Surfing at Ahipara Beach

On Tuesday, our two senior classes, Te Puawai and Te Kauru, went to Ahipara beach to participate in the 'Have a go' surf day.  When we got there, we piled ourselves into 'Sup Bros' headquarters for a safety chat. The students were great and knew all the answers for keeping themselves safe in the water and in a rip.  They were also able to identify the parts of a surfboard.  Our instructors were great. They each had a 'superpower' which they shared with the students. These ranged from being able to share their 'stoke', punching sharks, lightning-fast swimming and more.

Top and bottom left: Te Kauru and Te Puawai crammed in the Surf Bro's headquarters.
Both right: Our surf instructors sharing their superpowers.

After our safety briefing, our classes were split into three groups. We rotated around three stations for the day; snacks and games at headquarters, games on the beach and surfing.

On the beach we played frisbee, bat down and the hose game. Some students were building sandcastles and others were being buried. 

Top left - Oscar, right - Gemini
Bottom left - June, right - Oscar

Top left - Frano, right - Manaia
Bottom left - Group 2, right - Tristan

A huge thank you to our lovely whanau who are always there to support our outdoor excursions. Without our parents, we would not be able to provide our students were experiences outside of the classroom. 

A shout out to our very patient, amazing surfing superheroes. They were able to help all our students get up on their boards and achieve that feeling of 'stoke'. Thank you!

Ripper Rugby

Today most of the Year 5's and Year 6's went to ripper rugby in Taipa.  The students all modelled our school values and led by example.  They had a great day, many of the teams making it through to the finals.

Beach Education Day @ Ahipara Surf Rescue

Beach Education Day @ Ahipara Surf Rescue

On Tuesday, Te Kauru Students attended Beach Educations session which is a full day surf safety course delivered at the beach by surf lifeguards. Beach Ed is age-appropriate learning for school year levels 1-8.

The day was organised into modules. Below the modules are set out into different headings.

Tour of club

The first activity was to have a tour of the club. We got to touch all of their equipment and ask lots of  questions.  We learnt about the different equipment they use for saving lives, including the use of the RB boats, jet-skis, paddle boards and rescue tubes. The lifeguards explained that quite often, paddle boards are faster to respond compared with the RB boats or the jet-skis. This is because it takes a while to prep the motorized equipment for rescues, where the paddle boards are quick and easy to get into the water.

Beach Safety

Next we learnt all about beach safety, how to identify a rip, keeping ourselves safe in the sun and they showed us their first aid kit. Each life guard needs to be able to perform first aid.

We even played a game to help us remember the 'Slip, Slop, Slap, Wrap, Slide' rules of being sunsmart.

Water Activities

The next module was by far to the most exciting. First we had to make sure that everyone was safe on the beach, but drawing a large square in the sand. Everyone had to stay in the square. We used all our parent helpers to do the same in the water. This was to ensure that everyone was visible in the water, and didn't go to deep.

In the water, the students experienced mock rescues. The students were in pairs, and had to save their friend. Students had to make sure that they clipped the flotation device around the buddy, and ensure the strap was around their own shoulder before swimming back to shore.

A HUGE thank you to Liam, Val, Emma, Ariana - our very helpful and supportive life guards.

Experiencing Marine Reserves at Whatuwhiwhi

We were so excited. Te Manga and Te Kauru were off the Whatuwhiwhi for our Experiencing Marine Reserves snorkelling session.

Te Kauru group shot while Te Manga students were snorkelling.

Fun in the water while we wait for our turn.

Beach games with Te Manga.

Te Manga preparing to go snorkelling.

One of the many fish species we had seen on our trip - Parore.  We also saw spotties, baby snapper, triplefin and a baby eagle ray.

Student Writing

Yesterday we drove on the bus with Te Manga to Whatuwhiwhi to go snorkelling. When we got there we ran out of the bus with our bags and were told to have some morning tea. After morning tea we went down to the beach to play while the other half of the class went snorkelling. When they were done it was Te Manga’s turn, so we stayed at the beach and played while we were waiting for them. At last, we could see snorkels coming closer. “Yay it's our turn,” everyone shouted. So we walked across the road and we slipped on some flippers, slapped on a wet suit and slipped on a mask and a snorkel. When we had put on all the equipment, we headed down to the beach. We crossed the road to the beach and then we dived into the water and started snorkelling.We saw bluefish, a little clear fish and some of us even saw a little jellyfish. It wasn't long until we had to start heading back. When we got to the beach we crossed the road and had a juicy.

By Isabella

On Friday, 29th of March my class Te Kauru and Te Manga went snorkelling at Perehape Bay. We went snorkelling with Isabel, it was so cool because my group got to go first out of all the groups. When we got ready I had to have flippers, a wetsuit and a mask, then we got into our wetsuit and chose our flippers, put toothpaste in our goggles and we were off ready to go to the water. SPLASH! We were in.  All of a sudden I couldn’t touch the bottom and I saw lots of seaweed. Then my buddy Manaia took a big breath and went straight down under us. Pop! up she came again, it was really funny because we all kept on bumping into each other when we came up from dolphin diving. Then all of a sudden Manaia was saying that she saw a parore, but I said you wouldn’t be able to see one here because they only live at Matai Bay.  Then l saw for myself because she showed me the parore. We carried on a little bit then I saw lots of parore. Isabelle blew her whistle once and told us to try to find a golf ball sponge, golf ball sponges look like an orangey yellow sort of sponge with little tentacle-like arms which looks quite strange!  AAAHHH!!! Something pinched me it was a floating crab but it really hurt, then the three whistle command went and then she just told us to look carefully to try to find some more different fish and some more golf ball sponges. I said I’ve seen one of the golf ball sponges it looks very strange, then we had to turn around and head back to shore. Fair enough though because my legs were aching.

By Iris 

Seniors to the Town Pools

Today our two senior classes, Te Puawai and Te Kauru, went to the town pools. This was to provide students an opportunity to experience swimming in a larger pool (since we have a small school pool), and to select the students that would be going through to Zone Swimming.

The students had their normal swimming lesson at the town pools, followed by everyone attempting to swim the whole length of the pool, and finally being able to enjoy a free swim.

And then of course the teachers had to have a race. Who would win, Mr Masters or Mrs Davan???

EMR - Experiencing Marine Reserves

Our class was fortunate enough to participate in the EMR programme this term. A qualified expert came to our classroom to teach us about the importance of Marine Reserves and the different species we would find in our local protected area - Matai Bay.

Classroom Based Session

The students worked in pairs to match the species they would encounter.

Fitting Our Snorkeling Gear

The students were then taught how to fit snorkeling gear and were given a practice snorkeling session in our school pool.

Add a small amount of toothpaste to your goggles to stop them from fogging up.

Test to see if your snorkel fits by placing it on your face and sucking in through your nose, it should then stick.

Aria's mask fits perfectly.

After rubbing toothpaste on your goggles, be sure to rinse them clean.

Pool Based Session

Ready, set, snorkel.

The students were taught to dive under the water, through the hoop, and then blow all the water out of their snorkel instead of coming back up for air.

Each group will have a body board with them for safety reasons.

We are ready, and look forward to our real snorkeling session at Matai bay towards the end of March. Yeehaw!