Room 8 Weed Busters

 Today Room 8 learnt about pest plants and took action to help the environment. 

First we buddied up to read weed id cards. Next we put on gloves and collected tools. Then we hunted down weeds.

In the orchard we found Wandering Willie & GIANT Wollie Nightshade. We used our tools and teamwork skills to cut and pull the weeds out.

While we were working Harry found a special New Zealand prey mantis. Can you see its fat body and orange/ purple leg spot? That's how you know it's not a common South African prey mantis.

Next we're going to go home and talk to.our parents about entering THE MOTH PLANT COMPETITION, so we can continue our mahi in the community & WIN PRIZES.

Room Ono Get Thinking & Take Action

 Year 2 are kaitiaki for the Sunnyhills Honey Bees. We got thinking about our new topic.  What do you already know about bees?

Milana - bees make honey

Madison - humans can eat honey

Hunter - bees have stingers to get animals out of the way because they need to work fast

Allan - bees have an abdomen

Evie - bees pollinate

Ranger - bees need flowers so they can make honey

Hazel - bees have black and yellow stripes

Silas - bees drink nectar out of flowers

Chloe - bees make honey and move seeds into plants

What do we want to find out?

Hunter - how do they make honey?

Hazel - why do they have stripes? 

Coby - how do bees sting?

Octavia - why do they like flowers?

How are bee bodies different to ours?

We took action by planting calendula flowerrs to feed the bees and watering the garden. We hope we get to try Sunny Honey next time.

Room 13 Get Busy

 Today Room 18 took action in the Edible Gardens with Mrs Daniel & got busy learning about bees. We tended the hot compost, planted flowers, learnt bee body parts and even saw a slater spider. 

🐝 Bee Bits with Room 10

 Today Room 10 continued learning about bees with Mrs Daniel. Can your GEM name the parts of the bee?  Using our new vocabulary we created anatomically correct bees with Play Dough. Lastly, we visited the bees and watered their flowers.

We noticed wasps in the bee hive area. Next time we'll take action to protect our bees from pest insects.

Room 14's Discovery

Room 14 were about to learn all about our honey bees wuth Mrs Daniel, BUT Henry found a something when we were composting the gardens. Mrs Daniel said it was a cicada shell.  

We wanted to find out more:

Do cicadas love bees? Alice

Do cicadas eat nectar like bees? Harvey

How many legs do cicadas have? Alonso

How do cicadas get out of their shells? Helena

Do cicads love wasps? Lexi

How old do cicadas grow before they die? Isabella

Do cicadas like fruit? Quinn

Sophie said we could Google to find the answers. We found a video that answered some of our questions and found websites to answer the rest.

Alice - the loudest cicada is the Walker Cicada

Lexi - cicadas are one of the loudest animals

Flynn - cicada nymphs live underground for 17 years

Luca - cicada adults live only for a few weeks

Because we were SUPPOSED to be learning about honey bees today.  We compared cicadas and bees.  They are the same because:

Harvey - they are both insects

Lexi - they both have wings

Sophie - they both have 6 legs

Henry - they are both spikey

Isabella - cicadas sounds help me relax

How are they different?

Joshua - cicadas suck sap and bees suck nectar

Lexi - they make different noises

Harvey - cicadas are bigger

Cicada don't help trees but bees do

Henry - cicadas don't sting

We did finally manage to also compost the garden, plant flowers to feed the bees and water. 

We wonder what we'll discover next time with Mrs Daniel ...

Kauri Hub Shining GreenGold

 It's been a long wait, but finally this week, Year Ono launched their Sustainability learning journey with Mrs Daniel.

Firstly, we reminded ourselves of the everyday choices we can make to be more sustainable:

- pack a litterfree lunch

- use the community composters

- walk or bike to school

- put food scraps in the compost buckets

Next we took action;  last year SHS planted 700 trees. We set about rescuing them from under an avalanche of kikuyu grass.

Over the wet summer, some of the trees have quadrupled in height.  We can't wait to see how tall they'll grow this year.

Lastly we did a mapping and scavenger hunt activity to remind ourselves of all the special places around Sunnyhills that make us shine GreenGold. 

Next time we're beginning to learn more about Climate Change. 

Year Tahi Growing Kai

 Year Tahi are learning how to grow kai.  We fed the mara kai with our own compost made with lunchbox scraps. Next we planted seedlings and watered them.

What's this??

Room tekau ma tahi found a germinated avocado seed in the compost. We potted it up. When we're grown ups perhaps we can pick the avocados 🥑 

Next time we're going to make vegetable soup.