Felices Vacaciones y Próspero Año Nuevo

By Mrs Vincent while Huia 1 students are on holiday.

Here are some photos from the last day of school for 2009. This is the last time we were all together as a class.

We had a lovely surprise visit from Mrs Willet, of Mauku school, who has been following our class blog with her own class. Can you find Mrs Willet amongst us? Her students were intrigued to see photos of Daffodil the Lamb in our classrooms because they have a "Calf Club" day at their school - sometimes known as Agricultural Day or Country Life Day etc - where they bring animals to school for competitions.

We also had our class morning tea as part of our prize for winning the STANZA primary and intermediate section of the ¡Aprender español es divertido! video competition. We had hot chips with tomato sauce, Coca Cola, Fanta or Sprite with ice cream, ice blocks and lots of lollies and chocolate. It was a great way to finish the year and to celebrate our win. We wanted to have a Spanish or Argentina theme to the morning tea but it was just too difficult to organise in a short time for the last day - so everyone had to ask for their food in Spanish instead. It was a good way of checking what the class had learned during the year and no one went hungry...

While we were waiting for the hot chips to arrive, every student was presented with a Huia 1 "Fantastico" certificate for a special achievement during the year.


We farewelled Theo and Mikayla who are going to new schools next year and Daniel who is now back home in Korea. We presented Daniel with a Maori bone carving of a fish hook as a memento of his time with us in Huia 1. The fish hook represents strength, good luck and safe travel across water.

Daniel receives his fish hook pendant and his Huia 1 leaving certificate.

Waiting for the hot chips to arrive....

Still waiting.... and watching the lollies and chocolate on the tables....
Eating ice-blocks

The last of the hot chips - with tomato sauce - a Kiwi "essential" .

Mrs Lee is making an ice cream soda for Caitlin. Place a blig lump of ice cream in a tall glass and then pour soft-drink over the top of it.

Our party also included the World Premiere of our second video: ¡Aprender español es divertido! parte dos navidad especial.

This was organised by Nikeeta and her team. The idea is to show what Christmas means to some of the students in our class and some of the different ways it is celebrated in New Zealand. You will notice that the background is often a "mirror image" because some of the recording was done straight onto the computer using the webcam and it seems to record that way. This was an interesting feature of the process. Here's some notes from Nikeeta, the producer:

"Since our video called ¡Aprender español es divertido! is beginning to be popular on Youtube, we decided to make another movie named ¡Aprender español es divertido! parte dos Navidad Especial.We asked around all of the classmates if they would like to be in it. Some of the students said yes however some said no. We won't tell you who is in the movie, you will have to find that out for yourselves."


After the party we had our final whole school assembly which was also a farewell for the year 8s going to high school next year, other students leaving to go to other schools and a farewell to two teachers, Mr Williams and Miss Wood, who are going to new schools next year also.

Our Principal, Miss Fowler, farewells two of our staff members, Miss Wood and Mr Williams. Some of the Year 8 boys did a haka for Mr Williams.

The Year 7s are waiting to farewell the Year 8s.

At our school, at our very final assembly, the Year 7s sing a farewell song to the Year 8s who are walking around everyone else in the hall. Then all the other leavers join in walking around the hall as everyone else sings to them.

Well, that's pretty much it for 2009.
Enjoy your holidays.
See you back here next February with a new Huia 1 class.
¡Hasta luego!