Permaculture - The Māra

Permaculture Development

Our total immersion Māori whanau – Te Whanau Rumaki o Te Uru Karaka – was established in 1997. The name Te Uru Karaka (The Karaka Grove) being the pre-European name of the land on which we sit. It was significant to us to acknowledge and adopt this name given our commitment to regenerating indigenous species, language and culture of this land.

Following the establishment of this whanau within the heart of the school, Te Uru Karaka then set about developing core values, goals and philosophies for the unit. This meant the integration to teaching and learning programmes of core values of 'Kaitiakitanga' with regard to the land and the assurance that our children would learn knowledge, skills and methods to sustain the land for now and the future.

The Development Process

In early 2000, the parents and families of the children in Te Whanau Rumaki o Te Uru Karaka discussed with teachers the very real needs of children to learn basic knowledge, skills and attitudes about growing their own food and caring for their own environment.

Gardening became an integral part of science, technology, social studies, language, maths and māori curriculum studies.

The children built an entire organic composting vegetable plot rotation garden over this first year. They studied soil care, seeds and seedling care, harvesting, composting and worm farms and weather. Māori seasonal ceremonies around the Māori New Year & Kumara harvesting were and continue to be part of the annual teaching programme.

A school-wide composting collection system is now integrated and this assists with the ongoing composting and worm farm development and use in the day-to-day gardening and maintenance.

Children keep a regular dairy of their garden work to enable them to record knowledge, skills and processes. The children regularly distribute food harvested from the gardens to staff, parents and local community members.

This garden site is now maintained and worked by children in the junior school. You can see some photos of the growing and planting on our Gallery page.