You all know about the panda don’t you? But do you really know about them? Well pandas live in Chinese mountains and eat bamboo, they eat for 14 hours per day, they eat 12 to 38 kilos of bamboo a day. Pandas spend their days eating and sleeping, wish I could too. Pandas can poop 28 kilos a day and their poop doesn’t smell.
The amazing pandas are born pink, blind and furless, you’re probably wondering what about the black and white, well that comes after about 3 to 4 weeks. Some pandas are born white but this is very rare.
The great panda have an interesting false thumb to hold ver narrow bamboo shoots. Their jaw muscles are quite large, why? Well to grind through tough bamboo shoots.
Pandas climb trees right? But what for, they climb trees to avoid their enemies. What else are trees for? Pandas scrape trees with their sharp claws to say keep out to other pandas.
If twins are born what happens? Well if the mum gives birth to twins she will abandon one and raise the other, females usually raise cubs alone. Pandas like being alone and not with other animals. Unlike other bears pandas do not hibernate.
Have you ever wandered what the bones and inside of the pandas look like? Well the pandas skull looked a lot like a raccoon scull, pandas actually have a sixth thumb so they can grasp bamboo better, the sixth thumb also helps pandas pull out bamboo shoots and leaves that may not want to come out. The panda have a very strong digestive system so they can consume bamboo.
What have you learnt about the panda?
What else do you know about a panda?
The year 5 puduction this year was Hanging Onto The Bottom Of The World. The play was based on Australian history. The scenes weren’t real but they were based on what actually happened. Like in one of the scenes when the brides were on Western Australia was late because in real life Western Australia had the biggest land and didn’t want to share it. And in the cricket scene Henry Parks died and that’s what actually happened, he died before federation.
The year 5 production was really fun and a great experience. As a tea lady I had to pay attention to what was going on because I had to come in at many different times. I had to give out real sandwiches, but the tea we gave out was fake, we just had cups and pretended that there was tea inside. At the start we were first on stage and had to talk to the audience. After our scene we had many other scenes were we were on, like Captain Cook and Governor Philip with the first fleet, as well the scene with the suffrages.
We had 2 tea trollies, lots of cups and plates with sandwiches. Mable and I had feather dusters to dust peoples shoulders and other stuff. We gave people cups and sandwiches, we also gave cups to the cast during different scenes. We gave
sandwiches to the sweepers during other scenes. Tea ladies were in a lot of scenes so we had to be prepared to come on.
The year 5 production took lots of practise to make it perfect but it turned out really well and we all had the best experience ever. We each got our characters and had to try to step into that characters shoes, it was really fun being someone else and experiencing what it was like during that time. It was a good play because it helps you learn something and there were some funny jokes that made it even more fun and exciting.
Have you ever been in a play or experienced something like it?
Chinese new year is a holiday that my family and I celebrate, the dates of Chinese new year change every year because it follows the Lunar calendar instead of our normal one. Chinese new year lasts for 14 days, during this time we wear red to scare away the evil spirits and to bring good luck, we also make sure our house is very clean and tidy. during the 14 days we are not allowed to sweep the floor or cut our hair, that is why we do all of that before, we are also not allowed to wear black or dark colours. During this time of celebration we:
- have a tea ceremony
- married couples give the red packets to the younger generations
- whole family gets together
- we eat a special dish only served during Chinese new year in Malaysia
- on Chinese new year eve everyone in the family returns to their parents homes for a reunion dinner the night before Chinese new year.
When we have the tea ceremony the married couples will sit in two chairs, they will have a bunch of red packets ready to give them to the younger generations, in the red packets is money, but to earn your red packet you have to say nice things to them, such as “shen ti jian cang” which means healthy body, you say things like that after you have given them tea. you say things like that to earn your red packets, this ceremony also happens at Chinese weddings. there is no set amount of money to give people but the notes should be new and the amount of money should be even.
Chinese new year is usually a family celebration, parts of your family from all over the world come to one place and have a nice dinner together. This is called a reunion dinner that happens on the night before Chinese new year, we usually return to our parents house for the dinner, but for my family we all go to my great grandmas house for the dinner. The things we eat are:
- prawns because the cantonese word for prawn is har which sounds the same as laughter.
- fish
- chicken
- duck
- yiu seng
Yiu sang is a dish featuring 7 colorful vegetables and raw fish, we toss the vegetables and to mix it, the higher we toss it the more we get good luck.
This is how my family celebrate Chinese new year.
Does your family celebrate anything similar?
Toonallook reflection
Last week my class went to Toonallook, we had 2 year 11s come on
the trip with us, Emily, and Charlie. On the bus ride there we watched
Mr Bean for the whole time. When we got to Toona we got straight
into our activities, one group did kayaking and the other went bike riding
with Jesse, I was in Graces group, we had Emily as our year 11,
we went kayaking first, I was partners with Emilia, we struggled a
bit trying to get in time but we ended up working it out. After that we
went bike riding, Will and I had a competition to see who could fall
over the most without trying and I won because of my last fall trying to get of!
After that we had some free time so most of us went to go play king ball.
Then we went in for dinner, we had some interesting burritos,
then for dessert we had apple crumble with ice cream, it was the best
thing I’ve ever tasted! After dinner we went back to our cabins brushed our
teeth and got our torches, the we went back to Lyall Hall for a game.
We played the shoe game witch basically worked like this: there were
2 groups Jesse’s group and Grace’s group, there was a water bottle in
the middle and a pair of shoes, than we would each get a number, after
we got our number Josh would call a number and then we would have
to run and grab a shoe and try to hit the water bottle. It was really fun!
After the game we went back to our cabins and went to sleep.
The next day we woke up at 7am and had breakfast, we had cereal and toast,
after that we went to go see the water police. They talked about how
long they stayed in the boat for and showed us the beds , they also let us sit in
the drivers seat, it was really cool! After that we went back and ate lunch,
than the year 11s prepared some games, we played Gaga ball and bang.
After that we hiked to our camp site, we walked along the beach and stopped
to skim rocks, then we continued the walk until we got there.
When we got there we started a fire to keep the mosquitoes away.
Then we picked out our tent mates and set up the tent,
all the groups had to be 3s but there would be 2 left out so Esther and
I were in a tent alone, it was really fun! Then we had dinner, we had
the best burgers ever! After that we had cupcakes for dessert,
then we played a game of empires, during the game it started raining
so we all came undercover, when the rain stopped we continued the game.
When the game finished we went into our tents and went to sleep.
The next morning I got woken up by Esther poking my face,
then we went out and packed up, then we had some breakfast,
we had toasted sandwiches and milo. While we were eating
I accidentally spilt milo all over myself. But it felt nice cause
it was quite cold! After that we went on Toona storm to Raymond island
to go bike riding and fishing, my group went bike riding first, we rode
around and spotted 31 koalas, we also saw some baby koalas.
After bike riding we went fishing, when we got there we fished
for a bit then we had some cookies then we continued fishing,
we didn’t end up catching any fish. Then we went back and
had some lunch, after lunch we had free time till dinner, most
of us play king ball, it was so fun! Then we went in to have dinner,
we had the best lasagna ever! Than for dessert we had jelly and
ice cream, it was really delicious! After that we got washed up
and grabbed our torches, then we had free time before we
wrote our letter, after free time we went in and write our letters,
we wrote to our parents, we wrote about what we did and a PLA
we displayed the most. After we wrote our letters we went back
to our cabins and went to sleep.
The next morning we woke up quite early to watch the sunrise,
we walked down to the beach in what ever we slept in.
When we got there it was still pretty dark, we waited for a while and
chatted. Then the sun started coming up, we all enjoyed the view and
Mr Benwell took some photos, then when it came up more we took
the next part to our video. After the sunrise we had some free time
before breakfast and the Toona challenge. After breakfast we met
at the tables and started the Toona challenge, after the Toona
challenge we had lunch and had free time. Then we said good bye
and made the end of our video. Then we got on the bus and watched
Matilda and Shrek.
have you been on a camp like Toona befor?
what did you think of the video?
In this unit we have been learning about the gold rush era. It has been a really fun unit and I really enjoyed learning about the Eureka stockade. Learning about it was really fun and I can’t wait for the year 4s to do it too! I definitely used courage when things did not work the way I wanted it to. Sometimes we had to improvise when we didn’t have some things. The Hope Bakery ended up pretty good even though we did not have that much stuff inside. We decided to skip the veranda because it did not work properly.
Sometimes I would have to get my partner to concentrate but most of the time he was ok. It was really fun considering that it was our first time. My partner was very helpful and always was willing to help, I’m glad I had a partner that committed and helped. We worked well together because we understood what each other wanted and made sure that we both had an opinion. We listened to each other and we both ended up having a part.
We made sure that the building was finished in time and had all kinds of details. It ended up looking great, with the help of our new teacher Miss Dube we managed to finish on time. When I went to see the other buildings I was surprised because they looked so good.
Learning about the gold rush era was super fun and interesting, I might want to learn more about it. It was really fun and I enjoyed going to Sovereign Hill and pretending to be an 1850 child! I would definitely want to go back again. With the diaramas we also had to program a Sphero and make it go around the whole road, it even had to cross the bridge.
Every group put together a bit of information on their building then we put it on a shared document that everyone else could access, then we used the information and programmed Sphero to say it. It was really fun.
One afternoon some parents came in to see what we’ve been doing, we showed them Sphero going around the diarama and our newspaper articles. It was really fun showing my mum what I did! I hope that the year 4s enjoy this experience as much as I did! So year 4s this is what you’ve been waiting for your whole life! It’s really fun!
Would you like to make a diarama?
Can you tell which building is which?
A few weeks ago the year 4s, 5s and 6s had to judge 6 books.
I think that a good information book should have accurate facts and details, if it doesn’t than it would just be lying. A good information book should have pictures and interesting facts, it should also be suitable for specific ages.
My favourite book was definitely the Happiness box. It was my favourite beacause it gave really interesting facts and the facts were accurate. It was a really detailed book and gave a lot of detailed facts, the pictures and images we also very detailed, you could tell what the were immediately.
At the end of the week on Friday we even dressed up as someone from our favourite book or something to do with reading is my secret power. I dressed up as a netball player because I had a book with a net baller in it. It was really funny because some people came as where’s Wally! It was so cool.
would you read this book?
