Eco Leader Trip to Howick Pimary Silver Enviroschool

 Today, our Year Six Eco Leaders went on a trip with Ms Daniel to Howick Primary Silver Enviroschool.

We were welcomed into their Green Room and given cookies they had made as part of the Garden to Table programme.  It was really interesting to hear about how the school employs gardeners, a chef and learning assistants to work with small groups of children to grow food and cook it for GTT.  

Next, they showed us their big tidy kai gardens, seedling house, potting table and composters.  Ms Daniel particulary like the potting table. There was so much kai growing even through the winter!

Each year the HPS Year Sixes make enviro art around the school.  We saw the beautiful rainwater tank they had painted.

The HPS Kaitiaki told us about how their is an award system for each class. They can gain pointsby having litter free lunchs and using their red (landfill), orange (recycling) and green (compostables) class bins correctly. How motivating!  Each class has a monitor to assess the classes' progress and award points.  Rewards included ice cream, mufit and shared lunch. 

We loved seeing all the ways the children had reused items like

the green bins.  So sustainable!

Afterwards we checked out all the amazing planting and path creation around the school.  Alexander spotted a kingfisher.  We all loved the idea of a picnic spot in the middle of the bushy forest.

Lastly we got to hug a GIANT pumpkin. Thank HPS Kaitiaki and Mrs Long it was so inspiring to see how a big team effort can have amazing results embedded across the whole school. 

Year 6 2025 Annual Bird Survey

 Today, Year Six conducted our annual bird survey.  Bird populations are an indicator of how healthy an environment is.  Each class walked around the school for 40 minutes and noted down the biggest number of each species they saw on the official form.

Afterwards we recorded our data here so we can compare and contrast from previous years and reflect on how we can improve.

What do our results show?

Our results track with last year, so not improvement but no decline. The population of magpies is much bigger, which is a concern as they are aggressive to people and other birds.

How can we improve our bird numbers?

"Plant more trees" Maddy

"Give them food"Lucas F

"Like seeds" Justin

Manal "Give them water"

Taryn "Bird bath"

Evie "Make bird feeders"

Maddy "Make sugar water"

Room 1 told us they saw a kereru last week in the trees outside their room.  How exctiting!

In Term 4 we can research the birds we'd like to attract and put some of these ideas into action.

Next time we have EfS we'll be visited by Auckland Emergency Management.  

Year Four - Rimurimu - Forests of the sea

 Today Year Four found out about an under appreciated ocean feature - seaweed. It was amazing to read information and watch videos explaining how important it is.  Here are some things we found out:

TJ "If fish and shellfish don't have kelp they will have not habitat"

Annie "The seaweed gives us 70% of our oxygen"

Payton "The seaweed helps fish breathe by putting oxygen in the water"

Coby "Seaweed can be good for your skin"

"Adult snapper eat kina and if we catch too many big snapper there will be too many kina.  The kina eat all the kelp.  So there should be an oversize limit" Harvey

"Kelp looks better underwater.  It looks like a forest" - Georgia

Lakyn "There are over 850 types of seaweed in NZ"

We sketched types of seaweed from field guides and recorded some of the facts we had learnt.

Lastly we even got to try some seaweed from the supermarket.  Did you know that all types of NZ seaweed, except one, is edible?

Next time we are going to using our numeracy skills to survey our lunchboxes and the litter we find around the school.  Do you bring a litterfree lunch?

Year Five - Our Final Ready Steady Go Session

 

Today we were greeted at the school gate by the Travelwise team and a ZEBRA.  They were congratulating the tamariki using active travel.  Great timing for our last Ready Steady Go session.

We began by reviewing everything we've learnt about getting to school in a safe, healthy and environmentally friendly way, with a summative quiz, in our online workbooks.

Then we brainstormed the key ideas and words. We used these to create a catchy song to promote active travel with AI on Suno.

Listen to some of our tunes here:

Grace's Reggae Song

Angela's Walk to School Jam

Warren and Donglar's Rock Song

Renee's song

Emily's Anthem

Aelene's Catchy Tune

Alysia Sunnyhills Stroll

Emersyn's Song

Year Three Follow the Carbon Cycle

 Today Year Three investigated how we can be sustainable with our food waste.  Making sure no nutrients are lost, so we can keep growing new food and trees that give us oxegen and so that no parts of the world become a toxic dump.

We watched this video describing how Sunnyhills is sustainable with our scraps and talked about how we can do this at home with our own compost or the green lid bin.

Next we ate tangelos from Mrs Daniel's tree. "They taste zingy" said Joshua. "That tasted juicy" added Bella.

We collected the scraps and put them in our hot composters so the FBI (fungus, bateria and invertebrates) can break them down into new soil.

Next we each collected some "cooked" compost and put it on the Mara Kai ready for our spring planting. The compost was full of life! So many invertebrates! 

Room 18 found some pumpkin seeds in the compost that had germinated.  We potted them up in some soil to see if we can grow some delicious pumpkins to eat.  Free food!

Lastly, we recorded the carbon cycle in a diagram in our books: grow food - eat food - put scraps in compost - put compost on gardens and repeat.

Next time we're looking forward to investigating the invertebrates we saw,

Professional Development - Mission Heights

An inspiring visit to Mission Heights School:

Seedling tunnel house

Experiment to show compost soil structure VS chemically fertilized soil

Tapapa for growing kumara slips sustainably.

https://www.nzaee.org.nz/resources/earth-dreamers