Our First Skype in a Long Time!

We had a blast from the past today when this year's B4 got to Skype with Mrs McKenzie's friend Mrs. Morris 

and her Grade 1/2 class in Australia. 

Mrs. McK. and Mrs. Morris first met each other in 2010 through their class blogs.

Over the years there were lots of shared projects and Skye sessions.

We found some similarities and some differences between our classes and schools:

Here are some of the projects Mrs. Morris and Mrs. McK's. classes have shared over the years:

Our World, Our Numbers 

Our World, Our Stories

Flat Stanley

Do you have any questions you would like to ask us?

Weather Skype with 1D in Texas

We skyped with a class from a suburb of Dallas, Texas, USA to talk about the weather.
In New Zealand, it was 8.30am on Tuesday - our day usually begins at 8.50am so we had an early start. 
In Texas, it was 2.30 pm on Monday! 

What did we find out?

In New Zealand it is spring.

In Texas it is fall (autumn).

We measure temperature using degrees Centigrade (˚C).

They use degrees Fahrenheit (˚F).

In summer, an extremely hot day in Reefton might be 35˚C (about 95˚F).

A really hot day in Dallas, TX might be 100˚F.

This morning in Reefton the day was quite cool, and the temperature was about 10˚C (50˚F).

The temperature in Dallas, TX was about 80˚F (27˚C).

We had some time to compare notes about our classes.

We have 20 students. We are Year 1, 2 and 3s, and we are mostly aged 6 and 7, with one 8 year-old.

1D has 22 Grade 1 students, all aged six.

Both classes love doing Daily 5 at reading time!

Winter is the favourite season of Brooks, from 1D

Braedyn from B4 said his favourite season is summer.

We live in a community of just over 900.

1D live in a community of 35,000.

We live one hour away from a beach, but we have a school pool, a town pool and the river.

The children in 1D would need to drive for nine hours to get to a beach! However, they have a rec centre, and lakes, and backyard pools.

Which place is generally hotter - Reefton or Dallas?

What is your favourite season and why?

Mystery Number Skype

Mrs. McKenzie read this post by Ms. Cassidy in Canada about her class doing a mystery number skype, and thought that the students in B4 would enjoy doing it too.

Now we've had our first mystery number skype with Miss Revell and her Year 2 class of iKids, near Napier, New Zealand.
Beforehand, we brainstormed some useful questions, so we could eliminate lots of numbers from our choices.
These questions can all be answered with 'yes' or 'no' answers. They are called skinny questions!

First, our class had to work out their mystery number.

After lots of questions to eliminate the numbers, there was only one number left. It was 64!
That meant that the iKids won that round!

Then it was their turn to guess the number we had 
chosen to start with, which was 67. 
It was funny that both classes had chosen a number in the 60s!
For the next rounds we tallied the number of questions asked. Both classes solved their puzzles in only 6 questions.

Now we are looking forward to more mystery number skypes with Mrs. Watson's class in Canada; 

and Ms. Lirenman's class, also in Canada!

We have a mystery number for you to work out.

Ask us questions in the comments section.

Remember, questions can only be answered with 'yes' or 'no'!

Mystery Skype

Last week we did a mystery skype.

Mrs McKenzie first learned about mystery skpe calls from our friend in California, Mrs Yollis.

In a Mystery Skype call we have to find out the location of the other callers, hopefully before they guess where we are!

Before the call we prepared some questions to eliminate or confirm some areas of the world.

The questions had to be closed questions - the answers could only be YES or NO. 

Everyone had a job to do. 

The SPEAKERS asked and answered the questions.

Other students used the CAMERAS.

The ATLAS people were busy using the answers to the questions we asked. 

They had to eliminate or suggest locations.

The HELPERS took suggestions from the ATLAS people to the SPEAKERS.

The other class guessed first that we lived in New Zealand,  

but WE were the first to guess the actual location of the callers.

They were from Miss Panther's class in Greymouth, only 80km away from us!

Have you ever done a mystery skype?

What was your job during the mystery skype?

Questions from Canada

It's our first few days back at school after summer break and we've already had a skype call with a 
Grade 1 class 
at Florence Hallock School in Edmonton, Canada. 
The Grade 1 students were keen to talk to children from a rural area. Some questions arrived by email a few days ago for the B4 children to think about.

While we were talking we discovered that it is summer here and the temperatures have been around 25˚C to 30˚C here, and in Edmonton it is winter and the temperatures have been -25˚C to -35˚C!

Thank you for the call Grade 1 and teacher Tammy Thero-Soto. It was a lot of fun.

Nathan and Toby talk about what there is on Toby's farm.

Here are the questions from Canada:

1. Do you have kangaroos on your farm?

What other animals are on your farm?

2. What is your school like?

3. What things do you have on your farm?

4. What is the weather like where you live?

5. What do you do for fun on the farm?

6. Are your farms far away from school?

Do you have to drive to school?

7. What games do you play when you are at home and at recess?

8. What are the names of some of the friends in your class?

9. What is your favourite food to eat?

10. Do you have tables to sell small things during your lunch? (as a fundraiser)

B4 students - please add your answers as a comment. 

Remember to put the number of the question!

Visitors - you might like to answer some of the questions too - remember to say where in the world your school is!

Skyping with the New Town Kapai Kiwis

It's the end of summer break but B4 students are still on holiday so Mrs McKenzie got up early to skype by herself with a class in North Carolina, USA.
It was 7am Friday in New Zealand and 1pm Thursday in North Carolina.

The New Town Kapai Kiwis have a teacher who comes from New Zealand! 

Miss Lologa is at the school for a year. 

She loves teaching her students about New Zealand and was keen for the children to speak to some New Zealanders.
A highlight was the song the children sang 
at the end of the call.
Thank you for the chat Superstars.

Some items of interest:

What similarities and differences did you notice?
Whose school day is longer?
Would you rather your school day started and ended early, or start and end a little later?

Skyping With Our California Buddies

We enjoyed a 'Share and Compare' skype session with 

Mrs Yollis and her Grade 2/3 students.

Here is the distance between us 'as the crow flies'.
Do you know what that means?

Each class prepared information on a Google Doc about the communities

 and the schools.
Whose school is bigger?

In New Zealand it was 9am on Friday September 21, and one of our students was celebrating his 7th birthday.
In California it was 2pm on Thursday 20 September where his birthday would be the next day!
Why?

Birthday boy!

We wrote our information on little boards to make for easy sharing.

We met mascots Panda and Beverly from Mrs Yollis' class,

Beverley the Bear liked the look of our couch! Zzzzz.

and introduced our mascot, the cheeky and clever 

Quicksilver the Kea, and his friends: kind and helpful Mr Beesley, and fun, cuddly Squirmy-Wormy.

Our mascots Quicksilver

and Mr Beesley

These boys proudly showed their 'manu taratahi', a traditional Maori kite that they made during our Social Studies topic.

These boys made this manu taratahi during topic. 

Thank you Mrs Yollis and Grade 2/3.

We hope to talk to you again soon.

Do you have any questions for us or for our Californian friends?

Have you ever Skyped someone from home or from school?

Connecting with Connecticut

This week we had the chance to skype with some of our quad-blogging buddies,

Mr Salsich and his Grade 3 students in Connecticut, USA.

Our school day usually starts at 8.50 am 

but we started our skype session at 8.30 am (Wednesday) 

to fit in with Mr Salsich's class 

where it was 2.30pm (Tuesday).

We can only manage to do this during our summer when our clocks are put forward and it's winter in Connecticut and the clocks are put back.

Chase, Maura, Anthony, Carla, Joey, Creighton and Hanna shared some facts about the state of Connecticut and we shared facts about the country of New Zealand.

Then we had time to answer questions and to share 

items of interest.

We met Mr Salsich's class mascots.

 Shea introduced us to Perezoso the Sloth and

Joey introduced us to Juan Pablo, the green tree frog.

Ganda introduced our mascot, Quicksilver the Kea.

Nathan showed his rugby ball. 

It is a little different to an American football 

as it doesn't have laces.

Paige shared her toy lamb, 

because New Zealand has lots of sheep!

All too soon it was time for Mr Salsich's students 

to get ready for home, 

and time for us to get on with the rest of our day.

What similarities and differences did you notice?

Each place has a similar population but which place has more room for the people?

What is the difference between a state and a country?

What questions do you still have?

Read to Someone ... in Australia!

One of the choices we have each day in our reading programme is 'Read to Someone'.

It is always a popular choice.

Students usually sit side-by-side and can either take turns reading pages of the same book, or take turns to read pages from their own books.

At the end of each page they check for understanding - who the page was about and what happened.

Today Jack and Nikki read to Georgia and Tessa  - at 
Harston School in Victoria, Australia!

Now everyone else is looking forward to their turn!

How does reading to someone help us to become better readers?

What book are you reading at the moment?

http://mrsw.global2.vic.edu.au/2011/09/01/read-to-someone-skype/

Mystery Skype Call

What a great morning we had!
Last term Mrs McKenzie was inspired by a post by
 Mrs Yollis about a mystery Skype call, 
and was keen for the B4 children to do something similar.

During our Skype today, we had to find out what country the other class was in, and possibly whereabouts they are in 
that country, by 

asking CLOSED questions. 

The closed questions could only be answered by YES or NO.

We prepared some questions beforehand 
and thought about what the possibilities could be, depending on the YES or NO answers.

Every student had a job during the call.

Some were the SPEAKERS, and asked the questions.

Some were the CAMERA PEOPLE.

Some were NOTETAKERS and wrote YES or NO on the questions as they were answered.

Some were using the ATLASES and were eliminating or suggesting countries.

Others were the HELPERS and took the suggestions from the atlas people to the speakers.

After some great questions, they guessed first where we live.

Finally, we figured out that our mystery Skype callers were from Australia! 

Our callers were P-1-2 from Harston School!

Thanks P-1-2@Harston School, we had a great time talking to you.

What did you like about the Skype call?

What job did you do?

What job would you like next time?

Skyping with Maggie, James and Delia

We finally got to Skype with Maggie, James and Delia. 

They live in eastern USA and are home-schooled by their mother.

The theme for our session was favourite foods, and we discovered that there were lots of foods that children in both countries liked. 

Lots of B4 children have yummy food growing in their gardens, and we learned that it will soon be spring in America, and Maggie, James and Delia will plant their garden.

We also talked about our class mascots. 

We introduced Quicksilver but we couldn't meet their chimpanzee Rocket because he is on the way to Australia!

We did get to meet Speedy the parrot.

Our note-takers did a great job, and so did Nathan and Liam on the camera.

What do you like to grow in your garden?