Balmacewen Writing Competition!

Balmacewen Intermediate Writing Competition:

Task:
To write a narrative about the sentence: “It was so unexpected!”

Entries will be judged on the following criteria:
• The ability to engage and entertain the reader.
• The ability to organise and develop an idea.
• Clarity and coherence in the writing.
• The effective use of figurative language – to show, not tell.
Rules:
• Entries should be no more than 1200 words.
• Both handwritten and typed entries will be accepted. (Must be easily read)
• All work must be the writer’s own.
• Entries close Friday 16th September.

Cross Country

A HUGE well done to Room 3 on their cross country run. Everyone tried their hardest and Room 3 had some great results. Samuel came in 5th and Griffin came in 9th in the Year 7 boy race and Jessica came in 15th in the Year 7 girl race. I saw a lot of happy and satisfied faces after their runs, everyone feeling proud of their achievements.
A huge well done has to go to Georgia for seeing the race right through to the end. She didn't give in and she finished the race in style (giving Mr Clarke a run for his money!)

Cross country update:

Due to the weather and ground conditions the cross country has been postponed until next Friday, (26th of August.)
This will also allow for some more training next week too, ready for Friday.

Week 3

Well, after a snowy start to the week, we are here and ready to go. This week we are looking at the cardiovascular system in topic.
We are also working on narratives for writing and starting persuasive writing.
I have been impressed with the improvements I am noticing in students' writing. I find myself looking forward to reading their work! I had a few chuckles reading the homework task last week: Rewrite the sentence "My teacher was grumpy." There were some very scary teacher descriptions!

Week 2 - Student report:

Last week some people from Otago Boys and Otago Girls came to show us there very wide musical options. I liked their jazz music the best. Some of the instruments I bet I couldn't play but you never know unless you try.

Georgia

This week we are learning about the muscles. Did you know that involuntary muscles you can't mentally control, for example your heart, and voluntary muscles are the ones you can mentally control, for example your arm and legs.
All for now.

Ella

Week 2 - Brainpop

This week as we have continued to learn about the body, we have being using a website called Brainpop. I have signed up for a free trial which lasts for 5 days. You are welcome to use it at home to help revise or learn new knowledge about the body.
The web address is http://www.brainpop.com

Term 3, week 1

It's amazing how quickly the year is going! Hard to believe it is Term 3 already. I hope everyone's rested and ready for Term 3. This is a great term for learning and already we have started learning about the body.
Homework is back with a variety of tasks each week. Each week homework will cover revision of our topic on the body, reading, spelling, sometimes a writing task and a maths sheet.
I am looking forward to seeing the amazing effort everyone will have put into this weeks homework!

Show, Don't Tell:

This has been our writing focus this week and how to use active verbs and figurative language to show the reader, not tell the reader.

An example of this was the sentence, "It was cold walking down the street."

We pulled this apart, brainstormed descriptive language, and rewrote this sentence to show the reader how cold it was.
Here are a couple of examples:

Billowing winds numbed my exposed face. It was deadly, staggering zombie-like along the brain-freezing street. The whole blistering street was a sheet of horrific crystal-clear teeth-chattering ice.
Patrick

It was like striding through deadly numbness while ice daggers tore through my clothes and got to my sensitive skin as I lumbered down the ice laden street.
Abbey

The blistering bitter winds whipped around my exposed face, stabbing icy daggers into the pained skin on my face. Shivers ran up and down my spine as if frozen metal had attracted itself to my bare back. A swim in a sea of ferocious snow could endanger limbs and lives. Or at least that's what I thought.
Nic

It was mind numbingly bitter, staggering down the path, wind whipping snow particles at my exposed face, trying to mutilate me. In my efforts to escape this deadly blizzard I struggled on. It was about a metre away, the door to the blazing fire of warmth and dryness. I reached out for the numbing metal handle...
Lachlan

It was a deadly, freezing, blistering icy cold. My teeth were chattering like banging a nail with a hammer. I was kicking the snow off my feet, a shiver tickled up my spine like Jack Frost stroking me in the back.
Dayna