Kapa Haka 2021

 Last week Moana syndicate performed our Kapa Haka bracket, but because of Covid restrictions we couldn't perform to a live audience so we videoed it. 

We started with Utaina, a song about paddling your waka and that song was lead by Zoe. That was quickly followed by Ka Waiata a song about Mary, Jesus mother. Then E Rona, lead by me, that was our Poi song. Afterwards Zoe and I lead Ka Panapana and during the middle of Panapana the girls walked to the back with the boys walking forward. Max and Stavis then lead the Wainu Haka and to bring the the girls back to the front Koka Sue played the starting part of Toia Mai then Zoe and I lead that together and suddenly it was all over! Suddenly all my nerves were gone and I could look forward to the intermediate interview I was going to have that afternoon! 

Ilminster Green team performance

Today the year 6's, 5's and a small amount of 4's went to Ilminster, an intermediate, to watch the Green team perform a play. The play was about half an hour and had an environmental theme. The Green team is a group of people that practices and eventually performs plays that always have an enviro theme. 

The play started with a Grandma crayfish, called Nanny Kōura telling two little crayfish a story. After Nanny Kōura finished telling the story the little crayfish beg for another story, so she decided to tell the story of how she saved the world from aliens. This is when the story really started. Then a group of kids entered on the opposite side of the stage and started playing on bikes, scooters and skateboards. They ate some lollies and left the rubbish on the ground! 

Almost straight afterwards Nanny Kōura heard a strange, rattling and clunking noise ,and a golden brown looking robot walked out and stared at the crowd afterwards two crayfish looking creatures, called Morons came out and started complaining about the oxygen and the gravitational pull of earth. They inspected the skatepark and said " This is a suitable place for the intergalactic space dump. " Out marched a regal looking alien, the King Moron and asked whether this was the perfect place of for the intergalactic space dump, the Morons replied, " Yes, your Moronness. " " I want your answer in dance ! " retorted the King, so the Morons had to dance their answers, but the King kept on asking questions ! The Morons dumped their rubbish including the golden brown robot. 

The next day the group of kids came back to play and were completely shocked, their skatepark was COVERED in strange rubbish. One curious boy reached out and touched the rubbish and got zapped by a jolt of electricity! "Don't touch that guys, I think it's dangerous!" he said. The robot chose that exact moment to reveal himself." Ahhhh!!" The kids shrieked. After calming down the kids asked " Who dumped this rubbish?" " My masters, the Morons" " Can you call them for us?", the robot raised his hand, kind of like the metal from him was acting as a radio transmitter. Shortly afterwards the King, with his Moron minions strode in, like he was in a hurry, and demanded, " Who dares to summon the Moron king?" the kids explained how they wanted them to remove the rubbish from their skatepark. " No" said the king and stalked off. 

"What should we do? " despaired the kids, " I know! Lets ask Nanny Kōura, she always knows what to do." So they set off to the stream with the robot. They asked her what to do and she replied, " Well now you know how I feel when you dump your rubbish that eventually washes down to me! But don't worry I will help you. Call back those aliens! " The robot obliged and called them back. Just like before the king bustled in demanding who dared to call- but  before he finished the sentence he dropped to his knees and said " Your royal highness, forgive me ! " Nanny Kōura was confused, who is he talking to ? Then Kina said " I think he is talking to you, Nanny Kōura ! You do look a lot like them." So she played along and pretended to be the Morons long lost queen, she ordered them to take their mess back to their planet. The kids slowly started sneaking away but before they could go Nanny Kōura snapped " Just where do you think you are going!? come back here and tidy up YOUR mess ! " So the kids tidied up all the sweet wrappers, plastic bags and food containers. Afterwards the skatepark looked a lot more tidy! 

I think the moral of this play is to respect others environments, tidy up after yourself and Reduce, Recycle, Reuse! 

Speeches ! :-)

 The year has come around to the time of year when speeches are starting up again ! The topic is " Going for gold " and I am writing " Does everyone see things the same way? " This connects up to going for because once someone realizes that they see things differently they might get glasses to whatever they need to release their full potential and can go for gold ! 

This is my speech so far.

My speech is about going for gold, or is it yellow or orange ? How do we know that we see things the same way as the person sitting next to us ?

There are like 1, 2, 3, 4, ( counting off on fingers ), Whatever! Thousands ! Of reasons why people all see things differently, but I will only be sharing 3 reasons today otherwise, you will be sitting here for 3 hours and will be fast asleep. 14% of the population has Irlen Syndrome, What I have the coloured glasses thing. 46% have reading or learning difficulties including dyslexia. Now that I have got the hard numbers out the way, let's break it down.

That means out of all of us there are most likely 4 people who have undiagnosed Irlen, 3 counting me because I KNOW I have it. Irlen is just one of many different ways people see things differently, most commonly it’s diagnosed as ADHD or Dyslexia, because not many people know about Irlen, or other kinds of things like Irlen. My point is that there are so many people who have trouble doing things because they don’t know  that the words on a page aren't meant to float or move. My cousin didn’t know that the lines on the netball court were straight. She thought they were wavy. Things like this happen to EVERYONE.

Let's get down to the nitty gritty, how does Irlen and other things like Irlen work ? You would think that finding it hard to read  would mean that the problem  comes from the eye. WRONG. For Irlen the problem actually comes from the brain.

People with Irlens, brain just can’t handle some light waves, kind of like it’s allergic to some lights. It can cause headaches, problems with depth perception and tiredness. The part of the brain that is affected is the visual cortex ( the part that sorts through what you see ) and incredibly the only thing that sorts it out is coloured overlays or coloured glasses. The colour of your glasses and overlays changes as you get older. I had orange lenses, then pink, then berry tea, the colour I have now ( I called it berry tea because I couldn’t decide whether it was pink or purple. )

I still have to work on my intro, last reason, explanation and conclusion. So far I think I have done kind of well, what do you think ?

Aurora Drama Performance.

On the twenty third of June, Ella, Alice and I performed a play that we wrote with the other Aurora drama students. The play was about Whirikoka and his seal Oioi. Ella was Te Marama, the moon and she got to do  dance with Anoura and Grace. Alice was Te Kumi the Taniwha with Celia and Lilla. I was Oioi the seal. 

I was so nervous before the play my stomach was cramping up. Everyone else was nervous too, but we ended up having a really great show ! 

Gymnastics festival!

 We had been training for weeks at school for the Gym festival! I was so exited for it!

At school we got changed into our leotards and drove to the Gym club. First up was floor. I was really nervous as I watched the people from our school do the routine. All to soon it was my turn, and I got a 8.5! ( out of ten ). The beam was next, I was nervous because I am a little scared of heights. But I got 9.0! The second highest in B grade Wainui! Everyone lined up for box and had their practise straddles. The box went fast and suddenly it was my turn I straddled the box and then I was finished, the Gymnastics  festival was over for the year. 

                                                    

Rhythmic Callback

 We got a callback for the Rhythmic festival! That means that we got to perform in front of our parents and watch the other teams do their routines at the gymnastics club.
Almost all of the schools in Gisborne were there and the high schools looked amazing! The only other primary school that was here was Mangapa and they did a Hawaiian themed dance. 

I felt really nervous before the dance and for a moment I thought that the MC had forgotten us because he said that one of the dances before us was the last one! But thankfully he hadn't forgotten us. During the dance when I was skipping I had to quickly think of what was coming next because I had forgotten everything! 

After the dance, Jacqueline ( The person who taught us the dance )  took a team photo of us and then everyone started going home. I really loved the experience of learning the dance, practising the dance and  performing the dance. Next year I want to do it all over again! 

Aurora Drama

Aurora is a program where they choose children from multiple school from around Gisborne to work on different school subjects and work with kids they usually wouldn't work with. The subject that I am working on is Drama ! 

The first session that we had was on 14 of May. We went to Makaraka school and they told us  about their Pepeha and we went for a walk around the school to look at the murals they had created about the Maori gods and Whirikoka. We had morning tea and then got on a bus to go to Whatatutu. Once we got to Whatatutu we went to a Marcus's property. Marcus's property was a Pa site but then the influenza epidemic forced the Maori to another spot. The Iwi that lived there was Whirikoka's Iwi and he was the chief. 

Now you are probably wondering Who is Whirikoka ? I will tell you. There is a Maori legend that where the Waipawa river and the Mangataikapua stream connects, it creates a sacred or tapu place. Whirikoka was friends with a seal named Oioi and Whirikoka invited him to play with him at this tapu spot and to bring all of his friends. There was one rule at the tapu spot, that you had to be gone before sunrise.  Whirikoka was playing so much with his friends that he fell asleep and once he woke up the sun was shining !  Oioi and the other sea animals writhed about in pain wich split his blubber and his oil seeped into the ground. That is why there is oil springs there. 

We are going to present a play about Whirikoka and it's going to be so much  fun!

Rythmical Gymnastics and B grade Gymnastics

Earlier this week some girls and boys from my class, including me, trialed for the Rhythmic Gymnastics team. The trials started off easy, you had to do two cartwheels in a row and then skip to the rhythm of some music, then you had to show all of your tricks, that when I started to get nervous.  But I got in !

Practices are at every morning tea and lunch now and we are getting really good at the dance. One of the tricks we are learning is someone holding your foot  and you holding their shoulders then the person holding your  foot launches you up in the air and then you do a back tuck. I am doing that trick with Charlotte and I am doing the back tuck. It's not really going well though. 

This is our team from 2019. 

Kapa Haka Performance

 On Wednesday the 18th the whole of Wainui Beach school went to the Showgrounds in Gisborne. When we got there the seniors  ( year 6, 5 and 4 ) who were in the front row put on piupiu - Flax fiber skirts - and went on stage. 

The Kaias were Bay, Materia and me ! I was really surprised when I was told I was going to be a Kaia because Materia was away so I did the leading and then I was told that I was going to be a Kaia. 

Speeches !

How many of you have done a speech ? This is my first speech and the topic is 'Changemaker' so it could be about a person, object or activity. I am doing my speech about Kate Sheppard, in case you don't know Kate Sheppard was a leading suffragette. 

Here is my speech. 

The two major parties, Labour and National are currently led by women and some  local candidates are also women. Now imagine that you are in 1890 and my mother and your mother can’t vote but my father and your father can vote  ( point to some women in audience and say you can’t vote now point to some men in the audience and say you can vote )  and half the population are not allowed to vote, why because they are women, Kate Sheppard changes all of this by starting petitions to prove that women should vote and that people want women to be able to vote 

 

Hi, my name is Klara and I am going to share with you how Kate Sheppard was a real change maker.

One way that Kate Shepard campaigned was starting 2 petitions to prove that people did want women to be able to vote.  When Kate unrolled her 2nd  petition it was, drum roll please, 270 meters long!!  The first year she started a petition, it was signed by 9,000 women - the second year she did another petition, it was signed by 19,000 people, Proving that more and more people wanted women to be able to vote. Kate also had the support of the Prime Minister - who was a man -  and the Governor GenKate Sheppard completely changed the amount of women  in politics. There are now 120 members of parliament  in New Zealand  and nearly 48% of those are women - the highest number of women in positions of power in New Zealand since 1919.eral, who was also a man. 

Why was women having the vote so important?  Well first of all voting needs an array of opinions because if the only people who vote all have the same opinion the other side doesn't have a chance, but if people who all have a different opinion and the majority vote for one side it proves that the winning side is the best for the people.

Thanks to Kate Shepard and  other women and men like her, New Zealand was the first country to let women vote, proving that women and men are both just as equal as each other. Kate is also on the 10 dollar note putting her in the ranks of Edmond Hillary who climbed Mount Everest with Tenzing Norway and Lord Rutherford who split the atom. 

“Do not think that your single vote does not  count, the rain that soaks the parched ground is made of single drops” Kate Shepard said.

Do you like it ? I think that I did well.