot to take photos!

Now we have started 'Fishing for Compliments'!

Fabulous Cross Country!

We had an amazing day! The wind was crazy but we didn't let it stop us. It was awesome to see everyone running hard and trying their very best. We also had lots of fun dancing and singing along to some jump jam songs while we were supporting other runners.

A big congratulations to those who made in through to the Western Zone competition next week.

Thanks to Ms Grassi for taking lots of photos.

Insulation Experiment

Today we conducted our experiment around insulation. We each took an ice cube and we put it in our insulation made from different materials brought from home.

Here are some of the things we used:

We checked on the ice cubes again after lunch only to find that every one of them had completely melted!

So, we unlocked our ideas and thought about why our insulation didn't work as well as we thought it would. Here are some of our ideas:

• Our insulation didn't let any cold air in.
• They were under the lights which let out heat and so melted faster.
• They were wrapped really tight, which squeezes the ice.
• The cold air was not trapped in, it was being let out
• Warm air got trapped in when we wrapped them up.
• Some of our insulators were already warm when we put the ice in them.
• They weren't airtight so the warm air got in.

Then we thought about what we could change so it would work better if we were to do it again. This is what we though:

• To have something that could let in cold out and keep out the hot air.
• We could give the ice cube more room in our insulation.
• We could have used something cold to keep them in.
• We could have made our insulators airtight.
• Use proper insulation.
• We could put it somewhere dark.

One thing I would change if we did it again would be to check the ice at different points during the day so we could see how quickly the ice melts in each different insulator.

We saw that someone from Room 7 had used wall insulation and it kept the ice frozen for the whole school day!

We had some great questions being asked during the experiment. Tayla asked a particularly good question, "Why is something that is made to keep heat in our house (wall insulation) also really good at keeping in cold?"

Leave a comment if you can help us answer that question or if you have any other great questions about heat energy and insulation.

- Mr McC

Wind Energy

Yesterday, we conducted an experiment to explore wind energy. We used a balloon, a straw, a rubber band, and some scissors.

The first thing we did was cut the straw so it was the same size on both sides of the bend. Then we attached the balloon to one end of the straw using the rubber band.We had to do it really tight! After that we blew up the balloons and let them go.

When we let it go the balloon spun around in circles.

We figured out that the air pushes the balloon as it comes out through the straw and because the straw is bent, the balloon is pushed around in a circle.

Here is a video that shows you how to make it.

Chocolate Experiment

Last week we conducted an experiment to explore heat.

We held a piece of chocolate in our hands for 3 minutes to see how much it would melt.

The first group held it with their hand open, the second group help it with their hand closed and the last group held it with their hand closed while running on the spot.

Before each part we made a hypothesis (using our prior knowledge to predict what will happen) then recorded the results.

We discovered that:

• The chocolate melted more when we closed our hands than when we left our hands open.
• The chocolate melted more when we were running than when we were sitting still.
• The chocolate melted different amounts different people even if they both had their hand open, closed or were running. Some people who were sitting still with their hand closed had their chocolate melt more then people that were running on the spot!

We thought this happened because as we use energy our bodies create heat. Also, different people have different body temperatures which is why the chocolate melted more or less for different people.

Check out some photos of us conducting the experiment!

Sound Experiement

For inquiry room 8 is learning about energy. There are loads of different types of energy. Sound is one of them. On Tuesday we did a sound experiment with balloons.

Firstly we held a balloon (not blown up) up to our ear and tapped it to see if it made a sound.

Secondly we made a hypothesis about what the blown up balloon would do.

Thirdly we blew the balloons up and we put them up to our ears and tapped them and spoke through them to see what happened. Some people put two balloons together to see if they could still hear the sound.

After that we thought about what we had learnt from the experiment and what questions we still had.

After that we did loads of mini experiments in one. We put a balloon on each side of our head and talked through them to see if we could hear the voice of the other person on the other side.We also scrapped the balloons with the tips of our fingers and found that it caused vibrations in the balloons which made a noise. Also, around the end we put all our balloons together to see if we could here one end to another.

By Flynn, Noah and Mr McC.

Island Bay Reflection

Created with Padlet

On the bus back to School

Lunch and some fun on the playground

On the rocky shore with Liz

On the rocky shore with Liz

In the Aquarium with Jules

In the Aquarium with Jules

We got to watch Jules feed a live crab to an octopus and explain how the octopus digests its food.

In the Aquarium with Jules

In the Aquarium with Jules