Energetic Year Five

 Today Year Five began a new enquiry into sustainable energy.  First, we had to learn what energy is and how it transforms.  Did you know that "energy can neither be created nor destroyed - only converted from one form of energy to another"?

We completed activities defining types of energy and their transformations in our online workbook. Then we did some fun experiments to create static energy with balloons, feathers, spoons, salt and pepper: S&P Experiment & Balloon Experiment

How can we seperate the salt and pepper? 

Olivia A "Use the spoon to move the grains into seperate piles"

Hazel "Sieve it so the smaller pepper grains fall through"

Blake "Blow it"

We learnt we can generate static electricity to pick up the pepper by rubbing a plastic spoon on our hair and then hovering it over the mixture.

What did you observe?

Harper "I saw the pepper jump up onto the spoon"

Alexander "The more you rub the spoon the more pepper comes up"

Toby "It was static electricity"

Next time we're learning how active travel to school can use energy sustainably and it's great for our bodies and minds too. Do you walk, bike, scooter or 'park&walk' to school?

Bok Choy Banquet with Year Three

 Today, Year 3 harvested the bountiful bok choy from our Mara Kai. We talked about how it had grown from last year's plants with the help of our school bees. Mrs Daniel had left two plants to go to flower and now there's lots of plants that have grown from the scattered seeds.

Ciara "It tasted sweet and a little bit bitter".

Coby "I had a stomach ache and it cured it".

Tino "The bok choy was juicy and nice".

Afterwards we typed recounts in a Google Doc:

Bok choy noodle Soup

Today Room 18 and Ms Daniel cooked up Bok choy noodle soup.We went to the kitchen and

chopped up the bok choy with a big knife.Next we added it to noodle and flavours and water.

Ms Daniel boiled it all for 3 minutes.We each got a cup.Ms Daniel said we could slurp it.  It tasted like normal noodle and vegetable.  I liked it.  Jin Room 18.

29.5.24

Enviro Bok Choy Noodle Soup

Today we went to Enviro. We went into the kitchen.

We played Sustainable Shaun.

Some people made the soup.

We ate some. It was delicious.

Then we cleaned the cups&forks.

We left and that's how I came to write this story 

The end. Matty

Room 8 and Ms Daniel had bokchoy soup and it smelt  and tasted sooooo good. The noodles  were the best part for me. I didn't ’t like the bokchoy that much. Madison

2024 Waste Audit

 

2024 Waste Audit 

Thursday 22nd May 2024

Today Ms Daniel and Year Six conducted our waste audit.

Paper recycling and general waste collection costs Sunnyhills School $5036+gst per year. 

Classroom Waste Bins

Compostable .16kg

Recyclable .98kg (Pizza boxes were .42)

General Waste .82kg

Total - 1.96kg

Amount that was in the wrong bins - 1.14kg 🙁

Staffroom Waste Bins

Compostable .56

Recyclable .1

General Waste.38kg

Amount in the wrong bins .66 :(

Total 1.04

Recycling Bin 

Total 0.1

Soft Plastic Total 

Total <0.1

Total that could have been diverted if correct bins used 1.81kg

Total sent to landfill 3kg

Diverted From Landfill

Paper Recycling

Total 5.9 kg 

Hot Compost and Worm Farm

Total 2.22

Comingled Recycling .1

Total diverted from landfill 8.22kg

Observations 

- there used to be lots of masks and now there are none, but there are lots of tissues

- pizza boxes in the wrong bin increased our landfill by nearly 25%

- 1.14 kg of waste in classroom bins could have been composted or recycled so more education is needed

- If the all teachers used the hot compost bin we could reduce our staffroom waste by half

Actions

• Eco Leaders to talk to all the classes about putting pizza boxes in the paper recycling bin and using the correct bins.

• Emily and Monique will make posters reminding everyone to use the right bins

• Mrs Daniel will announce in the staffroom a reminder that pizza boxes can go in recycling and using the hot compost bin

• Mrs Daniel will email all teachers to remind them to use the hot compost bin in the staffroom

NIWA Township Flood Challenge with Year Six

 As part of our Protecting Estuary Inquiry we have  been investigating how our local wetlands are important for mitigating floods. Did you know floods are Tamaki Makaurau's most common natural hazard?

We played this online simulator to try and plan for town flooding: https://niwa.co.nz/township-flood-challenge-game/introduction-township-flood-challenge-game 

It taught us lots of strategies!

Afterwards we teamed up to play the board game version kindly loaned by Sustainable Schools.

Here was some of our thinking and actions:

Addison "You have to be very careful with your money"

Elizabeth "I learnt that it was really hard for me to get enough money to move out of the flood plain"

Jerry "We had to come together as a community and donate to each other to be able to buy stuff to stop the flood damage"

Kaiden "I sold the farm first when  I had lots of money before there were more floods"

Flynn "It was a good idea to buy a rental property out of the flood zone because then we get income"

Monique "Our farm was damaged and we had no money so we tried to get a loan from the marae"

Corina "We don't want to loan to them because we don't think they will be able to pay us back"

Rebab "But without the farm you won't have any food"

The marae decided to rent a house from the landlord for 200k a year because it was out of the flood zone. They also moved the whare nui 

Jerry "If you get the money you have to move the cowshed back because that is what gives you income"

We liked the online version for learning the game and then the board game for generating discussion.

We all agreed it was important to think very carefully about the location of your first house away from flood prone areas.

Year Four Kaitiakitanga - Thank you Paradice ICE Skating

 Today, as part of our Moana Inquiry Year Four looked at how we can be kaitiakitanga (guardians) of our moana and how our actions can make a difference. We watched Why is plastic so bad video and this inspirational video too Hope Stories

We wondered if we were part of the plastic problem, so we looked in our lunchboxes.  Room 6 had 12 litterfree lunches out of 25.  Room 5 had 14 out of 26.  Well done!  Room had 8 litterfree lunchboxes but sadly DOUBLE the total number of litter items compared to the other classes. We are going to run another promotion later in the year to see how much we can improve.

Room 5 had a total of 25 litter pieces in our lunchboxes. That would be 125 pieces of litter a week and 5000 pieces of litter in a school year. And over 100000 pieces schoolwide per year!

 Wow it sure adds up! If every class is the same that's 120 000 pieces of litter each year generated by Sunnyhills School children's lunchboxes. Goodness! Sadly lots of this plastic litter escapes lunchboxes and is blown into  the sea.

We had a prizedraw for the litterfreelunch children to say well done for making the extra effort. THANK YOU Paradice Ice Skating for the prize vouchers! 

We wondered how we could make a difference with a big group brainstorm.  Here's our ideas:

Touma - pick up rubbish

Kayla - pick up rubbish in the ocean

Lily - bring a litterfree lunch

Mukundi - make "pick up rubbish" posters

Indigo - talk to our parents about using less plastic

Kayla - make a video about how we can save the Hauraki Gulf

Bridie - convince the government to stop allowing plastic

Kayla - convince the supermarkets to not use plastic

Eesa - use less plastic. Use cardboard and paper

Ambrose - Bring a litterfree lunchbox everyday

Brayden - replace ship packets with carboard

Kayla - make crafts out of plastic

Emma - use old things

Luca - try to never use plastic again

Harry - try melting the plastic down so you can reuse it.

Mila - try to convince your parents to pack a litterfree lunch

Zachary - use less plastic

Nathan - go to the ocean each week and take the plastic out

Mila - use less Gladwrap

Richie - pick up rubbish everyday

Saane - pick up rubbish

Hunter - gather a group and get them to pick up rubbish

Nicolas - get some posters and share them

Ivy - have a litterfree lunch everyday

Renee - make agame of picking up rubbish and give out prizes

Rooms 6 & 5 set about put some of their ideas into action.

After lunch Room 4 collected all the rubbish bins around school for our biannual Waste Audit. We are monitoring how effective our waste reduction schemes are. Standby for the results tomorrow!