Credit: video by Toby Bell Teamwork makes the dream work ….. What a great team we all made. Matariki 3 days 3000 trees 15 schools 206 students 60 parents and teachers 12 organizing volunteers per day 3 planting crew -1 C frost 1 awesome native ngahere planting project!!!
The tamariki at Picton Kindergarten have been learning all about Wētā. This evolved through their exploration of te ngahere and how to care for the native flora and fauna through pest control. It began when one of the tamariki discovered a wētā family in her woodshed. She recognised it as one of our native insects and sent in photos to Kindergarten for everyone to see. Jo, then bought in a real live wētā from her home and they made a habitat for it. This lead to learning about what they like to eat, where they live, how many eggs they lay as well as what predators endanger them. When the tamariki learnt that cats, dogs and hedgehogs endanger wētā, they...
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St Mary's School Enviro Team wanted to provide fresh fruit for their hāpori whānui and community. They wanted to encourage students to eat more fruit, learn about growing and taking care of fruit trees as well as encourage wildlife to their school like insects to pollinate the flowers. To do this their Enviro Team proposed a space that they thought would be a great place to make an orchard. It was beside an existing garden shed, sheltered from the wind and easily accessible by vehicles. The area was very dry though and the rainfall in Blenheim is often low. So they knew they would also need to think about how they could provide a watering...
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Fairhall School's native garden entrance has a makeover Fairhall School has a meandering native garden created to grow beside a stream space that only has water in it for part of the year. It has a bridge over this space and is an area the school highly values. Over the years it has been added to and this time it was the native garden entrance that got a makeover. One of the senior classes and their teacher has been busy doing some planning and work to the entrance. They recently overhauled the Marlborough Rock Daisy garden at the entrance to the garden/ngahere. As part of this space they have created a bark mountain to...
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Redwoodtown School have been busy redesigning their Kids Edible Gardens Like many schools around Marlborough, Redwoodtown School is a construction zone of new classrooms. As part of the renovations, a decision was made to shift the Kids Edible Gardens and update the garden area. The Envirogroup took up the challenge to investigate where the best place would be and design a new Kids Edible Garden. Although it was tempting to rush in and build a new garden, they wanted to engage the whole school and seek feedback on how all the students would like their gardens to be. “It took a lot of time and effort. We thought it would be something that was quick and...
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Te Rūma Rātā and te Rūma Pōhutukawa - kaitiaki of birds and habitats at Fairhall School Whare wētā At the beginning of the year te Rūma Rātā and te Rūma Pohutukawa made a kaitiaki pledge to be guardians of birds and habitats at Fairhall School. We first set out to learn in particular about New Zealand birds, lizards and wētā so this could help inform how we could make a difference to their habitats around our school and local community. We also worked with local environmental educators and our Enviroschools facilitator to deepen our understanding of the native bush that is in our ngahere and what plantings might encourage more wildlife to...
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Linkwater School is celebrating winning this year’s Lions Youth Environment Award for the upper South Island and West Coast region. Linkwater School is a small rural Green-Gold Enviroschool in the Marlborough region, so named because it sits between Tōtaranui/Queen Charlotte Sound and Keneperu Sound. Students and teachers at the school are passionate about their environment. Much of their curriculum is based on students’ learning about and taking action for sustainability, supported by their wider community. Linkwater School is also part of the Marlborough District Council's “Kids’ Edible Gardens” programme. Earlier this term Linkwater submitted their Sustainable Outdoor Classroom development to the Lions Youth Award for District 202E (upper South Island and West Coast) supported by the...
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Grovetown School’s Waihi class has embarked on a special project this year to save the fantails in their school forest. Identify The project came about as part of an inquiry: ‘How is our place unique?’. The class began by exploring and learning about the native, endemic and introduced animals and plants in their school. During this exploration, some of the children found empty fantail nests which prompted thinking about why the nests might be empty. Some of the students’ ideas were: “rats have eaten them" - "it is too cold for the eggs and chicks so birds don't lay eggs in winter" - "the fantails think it’s too dangerous because of the rats and possibly stoats so they won't...
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We know that being outside connecting to nature in a green space is good for us: we feel refreshed and energised, but relaxed. Is the same true for children when participating in the Kids’ Edible Gardens (KEGs) programme? Absolutely! This is why, in a time when our children’s hauora (wellbeing) and mental health is so important, KEGs is a great resource for schools to have available for their students to participate in. Te Whare Tapa Whā model Te Whare Tapa Whā is a wonderful model that many of you will know of and have perhaps used in your classroom as a way of explaining what hauora means. Each part of a person’s hauora - their emotional, mental,...
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Springlands Kindergarten successfully reflected at Enviroschools Silver this term, the day before the national lockdown in August! It was fantastic to see all the great work that kaiako and tamariki have been doing at Springlands Kindergarten, especially linking to the Enviroschools guiding principle of Sustainable Communities. They are a green-fingered group and have been growing and making lots of things to share. We especially loved the relationship they have formed with a local rest home. They collected and made plum jam and then shared it with the residents at the rest home. How cool is that? There were some other clever sustainable ideas like homemade natural glitter, hand-dyed shirts using natural plant dyes and some special activities...
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