Kia Ora from Mrs Daniel

Be kind & stay safe all my eco GEMS

I'm looking forward to sending out some fun enviro challenges after Easter.

Our Kauri Mural

Our Kauri Dieback Unit continues - today Room 17 & 18 looked at all the endemic animals that rely on the kauri. We drew them to add to our kauri mural in The Green Room. Next we'll investigate how Kauri Dieback attacks the kauri roots. I wonder if we could grow our own kauri trees?

Te Amohaere Teaches Us About Kauri Dieback

Our Year 3's and 4's our learning about kauri and kauri die back disease.

In Term 4 we were lucky enough to be visited by a new young kauri dieback expert, Te Amohaere. She taught us about this disease that threatens our national tree & what we can do to stop its spead: SCRUB, SPRAY & STAY ON THE TRACK

We hope her beautiful waiata to spread the word will be released more widely soon.

We're looking at ways to spread the word too. Comment below with ideas for telling people about kauri dieback:

Room Rima Boys Accept the Radish Challenge

Room Rima Boys Accept the Radish Challenge - How spicy are our home grown radishes?

Lucas "They tasted as spicy as a chilli seed"
Max "The leaves taste like mint"
Ali "It actually tastes really good"
Bodhi "6/10 for spicy"

Edible Garden Working Bee

Drone Aerial View

Today enthusiastic whanau pitched in to help work on our Edible Gardens. Wheelbarrows, spades and rollers at the ready, young and old managed to finish muching around the beds and stain the fence black. Those with a super steady hand worked on our colourful garden signs too.

A little history:

Edible Gardens August 2016 - 12 beds

Edible Gardens August 2018 - 36 vege beds, orchard, Trees For Survival Seedling House, rain water tank, garden shed, worm farms, compost bins, irrigation, pathway, teaching area

This project began in 2015 when the senior school students began planning a replacement for our small vege patch, in the Senior Courtyard, that was due to be demolished.

Three years later with lots of research, experiments, fund raising, grants, u-turns, working bees, help from community partners and every child's involvement our Edible Gardens vision is close to completion.

Heartfelt thanks to everyone who came today - your hard work and great attitude had amazing results! The Edible Gardens are going to be a wonderful place to learn for many years to come.

We're now reflecting on our next steps...how to celebrate our achievement... skink suburbs ...bug hotels... honey bees or chickens. The action learning never stops.

Thanks to Mr Trembath for the clever drone footage:

Kek kek kek We've Got Plover Chicks

Kek kek kek - the call of our spur winged plovers could be heard across Sunnyhills this afternoon. Room 17 & I went to investigate and found our property manager Mr Leslie being dive bombed on the field by these big native birds.

Knowing these normally shy birds nest in scrapes on fields, i was pretty sure Mr Leslie had disturbed a nest, while marking out the rugby field, that borders our new bird corridor. Sure enough he and Mrs Driver confirmed two plover chicks and their parents had made their home pretty close to the goal posts.

Bad news:
- it'll need to be an away game next week
- the field won't be fully mowed
- we won't be opening the rugby field for a while

Good News:
OUR BIRD CORRIDOR IS BRINGING IN THE BIRDS I'm very excited.

Thank you to Mrs Driver & Mr Leslie for taking measures to protect our wee plover whanau 🦅🐣❤

Cameron notices a wriggly worry with our worm farm - Action Learning - Reflection

UPDATE FOR THE BLOG BELOW

A massive thank you to Mrs Trembath and Room 14 for our sturdy new worm buckets for kids to put their lunchbox scraps in.

Room 14 do an amazing job feeding and watering our worms each week, so we can return nutrients to our edible garden. You rock!!

Special thanks to Sticky Bambam for the sicker labels!

THE WIGGLY WORRY

Today, while Year One were learning about what to put in our worm farms and why we have worms at school, Cameron noticed a problem; the bins children put their lunchbox scraps in are all cracked and broken. Also, they don't have any labels or instructions. Sounds like an issue for our Going Gold group to resolve. Good spotting Cameron! We're always reflecting on ways we can keep our sustainable practices running smoothly.