MOVE IT - MUSIC TOY CHALLENGE

Today we again focused on learning the steps of Te Ako Ritenga.

Our HOOK today was the teachers challenging us to make a toy that either moves OR makes a noise.  They showed us the success criteria and asked if we wanted to make a toy. We were HOOKed.  We said we would love to give it a go!

Challenge accepted!


We went through all the steps of Te Ako Ritenga like we did on Friday.  After the HOOK comes WONDER.  We are getting sooooo much better at thinking of questions that we will need to find the answer to in order to solve the problem.

As always we could choose if we wanted to work by ourselves or in a small group.  We filled out our organiser and some of us shared our thinking with the class.

Next we needed to EXPLORE our WONDERings.  We had to find out the answers to our questions so we went into Wonderland to EXPLORE.  The teachers had set out lots of different things for us to look at and play with.  There were...

• measuring activities designed to help us learn to use a ruler
• musical instruments so we could investigate how they worked
• toys to see how they move
• lots of types of cardboard to bend, fold and manipulate to see which type of card would work best for our toy

We found out all sorts of fascinating things in the EXPLORE phase.  We found out that toys can be pushed, pulled, turned, rolled, and slid along.  We learnt that instruments make a noise when we bang, blow, clap, shake or hit them.  We learnt how to use rulers and found out that some cardboard bends easier than others!

Next it was time to ACT.  We thought about all we had learnt so far and we came up with a plan of what to do.

 Then we gathered all the materials we needed and set to work...

One of the most crucial phases of Te Ako Ritenga, is REFLECT.  This is when you stop and think about what you have made.  We had a set of success criteria that we had to meet.  When we REFLECTed today, we thought about those criteria.  Was our toy meeting them? If so, which ones?  All of them?  or only a few?  How could we modify our design to make it meet ALL of the success criteria?

Shyloh measured her toy only to realise it was too small.  It did not meet the 'must be longer than 20cm' criteria.  

What did Shyloh do?  

Did she give up? 

 NO!  

She made a new version of the toy but made it BIGGER!  Well done Shyloh on never giving up!

Oliver made his toy too.  When he was REFLECTing, he found a problem!  His toy was too short as well!

What did Oliver do? 

Did he give up?  

NO!

He made stilts for his toy!

What a CREATIVE thinker Oliver.  Not only did Oliver FIND a problem in his design, he fixed it!

When all the toys were finished we assessed them all against the success criteria.  We really are competent and creative learners! Go us!!!