Waste Audit Term 4 2024

Recently we conducted a waste audit. 

We collected all the red landfill bins from around the school and poured them into piles. 

Then we sorted the rubbish to see what should have been in the recycle bin (yellow), 

compost bin (green) or in soft plastic recycling. 

  

Things in landfill break down very slowly and produce poisonous methane gas. 

The landfills in Auckland and getting bigger and bigger every day. 

We need to try and recycle things or make them into compost instead of just burying them in the ground. 

These things should have been in the recycle bins: 

 

 

 These things should have been in the green compost bins: 

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Here are some of the things that should have been in soft plastic recycling. 

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This is some examples of things that were correctly placed into the red landfill bins: 

 

How many pens can you count? 

                              

We also checked the huge landfill bin in the car park to see what else might have been put directly in there. 

We found... 

These are just 2 of the 4 or 5 bags that were mostly full of paper towels.
We were wondering where they all came from! 

The Results! 

This data is for ALL school areas for 5 days worth of rubbish. 

* Amount that should've been composted: 1.32kg 

* Amount that should've been recycled: 1.51kg

* Amount that should've been put into soft plastic recycling:  0.41kg

* Amount that was correctly placed in the landfill bins: 3.56kg

TOTAL waste: 6.8kg for 5 days. 

Amount that was in the wrong bin: 3.24kg (48%) 

(that is NOT including all the paper towels we found afterwards) 

Positives: 

💚 This works out an average of 1.36kg a day that we are putting into the landfill bins 

- our best ever result! 

💚 We are now seeing less lunchbox wrappers in the bins compared to last time. 

💚 Some classes are now EXPERTS at recycling - Room 5/6/7/8 had only ONE recyclable 

item incorrectly placed in the landfill bin! Ka Pai! 

What Next? 

 P1. Paper Towels

Reminders to all staff & classes to put paper towels in the compost bins. 

We will also research ways to reduce the amount of paper towels we are putting into 

the landfill bin each week.

P2. Soft Plastic 

This appears to be mainly packaging from teacher resources. 

We need to come up with a plan for how we can collect this soft plastic & recycle it. 

P3. Pens 

We want to have less stationery (pens) going to landfill. 

We will research what other schools have done.

We'll make some containers for all classroom to put old broken pens (& batteries) into. 

P4. Recycling- Paper

Reminders to all staff & classes to put paper in the recycle bins. 

Visit to Wakaaranga & Sunnyhills

chicken coop at Wakaaranga school

 We are always thinking about ways to expand our enviro programmes at school so we visited two local ENVIRO GREEN GOLD schools to get some ideas.

We went to Wakaaranga Primary School first then on to Sunnyhills Primary School.

A huge thank you to the teachers and enviro students for showing us around - you were fantastic guides. 

Our TOP FIVE favourite things were ...

1) The chickens! These were such a novelty - everyone loved the idea of this! 

2) The native bush walk and bird corridor at Sunnyhills,

bird corridor

nature trail with so many native trees

3) All the amazing art work around both schools,

art made using bottle tops

drain painting (one of my favourite ideas) 

water facts 

science meets art - labelling parts of a flower

                                          

beautiful garden and images 

4) The bee hives                                          

visiting the bee hive at Wakaaranga 

5) The bird houses

Lots of beautifully painted bird houses

lizard lounge - love the idea of the lizard sculptures

It has given us lots of ideas to think about for 2025! 

It was also great to see their set up with their hot composter at Sunnyhills; something we are hoping to get next year. 

Year 6 Sea Art

Earlier in the year our wonderful librarian, Susie painted our water tank to make it look more interesting and make it stand out. 

We realised that many students didn't know what it was for or even really notice it so we thought we could make it more of an exciting piece of art. 

Susie painted  the background like the ocean so we thought we would add some sea creatures. 

The year 6 leaver students were invited to leave their mark on the school by adding a sea creature. 

They can return in years to come and see their work. 

Each of the year 6 classes will have a turn over the next few weeks, it's looking great already! 

Check here for our progress. 

Visit to Motuihe Island

As part of our prize for Moth podding, two of our students were lucky enough to visit Motuihe Island. 

 My day at Motuihe Island

On Sunday I picked up Vinny and arrived at the museum.

We went in and got our name tag, got on the boat, talked about the rules and untied the rope as we went.

It took two hours then we arrived at Motuihe Island.

The sea legs took us onto the beach.

If you're wondering what sea legs are, it is a boat with legs. 

 

We ate our lunch, packed up and walked up a hill.

We dropped our stuff off and went for a bush walk.

We had to clean our shoes. I stayed at the back of the line

and every one was up ahead of us me, My dad, Vinny,

Mark and Cate. We were shown where kiwis live.

I even saw a kiwi and a tuatara! 

The best part of the day was going on the boat.

We sat outside on the edge and I saw a penguin! 

By Addilyn 

Garden to Table Term 4

 We have had a fantastic start to the term; cooking favourite recipes - kale chips and ANZAC biscuits and trying new foods as we celebrated our Indian cultures. 

This included making a delicious curry and an Indian sweet treat, Nankhatai biscuits. 

Recipes can be found by clicking the link HERE and also on the recipe page.