Term 1 Week 11

Well we have made it to the end of Term 1 at Balmacewen.
Its been a great term and Tom has settled into it very nicely.

His Turangawaewae Piece came together really well and he was very happy with the result.
He also received a teachers award for such a terrific effort.

Well Thomas Cargill have a great break and I look forward to seeing your bright cheerful smile on day 1 of term 2.

Term 1 Week 10

Thomas had a great week this week.
two visits to the library, so lots of time to check out the wide selection of books on offer.
On Tuesday we took the opportunity to measure how tall Tom is. 143cm.
he seems to have grown taller since the beginning of the year.
Last session in food technology on Tuesday and he made choc chip cookies..
special music on Thursday and Tom chose to be out of his wheelchair for this.
He really enjoys music and makes the most of the time by really throwing himself into it.
On Friday we had school photos.

Mr Brew spray painted Toms rugby ball and its looking fabulous.

Ready for choosing a paint colour

Term 1 Week 9

Thomas  continues to enjoy his food technology classes.
This week he produced apple rhubarb crumble on Tuesday and on Thursday turned out a pretty good looking beef stir fry.


Thomas had the chance to accompany Poppy to collect and deliver some mail around the school.He really enjoys this job.

Chopping the apples

Mail duties

TURANGAWAEWAE PROJECT

We made a start on this this week and Toms ideas are coming through quite strongly.
I like how Tom is always open to ideas to strengthen his original plan.
He new he wanted a rugby type idea but we worked together to come up with ideas. Well done Tom.

First layer done

The ball.

working together.

Term 1 Week 8

Tom has had a few opportunities to play with his new talker and had a couple of simple chats with Poppy, also using her talker. While of course Tom still has his own voice and is more than capable of holding conversation, it is introducing another layer of communication and it is lovely to see these natural interactions.

Food Tech this week and Tom was thrilled with his lemon crunch muffins on Tuesday and his pizza on Thursday.

Makin' the muffins

Rolling the dough

End result

Term 1 Week 7

Week 7 has been a busy week. We traveled by bus to Toitu on Wednesday.
Our ASPIRE topic this term is Turangawaewae which translates to "My place to stand". It's about belonging.
Before Room 5 went on the visit Mr Brew had a world map and got the students to find out where their ancestors came from, and to pace a sticker on that place on the map. He then took that along to Toitu.
Our visit was focused on where people came from and where and how they settled in New Zealand.
Tom was in a group whose task was to research the The immigrants who travelled here by sea.
What ways was information displayed?
What areas were more interesting to look at and what made them more engaging?
His group worked well and enjoyed the visit.

Where did we come from?

ACCUMULATE

SORT

PLAN

IMPLEMENT

REPORT

EVALUATE

There will be more on the ASPIRE topic throughout the term

Technology this week and we started in Foods.
First up the class made a smoothy which Tom absolutely loved.
Tom has an amazing partner in Ashlynn for Food Tech.

Special music is always a fun time. Tom enjoyed the rainbow ribbons today.

Rainbow Ribbons