Booked Inn

Stage 3 students will be studying Antarctica this term during HSIE. These Youtube videos introduce the topic.

Horrible histories: “Potty pioneers: Scott of the Antarctic”:
A sketch from the BBC television series, “Horrible histories”, based on the best selling books by Terry Deary. In this segment, Antarctic explorer Captain Robert Falcon Scott, checks his equipment before setting off to the South Pole… just to make sure it’s completely useless.

Onboard the National Geographic Explorer in Antarctica, 2008:

Even the natural weather sounds on the soundtrack on this one is informative.

Antarctica: Icebergs, glaciers, snow, ice and water:

4/5P is studying the British colonisation of Australia. Here are four Youtube clips that should prove useful to introduce the topic.

1980s television commercial for Old Sydney Town:

Old Sydney Town in October 2001, mere months before the famous historical theme park was shut down. Captured here in form of digital stills, this presentation shows all the features of one of Australia’s longest running theme parks:

Historic Houses Trust has uploaded several useful video clips on the early days of Australian colonisation to Youtube:

200 years ago, convicts at Sydney’s Hyde Park Barracks didn’t have lighters or matches to light their pipes. See how to light a fire the hard way:

Convicts sent to Hyde Park Barracks in Sydney weren’t always lucky enough to be issued with socks. And to make matters worse, their shoes weren’t even specifically made for the right or left foot. See what they did to ease the pain:

Our Early Stage 1 and Stage 1 students are studying nursery rhymes. Here are two animated versions we found, plus a Teletubbies parody, plus a useful video on cheese making (from curds and whey, also known as junket).

Little Miss Muffet – animation:

Little Miss Muffet – animation:

Teletubbies perform Little Miss Muffet:

How it’s made – Cheese:

(from “The Discovery Channel”.)

Our Stage 2 students are about to undertake a study of inventions in HSIE (Human Society & Its Environment), and I found several useful Youtube video clips to kick off the unit:

Biggest barbeque
An outtake from “Inventions from the shed”:

Original Australian Wheelman Bushpig
Named one of Time Magazine’s “Best Inventions of the Year”, it is a combination skateboard, snowboard, surfboard and wakeboard:

Bricky Australia
Bricklayer’s mortar template:

Wacky inventor – Japan
Dr Nakamatsu claims to be the world’s most prolific inventor:
Click here.
(Note: The video becomes inappropriate for Stage 2 towards the end, after the inventor is photographing his food, so stop it then.)

Da Vinci’s machines
A visit to the South Australian Museum to see replicas of Leonardo da Vinci’s medieval machines in action:
Click here.

The Google Wonder Wheel is a research tool that helps students narrow down their search results. It can lead to better, more efficient access to websites that will provide them with background information on their specific topic. It is an excellent scaffold to promote and support thinking skills and the quest for deep knowledge. The video on Youtube is by Karen Bonnano of schoollibrarymanagement.com. Thanks Karen!

First information request of the new school year:

A Year 4/5 composite class is in need of pictures of peacocks. The poster collection was rather depleted in the bird area, but I did find numerous short peacock and peahen videos on Youtube. The best one is probably this:

The K-6 Connected Outcome Groups (COGs) resources and units are now available (NSW DET intranet) or through the NSW DET portal.

They can be found at the “Connecting learning in my primary school” website, at curriculumsupport.education.nsw.gov.au/connected/.

Today was the first day of Term 1, and already it feels like the year is chugging along under it’s own steam!

Novelist Tara Moss has been running a series of blog posts called, “I’ve Shown You Mine, Now Show Me Yours”, in which she invited her writer friends, colleagues and blog followers to send in photos of their personal/professional writing spaces. Judith Ridge (formerly of NSW DET’s “School Magazine” editorial team) was featured last week, actor/writer Rhys Muldoon (who recently co-wrote a children’s book Prime Minister Kevin Rudd) the week before that – and today…. my writing desk is featured.

It’s a bit of a buzz to be in the company of Tara’s esteemed and talented colleagues. Now I really have to get that first book written/published.

Teacher-librarians and English teachers looking for interesting snippets about Australian writers, to inspire their budding young writers, may well find some useful material. There are eleven segments so far, with three or four writers’ desks featured each time.

See today’s entries at:
blog.taramoss.com/index.php?itemid=378

Meanwhile:

First day back at school.

Not too long to wait now. A new school library will be built on the site of the old one!

And I must share my favourite holiday snap; all that work on polar bears the last two terms made me yearn to see one up close:

(Seaworld, Queensland, December 2009.)

Not exactly snowball season Down Under, but great fun.

The “Superman” cap given to me as an end-of-year gift by two of my most enthusiastic young library patrons! They know me too well.

Merry Christmas, everyone, and thanks for all the great feedback to my blog posts in 2009.

When I scrounged around at home, I found many more picture book-related toys to take into school to add to this year’s Christmas tree.

You might spot the Grinch, Selby, Max, Arthur, Captain Underpants, Bear and Chook, the Frog Prince – and many others.

I am again indebted to the neighbours across the road, who did a moonlight flit not long after their Midwinter Christmas party one year, dumping their huge, second hand, artificial Christmas pine tree onto the footpath. Looks much better in our school library, although storing it between outings is tricky.