MAUNGATAPU PRIMARY SCHOOL'S COASTAL DISCOVERY 2012

We all had an amazing time. Thank you to Van and Ranger Mark. Thank you also to the parents who came along for the day.   HERE ARE SOME STUDENT REFLECTIONS I never knew Maori people lived in a Pa on Mauao. I was really interested in seeing the hole that was once a house. It was interesting to find out that the Little Blue penguin nests on Mauao. I would like to build some houses for them. I never knew so many creatures lived in the rock pools. If you stand really still and ait, you see lots of little sea life moving around. I learnt about the special pathway between the rocks that has calm waters and the first Maori tied their waka there so it was safe. The best thing about the day was seeing all the different traps used to catch predators on Mauao. I would like to be able to help them get more. I liked learning about what type of volcano Mauao was and how the lava squired out like toothpaste. I never knew it was a volcano. It was such an awesome day. I learnt so much. Having predator free islands around Tauranga is very cool and seeing the place where one of the first waka got shelter was really cool. I never knew about the Petrels and the Little Blue Penguins. It would be cool to raise money to help make shelters and buy traps for the stoats.

Otumoetai Intermediate's shared writing

Last week we worked with Room 2 from Otumoetai Intermediate. They sent us this fantastic letter they created as part of a shared writing idea they had in class.

Tauriko School- Dune restoration

Love your parks

Hi my name is Peter and I work at Department of Conservation in Tauranga,

Discovery Days are one of my favourite things about schools in Tauranga. It is great to see students and teachers learning about our beautiful native wildlife and landscapes.

I wanted to tell you about Conservation Week which is happening in September. The theme is "Love your parks":

This year is the 60th anniversary of the National Parks Act which was a law passed by the New Zealand Parliament. The law was to create reserves for New Zealanders to enjoy their natural and cultural history and heritage for free, and to protect those areas from being used or developed the wrong way.

Tauranga has lots of parks and reserves. My favourite is Yatton Park in Merivale, but I also like McLaren Falls Park and also the Kaimai Mamaku Forest Park in the Kaimais.

Which is your favourite park and why do you like it?

We have two national parks near us in Tauranga. One is the Tongariro National Park which has volcanic eruptions happening right now. The other is Te Urewera National Park which is the home of the Tuhoe people and has a beatiful lake called Waikaremoana, which you can walk around (it takes five days)!

We are organising a planting event at Athenree near Waihi Beach to celebrate Conservation Week. Let me know if you want to get involved.

You can register your own Conservation Week event at: www.conservationweek.org.nz

Greetings from room 16 at Maungatapu Primary School. We are very excited as in term 4, we will be going on the Coastal Discovery Day.

Last year we had an amazing time at Mclaren Falls on the Forestry Discovery Day. It had been raining really heavily and there was lots of mud and water around. We explored the bush, listened to bird calls, looked at trapping, cleared trapping lines, identified trees and types of seeds and planted seedlings. We even helped build a new bike track!

Van and Mike came to our class after our visit and talked about what we saw, the things we were doing in our class and showed us maps of our local areas to understand how to read the different geographical features using a key. It was really valuable to have them come in and share this time with us and allow us all to celebrate our learning.

As part of our Scientific Report Writing focus for the term, and our visit to the forest, we decided we would like to create the native creatures we were writing about. One of our dads brought in a special machine that cuts sheets of polystyrene and we cut and and painted life like replicas of our creature. We then made a label, like you would see in a museum displaying our creatures scientific name, habitat, threats etc. One of our groups made a life size replica of the extinct Haast Eagle! We showed Van and Mike these and felt very proud of our selves!

  

Room 3s trap fundraiser

Rom three did a fundraiser to buy a rat/stoat trap. They got the money by helping around the house and they had a shared lunch and a crazy hair day. The trap that they got was an A4 smashing trap.  They kill 24 rats/stoats before resetting.

Room 2

Room 2 also went to the rock pools and had a hunt for the starfish, crabs  and the fish in the eco-system. Everyone wanted to catch the camoflage crab but only two groups managed to catch them.  The most common catch was shrimps but the hardest was tiger fish.

Our place and our Mauao adventure.

In term 1 we were learning about our place.   We had an adventure around Mauao.  We went to the rock pools and saw the eco-system.   Then we went up to the bush and saw the traps that are used for catching stoats, rats and possums.  When we got back we were so inspired that we made our own projects about the eco-system that we saw on the trip.

ROOM 2'S TURTLE

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Discovery day

Whaka school had a great day at the Mount.
Rock pools was great.  Early burglar alarm was a smashing idea.

Traps were interesting.Maybe we will get to do something about that.

Hi everyone


Welcome to our Learning Through Discovery blog!  We'd love to see some of your Discovery Day photos and hear about some of the work you do afterwards.


Check out this photo of me with the Giant bush dragonfly on my head. It came to visit us during a Forest Discovery last week. The Giant bush dragonfly is New Zealand's largest dragonfly. They can eat up to 20 flies in an hour, and sometimes catch large cicadas too. Unfortunately rats eat them so they are not as common as they used to be. Have you seen one before?


Van

Test Post

This is a test post on the Learning Through Discovery Blog

Welcome!

This is a new tool for us to trial this year, so we are looking forward to seeing examples of the great work your school is doing as a follow up to your Learning through Discovery Days. If you have any issues with using the blog please give me a call or send me an email so I can help.

Happy blogging!

Michelle
Sustainability Advisor, Tauranga City Council
07 577 7363 or michelle.elborn@tauranga.govt.nz