Teaser Week
(Year 3-5)
Kia ora! Welcome to the Summer Learning Journey (SLJ) programme. The SLJ is a free holiday blogging programme for Year 3 - 8 students attending schools in the Manaiakalani and Outreach Clusters. The programme runs for six weeks over the summer from Monday 16 December 2019 to Friday 24 January 2020.
This year the SLJ team have created an extra week of activities called the ‘SLJ Teaser Week.’ The ‘Teaser Week’ will be offered at the end of Term 4. The purpose of this week is to provide you, the students, with an opportunity to try the programme before it officially starts. You will need to register for the programme before you complete the ‘Teaser Week’ in order to receive comments from our Blog Commenting Team.
The theme for the SLJ this year is “People Who Have Changed the World.” Together, we will be learning about people who have done interesting, inspirational and/or influential things that have had an impact on others. Those included in this programme represent a small selection of the hundreds of people who have led impactful lives.
The SLJ Teaser Week has fifteen activities - three options per day over five days. You can do the activities in any order that you want. To complete an activity, please post your answer on your school blog site.
Please note that there are no points allocated for the Teaser Week activities.
DAY 1: Arts and Entertainment
Activity 1: New Zealand Royalty
‘Lorde’ is a New Zealand singer. Her most famous song is Royals. Lorde has won many awards for her songs.
Lorde’s real name is Ella. She was born in Auckland, New Zealand in 1996. She started singing when she was a teenager.
Please make a profile page (poster) about Lorde with some facts about her. You could use Google Draw or another app.
Here is an example of a profile page I made about Taylor Swift:
On your blog, share your profile page about Lorde.
Remember to attribute any images that you borrow from the internet or from other people.
Activity 2: Exploring Our Roots
Taika Waititi makes films. Sometimes he acts in films too. His famous films are “Boy”, “Hunt for the Wilderpeople” and “Thor: Ragnarok.”
Taika comes from Raukokore. His dad is Māori and his mum is Russian-Jewish.
I am Pākeha (New Zealand European). When I talk about who I am, and introduce myself to others, I sometimes use a pepeha.
Please create your own pepeha. You can do this in any language.
You can use this pepeha website, or you can use the template here.
On your blog, post a copy of your pepeha.
Please remember that smart learners do not share their full name online (first name only).
You can use your last name initial (e.g. Laura N) on the pepeha website. If you use this website, please do not submit your email address - take a screenshot of your pepeha!
Activity 3: Big Friendly Giants
Roald Dahl was an author who wrote lots of books. Some of his books were: Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, George’s Marvellous Medicine, the BFG, and Matilda.
Many of his books, including the BFG, have been made into films. Have you seen them?
Roald Dahl liked to make up words. Here are some examples:
Catasterous disastrophe, sizzle pan, bundongle, churgle, darksome, snozzcumber, frumpet, gollup, grunches.
Please make up five new words.
On your blog, share your words in a creative way (poster, infographic etc).
You can get some ideas of how to do this on the Manaiakalani Eye Catching Blog Posts page.
DAY 2: Sport and Leisure
Activity 1: Faster than a speeding bullet
Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce comes from Jamaica, a small country in the Caribbean. She is a famous sprinter. She is the fastest woman to run 100 metres.
You can compare her fast running to other fast things, like “Shelly-Ann is as fast as a cheetah.” These are called similes.
Please create three new similes. You can use the starters below or you can make up your own.
… is as fast as… (eg: The car is as fast as a lightning bolt.)
… is as tall as…
… is as small as…
On your blog, share your similes.
Activity 2: Equal Pay for Equal Work?
Fiao’o Fa’amausili was the past captain of the NZ Black Ferns, the NZ women’s rugby team. The Black Ferns have won the Women’s Rugby World Cup five times. Wow!
The NZ Black Ferns (women) now earn money for being in the team. They do not earn as much as the All Blacks (men).
On your blog, tell us if you think women should get the same amount of money as men for sport. Why/why not?
Activity 3: The Greatest of All Time
Garry Kasparov is the best chess player in the world. When you are the best at something, you can be called “The Greatest of All Time” or GOAT for short!
To be very good, you need to practice a lot. Garry did not have much free time to spend with his friends or family.
Pretend that you are Garry Kasparov and the best chess player in the world.
On your blog, list two good things and two bad things of being the best chess player in the world.
DAY 3: Environment and Exploration
Activity 1: The Rainman of Rajasthan
One of the most important resources that we have on planet earth is water. Without water, we would not survive.
In NZ almost everyone can get free, clean drinking water. However this is not the same in all parts of the world.
The Water Project is helping to solve this issue and bring drinking water to places that do not have it.
Please watch this short introductory video from The Water Project.
On your blog, share what The Water Project is trying to do.
Activity 2: When the Rubber Hits the Road
The Amazon rainforest is the largest tropical rainforest in the world. It is in South America.
Sadly, some are cutting down trees without permission. People like Marina Silva, are fighting back to try to stop the logging. Her family must be very proud of her because she is fighting to protect the Amazon rainforest.
Please interview a friend and ask them what they are proud of. It could be something that they, or someone in their family, have achieved.
On your blog, please share who this person was and what they were proud of.
My friend told me that she is very proud of her younger sister because she always volunteers to coach netball and touch rugby teams at her school and really wants to help the kids in her teams become better players.
Activity 3: The Columbian Exchange
Christopher Columbus was an explorer. He was born in Italy in 1451.
During his life, Christopher Columbus did both positive (good) and negative (bad) things.
When he explored the world he caused a lot of pain and upset to others. He also took things that did not belong to him. This had a negative impact on the lives of other people.
Think of someone who has had a positive impact on your life. Who is this person? What did they do that was positive?
On your blog, please tell us about this person.
Please remember to be Cybersmart and provide their first name only (unless they are a famous person!).
DAY 4: Politics and Activism
Activity 1: Leading the Charge
Helen Clark was the Prime Minister of NZ for nine years. She grew up on a farm near Hamilton. She was a teenager when she became interested in politics.
When she lost the election to John Key, she got a job as the leader (boss) of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). She was the first woman to ever lead this international organisation.
Imagine that you are hired to be the principal (boss) of your school for one week. Wow! What would be the first thing you would change about school?
On your blog, tell us the first change that you would make to your school if you were hired to be the principal for one week.
Activity 2: Fighting for Freedom
Mahatma Gandhi led peaceful protests against England being in charge of India. He wanted India to be an independent country.
He is famous for using protests, without any violence, to make changes.
Please think about an issue you would protest over.
On your blog, explain the issue clearly and tell us why it is so important to you.
If it was me, I would protest over how expensive healthy food is (fruit, vegetables, milk etc). I would like to see healthy food become much cheaper and not so healthy food become more expensive.
Activity 3: Mass Migration
Donald Trump is the President of the United States of America (USA). He decided to build a wall between the USA and Mexico. He wanted to stop people from crossing the American-Mexican border.
Donald Trump’s plan to build the wall is very controversial (some people strongly agree with his idea and others strongly disagree).
Imagine that Donald Trump called you up and asked for your opinion about building this wall.
On your blog, please tell us what you think about his plan to build a wall between the USA and Mexico. Is it a good idea or a bad idea? Why?
DAY 5: Science, Technology and Invention
Activity 1: The Social Network
Sheryl Sandberg is a businesswoman from the United States of America. She is famous for working as the Chief Operating Officer (COO) of Facebook.
Facebook was started by Mark Zuckerberg. It is the most popular social media site in the world.
Many people on Facebook like to share pictures and videos. Your parents or older siblings may do this.
Please think about what you have learned in class about being cybersmart.
On your blog, tell us some things to remember before sharing photos online.
Activity 2: Impossible Burgers
Many people in New Zealand enjoy eating meat. However, about 10% of New Zealanders are vegetarian. Vegetarians don’t eat any meat. Most vegetarian food comes from plants.
Impossible Foods is a company that makes “meat” from plants. It tastes, looks, smells and feels like meat, but isn’t meat! Wow!
Let’s look at the nutritional facts for the New Impossible Burger and the Original Impossible Burger. What is the difference between the number of calories?
On your blog, share your answer. You can use the following sentence as a guide.
The new Impossible burger has [.........] less/more calories than the original Impossible Burger.
Activity 3: Choose your own
Here is your chance to choose your own scientist, technologist or inventor who you think has changed the world. Be creative - there are no right or wrong choices!
Here are some suggestions in case you get stuck:
For this activity, choose one person and read all about them.
On your blog, please tell us:
The name of the person
A sentence about the work they do/have done
A sentence about how they/their work has had an impact on the lives of others