Enrich them all Big or Small - Whole School Mucks in at Zoo

Enrich them all Big or Small - Whole School Mucks in at Zoo

Loburn School students will kick-start their year by participating in rabbit poo ‘rake ups’, weeding kiwi aviaries and generally mucking in at Orana Wildlife Park. The whole school, comprising 170 students, will visit the Zoo tomorrow as part of a new ‘Living and Giving’ school and community focus.

Zoo School Educator, Carole Fursdon, says: “the students will participate in all manner of helpful and fun activities. Tasks include making animal enrichment items such as fish and fruit ice blocks for otters, cabbage parcels for siamang gibbons and pinecone treats for kea and monkeys. Other activities will be doing a Park-wide litter lift, cleaning poo from the Farmyard animal paddocks, weeding animal exhibits and creating sand dunes in the cheetah habitat.”

We have designed a programme to demonstrate the value of making a contribution to the community or a community group. Our Zoo School teachers will facilitate each session and as students carry out the tasks, the educators will explain how they are benefitting the Park and animals.

Loburn School Teacher, Rebecca Milburn, adds: “We came up with the slogan Living and Giving as our focus for the year. For Term 1 our topic encompasses an animal focus as well as giving back to society in general. Last year we raised $500 for Orana Wildlife Park and we have purchased a huge amount of gardening equipment to donate to them on our visit. These items will then be available to any other groups who want to muck in and help out too! We see this as our chance to support a well-loved Christchurch attraction, that was hit hard by the earthquakes. The whole school is buzzing about our trip to Orana!"

“Orana’s Zoo School is a custom designed learning programme which encompasses any subject or topic area from the New Zealand Curriculum and utilises our unique and wonderful outdoor learning environment. As a Learning Experiences Outside the Classroom (LEOTC) provider, our programme is fully supported by the Ministry of Education. We are very excited to start our teaching year with a committed group focusing on making a difference” concludes Carole.

About Orana Wildlife Park
Orana Wildlife Park is NZ’s only open range zoo and is home to over 400 animals from more than 70 different species. The Park is owned and operated by Orana Wildlife Trust, a registered charitable trust, which also runs Natureland Zoo in Nelson. The Trust also owned Southern Encounter Aquarium & Kiwi House (Cathedral Square) until February 2011 when it was closed indefinitely after a devastating 6.3 magnitude earthquake that struck Christchurch. The Trust is committed to the conservation of wildlife diversity on this planet. Our aims, along with being dedicated to the conservation of endangered species and the welfare of our animals, are to provide education, recreation and enjoyment to the public and to support research relating to endangered animals. The Trust is a member of the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums (WAZA), the Zoo and Aquarium Association Australasia (ZAA) and ZAA NZ.

ENDS

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