Year One Working with Water Care

 

Today Year One's EFS lesson was with Sarah from Watercare.  We discovered where the water in our taps comes from - The Waikato River, aquifers & dams.  Did you know Watercare has 12 dams in Tamaki Makaurau? 

We thought about all the ways we used water this morning; toilet flushes, facewashing, toothbrushing, handwashing, dishwasher, shower, and even a robotmop/vaccuum, 

We learnt how to be Water Saving Heroes:

- turn off the tap when we brush our teeth or use a cup (20 litres can be wasted if the tap is left running)

- use the small button when we flush the toilet (Yes, the small button can be used for number twos. It takes 12 litres to flush the big button and just 7 for the small)

- fill the bath less (a full bath takes 200 litres of water)

- use your bath water on the plants or share your bathtime

- have a short shower (showers take 12 litres of water a minute)

Each tamariki are bringing home a shower timer to help them and their whanau

be Water Saving Superheroes. Thank you Watercare!!

If we are careful with our water it's great for the environment as the water will stay in our dam lakes, aquifers and rivers.

Lastly we used our superpowers of problem solving and collaboration to create super fun water courses. 

Afterwards we identified ways a family were wasting water on a diagram and wrote about what we had learnt.

Thank you to Sarah and Watercare for a wonderful learning experience! 

Year Five Finish Up Food for Thought

 

Today, Year Five had their last Food for Thought session.

We began by thinking about how we can use the $60 PaknSave voucher:

Savy "Buy popcorn and have a movie day for the end of the year and wear pajamas".

Bianca "Get some food and make stuff from it in a cooking  class"

Paige "For a movie afternoon get popcorn but also fruit too and chocolate dipping sauce"

Erica "Buy sushi and share it"

"Dress up in pajamas and buy popcorn and bake Christmas cookies and then eat them while we watch a movie" Raquel

Evie "Do different challenges with food.  Like put a cookie on the forehead and move it to your mouth without using your hands."

"Buy apples and do bobbing for apples." Tim

"Make caramel popcorn decorations to eat while watching a movie" Paige

Jax "Recreate a mini PaknSave in the classroom"

"Use blankets and pillows to make forts for the  movie afternoon" Raquel

Louie "Getting orange juice for a Christmas party" 

Abby "Buy fruits and vegetsbles for the class"

"Get blueberry muffins for the class" Ruby

"A fruit basket to share with the class" Mea

"Real fruit iceblocks" Zoey

Dihan "Sushi"

Ayvah "Watermelon" 

Our summative activity to finish off this unit was to create a healthy and sustainable restaurant.

“You and your group are going to create your own healthy, sustainable restaurant! You’ll design a menu, create a theme, explain your sustainability features, and present your restaurant concept.”

We worked hard to create a name, healthy menu items and sustainable practices for our restaurants.  We learnt about divided up tasks and compromising to work effectively as a team. Our checklists gave us some ideas and structure for the project:

Student Checklist  https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_xXsLE3lsghUEgM8MYEApIlpu6_riptgahjLS3Rvddg/edit?usp=sharing

We all enjoyed presenting at the end.

Check out Bianca, Evie & Tim's restaurant concept: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1aL-DIjbNVK-18ejZ4Su-xIgxTJ8nbrOm_aEuSQDJo2U/edit?usp=sharing

Well done Year Five.  We're looking forward our new sustainability adventures in 2026 as Year Six!

Year 3 Explore Why We Keep Chickens

 

Year 3 have been looking at the important job fungus, bacteria and invertebrates do to break down our waste and return it to the earth so we can grow more food.  

Did you know we keep chickens at Wakaaranga? And did you know the reason we keep chickens is that they do the same job as fungus, bacteria and invertebrates?  That's right, we feed the hens food scraps and they give us fertilizer for the gardens and eggs to eat.

We did a fun scavenger hunt to find out some fascinating facts about chickens.  Did you know they can recognise 100 faces?

Growing with Year 0

 Year 0 had their first Education for Sustainability lesson today. 

We passed around a seed to look at. What is a seed?

"They help things grow" Ronni

Reza "Seeds grow"

Olivia "We have to plant them in pots or a garden"

Aaron "My dad loves bonzais"

Mia "We have to put them in the dirt"

Celine "They need water and sun"

We visited the Mara Kai (food garden). We saw the flowers and vegetables growing.  We tried sour sorrel, spicy rocket and silverbeet.

Afterwards we took some weeds to the compost and saw the bees and white blossoms on the apple trees. The chickens had laid an egg!

Next we read a Fredge story about growing kai. Do you like the Fredge we drew?

Next time we're looking forward to more mahi in the mara!

Year Five Food for Thought

 Over the last two days in EFS, Year Five have working with Naomi from Food for Thought.  They have identified the parts of a healthy meal and  learnt how to read food labels so we can make healthy choices when buying products.

In between sessions we promoted The Wednesday Challenge with Year One by sharing the Travelwise picture books we had made.

They are looking forward to visiting PaknSave next week to put their learning into action.

Later that day...

To finish off our previous projects, we shared our "walk to school booklets" with year 1s and 2s. 

We read the books and did some role play on correct road rules. 

Year Three Helping to Create an Eco Friendly Carnival

 

We're excited for Carnival this Friday!

What are we looking forwards to?

Eveline "Noodles* and rides"

Alton "Chocolate trailer*"

Margoh "Food stalls* and toilet toss game*"

Ryder "Hamster wheel and the tea cups"

Hiraya "Looking forward to Snot Man*"

"I'm looking forward to face painting" Rosemary

"Bouncy Castle"

"Bungy Trampoline"

Rock Climbing

Popsicles*

Sushi*

Cake Stall*

Sausage Sizzle

Juice*

Cotton Candy

Mini donut

Ferris wheel

Prizes*

Fizzy Drinks

Police and fire truck

BUT there is can be a problem with Carnival when you are an Enviroschool.  It can make a LOT OF WASTE.  

*These stalls create waste 

We decided to create posters to promote the carnival and promote being environmentally friendly at carnival.

We needed to include theses main ideas:

WAKAARANGA CARNIVAL

4:40pm - 7:30pm

THIS FRIDAY

We also wanted to include environmentally friendly messages like:

Pick up litter

Keep our carnival clean and green

Bring your own bag

Bring a drink bottle

Please use the right bin

We wanted to make our posters fun and colourful.

Look out for them around school!