Bottle Rockets Blog Post.

Kia ora welcome back or welcome to my blog. Today I will be talking about the bottle Rockets we made in science. We’ve been looking at forces and motions in physics and understanding how that works in our everyday lives.

Aim: The aim of this experiment is to learn and understand aerodynamics, forces and motion.

Equipment:

  1. Plastic 2 litre coke bottle
  2. Cardboard
  3. Popsicle stick
  4. Paper cup
  5. Tape
  6. Scissors
  7. Launcher.
  8. Sharpie

Method:

  1. First start by getting a plastic 2 litre coke bottle.
  2. Cut out four wing shapes from the cardboard.
  3. Tape wings to the bottle, evenly spaced out through the bottle.
  4. Cut the end off of the Popsicle stick.
  5. Stick the Popsicle stick, flat side down, to the middle bottom of the bottle.
  6. Cut a hole shaped like the Popsicle stick to the middle of the paper cup.
  7. Stick the paper cup through the Popsicle stick to make the nose.
  8. Tape the paper cup down.
  9. Decorate.
  10. Launch.

  1. we put 1/4 water in the rocket.
  2. We tipped out half the water.
  3. No water.

We manipulated the rocket in the three ways above.

  1. How did the rocket perform under each of the three ways?
    1/4 water was a little too much, and it did not travel as far.
    1/8 water was just enough, and it travelled the furthest.
    No water caused the bottle to blow up.
  2. What was the science behind it?
    There was so much pressure in the bottle it had to go somewhere, so it launched the bottle away.
  3. Why was the water necessary? To prevent the preasure from building up to much and inevitably blowing up our rockets.
  4. How does this relate to forces and motion? The pressure buildup is what caused the launching of the bottle Rockets. The ones with the perfect amount of water could travel the furthest. The thinnest bottles tended to go the furthest of them all.

Art Project.

Kia ora welcome back or welcome to my blog. Today I will be talking about the mixed media artwork that we have have been making in art. using methods such as rule of thirds, printing, lino cutting, painting and collages we used multiple medians to make the final piece.

Rule of Thirds.
The rule of thirds is using three by three sections when taking photos to play your focal point correctly. We took 4-6 photos using the rule of thirds and macro-photography. We then took our best two photos, made them black and white and printed them out.

Lino-printing.
We cut down the tiles using designs we made based off of Sonya Terk-Delauny. These were painted onto our images using red printing paint.

Collages.
Using old magazines we cut out different design and images we liked. Using these we cut them down to fit and arranged and stuck them down over our artworks.

Painting.
These images were then photocopied onto painting paper to have final details added. Using acrylic paint we added more details, whited out different prices and added to others. These were our finishing touches that fully rounded out our art pieces.

scan_23009_2026-05-12-14-32-53 (1)

DNA and Genetics end of Topic Blog.

Kia ora welcome back or welcome to my blog. Today I will be doing my end of Topic Blog for genetics and DNA.

Deoxyribonucleic acid or DNA is found in the nucleotide of a cell. It’s tightly wound in a double helix, into a chromosome and depicts our traits and how we look, the smaller parts of DNA are called genes. Genes are small sections of DNA that depict what we look like. When we carry the gene for something but it is not presented it is called an allele. An allele is the genetic code with the same purpose in the same place but mirrored on a chromosome. For example you may have the gene for blue eyes, but may carry the allele for green eyes and your kids may inherit the allele for green eyes. Inherit means to get or receive something from the generation before you. One way to depict what your offspring may inherit is with punnet squares. Punnet squares are a box method using letters to represent the genes to understand what genes and alleles an offspring will likely inherit.

A trait is a part of a person like their personality, and the way they look. One way we get new traits that stick is from natural selection. Natural selection is when those who have traits that are better suited for the environment live long enough to reproduce, when those who aren’t fitted for the environment die off. Natural selection is all about survival. Survival means to live, get nutrients, and reproduce. Reproduction is the action of having an offspring through asexual or sexual reproduction. When there are enough offerings over a long period of time the species may change, this is called evolution. Evolution is when a species traits change over a long period of time to best fit the environment.

Zombie Blog.

Kia ora welcome back or welcome to my blog. Today I will be talking about the zombie we made in science.

The aim was to see how different parents alleles mix and how the offspring may look.

Method

  1. Step one was to choose the parents genes at random.
  2. The genes we had were:
    Mum: SS, hh, Ll, Cc, tt, Ww.
    Dad: SS, Hh, Ll, CC, TT, ww.
  3. Mix the parents on a punnet square.
  4. Find the most probable phenotypes.
  5. Using the most probable phenotypes make the offspring of the parents.

Here is my zombie offspring.

Gene: A specific section of genetic code.

Allele: The genetic code in the same place.

Genotypes: The allele type which is not expressed.

Phenotypes: The gene which is expressed.

How do you fill out punnet squares? what’s the point?
The way you fill out punnet squares is your carry each letter to the corresponding box’s to make the new gene. The point is to see what the child is most likely to have as a gene.

Did it work? What would I do differently.

Mine did work, I think it turned out very well. Next time I might find more specific details like eyes, height, gender, ect.

 

Sonya Terk Delauny Lino Print.

Kia road welcome back or welcome to my blog. Today I will be showing you the design I made for my Sony Terk Delauny Lino Print.

A bit of history:
Sony Terk Delauny was an artist in the early twentieth century. She was all about abstract pieces that played with colour, composition and design. She made many of her pieces into fabrics for dress’s and clothes. She was an extremely talented artist that made beautiful unique artworks.

What I’m doing.
Me and my class are making our own versions of her work. Taking inspiration from many of pieces we will use different aspects along with our own ideas to make a lino print artwork. Using two pieces of lino we will cut out two layers of the artwork, each in different colours to make the whole artwork.

What I’ve done.
So far we have started on the design for the lino. We started with a drawing based of Delauny’s art, having fun with colour and making it abstract just to test our abilities. We then took key concepts and Ideas from that piece and made thumbnails for what we wanted our lino to look like. The aim was to have what colours and shapes we wanted down. We took our favourite thumbnail and made the two designs of the lino. Then we drew them on the two pieces of lino.

scan_23009_2026-03-10-14-37-15 (1)

 

 

Extracting DNA

Kia ora welcome back or welcome to my blog. Today I will be talking about the DNA extracting we did in science today.

We have been working on genetics in science. To expand on DNA we did DNA extraction of a Strawberry.

The aim was to have a visual representation of DNA

First we mixed a strawberry, a splash of water, a squirt of dish washing liquid and a teaspoon of salt.
Then we mashed them all together and strained the solution in a beacer.
Then the contents were poured into a test tube.
We filled the beaker with warm water and placed the test tube inside and let it set for 10 minutes.
Once the Ten minutes were up we slowly used a pipette to slowly pour 5 ml of cold ethanol into the solution.
Then you should be able to see the DNA forming at the top of the solution.

We had limited results with only minor DNA buildup.

I think we add the ethanol slowly to let the chemical reaction without disrupting it.

In the experiment we all had limited results, likely due to the DNA in strawberry and having the chemicals mix.

Next time I feel that we should try this experiment with Bananas to have better results.

I learnt that not every living thing has the same amount of DNA as others and that strawberries mixed with alcohol do not smell good.

Three real life uses of DNA extractions are:

!)checking for diseases
2)testing DNA
3) Having physical representation of DNA

 

 

Water pong.

Kia ora welcome back or welcome to my blog. Today I will be talking about water pong.

Today we played water pong.

The way in which you play this game is there are two teams at each end of the table. There are 10 cups filled with water in a triangle and the aim is to get the ping pong ball into the other teams cups to get the cup eliminated. The team who gets all the other teams cups out first wins.

When I participated in water pong my hauora was affected positively. My taha Whanau and taha Hinengaro were impacted positively because I got over hurdles and made sure to still had fun.

During the game it was a long term impact because I made amazing connections with teammates and opponents. It was interpersonal due to small connections between mates.

Overall, the impacts on my hauora interrelate as I have social health affected in the long term with activities that helped with connections. 

The social justice value of inclusion was shown when all students were included.

The social justice value of fairness was shown when everyone had a fair chance to win.

I believe the participation of individuals and groups can impact a class’s Hauora by bringing people closer together and building bridges between pears, this is because everybody had to work with classmates to try and get over the bariars and find the best techniques. 

The Key Concepts interrelate by  having students working with one another, have interperosonal connections and affecting their Taha whanau. 

 

 

Water Balloon Game.

Kia ora welcome back or welcome to my blog. Today I will be telling you about the water balloon game we played in health.

Today we played a water balloon toss. the rules are you have six players in each team, half of the team stands in a line whilst the other team stands parallel five metres away. The aim is to toss the balloon between all players fastest without the balloon falling or bursting.

When I participated in water balloon toss my hauora was affected positively. My taha Whanau and taha tinana were impacted positively because I was able to participate in a team chaleng e that got me closer to my pears, and I tried something new and tested my hand eye coordination,

During the game I had interpersonal connections that further stregnthed the bond with my peers, this is a long term affect I believe because it helped build bridges to make my year in health easier.

Overall, the impacts on my hauora interrelate as I made closer connections with classmates by enjoying new activities whilst working on communications and cues. 

The social justice value of fairness was shown when everyone was given an equal and fair chance at winning, the teams with less people had to pass the balloon more than once so that they did not have an advantage. 

The social justice value of inclusiveness was shown when students were not part of a team they were very quickly welcomed in another and they all worked together nicely. 

The social justice value of non discrimination was shown when every student had a chance to join and play.

I believe the participation of individuals and groups can impact a class’s Hauora by including others this is because being included helps with connections socially and building social bridges within the classroom. 

The Key Concepts interrelate by interpersonal, inclusiveness and social well-being, this is because all of these are the connections within students and how they work with one another within the classroom. 

Passion Project Waka Haurua.

Kia ora welcome back or welcome to my blog. Today I will be talking about the project I have been doing in social studies.

In social studies we had the option of making a passion project based on one of the topics we have done this year.  I chose to do mine on pacific way finders. I studied the build and design of the Waka Hourua to make a watercolour painting. I started with thumbnails of what I wanted the view to be. I than made the first sketch, added the details and shading. With the sketch is when I added watercolour, line work and some acrylic for final details. My final painting was only the start of my project. I than made a description of the painting to be put through chatGPT to make an image. With this image I made comparisons and reflections to talk about AI art and what it lacks compared to human art.

Here  is my final work:

Here is my planning document:

Space Station.

Kia ora welcome back or welcome to my blog. Today I will be talking about the space station we made to live on Mars.

How will we overcome the change of water?
Extracting water ice and melting and boiling it. Bringing water and recycling. And filtering all our water for recycling.

How will we overcome the change of food?
Bring enough food to lay us over as we grow food. We will grow crops in an insulated dome, we will recycle waste and water to grow crops and add LEDs to get enough sunlight.

How will we overcome the challenge of air?
We will use a device called MOXIE, which converts air on Mars into breathable earth-like air.

How will we overcome mental health?
We will find ways for the ocupents to have personal belongings like notes from family. We will make sure they talk and socialise and that they partake in things that promote mental well-being.

Here is my work.

The pressure chamber is there to help with those entering and dealing with gravity and pressure changes. There are bunk rooms and offices and living spaces to feel a bit more homey. We have electricity holders that are connected to solar panels to get power. We have water chambers that have filters to help with making sure there are no bugs or germs. There are also waste holders connected to the toilet. There is one last area, the greenhouse, this is used to make sure we can grow crops and get food.,