Water Safety with Whaea Rhonda

Whaea Rhonda came to visit our class today to talk to us about water safety. She shared some ways that we could stay safe when we are swimming or boating. 

When you are going out boating for the day you need to remember safety gear; life jackets, a form of communication in a plastic bag and a flare. You have to make sure your life jacket fits properly and you are wearing it on the boat EVERYTIME you are in the water. Your captain also needs to tell someone you are going out on the boat and what time you will be home. 

If your boat capsizes it important to form a 'huddle'. Whaea Rhonda talked to us about  why we form a 'huddle'. We form a huddle to keep together, to keep us warm and to make it easier for Search and Rescue to find us. The 'Huddle' helps us to stay together in the water if we fall off the boat. 

We also talked about swimming at the beach. Our class was very knowledgeble about how to keep ourselves safe at the beach. The student's knew how to spot a rip; a calm spot on a surf beach. If its green, it's mean. If in doubt, stay out! Never swim alone, always swim with an adult or at least someone who is older than 18! 

We are already looking forward to our water safety session in the pool with Whaea Rhonda next week!

Beach Education Day - Ahipara - with Te Tinana and Te Putake

We had a fantastic day at Ahipara to learn about beach safety from the team at Surf Life Saving New Zealand. The education team taught us how to keep ourselves and our whanau safe at the beach. We were able to look around the Surf Life Saving Club and find out about the equipment that they use when they are on patrol. Then the best part was when we went down to the beach and did some fun activities in the water. Thank you to the Surf Life Saving team and all our whanau who came to support our learning on the day. Click on this link to look at more photos from the day (more photos will be added next week!)

Swimming Fun!

The student's have been fantastic during our swimming sessions each week. They are excellent at managing themselves to remember their gear each day.

The students are confident doing a range of floats on their front and back including; starfish, mushroom and jellyfish floats. They have been working on their freestyle and have just started learning backstroke.

Our writing this week has been all about our swimming sessions with a focus on what happens when they put their caps on and when they first get into the pool. The writing has been very entertaining!