A few pictures during morning tea...

Here are a few pictures showing off our school Enviro efforts in the class gardens...

The garden has been enjoying the rain and is looking very green!   Our community have been very kind and we have had many seedlings donated to us over the past few weeks to put in our gardens...silverbeet, onions, fennel, strawberries, beetroot, lettuces are just a few of the plants that we have been donated to plant.  We have also planted more basil and some tomatoes.

We are also really excited about our new garden going in.  This garden is due to our growing roll as well as our growing enthusiasm for growing our own kai:)

We have been making and adding more decorations to the quiet area.

Here's Charlie and Bella playing noughts and crosses in the quiet area.

Our  passionfruit vine is PUMPING!

Making Bags

Last week, the team from Flag the Bag came in to show us how to make a re-usable bag from an old t-shirt.  Here are some of the fab results.  We are planning to make a lot more bags so we can give them out at the craft fair and encourage people to FLAG THE BAG!

We were lucky enough too that Nicky brought in the Flag the Bag team's bag chain.  The chain represents all the bags that were used in one hour at one supermarket!  It was SO big, it nearly stretched right round the field and Karma had to climb up into the crows nest to try and fit it all in the photo!

More about the sand dunes...

After we had heard a little about the sand dune plants we looked at the dune that some students from Wainui Beach School had planted 6 years ago.  The plants were still there and the dune was looking good.

Next we went along to the planting site in front of the surf club.  Some of us were a little disappointed because the site where the Coast Care Group wanted us to plant is great fun to slide down!  Mr Logan explained how the dune was eroding and that if we didn't plant it and stay of it that the dune would disappear and then the Surf Club would be in danger too.  We decided to be Kaitiaki of the dune and tell people why it had been planted up and let them know how important it is to stay off the dune.

A planting team from Room 10 stayed behind to plant the dune, while the rest of us went to a SECRET spot for a picnic:)

Our "secret" spot was down the back of Mrs Harris's section by the Hamanatua Stream:)  We got to see how the stream winds it's way down the hills to the sea.  Ms McVey told us all about how high the stream can get sometimes and how it too can cause erosion sometimes.

It was a great day out and about!  We all learnt a lot and it felt good to help out!

Sand Dune Resoration

Room 10 and Room 3 went down to the sand dunes in front of the Wainui Surf Club to meet some of the members of the Wainui Coast Care group and help them plant up the dune in front of the Surf Club building.  We talked about how plants on sand dunes are important because they hold the sand in place.  We learnt that if we had no sand dunes that out beach would disappear.  The creatures who live in this zone would loose their homes and the buildings on the beach front would be in danger of eventually washing away too.

Here's what Hugo, Israel and Felix wrote about the dunes...

Sand Dunes...

When you are on the sand dunes you are killing plants and making it easy for tsunamis to get in onto the land. If we don’t have sand dunes we will have no beach. Did you know that if the dunes were gone, the beach front houses would be on the beach, literally.

By Hugo.

Sand Dunes          

The thing that I learnt today is that  sand dunes are really important.  If you slide down them  and  do it too much, the plants will fall down and then the houses will fall down into the sea. IF THERE'S NO PLANTs THERE’s NO DUNES!!!!!!!!    

BY Felix

Sand dunes

One thing I learnt about dune plants is salt spray, they need to survive salt spray that is when a wave crashes down on the dunes and makes them salty.

Next is erosion, for an example if there were no dunes the waves would take dirt, sand and houses because the dunes hold the dirt and sand that’s why they are so important.

Did you know a tsunami wiped out 10,000 people in Indonesia once at Phuket.

By Israel

Planting at Hamanatua Stream - Room 2 Rocks!

Last Thursday Room 2 went down to our awa - Hamanatua.  They planted 50 trees and flax that had been grown in our school shade house.  They also planted 150 other trees provided by Kauri and Tui.

 That's  a total of 200 holes that were dug, a good cubic metre or two of mulch that was moved and a grassy hillside that's now been transformed into grove of native trees.  

The students from Room 2 worked very hard to get all of this done in one morning!  Ka mau te wehi!

If you have a chance - walk down to Hamanatua and check it out!

Flag the Bag!

Here's Room 3's little movie that won second place in the Flag the Bag movie competition!

Go Moana Kaitiaki!

Helping to Restore Titirangi

A couple of weeks ago, the Envirogroup and some keen beans from Room 2 went to Titirangi to have a look and help out at the native tree project.

It rained and rained and we wondered if we would go...but...go we did and the rain went too!  Not only did we strike a break in the rain for our planting session but the sun even came out making it a superb morning on Titirangi to hear all about it's history and some of the special native trees there.

After a bit of a tour we helped out at the planting site planting lacebark, kanuka, kawakawa and karo trees.  Everyone that helped out got to plant a tree (or two) and got their photo taken with their tree.

We now consider ourselves kaitiaki for these trees and will watch them grow with interest.

Thanks to the GDC, Enviroschools and Ngati Oneone for giving us this opportunity!

compost bin

Over two days, we have been painting the school's compost bin. We have painted flowers, butterflies, and a lot of other things. Mrs Kingi thinks it really lights up our garden. We hope you like it.:)

by Nina, Lucy and Fern

Mara Kai - The Interschool Final

Today Anna, Ella, Carlos and Natalie all represented Wainui Beach School at the Interschool Mara Kai challenge at the Poverty Bay Golf Club.  Carlos and Natalie created a brilliant presentation about our school gardens and spoke to the audience about how we do things at Wainui Beach School. 

 Ella and Anna re-created their Quesadilla dish from round one for the judges showing off their cooking skills and our school garden produce.

Read on to hear about our fantastic results!

Ella and Anna sliced and diced - Anna even managed to slice her finger but with true Akuhata Brown resilience she carried on no trouble at all.  At the end of the competition they won Most Creative Dish and Best Presentation.
Awesome outcome girls!

Carlos and Natalie impressed everyone with their presentation and won awards for - Best School Garden and Best Produce  Presentation.  Go the Lands!

Go Wainui Beach School!