Tui - A Beautiful Gift

A couple of weeks ago on a Monday, we received a call from Emma our administration superstar!  To say that she had found a Tui, sadly this Tui had passed away.  Initially I was hesitant to say bring it in, as the Tui I find are such majestic beautiful birds and I love watching them in my own back yard enjoying the kowhai flowers and on the Nature Programme flying, soaring and at this time of year very active and territorial. 

Though after talking with the rest of the team, it was agreed that this would be a great learning opportunity for our tamariki and ourselves to be able to have a close up and real view of this beautiful bird.

"In Culture - Tui is a natural heritage animal - in Māori culture, the bird is associated with life fulfilment, confidence and spiritual harmony.  They are said to be messengers of the Gods and Goddesses.  They acted as a medium to communicate with the gods and goddesses in Māori beliefs"(https://www.nznature.net/) 

For those of you who have never been to Mairtown Kindergarten, manu in particular the Tui is very special to us for many reasons.  First it is on our Mairtown logo, it is displayed in many ways around our kindergarten, through art work that is hung on our walls, when a tamaiti leaves it is given in the form of a glazed tui as a gift, it is even on our kindergarten gates made out of wrought iron.  

We also have a special 'Tui Award' for our tamariki -  recognise tamariki who consistently demonstrate attributes of the kaupapa we are learning about and acknowledging at kindergarten. In early childhood there are many different ways to uphold the kaupapa of Tika; doing the right thing, Pono; being honest and truthful and Aroha; showing love and caring: all of which strengthen the leadership and learning potential of tamariki.

"Supporting children in their growing awareness and interest in animals can lead to deeper feelings of empathy in young children, more positive classroom relationships, and social-emotional development". (Selly, 2014)

Emma, brought the Tui into kindergarten and shared her story of how she found the Tui with the tamariki.  

"Vygotsky’s theoretical perspective that an environmental playground provides a rich authentic context for children to learn from hands on active exploration of their environment. Combining children’s natural curiosity with animals provides a powerful pedagogical tool building children’s self-concepts, science skills, providing opportunities for children to develop sensory, physical, emotional, intellectual and social skills. Using animals as pedagogical tools within the early childhood context enables children access to unique opportunities to explore life processes and develop working theories that other pedagogical approaches simply do not offer." (Burr, 2016)

The Tui, was in perfect condition it just looked like it was sleeping.  All the tamariki were fascinated, as were we, with seeing this beautiful manu so close.  This started the conversation of "What do you think happened to the Tui"?

"I think his wings got wet and it made him not be able to fly and he fell down and got hit by a car" - Rada

"Tui hurt its neck, hurt arm and nose" - Kehlani

"Well I think someone accidently drived over it" - Riley

"Maybe a Myna bird was fighting the Tui and it killed it?" -Fisher

"Oh, no, it dead.  It fall out of the tree.  It fall off branch.  It will get better, ohhh" - T

"He just got away from his friend because he got on the road and he dies.  He's going to go back to his house.  He just died and died and that's not good.  He didn't want to die" - Indie

"I think he bumped into a tree because tree's make things die.  If you bump into them" - Nikau

" I know, it flewed on the car through the window and bumped its head on the road" - Beauden.

"Maybe a car may have run it over" - Te Ariki

 

I think he saw something and he wasn't looking where he was going so he crashed into the car" - Leina

"Well I know that Tui died.  He wanted to rest and he landed on the road instead of the tree and when he was resting on the road a car ran him over" - Hazel

"The bird donged it's head hard and that made it die.  It was going to the muesli bar shop" - Maxwell

Feelings of empathy were also shared

"I just love him.  Can we keep him? He has tickly white feathers.  He banged his head.  There is blood" - Lucas v.E

"Maz, do you love this bird? I love this bird, maybe we could have one of these birds, we don't have this bird" Te Ariki

"Studies show that around 2 years of age, children start to show genuine empathy, understanding how other people feel even when they don't feel the same way themselves. And not only do they feel another person's pain, but they actually try to soothe it." (Aberton, 2005)

Over the next few days, kaiako brought the tui out to show the tamariki that had developed an interest.  It was interesting how the conversations changed and the tamariki were starting to observe small and different things about the tui. 

"Look at it's tail. That is long tail so it can fly.  He has white on him" - Leo.

"This is it's bell? This white thing, does it go biring a ding?" - Leina

"Do you know how they flap? They go up and down" - Leina

"It has a long beak, but don't touch the end, it's sharp" - Indi

"That's because he put's it in the flowers get the nectar" - Beauden

"I see the spiky stripy feathers around it's head" - Hazel

During this time tamariki also started to draw the tui, developing and supporting their further knowledge and understandings.

Elijah's observation's while drawing - "tuft - I didn't notice, I need to do that.  He has a big head.  He has a big body and a long tail at the back. His claws look like thorns.  He has curly stripy white lines by his head and look he has these white feathers here".

"Through observation, a child can reflect on what they consider aesthetically pleasing and these reflections will hopefully positively influence their own artistic journey through inspiration. In supporting their developing aesthetic appreciation and openness to new ideas, toddlers and young children benefit from this for when they begin to recognise what art is aesthetically pleasing to them, they will discuss their thoughts while also critically reflect upon their observations, using this art to inform their current and future work (MoE, 2004; Duh, 2016; Plows, 2014)." Jenson, 2018

Mā te huruhuru, ka rere to manu

Adorn the bird with feathers so it can fly.

Ngā mihi nui

Sarah

Jacaranda trees!

The beautiful Jacaranda tree in our bark area is an important part of our lived environment. It supports one of our favourite resources, the monkey bars, provides valuable shade and shelters visiting birds. It also offers us resources in the form of beautiful fallen flowers and mature seed pods, which our tamariki love to open up to find the featherlight seeds resting inside.

When we returned to kindergarten after the summer break, we discovered a surprise waiting for us beneath the tree. That quiet period of time had given Papatūānuku and Tane Mahuta time to work their magic, and we found that lots of te seeds that tamariki have enjoyed blowing to ngā hau e whā had found their way into the soil beneath the bark, and with a rest from the trampling of busy feet, lots of tiny Jacaranda trees had begun to grow!

It was so exciting to see the life cycle of the Jacaranda happening naturally within our own environment, but we needed to talk about what we could do to help, as we knew that the little trees would not be able to survive and grow in our bark area!

Te Whāriki explains the importance of students developing their knowledge and understanding of people’s interactions with places and environments and how people can sustain their environment

Back on the 24^th of January, Cadence, Zoe, Aki, You You and I decided we would rescue some of the little trees and see if they would grow bigger in pots. Then if we succeeded, we could see if any of our whānau would like to grow a child of our tree in their own garden – continuing its ‘family tree’!

We found some compost beside kindergarten, and some seedling pots and trowels in the shed, and headed off to the bark area. It was a tricky job extracting whole baby trees with their roots still intact from the bark, and unfortunately there were a few casualties along the way, but all of the girls were so careful, and they persevered until they succeeded. Luckily there were lots of little trees to find, so everyone was able to successfully transplant at least 2 of the seedlings into a pot.

Then we needed to water them and find them a place in the garden were they would get rainwater in the weekends if it rained, and where they would not be knocked over! What a wonderful demonstration of Kaitiakitanga. I loved the way the tamariki all wholeheartedly engaged with this project – I had the sense that some of them already had some great knowledge about how to manage the tools and the delicate plants, and it was great to see this hands-on experience of our lived environment occurring not just as part of our Nature Programme, but also within our own kindergarten environment. It was also so cool to observe the way they supported each other with physical assistance or helpful suggestions as they worked.

Kaitiakitanga has a strong focus on rights, responsibilities, relationships, and the role of kaitiaki (guardian) over the natural environment. An important aspect of this is reciprocity between the kaitiaki and the land. The kaitiaki cares for the land ensuring its sustainability and the resource sustains the kaitiaki (Miller, n.d).

When young children learn kaitiakitanga, they learn to respect, care for, and protect people, places, and things. When they care for the natural environment, in the daily flow of centre life, they develop skills and knowledge that support them in caring for nature throughout their life (Ritchie, Duhn, Rau, & Craw, 2010). The role of kaitiaki is found within the Belonging and Exploration strands of Te Whāriki, where teachers are required to support children in their love, care, and guardianship of the land (MoE, 2017). In Aotearoa/New Zealand, there is an emerging interest in children’s experiential learning through engaging with nature in their local bush and forest. This facilitates deep learning through real time connections with nature while building on children’s dispositions of curiosity, playfulness and exploration. Place based learning, within the child’s immediate environment, also supports their sense of connection, relationship and responsiveness to the land (Vincent-Snow, 2017).

A week on, not all of the trees have survived (I think a snail may need to be talked to about that!) But we do have a number of happy healthy looking baby Jacaranda trees growing – we now watch and wait until they are big enough to make their way to new homes!

Toitu te marae a Tane, Toitu te marae a Tangaroa, Toitu te iwi

If the land is well and the sea is well, the people will thrive.

Ngā mihi mahana, 

Anne