Norton's Hut

Here is Hamish's story about Norton from Norton's Hut . Make sure you check out Caleb's Post from last week if you haven't already.



NORTON by Hamish Markland

The moment we stepped into the hut I felt something was strange, moments before we were yahooing and loud but as I opened the door my face dropped and made everyone wonder what I had seen.
Sitting by the fire was the silhouette of a man as we came through the door the man slowly turned his head towards us, the hood his oilskin jacket doing its best to cover his face. His dark, shaky eyes piercing us with a paralyzing gaze cautiously we tiptoed into the hut and laid our pack down on our bunks strangely the man had no gear of his own other than what he had on him. We try to talk to him but strangely there is no reply, we ask him where he came from or if he wanted food but he refused with a slight shake on his head and turned back to the fire which cast a sinister shadow on the wall. We caught our last glimpse of the dark figure before we went to bed. The next morning we woke up and it was just like he was never there… he was gone!

10 things that annoy Mr B

Another Andy Griffiths-inspired list by Jack Olsen

1. Kids who fart
2. Kids who scream
3. Guns
4. Screaming kids who have guns which make farting noise instead of BANG!
5. Women who don't like, or understand cricket, that ask "who's winning?" on the first morning of a test match
6. Dreams about women  asking "who's winning?" on the first morning of a test match
7. Waking from a dream where a woman asks him "who's winning?" on the first morning of a test match, to find that he's fallen asleep in front of the TV and his wife walks in an asks him "who's winning?"...and the test match has only just started!
8. Not listening to him
9. Slugs in his garden
10. Kids who don't listen to him and sprinkle slugs in his garden thinking that they were anti-slug pellets

10 ways to annoy Mr Wood...

An Andy Griffiths-inspired list by Joseph and Cody 

They look like this in real life too...

1. Your teacher asks you to write a 10-point list and you write only nine
2. Scribbl### in your b##k
3. Kill him 
4. Kill him twice
5. Kill him to death
6. using badly grammar
7. txt lng
8. wrtin wrk n txt lng
9. kling hm 2x 2 def
10. ...

Norton's Hut

This week we read 'Norton's Hut', by John Marsden (illus.Peter Gouldthrope).

Without giving too much away it's a spooky story with a twist. A bunch of kids go tramping and unexpectedly have to stay in a hut until a storm passes. When they arrive at the hut a mysterious man is there as well.

We used this as a motivation to write our characterisations.  Scroll down and enjoy.


NORTON 

As we entered the hut we were greeted by a roaring heat of an unnaturally large fire. But even more disturbing was the shadowy figure hunched in front of the blazing flames trying to absorb every last ounce of heat yet still the cabin had an unnatural chill.  As we unpacked in silence, trying not to disturb him, he slowly turned revealing half of his face, the rest of which remained hidden beneath the hood of his damp old oil skin.  His skin had a youthful appearance as pale as the blizzard surrounding us.  His one exposed eye had an undeniable knowledge within its darkness.

We tried to greet him with a smile and an offering of warm food which he declined with the turn of his head back to the blazing flames without a word spoken.  This made us feel uneasy.                          

                                     By: Caleb Anderson

The mysterious man from "Norton's Hut"

Reading SuperHero

A little video Mrs Woo's kids at Lake Brunner made about her for a competition. Well edited I thought!

Bailey Bridge

Last year, Mr B and I saw a teaching resource that was advertised in the Education Gazette. It showed high school students sitting around a 1/6th scale bailey bridge that they had created. The resource demonstrated how temporary bridges were constructed and assembled. Possibly more important however was the social aspect behind it. A team, working together, to achieve a common goal...perfect for bonding a new class. 

After having a run through in the morning, the boys decided that they wanted to see how fast it could be completed in the afternoon. 16mins and 33secs is our record so far...I wonder how much faster we could go? 

The panels go up

The rakers start to straighten and strengthen the panels.

Transons will support the chess (decking timber) later on

Foster oversees quality control.

Most of the transoms are on

Team work was the key to a quick successful build

The stringers go on top of the transoms

Panels are still being contructed

Alex pinning the panels together

Jack bolting on a racker to the panel and transom

Foster, Levi and Flanny; hard at it.

Will and Kobie begin to add the chess

The beginning to the end of the build. We are flying!

Jai and Alex

Foster and Jack

Still hard at it.

Halfway there...

Now the ribalds (kerbing) can be added

Jack having a smocko break

The final few panels are added

Daniel going for it

Levi, Dan and Kobie

Not far away now fellas...about 12 mins into the build

Add caption

Jonny...quiet AND working!

All you need Foster is shorter shorts and a singlet...

Zeal

Broc

16mins and 33secs later...I think we could go faster however.

Quality control will have to be better next time fellas...i can see a decking timber sticking up. Who's in charge?

Build a Bridge V2.0 (Return of the Bridge!)

After watching the videos (in the post below) the boys had another go at constructing their paper bridges. This time the time available was halved (45mins).

Team ThunderPandas with a design that was incredibly strong and practical...just like them really!

Team Epic Fail did not live up to their team name. Nice work fellas!

Team Majestic Unicorns with their completely useless bridge that "won"

Team Super Unknown with the same design as last time..except that the chicken  feet are pointing downwards this time

Team The Fallen...'nuff said

There was definitely some learning going on. Arches and triangles used this time.

Unfortunately we did find a fault in the scoring system. Even though some groups (or should I say person...lets call him Yoseph to hide his identity!) believed they had met the design brief, I'm sure that the bridge falling over or the bus continually plummeting over the side and killing every single living soul on board ...was not in the spirit of the competition.