Woodlands class loving their place – 27 August 2019
The Woodlands School Kakapo class arrived at the Southland Community Nursery ready to learn and excited to be seeing another place where restoration has occurred. We spent some time in the education centre sharing what we do at the Southland Community Nursery (our place) and the school students telling us about their Outdoor Learning Area (their place) – what it has, what it’s like, what the plans are. Our bush walk around the pond saw us noticing different NZ native plants, and experiencing first hand an area that has been restored from a paddock to a forest. We talked about the different species of NZ native plants that have been used at the nursery for the restoration and how many of the species planted have attracted birds to the area. By providing habitat we can create ecosystems. Exploring how a forest works – the different layers of a forest, colonising/nursery species and mature tree canopy species was a lot of fun with the school students becoming trees and acting out the growing of a forest story! Over lunch the paddock and lizard homes were explored and lots of thinking questions asked. We focused on the kind of conditions different plants like and how this has to be considered when carrying out restoration planting. We then planted out finding a higher area to dig after all the rain. The need for pest weed and pest animal protection was noted and with Woodlands looking at starting a pest control programme it was great to hear that Dave from ES is speaking to them later this week. A busy day was finished with some expert potting up of some manuka seedlings. It is great to hear that this class is immersed in learning in their place – doing mathematics, writing and everything in their Outdoor Learning Area. Awesome!
Lots of links we could make…..
Restoring your patch https://www.southlandcommunitynursery.org.nz/restoring-your-patch/
Attracting birds https://www.southlandcommunitynursery.org.nz/restoring-your-patch/planning-your-project/attracting-birds/
Creating a school garden https://www.southlandcommunitynursery.org.nz/restoring-your-patch/planning-your-project/creating-a-school-garden/
How a forest works https://www.southlandcommunitynursery.org.nz/how-forests-work/
Posted: 2 September 2019