The WORST Day In History!

No one can help me overcome how sad I am. This is the most dreadful day at Enrich. Do you know why? Because it's my last day at Enrich. Not for the year, but for my entire life! 

I'm not the only one who is sad though because my teacher Darryn and his daughter Jemmimah who comes here too are leaving! 

I feel very sorry for the people coming next year because they won't have the opportunity to play chess with Darryn or get to know him which is very sad. 

I will miss Enrich because it is such an awesome gifted school! You get to do passion time, Wilson games, go to chess tournaments, learn new and exciting things, know yourself better, learn the habits of mind, study something for the whole year to understand it better (such as patterns and perspective) and lots of other things. 

If you get chosen to go to Enrich and you are accepted you are VERY VERY lucky. You will always remember your time here just like me. I wish that Enrich would run to year 13 instead of year 6! 

The things I have enjoyed at Enrich are:

Sharing your work at Enrich with the world on Blogger.

Playing chess and going to Dunedin two years in a row. Also winning the chess tournament this year and getting to go to Ashburton for the South Island Chess Championships. That was the best part about this year!

Getting to work on what you're passionate about in passion time (lino printing/writing) and doing performance with Nicola. My favourite part of performance was doing a dance and singing at a concert.

Having access to all the computers and iPads. My favourite app on the iPads was Bookworm, a word game.

Doing Writer's Studio twice. One was writing studio where we went around town taking notes about people and buildings and writing a story about it. Then the second writers studio was writing studio 201 which was harder because we had to get given a starting phrase, a setting and four words that we had to include in our story.

Getting to paint a kowhaiwhai panel last year.

Having sausage sizzles at the end of the year. One last year because one of the teachers Allanah was leaving and then this year because it is the last day of the year.

Well, bye for the last time!

Another Short Day!

I had my swimming competition this morning called Southland Champs where we race people all over Southland. I have made it into the final for 100 backstroke which I am pleased with.

I walked from Splash Palace to Enrich exhausted. I came in and we were into passion time which was good because I really wanted to get my lino-print finished. In the end it turned out great thanks to Darryn. He just did a few touch ups and afterwards it looked pretty great. I will probably have to do another print next week so I can learn and keep improving. I have really enjoyed doing lino-printing because I got to learn something new and it has been so much fun! Thank goodness we still have another week left at Enrich!

Another Choice!

Another choice had fallen on me. This was even worse this time. Maths/Art and writing 201! My two favourite subjects. I really want to improve in my writing and learn new things or maths/art which is my all time favourite. But when it came down to it I chose writing because I just love it so much and we never get to do this much writing at school a day.

Writing 201 has been awesome! I am so glad I chose it now. The first thing we did was get a computer and login. Next, Nicola gave us a notebook and pencil to keep. She then spun some writing ideas and then whatever it landed one we had to use in our writing. We had to have chosen our setting, starting phrase and four words that we had to use in our writing. Here were mine:

Setting- Super Bowl

Starting Phrase- The postcard said "Greetings to you all."

Four words I have to use- Moo, wrist, tumble and burp.

At first I wasn't that excited about my Setting when I found out my story had to be at a baseball game! My interests are swimming, music, maths and writing not baseball! I then thought that this is teaching me a lesson and how to be a better writer so I felt happier later on.
Here is some of my story for you(without being checked Nicola)

The postcard said “Greetings to you all.”

I felt so excited knowing that I would be going to The Super Bowel in California, America. The postcard was from my friend who lives in California and said that I could go with my sister Rue to the World Cup. We all love baseball and can’t wait to go watch the game between the billers from England and the pillars from London.  We all want the pillars to win because they are from our hometown and they are just so incredible to watch. 

Moo! Our cow Millie started to interrupt us from the very lovely postcard from Mila. Whenever our cow does that it means that she is hungry and wants food. Of course we couldn’t just leave her as cows need to be fed as well as us. Rue and I started to argue about who should go feed Millie because we both HATE doing it. In the end I had to do it because I’m the older one and Rue said that I have to be a good role model to her. My shoulders lay low and I dragged my body off the couch. I felt exhausted from completing a marathon earlier in the day and walked as slow as a tortoise. Millie continued to moo but became even louder. I rushed out to feed Millie as fast as I could while she kept on mooing. 

When I got back inside Rue was still reading the postcard as she is so slow! I snatched the  card of her and finished reading it. Rue kept on going on about how I  should be a good role model, but I didn’t take any notice of her because she is old enough to make her own responsible decisions.

You really think you know?

I start running to Enrich and was nearly at the stairs when suddenly I tripped feeling very embarrassed. It was  spitting with rain and I felt so excited to come into the Enrich door and then that just had to happen; I must be SO clumsy! The reason I wanted to get into the door so fast is because I came in at ten to one. You're probably thinking why I was so late, why I wanted to miss so much learning time, why I wanted to miss my favourite time of the day at Enrich, which is chess!

Well you're all wrong, I was actually going to James Hargest (the school I'm going to next year) for my new entrant day where we did lots of fun activities and got to know other people from other schools and what they're like. My favourite part was getting to throw chickens around!!! Not real chickens of course because that would just be mean - it was a toy chicken that looked like a turkey. The point of doing that was to learn other people's names as before we threw the chicken we had to say the person's name. Anyway, when I got to Enrich I got big hello's from everyone and then we started to learn about digital citizenship. This is about how we can be safe on the internet,  and what we think we know about the internet when we really DON'T! But the best thing about coming into the Enrich door was finding Nicola as she has been away for the last few weeks and I really missed her! Thank goodness she's back now! I can't wait 'til next week where I can finish my gifted study on Leonardo da Vinci and start Enrich at the NORMAL time which is 9:00am!

Blog you next week, Clara!

GIANT!

"Don't squish me!"

No, there is no giant it is just a GIANT crossword. I'm not joking, it's University standard! A crossword where we have to think of 54 words! 54!!!!! When I first looked at it I was scared. A huge blank crossword that we have to fill in by ourselves,  tough work! I started doing it and it wasn't actually that bad. You'd think it would be so hard but it really isn't. I am so close to finishing as I have only got five more words left to fill then I will be done. The hardest thing about the crossword was getting the big fifteen letter words and then adding little words around it. I looked so hard for them and then I finally found it.  It's so frustrating knowing that you've only got five more words left and you have to go do blogging!!! At least I'll have it done by next week! (hopefully)

 Affective Study (Leonardo da Vinci).............

Finished-

Introduction

Childhood

Verrocchio's Workshop

Inventions (nearly)

Habits of Mind he used

Bibliography (most of it)

What to do next-

Paintings

Timeline

Renzulli's and Gagne's model of giftedness 

Comparison with someone (maybe, as there has to be someone so brainy and smart to be compared with Leonardo da Vinci)

Conclusion

That's what I have for my Affective Study so far and have got most of it checked by the AWESOME Darryn which all went very well.

I can't wait to come back to Enrich next week because Nicola will be here as she was sick last week!

Leonardo da Vinci

  

The Excruciating Choice

The choice was fallen upon me as I had to choose between my two favourite things!


Singing 












And......



Writing












To make it more clear to you about what the choices were for - it was this. We were either allowed to choose between Singing201 or Passion Project. I really want to do Singing201 but I don't want to sing a solo.  I sing all the time but it is always by myself. Then, I absolutely love writing and just love using my imagination and putting it on paper. The reason why I love writing is because you can write whatever you want without anyone telling you what to do. Writing to me feels free and relaxing. Just you and the pen writing your heart out onto a bit of paper not knowing what will come out. When the choice came I still didn't know what to choose. Nicola thinks I should do writing,  and so do I but I really want to do singing as well!!!! What do I choose?

Clara

Hailing Music

"Ahhhhhhhhhh it's hailing with music!" I screamed.

"No it isn't!" said Nicola.

"Yes it is Nicola!"

"Don't be silly, there's no music falling from the sky!" Nicola said angrily.

"Nicola, I'm telling you the truth! Garage Band is full of music and it just keeps filling my ears!"

"Well that's different!" explained Nicola.

"OK I admit I was telling a lie. But I better get on with Garage Band."

"Good idea."

Performance was out OF THIS WORLD! 

We got to watch our performance from the sharing night and then we got to go onto the awesome GARAGE BAND! Garage Band is a music app where you can write your own music and make really cool songs using the different instruments. The selection includes; drums, piano, acoustic, beats and lots more. I have made a beat which I think sounds pretty awesome but other people might not agree.

Well it's time to say goodbye to Garage Band so,

Byebye!

Star Teacher Nicola

Pop, pop, pop, it's popcorn time! Yes, the lovely, kind, Nicola let us go to the movies and eat loads of popcorn! She did, I'm not lying! She let us eat loads of popcorn! Now I did say that she took us to the movies, well she did. We watched the America's Cup and ate loads of popcorn at the Enrich movie theatre. Not at the real movie theatre - would you seriously think that Nicola would take us to the movies? Well actually, I can because Nicola is one of my most favourite teachers and I will always remember her as one of my star primary teachers! So thank-you so much Nicola for being such a good tutor to me for performance and everything else. I never want to leave Enrich because you have made my time here so amazing! 

Beep, beep, beep, the alarm is going off telling me I need to go on with my actual day, not how amazing and wonderful Nicola is, even though I would love to. 

In chess I versed Jemmimah and won as she only had a king and a pawn that she couldn't move, so she just gave up, but we still gave each other a handshake and said "Good game" like always.
After chess we drifted off into our gifted study for Affective Domain. I think I am going well with my gifted study on Leonardo da Vinci and can't wait to carry on next week. 
Nicola, Olivia and I were looking at rebuses on the internet and trying hard to work them out. All our thinking skills worked well because we joined all our ideas together and found the answer. I found that fun,  and hope I can work out the rebuses and riddles for today when we work them out at the end of the day. 
After that we had morning tea and then did Talent Development and Passion time where the performance kids got to go on Garage Band and www.sfskids.org to create our own music and learn more about music.
After lunch we hopefully get to play a Wilson Game and do teacher-led workshops, rebuses/riddles then HOME! 

'Til next time,
Bye!

Newspaper Girls Strike Again!

I'm an atom bomb!

Oh no, we need to run or else it will explode!

Oh, oh, oh, oh, explode!

Ahhhhhhhhhhhh! Performance time!

Hello, hello, welcome to performance at Enrich. Performance at Enrich is the most exciting, amazing, stupendous thing that you could do. You get to perform, dance, sing, act, do anything! I LOVE performance. So today we practised Don't Stop Me Now by Queen and Let Me Entertain You by Robbie Williams. I think that the Friday Vienna Girls Choir (Nicola calls us that for a joke) did quite well but we need to practise remembering the actions and what to do next, but overall we did a good job (I thought!). 

Newspaper Girls Strike Again!

Ella-Rose and I were dressed up by Nicola in fabulous theatre outfits that were bouncing around the room being centre of attention. Sparkly hats, bright yellow and green skirts, Hawaii necklaces, we were definitely newspaper girls!

You're probably thinking, why would be wearing all those things?  (we are only girls handing out newspapers!)  Well I have the answer! We need to be centre of attention so that people will buy our fabulous newspapers because if no one buys them, what's the point in writing all that wonderful stuff, putting all our effort into it and then no one buys it, how dreadful. But that WON'T happen, we will be selling mistresses and be the best sellers in town!

Well I better go practise swishing around in my dress,

Bye!

"It's A Crime Scene, Call The Police!"

111, I call the police as I have a crime scene to report. 

"Hi, I have a very important thing to tell you. I can't decide whether to use Prezi or Keynote to present my project and I really need your help!" I said.

"Well, I think you should use, um, um, um, Keynote. You have waisted my time so now I am going to waist yours!" yelled the police.
I waited and waited until the police said that he had given up. I knew I would win because no one can ever stop Clara the lucky superhero! 
I walked over to my computer and chose to use Keynote. Clicked on a theme and started writing.

I know you can't read the writing, but that's the idea right? You keep people in suspense so they can moan to there parents. It's not that nice for the parents or people reading this blog, but it's nice for me because then I get to sit back, relax and keep writing, so lets get on with the MAIN point.

For Affective Domain we had to choose a gifted person to study and I chose the one and only~

Leonardo da Vinci

I chose him because I thought he did a lot of amazing things and his quotes are very inspiring. I have started getting information at home and then just sending all that I've done to Enrich since we only come here once a week which is on Friday. I am now onto his Inventions/Paintings and have already finished the introduction, childhood and Verrocchio's workshop. I think I am going pretty well with this project and can't wait 'til it's finished as it will look awesome!

Anyway,
Blog ya next week!

Kate Middleton At Enrich!

"Welcome, welcome, to the lovely gifted school of Enrich. We are so happy that you have come here".
"My greatest pleasure."

We welcomed Ella the year 13 from James Hargest College down the red carpet. We bowed and cheered her on as she just had birth to the new prince, George. 
Your probably thinking, she's not Kate Middleton she's Ella you said. I know I did, but she really did look like Kate Middleton. Just jokes, she looked nothing like her (not in a bad way!).

"Hello everyone, my name is Ella and I'm here to teach you a few dance moves for your ................ (secret surprise) that you are doing." she said in the most royal way possible.
We all sat there in the most dull way, that I almost felt sorry for Ella, teaching kids that aren't even interested. How horrible.

Up, in, click. Up, in, click. We started to learn our dance moves for the secret surprise. It felt like we learnt heaps but we only just started. I can't wait to learn ALL of the dance moves, it will be out of this world like a rocket launching up into space! I am so so so desperate to tell you what we are doing but the nasty witch is keeping our mouths locked up in the dungeon and we can't get them out. It totally stinks, actually it doesn't stink because our beautiful girly mouths don't stink, they smell more like exquisite perfume. If I have to use another word than stink, I'll have to use, well, it sucks. I should stop moaning, because I guess you get sick of me moaning each week so I promise (try to) next week that I won't moan, even if I really want to get it out, I won't.

I can't wait to get my body moving again next week because I love to dance,

Clara!

The Coughing Man

The man wouldn't keep quiet! 
We were 'trying' to watch the musical of Little Women but this man kept on coughing. No, not anyone at Enrich, the person who was videoing the musical on Youtube. Ella Rose was looking around to see who was interrupting us, but then realised it was the man recording Little Women on the computer. 
I'm not here to give a big lecture so let's actually get on with performance and not someone coffing!

At performance.....WAIT that is way too boring to start this marvellous adventure! Let's start that sentence  again.

Take 2-

All my life. I've lived for loving you; let me go now..... 

That was the last heartbreaking line of the musical Little Women. Little Women is about four sisters, and one of them called Beth is dying. One of her sisters (Jo) is very close with her and they love each other very much and don't want to be apart from each other. But Beth knows she has to go. This musical is very depressing and sad - so sad that Violet actually started crying, that's how sad it was. 
Our group (Friday) is doing the solo group one so since it is a 'solo' Nicola is going to choose one or two people to sing those lines. She's going to choose people who sing it beautifully like the two sisters who sing it. 
I hope my mum will let me get the book because I am really interested in it and I want to learn more about it, anyway,
See ya later!

Helpless Babies at Enrich

Sigh. We're back at Enrich.

"Excuse me! What are you talking about? Enrich is a mind blowing, jaw-dropping place to come to. Even though we only come here for one day per week. You can never say that about Enrich!"

Now if you think this post will be all about me going on about how Enrich is such an awesome, breathtaking, stunning place to come to, well you are 100% wrong. Why would I go on about how awesome it is, (even though it REALLY is).... that would just be so boring? Why don't I talk about how awesome our day is going so far and how we did this very entertaining Technology Challenge? Whoops, I wasn't supposed to say that to you, it was meant to be a big surprise. What a shame. 

Anyway, why don't I tell you what the Technology Challenge was and how we were heroes. Yes heroes. But I can only tell you how we were heroes if you promise not to tell anyone. It is huge secret between you and me. 

This top secret challenge was about saving flour and sugar babies. Yep, that's about it. Carrying flour and sugar babies on a homemade stretcher. This seems like an easy challenge but when you find out that you have to make the stretcher out of newspaper, string and tape, your mouth drops. Like, literally drops. Only having twenty minutes to make this stretcher seems like a long time but it feels like you have walked ten steps. A team of four, twenty minutes, newspaper, string and tape=Ahhhhhhhhhhh! 

3,

2,

1......

Go!

My group (Violet, Kady, Pearl and myself) started to get to work on discussing our ideas and choosing the best one. We chose Pearl's. 

Lots of newspaper, roll the sides up. 

String attached to the end of newspaper.

Tape, tape, no more tape.

The time is up. The battle against good and evil has begun.

Four flour and sugar babies sitting on our stretcher, helplessly waiting to be carried across the course. Violet and I are ready to carry the babies to the other side of the obstacle course. Katie is ready to start the timer. The babies are ready.

Go!

1 handle destroyed. 2 handles destroyed. 3 handles destroyed. One more to go, Violet drags the last handle across the floor until it falls off. 

Our stretcher was destroyed but the babies weren't! We won! Our babies are still alive. No we didn't win - we lost like most of the other teams. There was only one team that won and it wasn't us.  I have learnt that when in a group we should all work together to get the job done (properly) like Bob the Builder says. 

Thanks for reading,

TSM (Top Secret Mission)

with Clara 

Claws Will Come Out!

"Ouch!"
Musical Bumps was the first activity of the day. The music played we danced around, the music stopped we sat on the ground. I got to the top five and Nicola called it a draw because we had to get on with the day. I was puffed after that as Nicola kept playing tricks on us and we were bouncing around like a yoyo. Up, down, up, down, pant pant pant!

Do you think you know who is an ultimate chess king? Darryn! 
Yes, he beat me again twice in a row. As usual he gets his claws right into the game and secretly becomes a tiger. He looks a bit like this tiger here from my point of view! One big tooth is a Queen and the other big tooth is a Rook.            Join them together and you get Checkmate! Next time I play Darryn I will be the nasty tiger. The victory tiger, the defeating tiger, the winning tiger! 
Message for Darryn-
You better watch out Darryn because I will get my claws out and defeat you, and I will win not you!

Alarm Clock

"You're not serious are you? No way!" I said to Olivia at school as she told me what she did at performance last week since I was away. She said that we had to sing one or two lines solo of 'Like An Eagle'.  I didn't know what to think when she said we were doing a solo. I didn't know whether to be excited or nervous, or just completely TERRIFIED! Knowing me I think I would be completely terrified. But I knew that I had to make an effort for Nicola and try new things out of my comfort zone. Olivia said that it wasn't that bad but I was thinking the complete opposite! How can singing solo be fine? I know, what is she thinking?

10:50 er er er er er er.
The alarm bell goes off in my head as I head down to the performance corner. My legs are trembling and my arms are shaking. What do I do?

Sing,

I like to eat,
I like to eat,
I like to eat eat apples and bananas,
I like to eat,
I like to eat,
I like to eat eat apples and bananas!

Warm up over time for business.
Dun, dun, dun
Time for action! 
Solo time.
"Oh no! Here I go!"
................................................................................................
"What am I doing I'm supposed to be singing!" I thought to myself.
Everyone staring at me like I'm their tea for tonight, everyones eyes popping out of their brains.
What am I going to do now?

"You have got to open your mouth and sing loud, not like a quiet little mouse people!" Says Nicola looking disappointed at us. But not Violet she did it beautifully. Mouth open, singing loud, holding long notes, expression, stunning voice, what more could Nicola ask for? 
I definitely look up to Violet as a performer, one hundred percent.

For a round up of the day we sang a new song which sounded a bit like this;

"Trying to please me
Making it easy
It won't be there
It won't be there
In your life

In your life

In your life

Oh, In your life."

Bye Bye!

No Way!

"No way. Are you being serious Nicola?" I thought to myself.
As we were presenting our monologues to the other performance people in our group,  you wouldn't know how nervous I was. I kept on biting my lip and thinking to myself "I CAN do this." (even though I knew I would probably do something wrong).

The first thing I was hoping for was not to go first. If I went first I would be more nervous then I already was, because I wanted to see how others go and then see if I can be better than them. As soon as Queen Nicola told us that we would be going in alphabetic order my heart nearly stopped. I knew I was C and I would be either first or second. Luckily Cassie went first but if she stopped or anything I would be next.

"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!" Cassie stops and starts to cry, now I have to go up on the stage and be the beautiful, exquisite  Alice in Wonderland.

As I walk up onto the stage, I'm feeling elated as ever! Not, I am as nervous as ever! I am trembling all over and have no confidence in myself, but since I practised like no tomorrow I am certain I can do this monologue perfectly. 

So here it goes:

I stomp my feet and put my hands on my hips feeling very annoyed with the White Rabbit for not listening to me. 
"How impolite of him" I say.
(The last line) 
"Oh I think I see the bottom. Yes I'm sure I see the bottom. I shall hit the bottom, hit it very hard, and oh how it will hurt!"


"Wow are they actually clapping for me?" I thought. 

I was shocked. I couldn't believe that Nicola said I did a very good job practising my monologue and that I said it beautifully. After my monologue I felt like I was flying with angels.
It's finally over and done with and I don't have to worry about saying a monologue ever again. (I hope!)

'Til next time,
Bye!

"Why, how impolite of him!"

"Why, how impolite of him. I asked him a civil question, and he pretended not to listen to me. That's not at all nice." 

Yes, for performance we are doing monologues. We had a whole lot to choose from and when Nicola asked us which one we wanted to do I had no idea. They all sounded amazing so Nicola said to me to choose between two amazing monologues but I knew exactly which one I wanted to do after I read the first line. Alice in Wonderland. Nicola said that it would suit me. Phew, that's one thing off my mind! 

We had an hour to practise and know it off by heart as much as we could. The week after next we will be presenting them to the group so I am extremely nervous because doing anything in front of a group is terrifying for me. But I am going to face my fears and do the best I can to get over stage fright. I am going to practise, practise, prcatise to make it perfect. "Be Alice" I kept telling myself not Clara! Alice, Alice, Alice. 

As we all went away on our own to practise I didn't know where to practise because I didn't want anyone to hear me or look at me. Nicola gave each of the performance girls skirts and dresses to wear so we could feel comfortable wearing something that we could sway and swish around. Nicola gave me a long white skirt which was one of my favourites. First I went to the bag area to practise but as soon as Alex walked in while I was rehearsing I knew I wanted to move, desperately! So I asked Nicola where I should go and then she put me in front of a chess leaderboard. I didn't feel that comfortable there because it was quite public so then I asked Nicola again if she could move me so she made me swap with Pearl in the kitchen.

The kitchen was alright but then Reina was doing Alice in Wonderland as well right in the next room without doors so that was annoying. Nicola came up to me and said that I should go in the girls toilets because it was private and no one was in there. Yay! The girls toilets was like a palace because it was so quiet and no one could really hear me. A lovely glass palace with just germs and I. How fantastic!

I thought I was pretty good at my expression and voice and was very proud of myself. Here is one more quick snapshot of Alice in Wonderland that follows on from the first sentence.

"I say, Mr. White Rabbit, where are you going? Hmmmm. He won't answer me. And I do so want to know what he is late for." 

Mission Complete!

"Yes, Yes, Yes I won!" I can't believe it, actually I can believe it because I knew I was going to fight back and I did. I now think that tigers are SOMETIMES deadly, not always. That tiger was defeated in wait for it, wait for it.......VICTORY! I am the tiger now, Jemmimah is just the little jaguar growing up, and when she has finished growing she will fight back. But she won't fight back yet, it will be in a few weeks after I keep beating her. I will still remain in the flame of fame and she will be right behind me being my servant. This is just perfect! My day has come and HALF gone but not fully.  The reason why I said half full is because after I bet her she wanted another game so I couldn't refuse as it was still chess time. We are only just after halfway in our game but I will stay strong and keep fighting like she did last week. I don't know why I even said that because I should be getting that game behind me because I don't want to think about that, that, that well that fame that she took away from me. How embarrassing!  But no back to the game, I think I am beating her but I don't know as it is so close. But close isn't enough it has to be heaps! I WILL WIN!

Tigers Are Deadly!

Yes that's right I'm going to FIGHT, FIGHT, FIGHT to get back up at the top of the chess leader board. That Jemmimah is like a tiger, if she see's her prey she gets her prey! Yes that's right you have probably guessed, Jemmimah bet me in a game of chess today. We both wanted to play Darryn but when Katie said Darryn was going to be taking the advanced chess lessons, well Jemmimah sprang over to me with her tiger paws and quickly said before I could even stop her. 

"I CHALLENGE YOU!"

I knew that I couldn't back down so I said yes and was feeling very anxious because when Jemmimah gets her paws out she really gets them out, so I was very afraid that she would take my fame at the top of the leader board. Five minutes into the game, she got my most precious player. THE QUEEN! I was thinking "Noooooooooooooooooooo!" but I didn't show it one bit. I knew I could still win but after another five minutes she let out her secret trap out and there I was, my lonely king stuck in the corner of the board. No one there to save me. No one at all. Then suddenly the music went off. All I had to say was, "You won." Even though it was my turn and I wasn't in check or stalemate I let her win and take my spot. Even if I did feel very disappointed in myself I felt good for her. Then as soon as Jemmimah told Darryn he said that you have still got four and a half weeks to stay on the top to go the chess tournament. I had a good feeling in me because I knew I have heaps of time to practise at home and next time it's chess time, I will defeat her. No more fame anymore tiger! You better watch out!

Clara

You!

Yes that's right, two whole hours of fun filled performance with Nicola. Lets get straight to it as Nicola would say. "Now we'll start with our warm ups. I have got some new ones today for you to learn."
Warm up #1:
"Now this is a new warm up and it is called "you!" "Now what you have to do is point to someone and say 'you'."
I was thinking that was a pretty simple warm up and how it would help our voices warm up. But then I found out after we finished the WHOLE 'you' warm up.
After we finished pointing to people and saying "you" Nicola added her secret twist. This time we had to do the same thing, point to someone and say "you" but instead of doing it in a normal voice, we had to whisper and then get louder each time we said it. I found that a fun warm up. But no, just when I thought the 'you' warm up had finished, Nicola added ANOTHER secret twist to the warm up. We had to the exact same thing (point to someone saying you) but whisper then get louder and go back down into a whisper. Some of us kept going louder than the loudest you can get and then forgot to go back down again! But that didn't stop us from continuing where we left off. And then just as I thought we were done the warm up. Nicola added her next special twist and guess what it was? "Now onto the next warm up!" Nicola said. Did I trick you? I thought I did.
To round up what we did at performance I have added a LITTLE paragraph to tell you.

We did some warm up's as usual. We sang" Don't stop me now" by Queen again, and "Oh my" by Gin Wigmore. We also got a new song called "Life on Mars". It was a completely different song to "Don't stop me now" and "Oh my" because" Oh my" and "Don't stop me now" are fun songs and "Life on Mars" is a serious song. I didn't mind the song "Life on Mars", but I don't really like that type of music.

Ta da, TINY paragraph complete. Oh and before I end this blog I wanted to tell you that Nicola said I had improved on my expression. Which is spectacular! Now I am going to ask her what my next goal is for next week. I better not drag on too much longer so I will go now.
Bye bye

If I Had A Magic Wand....

If I had a magic wand I would do performance for Talent Development. Ta Da, I'm at performance group now. My magic wand worked.
I wish I was more like Violet at performance because she doesn't care what anyone thinks when she's singing and dancing around. I wish I could be like that. Not caring about what anyone thinks of me. But at the moment, I can't - although Nicola said I relaxed a lot today.

I need to show more expression when I am singing and really get into the groove of things when I am performing. I love being in the performance group with Nicola, even if I do have to work on things. That helps me because then I can focus on one thing at a time, and then when I have completed it, I can move onto the next thing that I have to focus on. That makes it much easier for me, instead of trying to focus on all of them at once. As I will probably forget all of them anyway. 

The first thing I am going to focus on is expression. Then Nicola can tell me what can work on next. I hope I remember to focus on expression next term! 

That reminds me. It's the last post of the term. That disappoints me very much because I absolutely love blogging. Blogging is one of my most favourite activities of the day at Enrich. I don't know why though. I think it's just because I love writing so much! When I leave Enrich I will definitely remember my time blogging at Enrich. Especially with Nicola helping us making our blog GREAT!

'Til next term,
Bye!

Reflection Of The Term

Why do we write reflections at Enrich? I know! I think we write end of term reflections so when we do the full end of year reflection we can look back at our sheet to see what we did in whatever term.  It also helps us think about what we have learned. 

You probably have no idea what the sheet looks like, so I have added a chart below so you can stop imagining it in your head! (scroll down to see). We had an hour to fill this sheet in with everything we have done over the term and put the activity under one of the sections. 

But there was a twist. We couldn't just put the activity - we also had to put what we had learnt beside it. That made it harder! Below I have made a list of things you could put under each section.

Affective Domain;

Wilson Games, Caine's Arcade, What is intelligence?....

Mental Edge;

Mental Edge games, Chess, Wilson games, Technology challenges...

Talent Development/Passion Time;

Whatever you're doing for passion time, or what activity with the teacher you are doing. For example; Performance group, Art group, or MADE Awards group.

I went to performance group and we had ten minutes to share something with the group. I did the keyboard but then Nicola said I had to come up with two lines to sing to the group. I was so frightened because I hate singing in front of people but I am fine singing in a group. If I didn't sing I wouldn't get into the group.

I didn't sing, because I was scared that everyone would think I was bad or I was too quiet and so I wouldn't get into the group.                                                             I changed to passion time and decided I should finish stone carving my rabbit as it is nearly done. I don't mind doing it but I would rather be in performance group without singing in front of everyone alone. 

I better stop writing now as you are probably getting bored of all my LONG as stories!

'Til next week,

Bye.

Queens Park BOSSES!

Did you know you can use 'BOSS' in Queens Park? Yes you really can, I'm not joking! If you don't believe me I'll make you pay, so you better watch out! No I'm joking, I won't pay you back!  Anyway back to the MAIN story. (You must be thinking what a crazy title? But I bet you will be interested, no doubt.)

I think I might have told you what BOSS means already, but I'll remind you again so you keep it in your head and have some more knowledge. 

B stands for Beauty.

O stands for Order.

S stands for Strength.

S stands for Survivability.

You probably have no idea what this has to do with Queens Park, but just be patient and you will find out after you have read my blog!

Since our concept curriculum this year at Enrich is patterns, we thought that instead of looking at pictures online we could find some ourselves. This would've been a great experience for Visual Spatial people (not me though!).

You have probably guessed from the title that we went to Queens Park. That is probably one of the best places to go in Invercargill to look at patterns as Queens Park has a lot of activities to go to, whilst one is studying patterns. Some examples are: The bird aviary, The Japanese Gardens, the plant aviary, the duck pond etc....

Anyway, we went in two groups, one group was with Nicola and Daniel's mum, and the other was with Jenny, Katie and Josh's dad. I was with Katie's group and was joined up with Thomas. The reason why we paired up with someone was for someone to take the photo, and the other person was going to record patterns that we saw under each word, Beauty, Order, Strength and Survivability. We got to swap turns so we both got a go at taking a photo and recording the pattern. I think Thomas and I worked well together but I think next time we need to work on staying together as a team instead of staying separated from each other. Below are some examples of patterns under each letter of BOSS. 

1st photo: Survivability

2nd photo: Strength

3rd photo: Beauty

4th photo: Order.

I better go now,

Until next time, Bye.

Probability

My heart pounded as I wondered which Talent Development task to do. Maths, Music, or Art? I was stuck as I adore Maths and I really wanted to do Music as I play the piano and flute so I would have knowledge of which music notes were which and know what everything is. Oh and Art, I love art but I couldn't resist doing maths so I made a call and turned to the maths corner. I was a bit disappointed that I didn't do Music though, but I  found out I could do it next week so that solved that problem.

Maths:
The maths strategy we learned was Probability. I was relieved as I knew how to do it as I have learnt it at school. Probability is when you estimate. Our group was working with percentages and tally charts. One of the tasks we did was role a dice that was a 1-6 dice. That might sound like a lot but it wasn't really, it felt like I was in my own little world of numbers, decimals, charts percentages and more. I find it quite a fascinating pattern. Back to the topic! While Katie was calling out what number it landed on we had to record it. The end results were: 1 got 6 marks and the percentage was 12% (I will show you how you get the percentage after) 2 got 5 marks and a percentage total of 10%, 3, 9 marks and 18%, 4, 11 marks 22%, 5, 8 marks 16% and finally 6 got 11 marks and a total of 22%. To get the percentage you use your brain and think, since we rolled the dice 50 times out of six we then just times it by 2. Which makes number 1's percentage 12%. Then you do the same to the rest.

Task 2:
Make a 6 times 6 graph which is 36. Imagine that we use 2 dice. The numbers for that would be 2-12. Then think to yourself, which numbers on the dice would add up to 2. Which would be 1 and 1 so you would write it like this 1,1. Then we use stairs to show our working out. 1,2 make 3 so you put that under 1,1 because your going up. You go all the way up to 12 and then if you are a visual spatial person you can colour in the stairs for each number.

Task 3:
CHOCOLATE!!! No, no, no not eating the chocolate before we do the maths with the chocolate! Using the chocolate to do the maths. We did the exact same thing as the first task but get one person to tally it while we sorted the chocolates into groups. Put all the Flakes with the flakes, the turkish delights with turkish delights etc... We did that 50 times. Before we chose a chocolate we knew that there were more flakes then anything else. So we knew that people would probably pick flakes the most and  cadbury dream the least, as there was only one.
 RESULTS!!!! Why did I put results in capitals as we already knew that flake would be the most chosen and dream would be the least! Our prediction was correct. Don't think that we didn't get a chocolate afterwards for doing all that problem solving! Why wouldn't you get one! I chose Turkish Delight. My favourite.
I found Maths really exciting and different as we would not do things like that at school.

'Til next time,
Clara

Perfectionism/Drama

No, no, no, where's 16! Oh no I'm going to run out of time to finish! Ohhhh what to do, what to do! "STOP!" roared Darryn as he  made a halt to stop the timer at one minute.
So you probably have no idea what I am talking about which is a real shame, well not really because we did it for NOTHING! Except for putting us under anxiety! Like really I thought this was a Gifted school not a Goofy one!
So what we had to do is find as many numbers as we could (of course they were jumbled up) and circle them IN ORDER from 1-60. Most people got up to 20 and a little more. We did it four times and on the first go I got 19! Second go I got 15, only because I was struggling to find 16 and that wasted 10 seconds of my time which made me very irritated. On the third go I got 20, and the last and final go I got 22! Yeah! My personal best! But, no, no, no there was this one girl called.....Neave and she got  29! 29! The last go was in 30 seconds and she still got that unbelievable time, that's just incredible, so go her! That task was called Perfectionism.


Next Fun Task:

Drum roll please................DRAMA!

Yay! Even though I don't really like Drama I love giving things a go and putting myself out of my comfort zone like last year when I did Drama, I was so nervous but I still got there.

And so one of the activities was to get into a circle and hold hands like a big jubilant family (not!) and choose some people to have a hoop on them. Then what you would have to do is get the hoops all the way around the circle with out letting go of your hands or letting the hoop fall to the ground, and if you didn't you would have to stand back and watch. But there were only a few people that had to watch but not much. Of course as gifted students of Enrich we accomplished that task.

Task 2:

Musical Bumps!

A bit like Musical chairs really but a twist. When the music stops you must fall to the ground and cross your legs as fast as you can. The last person to do that sits back once again and watches. I got up the last 10 people which was a pretty superior effort really. The winner(s) were Natasha and Jemmimah!

Task 3:

Musical Bumps with a new twist:

Well the task is exactly the same but joined with another person back to back. The rules were you had to land with crossed legs on the ground at the same time and back's together, not together together but touching. My buddy was Reina and we were hopeless, I really have to say.

Ta Da,
Drama Tasks complete!

So that was a description of part of our day.

Until next Friday, Goodbye.

Chess Victory Coming Close

1, 2, 3, Checkmate.Ohhhhhhhh! I lose against Darryn again as he is one and only a true chess player. At the end of every single game I play against Darryn I give him a handshake and say "Good Game". As it is polite to do so ...... even if you don't win. I feel happy about losing though and you may think that is weird but it helps me to get better as every game strengthens me to push again and again to win.Today I played him four times to get me into the swing of things as I had not been practicing much these last holidays. The reason why I play Darryn a lot is because he is my main challenger and he pushes me to become a better Chess player. I have never beaten him before though, which gets very annoying once in a while, but I know that I will beat him one day from practice. Next time I play Darryn I am going to soar and focus on the game not anyone else even if I really want to look so I can keep the emphasis on my next move. I will try and try so hard that I might turn red to beat Darryn. And if I do beat him I am going to be so euphoric and proud of myself because that will make me 1st on the Chess Leader board!!!
Till next Friday,
Clara