Lesley Inspires Us Again

Last week, Lesley Ottey worked with children around the school to help us increase our pool of knowledge on what to do with our food and paper waste at Ashley School so that we can improve our systems and make them sustainable for the future.  

In Korimako, the children learned more about how worm farms work and how to look after the worms at Ashley School.  They learned about what worms like to eat and what they don't.  They also created their very own mini worm farms to look after!

A team of keen enviro children from Korimako with the help of a parent are going to take the lead in making sure our worms are well looked after!  They will be making sure we put the right kinds of food scraps into the worm Bins.  

In Harakeke, the children enjoyed the challenge of creating paper bricks using paper from our BOB's bins and old newspaper with Lesley.  They learned how to turn this paper into something useful.... they are waiting patiently as they dry, ready to be used to help light the fire in winter!  We have a group of keen parents who are willing to help children make these more often!  

In Rakau Lesley shared with the Year 6 to 8 children how Bokashi bins can be used for food scraps.  We were keen to build up our knowledge to see if we think that this would be something that we would like to trial again at our school.   
We liked that we would be able to put all food waste in this system including meats and dairy products  and that it doesn't have a smell. 
In our class hui we had a vote and agreed that we thought it would be worth a trial in the senior school to begin with.  Carter and Caden have volunteered to set this up and monitor how it is going. We look forward to seeing some positive results! 

The Year Five children learned about how compost works.  We explored out existing compost bins and found that they are actually doing a pretty good job.  We even have some that is ready to go on our garden in spring when we are ready to plant.

We learned that making compost is a bit like making lasagne.We need to keep layering... a layer of  shredded newspaper/ cardboard , then a layer of Nitrogen rich materials ( grass clippings, weeds, coffee grounds, vegetables scraps, rotted manure, garden debris) and finally a layer of Carbon Rich Materials ( dry leaves, sawdust, corn stalks, pine needles, straw.)
We look forward to some more fantastic compost for our gardens to help them grow soon!  Sustainable Living!

Thank you Lesley for helping us build up our knowledge and understanding!