OKE Productive Garden Area
Our Journey with OKE
We are always on the lookout for ways we can enhance learning and opportunities for our ākonga. Term 1 2024 we were very excited to have the productive garden area between our new building and the top playground being developed by an organisation called OKE. A big thank you to Monika (one of our Learning Assistants) who found this opportunity and who will be a big part of making sure we fully utilise this area. There are so many opportunities for learning which we can get from this area!
If you or someone in your whānau is interested in getting involved please let our office know. (636 6256, office@onehungaprimary.school.nz, or come in and see us)
We are especially interested in anyone who can help us learn about Maramataka and planting by the moon or traditional Māori crops.
We went from this...
To this!
To this!
Click in here to see the movie and all the images.
Many of you will have already seen the new raised gardens, garden shed and tunnel house in our productive garden area. The installation of these and the planting of a number of fruit trees was made possible by ‘OKE’. Oke brings together sponsorship for materials and volunteer workers from local and national businesses and organisations. All we had to do was make lunch for them. You can see a picture of sandwich making below.
We had a small group or OPS ākonga, volunteers and the Oke team installing everything.
We are looking forward to involving a lot more of our ākonga and have big plans for using this area to grow fruit and veges to cook in our Cook and Create spaces.
A huge thank you to…
Miranda and the team from Hello Fresh
Amanda from Simplicity and our Oke Board
Karen from 10x10 Philanthropy
Lance, Laurence and Arsenio from Kalmar
Tania and Sifa at Bunnings Mt Roskill
If you or an organisation you are involved with are interested in sponsoring Oke - you can find out how on their website.
Use the arrows on the left and right to click through the photos
11 June 2024
July 2024
Our gardens are now producing food we can harvest and cook.
Monika worked with a group of ākonga to collect vegetables from the gardens and lemons from the tree. They made vege stir fry and lemonade and it tasted great!
August 2024
We are learning about the letter ‘L’ and made lemonade - Kiwi Kohunga
September 2024
Our productive garden is thriving thanks to the mahi of Monika and her team of children.
It's great to see children getting involved in break times and learning about growing plants and food.
We have had the addition of flowering plants in one part of the garden. Many of these were being dug up at a local park and were rescued for us.
Our learning communities have been using vegetables harvested. Some of our children and trying new vegetables for the first time.
Lettuce sandwiches. For some ākonga it was the first time trying this!
September - So Much Lettuce!
Many of our classes have been trying lettuce sandwich combinations
5 September OKE Visitors
We felt very proud and fortunate to be able to share our gardens and school with visitors from other schools. A special acknowledgement to Monika who hosted this group and for her amazing mahi in our productive gardens.
Kiwi Paki gave back to our garden by making some signs so we know what we are harvesting.
“We need a sign for carrots because you only see the leaves at the top and don’t know what is underneath”.
“We are giving back to the garden and saying thank you to Monika”.
24 September
Our Learning Communities have been enjoying harvesting from our gardens, cooking and trying new things. Ākonga in Piwakawaka made bread cases with spinach filling this week.
