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Meeting the chicks
This month our tamariki (children) have had a huge interest in exploring the natural world. On this occasion one of our wonderful whānau took the time to bring in their chicks Dixie, Karen and Hilary for us to meet. The nursery tamariki were absolutely fascinated and quickly sat down to see what was peeping from inside the cage. There was the opportunity to hold and pet the wee chicks and the nursery tamariki certainly expressed their enjoyment as we saw big grins and enthusiastic “chick” expressed.
We followed up this visit with the story “My chicken dances” before saying farewell to our new feathery friends. The tamariki were able to shared their existing knowledge with one another as some have pet chickens at home. This experience links to Ako, one of the Māori principles of Tikanga. It recognizes the importance of pair and group experiences in which tamariki learn to interact with those around them and learn from one another. The children also showed that they are very quick to copy one another, as soon as one started “peep” like the chicks and dance around like the chickens from our story.