Pathways to Possibilies - A Home for the Chickens

We are excited to announce today that the school has launched a crowdfunding campaign to raise $2500 to build a chicken yard complete with chicken coop, fruit trees, herbs and other elements to create a mini food web from which children can learn.

 

For those of you who don’t know what crowd funding is, it is when lots of people give a little to make a BIG difference! Check out our page and video here www.pozible.com/ahomeforthechickens

 

So why take a crowdfunding approach? It’s something a bit different that we are keen to try out and it presents a new opportunity to enhance learning at the school by demonstrating to students how communities can work together to achieve something that benefits many people. By discussing with your children how crowdfunding works and whether your family would like to give to the project you can help teach them the power of one person’s contribution – that they can be a part of positive change. Crowdfunding also gives us an opportunity to communicate with the broader public and showcase the school.

 

‘A Home for the Chickens’ is part of our bigger Pathways to Possibilities garden project which will encompass outdoor environments built around Food Production, Adventure and Exploration, Art and Creativity, and Rest and Relaxation. All these new outdoor environments will be treated just like a regular classroom where children can learn about art, numeracy, literacy, science and sustainability. Research shows that nature-based outdoor lessons and free play better engages students who learn through practical kinesthetic activities, it improves student behaviour and attendance, and promotes connectedness and a sense of belonging.

 

Get excited about our crowdfunding campaign and have a think about how you can spread the word and invite others to contribute too. A flyer has been attached that you might like forward with this email.

Some key things to keep in mind about our campaign are:

• If we don’t reach our target of $2500 we don’t get anything at all.
• If we achieve our target we can set a stretch goal to try and achieve funds for an additional aspect of our Pathways to Possibilities project, such as a pizza oven.
• If you give a little, others will give too.
• Your contribution is made online from our campaign page (it can be anonymous). You will need to sign in to Pozible which is very easy, especially if you have a facebook account.
• Pozible will hold your details and not deduct anything from your account until we reach our target.
• All funds are collected through the Pozible Credit/Debit Card Merchant facility.
• Each gift receives a little reward from us to say thank you J but you can choose not to receive this if you prefer.
• The campaign ends 12pm Sunday 28^th September.

Guerrilla Gardeners

Following from National School Tree day the senior grades of our school were involved in making bombs......

BOMBS!!??!

Yes bombs. But not of the destructive explosive type. Quite the opposite.

The students were involved in making Seed Bombs.

On the coldest day of the year the students got down and dirty. They rolled up their sleeves and stuck their hands in the mud.

Firstly students were introduced to the idea of Guerrilla Gardeners and we talked about the process of making the seed bombs and the ingredients that are required. Then after watching a short video on the making of seed bombs the students braved the cold and wet weather (mind you we were in the undercover learning area) and got busy making their own.

The idea for making the bombs at school was to introduce the students to a sustainability activity that they could easily get involved in at home. I also wanted to ensure they had some hands on practical tasks to do to engage them further into the sustainability focus of our school. There are many studies that are done about children and the outdoors and the importance of it so the focus of the sustainability rotations will be around interaction and engagement in our environment.

At first I had many comments like "I'm not putting my hands in the mud", "It's cold" and "do we get to blow stuff up"

By the end all of the students had made several of their own seed bombs.

Once they are dry the students will find suitable places to 'throw' their bombs. Over the term they will observe and record the success of their bombs and even get to take some home to do a little bit of guerrilla gardening at home. Of course part of our discussions about our 'bombs' was the safety. Both safety of the children and of the environment. The children were informed about the dangers of using potting mix and breathing in the dust and also that we wouldn't really throw these; more toss them into suitable locations. Secondly they were also informed about the dangers to the environment. We would need to make sure we are being responsible guerrilla gardeners by not introducing any invasive weeds. So to make our school a bright and happy place our seed bombs are full of sunflower seeds. If successful we might see several heads of sunflowers popping up around our school and community.

How to make seed bombs

Materials
1 part seeds 
1 part potting mix
2 parts soil
2 parts clay
a little water

Procedure
Mix all ingredients together so they are well mixed (only add a little water to bind the materials not to make it sloppy)
Roll golf ball sized portions of mixture to form firm tight bombs
Dry out of the sun for up to 2 weeks
Toss them into a location that will not cause issues later on. (Be mindful of who they might effect and if they will be disturbed)

The bombs contain all the essentials to promote and grow happy plants all is required is the sun and rain.

I will keep you posted on their success at our school.

Next week we will be making our own seed paper just in time for fathers day.

National Schools Tree Day

School up for the challenge

Friday the 24^th of July was National Schools Tree Day and the students at Poowong Consolidated were up for the challenge of planting some trees to contribute to providing a greener school environment. All students participated in some way. Our prep students planted some new native trees in one of our garden beds and grades one and two planted some larger native trees alongside the running track.

Meanwhile the senior students participated in a National Schools Tree Day Challenge – 12 teams, 12 trees and 1 planet.

Each team was required to work together to produce a poster showing the procedure they would use to plant the tree, document the team’s activity by taking photos and then successfully planting their tree. This combined all of the skills that they have been developing in other subjects like Science and ICT. All students were very enthusiastic and by the end of the session they had all planted their tree. The challenge was developed and supported by Mr Jason Horton a classroom teacher at the school. Jason is very enthusiastic about sustainability at the school and has been a major contributor to the schools achievements in receiving the core module accreditation in the AussiVIC ResourceSmart school sustainability program. He has also been nominated for the ResourceSmart Sustainability Teacher of the Year award. The students often refer to him as Mr Sustainability.

 

 

 

 

Time To Celebrate

On the 20th of June the whole school were invited along with special guests to celebrate the achievement of gaining our first ResourceSmart accreditation star.

It was a great way of recognizing the huge achievement and hard work that has been put into the area of sustainability at our school.

Congratulations to the whole school community.

Phew... Where has the time gone?

The wind has been blowing and it is definitely feeling like winter now. It is hard to believe it is already half way through the year. Where did that time go?

Hmmm let me think...... First term was a blur getting adjusted to new routines, a new classroom and a new focus on energy, not forgetting weekly rotations, parent teacher interviews and the Recycled Art Project.

Second term..... well it was just as hectic as the first with a change in staff and a new element of my teaching capabilities ...... Art! I guess I must mention the big R word that consumed much of my time - yep, Reports. I would love to say that it was one of the other R's that we juggle around our school but importantly reporting on learning is a major part of my job.

So it's now school holidays and we are all on our well earned break and getting ready to gear up for the next half, but there is a little time for celebration........

Newsletter Goes Online

Our School Council has supported the move to reduce paper use at our school by publishing our newsletter online. This is a very big move as our school community is very reliant on this weekly communication and a change in how they get their information is something that we understand may cause some concern. However we have received a fantastic response with almost all of the school signing up for the newsletter to be emailed.


Our newsletter continues to be published on our school website at www.poowongcs.vic.edu.au‎
Feel free to view our newsletter online or request an email version from the school.


By making our newsletter we will approximately save 21 reams of paper per year (based on  a 3 double side page newsletter). That is a huge savings to the school and the environment.

Energetic Start to the Year

Static Electricity! Has it really been that long. It seems like only yesterday that I wrote about the consortium visiting our school and here we are at the end of the 3rd week back in 2014. Where did that time go?

Since then we have received some very exciting news......... but I am going to keep you in suspense over that. In the near future you will be able to share in the celebrations of our good news.

This year we are working on the AuSSIVic ResourceSmart Energy Module and hope to have that completed by the end of the year. Fortunately we are already well on our way as we had our energy audit completed at the end of last year. We are just waiting for the report to come back from the auditor so that we can start spending the Energy Grant money we received.

Our very first PD for the year was with Heidi Hamm our ResourceSmart Facilitator. Heidi will be guiding us through the Energy Module, sharing with us her wealth of knowledge in this area. On the same day we also held a parent information session. Although attendance was low the parents that did attend were very interested and also got involved in discussions about how we can increase parent involvement.

As of today one action from our PD was implement a section in the newsletter on energy saving tips. These ECO tips will be published weekly providing short and easy suggestions for making our whole community more sustainable. If you have any tips that you would like to contribute, please email me at horton.kenneth.j@edumail.vic.gov.au .