Education Outside the Classroom - Trips and Visits

Waitakere Library & Millhouse visit 

On Friday the 14th of March, our class along with rooms 22 & 25 walked down to Waitakere Library in Henderson.  We talked to 2 historians while we were there.  We were very lucky to be able to look at and learn alot more about The Treaty of Waitangi, Te Tiriti O Waitangi. We discovered that there were 9 copies of the Treaty and that only one of these was actually signed at Waitangi on February 6th 1840. We learnt that the translation between Maori and English was very different and one copy of the Treaty was actually typed up (not hand written).  The signatures were very interesting and reminded us of koru patterns, waves in the sea, nature and planets.  The historian, who had put together this exhibition, said that alot of the signatures represented the Ta Moko, that chiefs had on their face. 

   This is Joshua Potae.  His dad showed him his great, great, great grandfather's signature on the Treaty behind him. We were all amazed that we have a direct descendant of an East Coast Chief, in our class.  Thank you Josh's dad for sharing this with us.  

We talked to another library historian, who let us look through old Western Leader Newspapers.  We all had to find the newspaper closest to our date of birth.  We were stunned at how cheap food was back then!  You could buy a block of cheese for about $5!  Some of us found an article about Western Heights School and it was on the front cover.  

Our last pitstop was The Millhouse.  We learnt alot about the brickworks in West Auckland, Kauri gum, and driving dams.  The coolest thing we saw here, was a model of an actual Kauri driving dam.  We got to see how fast and powerful the water would have been, to drive the Kauri logs down stream towards the sea.  

Many thanks to the volunteer ladies who educated us about the history of Henderson.  

Here are some photos of from this trip.  

Thank you to all the parents who walked down to Henderson with us.  We know that you are all very busy and we appreciate all the help you gave us on the day. (Especially crossing Great North Road)