Category: Hanga | Create

In maths we were  given a sheet with graph on it. The x axis was labelled Time (hrs) and the y axis was labelled Distance away from her house (km). Mrs Robinson was away from her house and went shopping while going to her friends house for lunch.

We had to answer two questions which were At which point was Mrs Robinson was furthest from her house and at which point did she stop for the longest.

After all that we had to make a story about why she was away from home, here is mine.

Mrs Robinson was driving to her friend’s home in her new Rolls-Royce Boat Tail when she saw that everything in the local two dollar shop was 50% off! She immediately parked her car and went inside, a few seconds later she left because she was bored. She then noticed she didn’t get a present for her friend so she went to the cake shop back closer to her house to get a single cupcake the size of an egg. Mrs Robinson then went to her friend’s house and ate lunch there. On her way back home, she spotted the prison, she went inside, freed all the prisoners and quickly drove away.

The End

Today I did a one minute speech about whales, it was only in front of four other people but I was still nervous. the speech was actually one minute and six seconds but that was close enough. First we had to pick a topic, I picked whales, next we had to pick a big question, I picked what is really happening. here is a link to my speech. We also had to give feedback on the other peoples speeches, there three categories where we had to tick to boxes, there were also three levels, I got the second level for all of the categories.

Today we had a visit from someone from the Christchurch City Council. They first talked about the three water systems and where they come from around our houses, the three systems are the storm water system which carries away excess rainwater, the fresh water system which brings us new water to use and the waste water system which is what carries away water dirty water. After that they talked about the percentages of where waste water comes from, 25%  comes from the shower, 23% comes from the washing machine, 18% from the toilet, 15% from hoses/outside, 13% from taps, 3% from leaks, 2% from baths and 1% from dishwashers. After that we learnt about the Christchurch Wastewater Treatment Plant and the process it uses to clean wastewater. This is the process:

1.Home – wastewater comes from shower, taps, toilet etc

2 Pump stations – about 100 around Christchurch, pump water from houses to the treatment plant.  Someone monitors this from a control room 24 hours a day.

3. Waste screens – (Bar screens) – taking out big things, like rags, wet wipes, jewellery, sanitary products false teeth, dead animals etc 2 tonnes everyday to the landfill
4. Grit tanks – Grit, fat and oil (about 2 tonnes ) goes to landfill
5. Sedimentation  tanks – remove 30%  heavy sludge, sand etc 
6. Trickling filters – Liquid from sedimentation tanks passes through, bacteria sits on plastic filters, breaks down the microbes into slime clumps which then fall down
7. Smelly air from trickling filters escapes and helpful bugs get rid of it, biofilter
8. Air-mixing tanks, pump water through to help separate slime from trickling filter and water
9.   Clarifiers – Slime clumps sink to the bottom, 90% of pollution has now gone
10. Oxidation ponds -oxygen,sunlight, cold water and good bugs – kill any nasty bugs left  – takes 2-3 weeks
11. Long pipes take clean water out to sea, 3km offshore.  99.9% of pollution is now removed. 

12. Sludge thickener – big tank, looks like chocolate milk going in, add a thickener to turn it into a kind of porridge to help remove the solids
13. Digester –  Solids from sedimentation tanks and clarifiers come here, 
14. Biosolids machine squeezes out water and dries the solids to be used to help the environment. 98% solids
15. Dry biosolids are taken to west coast, used with waste from mining to make fertiliser for growing native trees – not used for farmland where food is grown

16. Engines use gases (Methane) to power the machines used to run the wastewater plant.

After that we talked about ways we could reduce wastewater, these were things like turning the tap off when you brush you and fix any leaks that might be in your house.

Lastly we had to complete an activity where we had to sort things into two categories, what you can flush down a toilet and what you can’t. The things in the can’t flush down category were things like tissues, bleach and toys. The things in the other category were water and the three P’s (Pee, Poo and Paper).

Today in literacy we have been looking at the author’s purpose of a website called Tree Of The Year. We had to read the description of the five trees and find evidence of if the author’s purpose was to inform or persuade. The author’s purpose is what the person writing something wants the thing they’ve written to do to anyone reading it, here is what the description of the Hansen Lemon Tree had:

This lemon at Rangihoua (Citrus x limon) is believed to be the oldest surviving lemon tree in the country! It stands on the site where Māori and Europeans first learned to live side by side and is a popular tourist attraction which is visited by thousands of people every year.

The authors purpose of this description is to persuade people to vote for it, some evidence of this is the exclamation mark after country and how they said that it was popular. Here is a description of the Gallipoli Oak:

Also known as ANZAC Oak (Quercus hartwissiana), it was planted on August 4, 1924 and is an important symbol of remembrance, often included in ANZAC Day commemorations. It was grown from an acorn collected on the Gallipoli battlefield in Turkey (and sent home in a tobacco tin.)

The author’s purpose is more to inform than persuade because it is a lot more factual information.

Today for maths we measured angles using an online protractor tool, here is a link to the document I worked on.

Two weeks ago we had a visit from two people in a group called Global Gamble. They talked about how burning fossil fuels can affect the environment, what renewable and non-renewable resources are and what greenhouse gases and the greenhouse effect is. They told us about how we can reduce the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and how we can get power while still being environmentally friendly. Here is an animation I made about greenhouse gases:

The last few weeks we have been creating a diagram about the ecosystem of harakeke, here is what I created: