Te Waka Ako Syndicate Treaty 2020

Te Waka Ako have been inquiring into the Te Tiriti o te Waitangi  (The Treaty of Waitangi) since we started back at school. This began with looking at the history of New Zealand, how it first became Zelandia after it split from Gondwanaland. Then we looked at the animals and plant life that remained on Zealandia and how it became almost predator free as it became New Zealand. We learned all about how it was thought the first Māori (indigenous polynesians) arrived in New Zealand and the impact that had on the plant and birdlife, as there was an abundance of flightless birds for them to hunt. We then looked at the arrival of the first Europeans and the impact that had on not only the plant and birdlife, but also the Māori people who had settled for around 500 years in this paradise. We looked into why a treaty was needed and how it was formed and then signed. We asked lots of questions: Was it fair? Was it honoured? Was it translated correctly?
We then looked into why a treaty is important and what sort of rights and responsibilities we students and teachers have in Te Waka Ako. We then brainstormed these, classified them under common headings and then narrowed them down into ten of the ones we determined to be the most important.

Once we had our ten rules for our treaty we decided to present it in a different format to last year (a scroll). We thought a quill would look nice with everyone signing the inkpot and adding their fingerprint. 

We asked all of the teachers and students teachers in Te Waka Ako to sign. We even asked Mrs Peterson and (the Fabulous ) Julie! Here is our finished treaty.

Any parents that would like to sign our treaty are most welcome! 

Our Treaty says........

A LINK to the DOC 

2020 Has BEGUN

Welcome Back to the Te Waka Ako Blog. The first few weeks are always a very intense time of the year in the Senior Syndicate of Waikowhai School. Students have many opportunities and responsibilities that they need to be trained up for and organised around. This builds student independence, community service and confidence as senior students. Many activities can be added to the school programme because of this student involvement.

We also all need to get to know each other so as a school the staff and students complete Getting To Know You Forms. The students forms are written in class and will be printed for a wall display. Later they will be blogging these on their individual blogs. The teachers forms in Te Waka Ako are included below. This is our second year working together and we feel we work very cohesively. We certainly enjoy working together and look forward to another year designing programmes that hold activities and learning that sparks the imaginations of all students. 

As the school has a pool we can have swimming lessons twice a week and lunchtime free swims twice a week. In this hot weather we love the opportunity to cool off.
Last year the school was gifted some bikes, so students have been able to ride the driveway and courts during break times.

Zone Sports training of Rippa, Softball and Football have all started up this term as well. All in all there are lots of physical activity opportunities for students to involve themselves in. They can also train for Jump Jam, Librarian duty, Backtrack duty, Leadership and House Captain roles, Peer Mediation, Environmental Group, Gardening Group, Sports Monitors, AV System monitors, Wet Day monitors and Bell ringing. As you can imagine, some students can have very busy school lives!


Over 90 of our students also participated in the Summer Learning Journey over the break. Three of our girls completed every task set and commented on many other students blogs across New Zealand.  All the students received certificates and the three winners received awesome prize packs. Congratulations to Pao, Maddison and Izumi.  

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 TEACHERS Getting to Know You Forms  

          

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