Positive Accomplishment and Health!

When we talk about Positive Education and Flourishing we are talking about scientifically proven strategies for "feeling good and doing good".  The flourish model is a framework we look at to help balance what we do.  These last few weeks we have been engaged in many experiences that have helped us to strive towards goals and have also been grounded in fitness and health. We know that these are just small parts of the whole picture of not only our wellbeing but also our academic successes. 

Cross Country and Swimming have been in the spotlight in the last few weeks as some focus on Positive Health and Positive Accomplishment. We know to be fully flourishing we strive to have some of each domain represented on a regular basis.

Positive Accomplishment: The development of individual potential through striving for and achieving meaningful outcomes--involves the capacity to work towards goals despite setbacks.

Positive Health: Optimal and sustainable physical and psychological health.

Leading up to our x-country we have been practising our running every day, choosing our own challenges of laps around the school. We have been working on trying to push ourselves while also pacing ourselves. We also have been needing to practise perseverance because at times we wanted to give up. On the day we all gave it a go, achieved some of our goals and had fun!

In swimming each week we are not only practising healthy habits, but also we are working towards and achieving small goals.  

For some of us, it is getting comfortable in the water, while others we are working on swimming underwater, bubble breathing, streamline arms and much more! 

A rocket takes flight

Last week we had a big push to finish our rocket. We had parent helpers leading the painting of the rocket and clever engineers crafting all sorts of parts to bring our rocket to life. So much creativity was on show as new ideas were brought to life by the talented hands of the Autahi astronauts.
We persevered even when some tasks seemed too much and in the end our rocket started to come together.
This week at assembly we will share a short video showing lots of learning along the way. In the meantime check out these pictures and see into our building process.


We crafted parts for our control centre.


We made a clock to go inside the rocket.


We made dials and panels to put inside the control centre.


We are hot glueing the buttons onto the control panels.


We painted the rocket to protect us when we are in space.

Perseverance

This week we have had a focus on the strength of perseverance. Sometimes we try things that are a bit tricky and it can be easy to write something off as too hard. By practising things we help to grow our brain and get a little better every time we attempt it. To show this in Autahi we put out lots of perseverance challenges for us to try and keep trying all week.
We celebrated giving things a go and challenging ourselves to keep going even when it seemed too hard. The feeling of joy when you finally get something is what it is all about and reminds us of how hard we worked to get there.

Check us out as we attempted some challenges...

Balancing can be tricky especially on a wobble board. We practised perseverance by trying and learning each time we wobbled off. Some of us mastered the board with two feet and challenged ourselves a bit further by trying one foot.


We did a bit of sorting. Only we couldn't use our hands and had to use tweezers instead. It was challenging trying to pick things up, especially the glass beads. The learners in Autahi persevered though and found lots of different ways to meet this challenge.




Building a card tower is pretty tricky. It takes lots of creativity and perseverance to even build the first part. We have been having lots of fun trying different ideas and even when it falls down we just pick it back up and start again.




Skipping is another of our perseverance challenges. We are having lots of fun trying to work out the best way to skip.

There are so many other ways we can practise perseverance. Have a go at home and see what you can come up with and share your ideas with us.

Matariki Celebrations: Weaving Stars with Shona and Nic

Today we worked in whanau groups and worked with different people across the school. We worked with different teachers too at different times of the day.

Nic and Shona Activities

We brainstormed the names of the stars and what each star is kaitiaki of. We were blown away by what the students already knew about the different stars.

We sang the Matariki song: 

Nga Tamariki O Matariki

Waitī, Waitā, Waipunarangi,

Tupu-ā-nuku, Tupu-ā-rangi, Ururangi e

Koinei ngā tamariki o Matariki

(These are the children of Matariki)

Ngā whetū e pīataata i te rangi e

(The bright stars that shine in the sky)

Ngā whetū e pīataata i te rangi e

(The bright stars that shine in the sky)

We worked with buddies to weave stars. We used wool and paper plates. We knew it would be tricky so we discussed what Character Strengths we could use to overcome these challenges. Some of the ideas were judgement, perspective, kindness, bravery, perseverance and zest.

We watched the beautiful story of the Seven Stars of Matariki read by the author, Toni Rolleston-Cummins:

Whanau Day: Nic and Shona's Group

Last Friday was Positive Education Whanau day. We were in groups with others from Autahi, Tautoru, Matariki and Mahutonga. It was fun to work with our brothers and sisters and to make new friends.

Each Whanau group had five character strengths to unpack. Ours were Judgement, Perseverance, Social Intelligence, Honesty and Love.

 

We talked about Judgement which is thinking things through and examining them from all sides, without jumping to conclusions and then we played "Would You Rather?" It was fun!

We talked about Perseverance and how we work hard to finish things that we start. We shared ideas of times we have persevered- Cross Country running, swimming, writing, maths, etc.

We discussed Love, and then we helped each other to weave a heart and create a mobile which is hanging in Tautoru.

We talked about Social Intelligence. It is when you are aware of the motives and feelings of other people. You know what to do to fit in to different social situations, and you know what to do to put others at ease. We read the story, Knuffle Bunny Three and discussed how the girl in the story used her character strength of Social Intelligence. 

Lastly, we discussed the character strength of Honesty. We played a fun game called "two truths and a lie."

Teaming up with John and the seniors to learn about Tane

It was really nice to get to have our snack with John and his base group this week.  John told us the story of Tane and the baskets of knowledge and the struggle Tane went through to get to the baskets.  Learning can be a struggle, but it's well worth it and one thing we have been learning in Autahi is: 

We might not be able to do it (whatever it may be) yet, but we won't give up and we will keep trying!