Waste Audit

WasteNet visited Gore Main School during Term One.  Each class received education on waste management and had their questions answered about issues like this:  What can go into the yellow bin?  What can go into the red bin?  Where does the yellow bin recycling go?  Where does the red wheelie bin rubbish go? etc.  Some classes participated in a waste audit.  They saved their rubbish for one week and then tipped it out onto a tarp.  The rubbish was then sorted through!  It was realised very quickly that we are all being very careless with our rubbish and that we could be more efficient with recycling!  It was very eye opening!

  

Children's Day 2017

Gore Main School participated in Children's Day again this year!  We wanted to show our community that we care about them and also to spread the message of sustainability.  We decided to grow sunflowers from seed and give them away to everybody!  Sunflowers grow, just like children's learning!

We grew the sunflowers for Children's Day and transplanted them into egg carton sections.  

We made signs to show that the gift to our community was from Gore Main School

 

Our Diversity Wall

This wall is going to help us to remember about the important component of our Gore Main Enviro-Stars...STRONG DIVERSITY.

Our Gore Main School Hen House

Our Hen House which was set up as part of Room 3's inquiry project in 2016 shows the Enviro-Stars!

Sustainability: We raised the chicks ourselves, they are fed food scraps from the children at school, the hens are eating our food scraps (plus playing pellets for supplements) they lay us eggs and we sell their eggs to make money to buy more feed and cool things for our school.

Taonga: The hens are our special treasure which we respect and care for. We are living off our land and providing for ourselves.

Actively engaged: The children are running the hen house and caring for the hens themselves, this is part of our inquiry learning in the classrooms.

Respect: We are showing great respect to our hens and to the environment by disposing of our food scraps by feeding them to the hens. When Blossom (aka 'Hoppy') got sick Room 8 showed her the upmost respect by caring for her and doing everything they could to help her get better. Unfortunately, she could not be saved and they made the difficult choice to have her put to sleep peacefully by the vet. This was respecting her rights to be without pain.

Strong Diversity: The children are learning about and how to care for a different animal that many of them may not have had experience with. The hens must be fed a diverse range of foods to ensure they maintain a healthy diet. Different classes/children are involved in looking after the hens through a roster system.

Sustainabiltiy - Using our produce to feed our people

Already over 2017 we have had so many wonderful opportunities to demonstrate 'sustainability' within our Enviro-School.  We have made apple and apricot crumble, fried up potatoes for our whole school and shared corn amongst some classes!  More importantly, the students have grown this food themselves!  It is so important to share the process of food growing with students.  Also, it is wonderful to see children involved in Maori perspectives like tuakana/teina (more abled person helping someone less abled) and kotahitangi (everybody involved) in our Enviro-School.  We have many photos of sustainability involving kai!    

SUSTAINABILITY WITH APPLES!

SUSTAINABILITY WITH POTATOES/CORN

Gore Harvest Festival 2017

Gore Main School acknowledges that we are a part of an amazing community!  It integral to be a part of a community as we aim to be a Green/Gold Enviro-School.  This year we made a special effort to enter and be a part of  the Gore Harvest Festival, run by The GORE GARDEN CLUB.  Children from a range of classes made different things and entered them into this event!  There was baking, tin-can creations, egg-carton creations, art, colouring-in, etc.  We really made an impact on our community because the organisers of the event shouted the staff morning tea to thank us for the effort that was put in.  Many students won prizes!  Thank you Gore Garden Club, you are an incredible asset to our community and we will be entering in this event again NEXT YEAR!

ENVIRO-STARS

To be an effective Enviro-School means that you to follow a set of principles and guidelines.  These cover a range of core learning and values and they are...

Maori Perspectives
Respect for Diversity
Sustainable communities
Learning for sustainability
Empowered/engaged students

It is important that staff and students understand what these are and how to deliver suitable programmes in their own place, to empower people and participation.  (The 4 P's).

At the beginning of the year the staff got together and changed the set of principles to suit Gore Main School.  Our motto is 'REACH FOR THE STARS' so we thought it would make sense to link the principles with our motto, rather than having a huge range of things to follow and think about.

Here is what we devised...

ENVIRO-STARS - We are learning about these and are enjoying seeing how the things we do link so effectively into these principles!

Enviro- Council 2017

Congratulations to the following people who are on the Enviro-Council for 2017...

Talia Moody
Claudia Mardon
Alex Mardon
Georgia Cockburn
Maia Peterson
Hunter Wornall
Stella Munroe
Anouk Collins
Jai Pearce
Charlee Hope
Lily Beattie
Mikayla Taylor
Millie McFadzien
George McFadzien
Addison Grant
Skylar Baillie
Devlin Grant
Isla Wilson
Summer Karan


To choose the council for 2017 we invited all children at Gore Main School to make a poster about why they thought they should be in the ENVIRO-COUNCIL.  We had over 50 applicants so it was very difficult to select the council.  We reassured everybody that Gore Main School is part of our ENVIRO-SCHOOL and that the ENVIRO-COUNCIL role was more administration, rather than fun activities all of the time!  It is so great to see so many children want to be part of the Enviro-Schools programme!

GREEN GOLD KAUPAPA

Here is the GREEN/GOLD kaupapa!  This is what we have to achieve in order to be a GREEN/GOLD ENVIRO-SCHOOL!  Do you think we are on the right track?

Recently this was re-written by the children in the Enviro-Council so that it is easier to understand!  Here is the new re-written version of the Green/Gold Kaupapa.  Well done Gore Main School students, it is great to have your thoughts and input about what has to be done in order to achieve Green/Gold!

Aiming for GREEN GOLD

Gore Main School is aiming to be a GREEN GOLD ENVIRO-SCHOOL by 2018!  We have been working really hard around the school and community to make sure we are showing sustainability, treasuring our ground/community, being actively involved and respecting every one and thing for their difference and diversity.  These are core principles (kaupapa) for Enviro-Schools.  Here are some photos of us demonstrating some of the things we think are important as being an ENVIRO-SCHOOL!

History of Enviro-Schools at Gore Main School

Recently we had a look back through past Enviro-Group initiatives and realised that there has been a lot of work done around the school and community over the past few years!  We hope you are enjoying the compilation of the photos and slides we have!