Enviroschools Celebration

We have been an Enviroschool for six months now and are really excited with the progress we have made and the possibilities for next year and beyond. Some highlights have included the arrival of our beehives, the fruit trees that each class planted and our vegetable growing, harvesting and eating.

Three representatives from Room 17 attended the Enviroschools Celebration day last Friday, where there were displays from other schools which was really inspirational and gave us lots of ideas for what we could achieve at our school. A fabulous storyteller entertained us and there was a delicious waste-free, locally-sourced and healthy morning tea!

We hope to be in a position to exhibit our sustainability journey at the Enviroschools Celebration this time next year. Watch this space!

Enviroschools Principles in action here:

- Empowered Students are enabled to participate in a meaningful way in the life of their early childhood centre or school. Their unique perspectives are valued for the knowledge and insight that they bring, and they are supported to take action for real change.

- The principle of Learning for Sustainability recognises the types of teaching and learning that foster student empowerment, decision-making, action and sustainable outcomes.

- Sustainable Communities act in ways that nurture people and nature, now and in the future, to maintain the health and viability of our environment, society, culture and economy.

Harakeke Harvesting

A group of students from Puāwaitanga needed some harakeke (flax) to use in their inquiry learning. Before harvesting, we said a harakeke karakia and the students sang a beautiful waiata. When we harvested, we cut on the diagonal away from the heart of the plant and we took only the Tūpuna (grandparents/ancestors) leaves, not the Matua (parents) or Rito/Pepe (baby) leaves. The students took three leaves to plait into a rope to be used on a waka they had crafted. The trimmings of the harakeke were returned to Papatūānuku and buried beneath the harakeke plant that we harvested from. Source: National Library Enviroschools Principles in action here: - Empowered Students are enabled to participate in a meaningful way in the life of their early childhood centre or school. Their unique perspectives are valued for the knowledge and insight that they bring, and they are supported to take action for real change. - The principle of Māori Perspectives honours the status o

Pet Robots Made From Waste Materials

It is wonderful to see Room 9 using waste materials like wood offcuts, bottle tops, construction waste to make these gorgeous pet robots. Enviroschools Principles in action here: - Empowered Students are enabled to participate in a meaningful way in the life of their early childhood centre or school. Their unique perspectives are valued for the knowledge and insight that they bring, and they are supported to take action for real change. - The principle of Learning for Sustainability recognises the types of teaching and learning that foster student empowerment, decision-making, action and sustainable outcomes.

Puāwaitanga's Investigations into how we can 'Make our Community GREAT!'

Puāwaitanga have been buzzing with investigations that looked at different ways we can help to ‘Make our Community GREAT!’ Take a look at what we’ve been up to. Room 16 has been looking at ways to improve our community to make it GREAT. We gathered information about organic methods to spray the weeds at our school and then we made a hypothesis before we began our testing. There were varying degrees of success, and one of the most effective ways of eradicating weeds was a mixture of vinegar, salt and water. As part of Room 17 ’s Inquiry learning this term, students were fortunate enough to spend a morning with Sarah Slater from Watercare, learning lots about water quality in our local streams and waters. Students were shown how to test the quality of water using pH and nitrate indicators, and were also able to identify how the effect of pollution can impact the water quality and animal life in our local streams. Room 18 has been using our overarching theme, ‘What

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