The social health area of the Whare Tapa Whā model aligns closely to Health in the New Zealand Curriculum, in particular building relationships. This is particularly important at the start of the year. In Room 11, students started this journey by sharing stories about themselves using Art as the context.
We used a jandal template to represent walking with each other to get to know one another. Students had to use pictures to tell their peers about themselves.
Exercising, basketball and soccer and watching the sunset make me feel good. When it's sunny I can swim in my pool.
My favourite things to do are running, playing on the trampoline and lego. I drew my family and where mum and dad work too.
As the students explored what they did to help them maintain a balance, they discovered that they had many things in common with their classmates.
We both go camping sometimes.
We both like nature like sunsets and swimming.
I like swimming, playing soccer and going on our boat.
I love playing soccer and going on my boat too.
This helped students become more comfortable to interact with a wider range of their classmates. To encourage this, Room 11 did team building activities such as puzzle making and building challenges. Students were surprised at how much fun they had problem solving together with other students they would not normally work with.
To introduce the Whare Tapa Whā concept to the class, one challenge was for teams to use different materials to try to build a strong and secure home. Quickly, students realised that without a connection between walls, their houses were unstable and more often than not fell over.
Students are realising how growing connections with others can strengthen areas of their health. In Room 11, we will continue to work on strengthening all the walls of our whare.
We encourage you to work on strengthening areas of your whare too. Maybe we’ll bump into each other on our journeys.
Keywords: Strong, Whare, wellbeing, relationships, growing connections
I am from Christchurch but moved to Taupō at the end of 2018. I am passionate about travelling with my most memorable trip being to Egypt. I also love keeping fit through sport, the gym and just getting out and exploring the outdoors.
I have been a qualified teacher working in New Zealand since 2013. Prior to that, I spent 8 years in Hong Kong working with Chinese children in primary schools.
I decided to pursue a career in teaching because I loved the idea of making a difference in the world by helping children learn and develop as people. It is rewarding to see the progress children make and to be a part of their learning journeys.
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