Nature Smart
2014 The Nature Smart team has 23 dedicated members who are advocates and protectors of Planet Earth. Scroll down to see photos of what we have been up to recently. Our main goals for 2014 are:
|
|
Goal 1: Reducing Rubbish in Our School and Community We are working hard to prevent rubbish from ending up in our precious ocean or the landfill by:
Plastic Sand Did you know that our sand at Sumner Beach is full of plastic? (See picture). These little balls of plastic are called Mermaid Tears. We are going to investigate how they washed up on our beach and what we can do to stop it and keep our beach beautiful! |
|
Did You Know Series: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle
Click on the arrows to watch our Reduce, Reuse, Recycle presentation. How many questions did you get right?
Starship School Phone Swap
Every old mobile that is recycled helps to prevent hazardous, toxic substances from entering our precious environment. This is why we are involved in the Starship School Phone Swap as well as helping a good cause! This is how it works.
So please help us to help the environment and support Starship by bringing in any old cell-phones. Click here to go to the Starship website. |
|
Goal 2: Promoting the Efficient Use of Energy Throughout Our School
We are investigating ways in which we can save energy and promote energy efficiency at Sumner. Solar Panels We are learning all about generating electricity from renewable sources, in particular, solar power. This involves participating in a programme developed by Genesis Energy called Schoolgen. Through this we will look at how we can use energy more efficiently in our school. The Schoolgen website gives us lots of data on the solar panels in our school as well as lots of information on solar power. There are three other schools in the South Island that also have Solar Panels installed by Genesis Energy. The schools are Banks Ave, Middleton Grange Primary and a wee school in Tekapo. Power of 10 This year we introduced the Power of 10 Challenge. The idea was to encourage each classroom to turn off their lights for 10 minutes each day. However this has become very competitive and many classrooms have been turning their lights off for more than 10 minutes! Some classes have been switching their lights off for the whole day! We can't wait to see if this has made a difference to our energy bill! The amount of power saved by a class goes towards winning the Green Choice Award. |
How much electricity are our Solar Panels generating?
|
Did You Know Series: Saving Energy
We created a Did You Know Series on saving energy and we show this at school assemblies. Click play to watch. How many questions did you get right?
We created a Did You Know Series on saving energy and we show this at school assemblies. Click play to watch. How many questions did you get right?
The Green Choice Award
The Green Choice Award is a Nature Smart initiative to promote recycling and energy efficiency throughout the school.
Nature Smart members complete classroom checks to ensure that:
- only flat paper is being placed in the recycling bins.
- only pencil shavings and tissues are being placed in the classroom rubbish bins
- the classroom is doing its best to conserve energy.
Winning classrooms are announced at each assembly. At the end of each term the overall winning classrooms are awarded a mufti-day and at the end of the year, the Green Choice Award, made by the Nature Smart team on the 3D printer.
Click on the graphs below to see which classrooms are winning.
Goal 3: Learning about Endangered Animals
Canterbury's White-Flippered Penguin The White-flippered penguin is one of the smallest and most endangered penguins in the world. It is endemic to Canterbury, New Zealand, breeding only on Banks Peninsula and Motunau Island. We are going to work closely with Lincoln University to find out how we can help this little penguin. Click on the picture to find out more about the White-Flippered Penguin. |
Goal 4: Raising Awareness of World Wide Environmental Events
Recent Photos