Hurricane Reading

The Princess and the pea

Unwanted visitors

Wellington Writing

Purpose: to inform

WALT describe with clear and interesting details

Success Criteria

• Quick plan to prepare for the writing task (brainstorm with words or ideas)
• Interesting beginning and ending
• Using the senses (see, touch, hear, smell)
• Includes strong descriptive words (adjectives)
• Uses the present tense

Examples: Bamboo Forest / Scene Description by Dylan / Scene Description by Sophia

Writing Task: Describing a special place in Hawke’s Bay

Wellington

As we come out of Victoria tunnel to Wellington, it was rush hour and everybody was coming home from my future destination. Suddenly l started to see people and then l started to see more and more. I could smell the fumes, I could hear the chatter and my palms were heating up as if they were in a electric hand dryer because I was so nervous. I opened up the glove box and pulled out an old map and carefully unfolded it making sure it wouldn’t rip, on the map it had lots of different complicated places that were hard to pronounce but the street that caught my eye was Cuba street,  it was a long one-way street with lots of fancy shops. I wound down the window for fresh air and looked up and saw electric cables connecting to the tall buildings that looked like they reached up to space. Then we suddenly stopped we were in a  traffic-jam, it was dinnertime and everybody was going out to get their dinner from Mcdonald's and other junk food stuff. When we were out of the traffic-jam we whizzed passed Te Papa museum, I turned the radio on and in an instant I heard the nice sound of music. We started winding up a steep hill and turning sharp edged corners it felt like I was in a roller coater. Finally we reached the top of the hill and walked up some stairs and made it up to Victoria lookout  and saw the view of Wellington, it was amazing. As I was walking down the stairs and had one final look at the view and murmured goodbye. Through the busy traffic to the hotel, I never in a thousand years want to leave Wellington.                                             

Save our streams and rivers!

To the editor,

Our streams and rivers are being polluted everyday.

Rivers are important because animals like fish, eels and ducks live in them. They will get polluted because people dump rubbish in rivers and when people cut down trees, they land in rivers and block the river from flowing.

Nobody likes drinking dirty water made out of dirt or sewage or eating fish that make them sick.

Cows are escaping from farms and cows are leaving their manure behind. Because of this people are telling farmers to build fences but the farmers are replying that they don’t have enough money to build fences.

Lots of people like doing swimming sports in stream and rivers and they won’t be able to do that anymore because the rivers are dirty. We should raise money to make a river cleaning club and check if the rivers are cleared every week.

From Christina,

From Parkvale school.

Hawkes Bay fires

WALT make connections across several texts

Before reading

Think back to last week’s Hawke’s Bay fires. What do you remember?

Mr M’s example:

I first heard about the fire in the staff meeting. As I left work later that day, something seemed different in the air. As I got home I could smell the fire. It was closer and bigger than I realised. Then I started to hear more and more about it.  I always look at those fire danger signs and now I was reminded how real the danger is.

My connection: (where you were and what you saw or heard about it)

The first thing I knew that there was a fire because I heard sirens which were really really  loud. And then we looked out the car window  and we saw two fire trucks. We followed the fire trucks and then lost them.

First reading

Aerial shots show...

Read the article and discuss the pictures with a buddy. Paste your favourite picture from the article of the fire’s impact below. Describe what the photo shows in your own words.

The photo shows... The burnt hills from the fire that happened on Monday.

Second reading

Generosity, gratitude and grief: stories from the fires

We need to understand the words to make connections. Find the meanings of these three words from the title:

Word	Meaning (in your own words - not copy paste)
generosity	Generosity, means that you do something kind for somebody else.
gratitude	Gratitude means that you are thankful for something somebody has done for you.
grief	Greif means you worry and care about something that you like.

Describe what happens to these people during the fire.

Person	What happened (in your own words - not copy paste)
Doug Lowe	Doug Lowe dialed 111 when the Waimarama fire happened. He said that he could see the smoke going through the trees surrounding them. The fire trucks came when the wind picked up.
Ali McEwan	Ali McEwan had escaped with her three kids on Waimarama road on Monday. She said it was a miracle that the fire trucks saved her house.
Guy Gemmill	Guy Gemmill’s house was now a pile of broken glass, scorched wood and charred roof he had lost his home. He had no clothes except the ones he was wearing and he had lost everything.

After reading

Why do you think firefighters are so important?

Firefighters are important because they put out fires so that everything won’t be destroyed. They also save the planet from firebombs.

Thank you letter

                                                                                           To, Sandy

Thank you for helping me get my clothes ready for when we went for bush walks, and helping me butter my toast. Also doing the washing, or we wouldn’t have clean clothes the next day.

I really appreciated you helping us with the amazing race when it took forever to shoot a goal and you gave us advice when we didn’t get a goal.                                                                  

Once again, thank you.

Yours sincerely,

Christina