Omriston Bridge Trip

In Week 6 of Term 3 Senior GaTE went on a trip to Omriston Bridge. This kicked off our topic on Bridges and since the school's Art Exhibition was coming up, Mrs Grainger thought everyone could learn about bridges by photographing one close up! Omriston Bridge is a fantastic design to photograph. When the group got there, we all went under the bridge to look at its structure. Mr Grainger, who accompanied us, gave us a great lesson on the different type of bridge structures. We learnt that Omriston is a cantilevered bridge - this means that the bridge is supported only at one end and it can project into space quite a distance. Then we had fun photographing the bridge from different angles. When we got back to school we spent some time working with our photos using Picasa - we used different effects like sepia, film grain, etching, saturation and different filters. Our photos went up at the art show. Some of our photos are above.

Front Pages are finished!

We finally finished our Front Pages and submitted to the Auckland Herald Newspaper for marking. They looked fantastic printed in their A1 size in full colour. The teams worked very hard and did a fantastic job. Well done everyone!

During the last few weeks of the term, we were working on developing our lead stories for our newspapers. We've had to think about the 'angle' our story is to take. Newspaper stories use the inverted triangle structure. The first paragraph is the hook - if it's boring, no-one will read any further. The middle part of the triangle are the main facts, followed by the lesser facts. The angle and the hook have been the hardest parts to develop - but once we've got those, the rest seems of the story seems to flow. You are working well, guys - keep it up!

Making Headlines

Yesterday we made headlines! Newspaper headlines help sell the paper so they need to draw people's attention. We thought about using word play, puns, alliteration and getting rid of any unnecessary words. We talked about the 'less is more' principle. Then we practiced headlines using Fairy Tales and Nursery Rhymes. Random! Here are a few of them:

'Blondie Breakin' (Goldilocks and the Three Bears)
'Prince gives Kiss of Life' (Sleeping Beauty)
'Scrambled or Fried?' (Humpty Dumpty)

It's a pity we ran out of time, because once everyone got the idea, the headlines were getting better and better. Well done, everyone!

Mrs Grainger

First Step: The Masthead

Our groups have chosen our masthead for our newspaper. This has reflected our initiative to design and create a newspaper. Our group have used old english text because it relates to heralds in medieval times. Fonts are important because it reflects the region and establishment of our community.

By: Raphael

Trip to Trading Room

Last term we looked at money and statistics using the share market as a focus. We each 'invested' in the share market and 'sold' our shares some weeks later. It was interesting to see who made money and who didn't!

To finish off we had the opportunity to visit the main trading room at the Westpac Building in Auckland. This was an awesome opportunity to see money trading in action. We were impressed by the technology in the trading room plus the pool table in the corner! We learnt some more about the companies we had 'invested' in and a bit more about how money really does make the world go around! Thanks Damon and the Westpac Team for organising a fantastic morning for us - and even giving us Easter eggs as well!

The First Post

Welcome to our Senior GaTE group blog. We are a group of Year 7 and 8 students from Bailey Road School in Auckland. We meet one morning a week for extension and enrichment. Mrs Grainger is our teacher.