Cultural Arts

This slideshow contains all my Cultural Arts artwork, and some examples of inspiration or what it's meant to look like. 

My Artwork

 

This is my art depicting my river, my mountain, the sun, my name, a koru, zebra stripes, a sunset, a flower, and a lot of koru's. If you can't read the top piece of writing, it says:

Ko Kopuka-tau-manoka tōku maunga

Ko Owheo tōku awa

No Otepoti ahau

Ko Atawhai tōku ingoa

Ko Dickson tōku ingoa whanau

Aoraki Art

 This is my Aoraki artwork. The middle one, and tallest, is the eldest brother Aoraki. The four behind him are his brothers. The blue is an intertwining river, and the brown behind the river is the waka.

Aoraki: My version

This is a story about Aoraki and his brothers, but it may be a tiny bit different to the version you may of heard. This is my version of the story.

 Me and my brothers got bored one day in the sky with our dad, Rakinui. Aoraki was the one with the brilliant idea to visit our mother, Papatūānuku. Oh, how I missed her. Every day, every night, every second. What can I say? I’m a mummy’s boy. We packed our gear, everything we would need. We spent hours everyday behind our fathers back making a waka big enough for us all to fit. Oh, did I mention he doesn’t know we’re going? We knew we were going to get in trouble, but I didn’t care, and neither did my brothers. Aoraki was the mastermind behind this plan, but if anyone asked, we did it together. I looked up to my eldest brother, admired him, I really did. Now you’re all caught up, let’s skip to the day, today, when we finally finished the waka. We celebrated and cheered, for finally our waka was done! We didn’t care if our father heard us, although we should have.

We hopped on the boat that had beautiful pounamu eyes of Aoraki, who was carved from wood and stuck on our mast. We said the incantation and we descended slowly out of the clouds and down to the water. Suddenly, we heard the angry roar of Rakinui. But we did not regret what we had done. We were off. We sailed on for hours and hours, looking for our mother, not realising that we wouldn’t find her. The waves got rougher and rougher, turning the waka side to side and making me seasick, and scared. I was scared out of my mind, and so were my brothers. Except Aoraki. He put on a brave facade but he couldn’t fool us, his brothers. We pleaded with him to go back home, and although he was sad about it, he saw the fear in our faces and decided that we would go back. There were shouts while we tried to steady ourselves enough to do the incantation. 

But as we were about to say the incantation, the backslash hit us. If we went up to the sky, we would face dad’s wrath. We hesitated to say the incantation, and our father took his chance in our one moment of hesitation. A strong gust of wind hit us, not any wind, wind strong enough to tip our boat, strong enough that we knew that this was purposeful. Our father was made at us for leaving, and now he was teaching us a lesson. The boat turned, and we went under. We scrambled to the top of the overturned waka so we wouldn’t drown. We stayed like this for hours, pleading with our mother to help us, apologising to our father. But no help came. We turned as stiff as ice, and turned to stone. Our waka became the south island, while we became the mountains there, while our brother stood tall above as, as he did in god form, as he did now as a mountain.

Holi

Festivals

This slideshow is about Guy Fawkes, Diwali, and Day of the Dead. Each festivals includes; history and origin, how it's celebrated and the changes over the years, and comparing it to 2 other festivals. 

Bush Survival

My classroom is going on a camping trip to Arthur's Pass. We reviewed what to do if we get lost, and this is an information pack I've made. 

Cairn Animation

 My class (Room 7) is going on a camping trip to Arthur's Pass. Me and Harper learned about cairns and made a animation. Cairn are like landmarks people use to find their way back, and know they've been there.

Creatures at Arthur's Pass

My class is going on a camping trip to Arthur's Pass, so me and Harper did research on 3 select animals from Arthur's Pass.

What is the difference between heat exhaustion and heat stroke?

 

Hypothermia/Frostbite & Heat Exhaustion/Heat Stroke

 My class (Room 7) has been learning about hypothermia and heat exhaustion to prepare ourselves for our class camping trip to Arthur's Pass. 

Click this link to learn about Hypothermia

This link will take you to learn about Heat Exhaustion

One of the interesting things I learned from this is that Anna Bågenholm holds the record for the longest time a person has endured hypothermia and cardiac arrest and survived. She spent 80 minutes in a frozen lake before her comrades found her.

Endangered Species Essay

                                                         

Endangered Species Essay

There are many problems in the world, but we cannot tackle them all head on. We have to start at one at a time. That’s what I’m doing. Let’s talk about endangered species. Animals are found all over the world and are an important part of our ecosystem. To keep us alive, and the world alive. Without animals, it would be hard to survive. Some animals make it harder though, like the ones that eat your crops. Then again, they are starved because of humans taking over their habitats and making it unsafe. Lots of animals are losing their homes to deforestation. Alas, deforestation is another problem for another essay. 

Great example of human greed: tigers. Tigers are hardly ever used for eating, and never should be with their numbers dwindling, but are used to make a nice rug to wipe feet on at the front of the door. And their guts are used for medicine! Yuck. It may have worked in the beginning, even though it sounds disgusting, but with their numbers so low, it’s a horrible way to save people. You may convince yourself that you are saving lives by making this medicine, but you're killing more than your saving. 

Another great example of human cruelty: elephants. In Africa, elephant meat is considered a delicacy and growing populations have increased demand. Isn’t that horrible? I mean, they’re endangered! Elephants are also killed for their tusks, to hang on the wall like a prize, or to scrape bark off trees, or to dig, and so much more. And, did you know that elephant ivory was used to make pianos? They killed elephants and made their tusks into piano keys for human enjoyment. Luckily, that’s not happening anymore, but you can’t change the fact that it did happen.

When a creature goes extinct, some of the time is because they have trouble repopulating, but most of the time it’s because of humans. When a species goes extinct, it leaves behind a scar, which affects the entire ecosystem. Animals eat each other, but keep the population down so animals don’t take over the world. They all do their part in nature, and we are here messing it up. Like bees, bees are thought to go extinct soon, but bees keep the plants alive. How is that fair? Is that how we repay debts? Yes, I know, ‘the world’s not fair’ and it’s not, especially to animals. Another example: South island Kokako. A Kokako is a supposedly “extinct” (or extremely rare) bird. Sometimes known as the “grey ghost”. They haven’t been seen in years but people still think they're alive. Personally, I think they’re desperate for them to be alive, and are grasping at straws. They don’t want to have to face the facts, humans can be cruel. But, of course, you already knew that.

Would you like another example of human cruelty? I could list so many animals that are critically endangered because of humans, but then we would be here years. So, think about the fact that animals have been on this earth much longer than us, and we’re killing them in their own habitats! As you can see from above, we humans kill animals for our own satisfaction and our own greed. Greed is a dangerous thing when it comes to humans and animals. We take, but never give. Welp, that’s us. Humans. The greatest species ever, or so we'd like to think.

Running Wild: Show don't tell

 

Michael Morpurgo: A little bit about him

 

Royal Albatross

 

Camp Equipment

 

Running Wild: Timeline

 

Running Wild: Show don't tell

 

Persuasive argument: Sumatran tigers

 Down below is a persuasive argument disguised as a letter. The letter is about Sumatran tigers, and why we should stop killing them.

Dear Joko Widodo, President of Indonesia,

I am writing to tell you that I am concerned about the number of critically endangered species in Indonesia. I have chosen only one, though there were many options.

Sumatran tigers are a shy species that need to be protected better.  Why do I say this? As you very well know, Sumatran tigers are dwindling in numbers and they will be extinct in just years. There are fewer than 400 in the wild, and they are dying out in their own habitat! Cruel, no? And the reasons they are dying out are horrible, for their skin and their insides. Their skin to be used as rugs and their insides to be medicine! Which, you probably knew as well.

When a species goes extinct, it leaves behind a scar, which affects the entire ecosystem.The tiger is a unique animal which plays an important role in our ecosystem. It is a top predator that keeps the population of wild animals in check, therefore keeping the balance between prey, herbivores and the vegetation upon which they eat.

Sumatran tigers are the smallest of their species, the tiger. They are also shy, and tend to avoid people. So why are we killing them? For our own satisfaction and our greed. Greed is a dangerous thing when it comes to humans and animals. We take, but never give. And what has the Sumatran tiger done to us? Nothing. Nothing, absolutely nothing, but instead of giving them the respect they deserve for keeping our ecosystem afloat, we make them into rugs to wipe our feet on.

There are eight main species of tiger, and three of them are already extinct. Are you ready to have it on your conscience that a fourth species has died out, in front of your own eyes? I am not saying it’s your fault, but I am saying you might have to lay the laws a little heavier. Reinforce boundaries perhaps?

Thank you for your time

Atawhai Dickson, New Zealand

Show don't tell: Running Wild & Endangered Species

 For literacy, my group had been reading 'Running Wild' by Michael Morpurgo. The slideshow below is phrases or snippets of the book, with the page number, that match the expressions.

In Running Wild, there are mentions of endangered species. Down below is a small fact file about Sumatran tigers, Orangutans and Sumatran elephants.