Creative Chaos

Mrs. Venville talks design with Ruby

Working together in order to lighten the load

Careful construction by Jasmine

The Cat's Tail

Don't worry peeps, it's a pun not an error!

Cats in the city... that was never the intention when I was told to pick a theme/artist for our Visual Arts week... in fact, I very earnestly wrote down that we would study Piet Mondrian (Abstract) and then later on changed my focus to art inspired by James Rizzi (who does colourful cityscapes).  Mrs Fowler, however, had other ideas.  

              In a serendipitous moment, and because she was in rascal mode, she changed my theme to Cats (when I had Mondrian) and then later to Cats in the City (when I had decided on Rizzi).  I did change it back (numerous times, believe me!) but, in the end I accepted that I could no longer prevail against her determined effort.

          I relented and I'm pleased I did!

          In poetry (Term 1) we spent a lot of time exploring juxtaposition - that's the placing of unlike things together to provide contrast - and so this project provided the perfect platform to revisit those ideas but in a visual art context. 

            The juxtaposition is happening in multiple ways:  in the city that is monochrome, while the cat pops in colour, but also in the subject: the city is a symbol of man containing, controlling and altering the environment, while cats, although domesticated, can never been contained despite ongoing human effort.  (For arguments against cats see Gareth Morgan! :-))

           The kids are pretty stoked with their efforts, and I reckon they deserve to be.  Guess this just adds to the mounting evidence that Room 2 really is the very best class at Sunnyhills School.

By Fiona
The colourful motifs were borrowed from the artwork of  Heather Galler

By Karthiga

By Jasmine

The moment of truth ....

Such focus and task commitment, Jacob

Karthiga - sweet taste of success after finding her inner design engineer

Jasmine's wallet has a clear cover for an iPhone.  Her attention to detail is evident in the card pockets

Nadia proudly displays her prototype and the final product

Brayden's nifty catch idea worked a treat!

Joseph holds a prototype and  his wallet.  Well done, Joseph!

ANZAC Day - unlocking the secrets of my family history

I learned a lot today, so a huge thank you to all the kids in Room 2.  

             The memorial plaque my great great grandmother received is colloquially known as the 'death penny', and was sent out after World War I. It was given to the next of kin of deceased servicemen and women.   Thanks for providing that interesting information, Fiona, Carol and Nadia.

 BaiLin, Jake, Jacob and Nicholas explained some of the symbolism. I thought the most interesting part was that there is a lion (the symbol of England), tearing apart an eagle (the symbol of Germany).  The anger the allies felt must've run deep after the war.  I also learned the design was chosen after a competition, and that the winning designer was named Carter Preston.  Thank you boys for your thorough research.

My great grandfather's hat caused great excitement.  Lots of my boys wanted to have their photo taken wearing it.  Naturally, I obliged.  The hat is known as a 'lemon squeezer'.  This was news to me.

Courtesy of Tandia, Jasmine and Ruby, I learned my great grandfather, David Honore was a rifleman and trained in Wellington

David's brother Fritz was killed in action on 26 October, 1918.  He was also a rifleman, was in the New Zealand Rifle Brigade, and fought in the 4th Battalion.  Thank you to Ruby, Jasmine and Tandia for researching this.  It was sad to consider he was so young when he died, and also that the war ended only weeks after he had made the ultimate sacrifice. 

Thinking Skills - The Hat Challenge

What would you wear if you met someone really important?

Our milliners (Year 5 students) were commissioned to design a hat (or fascinator) that would be suitable for an audience with the Queen.  It had to look good and fit well.

Well, that should've been easy, right?
Think again.

The only materials our milliners had access to were sheets of newspaper and Cellotape.
The biggest problem?
They had LESS THAN AN HOUR to design and construct their creations for this most auspicious event. They had to co-operate, be innovative, and adapt their designs as they encountered technical and design-based obstacles.


Well, so how did they go?

Naturally, they smashed it.  Check out Jasmine, Nessa  (with Nadia) and Samuel.
You guys are too too awesome!

Who am I?

I am considered the greatest poet of all time.  I was born a long time ago (well before anyone even conceived of the idea of a camera), in a place called Stratford-upon-Avon.  I wrote the plays Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth and King Lear.  They call me The Bard because, seriously, I am that good at writing.  Just sayin'.

If you think you know who I am, please email your answers through to Mrs Wallace by Monday morning.

By the way, we are going to be working on writing good poetry this term.  We will learn about tone and tension.  We will also practise using simile and metaphor effectively.

Here is a poem I wrote to help people understand about poetry and poets.

About the Poet

she had an artist's mind

but not an artist's hand,

and as a consequence,

it's true,

she often
wrote

but never drew.

(Yes, the lower case 's' is on purpose!)  (Yes, I know it's not that good, but it only took a couple of minutes!)