Primary & Intermediate Level Visits

Primary & Intermediate School Level Activities for Educational Visits

Come experience our city farm as an authentic context for immersing your learners in a dynamic natural setting that offers a safe and encouraging space for activities that challenge understanding and present opportunities for meaningful, positive learning experiences in the real world.

Primary & Intermediate School level visits are designed and delivered to complement The New Zealand Curriculum, to support your teaching programs that foster the development of confident, connected, actively involved, and lifelong learners, through inquiry- and nature-based experiences that encourage learners to ask questions, take action, and cultivate connections with the environment and each other.

Have a look below at some of the activities we can arrange for your group, to help you get your learners outside, observing & interacting in nature, investigating key concepts, and practicing essential skills — all while having a great time! Choose from one or more of these to build your session, or get in touch for a bespoke experience tailored to your outcomes.

Activities on this page:

Curating Your Session:

Have a look through these activities, then use the booking enquiry form below to tell us about your group and choose the activities you would like for your tamariki, or to let us know how we can help deliver a bespoke experience that meets your goals and learning outcomes.

If you are interested in visiting us with the same group multiple times over the course of a school term or academic year (i.e. Regular Visits), then Unit Lesson Plans can be arranged to take advantage of a schedule of recurring visits, to arrange for a sequence of sessions that build on prior learning and experience in order to deepen investment, reinforce knowledge and skills over time, and broaden the scope of achievement objectives and learning outcomes. You can indicate your interest in this option in the booking enquiry form below.

Visit the School Visits main page for more information on our program, health & safety, and charges.

Sensory Expedition

🪁 Primary & Intermediate School Level

An essential activity at Kelmarna, and one of our most popular, this guided exploration of the farm gives learners the opportunity to slow down and really focus on the world around them, to observe and connect with details and patterns in nature that often ordinarily go unnoticed.

Learners will use all five of their senses – hearing, sight, smell, touch, and taste – to engage with the natural environment through focused investigation, getting to know the farm and its operations, and developing skills and interest in exploration that can be applied in any setting.

Learners will help guide our wander, encouraged to practise creatively and effectively communicating their experience, examining the details they observe, and considering the role and interconnections of the things we encounter.

A staple of most visits, this activity is highly recommended for all ages and levels. Never the same experience twice, there is always something fascinating and fun to discover in every season. This activity can be adapted to suit any age group and most booking arrangements.

Duration: 20-60min

Level: All Ages & Levels

NZ Curriculum

English
Health & PE
Science

Join us with your group

Newspaper Plant Pots

🪁 Primary & Intermediate School Level

Take the opportunity to get crafty on the farm by learning how to upcycle old newspaper into plant pots and then get hands-on with the soil to pot up and sow a seed.

Learners will practise observing and following instructions, and applying concentration and dexterity to manipulate newspaper into a sturdy structure, then use tools to attentively convey soil into their pot. They will learn essential principles for sowing seeds at a viable depth before focusing again to carefully dimple the soil and sow a seed of their own.

Our potting soil is made on site from fundamental ingredients according to our own recipe, and this activity can be expanded to examine these components of the soil and how they work together to support our seeds and seedlings into healthy, productive plants.

A fun challenge and practical skill, this activity is recommended for getting hands-on in a controlled setting while practising propagation and resource recovery. All materials are provided, including certified organic potting soil and seeds, and learners get to take home their finished product.

Duration: 20-30min

Level: All Ages & Levels

NZ Curriculum

English
Science
Technology

Join us with your group

Creepy Crawlies & Composting

🪁 Primary & Intermediate School Level

Take advantage of the unique resources on our farm to introduce your learners to super cool creepy crawlies, and safely handle worms and larvae while learning about the benefits of their poos and wees!

Learners will have the opportunity to observe and interact with tiger worms used in vermiculture composting, and the larvae and pre-pupae of Black Soldier Flies used in composting as well as for chicken feed. Both of these beneficial organisms are fun to handle, and they play an important role in generating sustainable natural soil conditioners and whole-food sources for our chooks.

This activity can be expanded to increase the scope of interaction with the compost systems and organisms, to include exercises such as measuring temperature, weight, and volume; using byproducts like compost, castings, and liquid fertilisers in the garden; and considering more critically the impacts of these systems on our farm and in the community.

This activity is recommended to provide learners with novel experience and perspective, to gently stretch their comfort zone and frame relationships with nature as positive and constructive.

Duration: 20-45min

Level: All Ages & Levels

NZ Curriculum

English
Maths & Stats
Science
Social Sciences
Technology

Join us with your group

Trash-to-Treasure Hunt

🪁 Primary & Intermediate School Level

As a certified organic farm and with our site based on permaculture design principles, it's important to us to establish and maintain sustainable and regenerative systems that make the most of every resource.

Learners will practise taking a broader approach to identifying value, measuring durability, and determining application in this activity that is designed to challenge assumptions and highlight the significance of things beyond their most obvious context.

Learners will investigate a multitude of living examples around the farm where materials that might otherwise be considered 'trash' are repurposed and valued as taonga, or treasures. What's more, we will consider how circular systems can help reduce impacts on the environment while saving time, money, and achieving amazing results.

This activity is recommended to demonstrate upcycling techniques and inspire creative reimagination of waste as resource. It can be adapted to suit varying ages and levels, including with hands-on craft activities for certain upcycling projects.

Duration: 15-45min

Level: All Ages & Levels

NZ Curriculum

English
Science
Social Sciences
Technology

Join us with your group

Pals & Pests

🪁 Primary & Intermediate School Level

On the farm, we acknowledge that every organism has a role in supporting a healthy ecosystem. However, we also acknowledge that not all of these roles are always well suited to our goals and expectations. In the activity, we will look closely at what labels like 'pest' really mean and how our understanding can shift relative to context.

In this activity, learners will examine the variety of animals and insects that live and work on the farm, to consider their roles and how their mahi relates to our community farm. Rather than as categorically 'good' or 'bad', we will instead evaluate relationships in terms of being 'beneficial' or 'non-beneficial' to our goals of producing food and maintaining a therapeutic community space.

This activity begins with a discussion component in which learners rank organisms on a spectrum, to record their assessments and compare different organisms with regard to how well they alignment with our goals. Then, the activity can be expanded to include an investigation of certain organisms in their habitat, at work on the farm.

An exercise in critical thinking and collaborative group discussion, this activity is recommended to practise these essential skills while building a deeper understanding of and connection with the natural environment.

Duration: 15-30min

Level: Year 2+

NZ Curriculum

English
Maths & Stats
Science
Social Sciences

Join us with your group

From Flower to Fruit and Back Again

🪁 Primary & Intermediate School Level

We like to say that the animals and insects on the farm are gardeners just like us, and in fact work much longer and harder than we ever could. We acknowledge that every organism has a role, however not all of these roles are always well suited to our goals and expectations.

Learners will examine the variety of animals and insects that live and work on the farm, to consider their roles and how their mahi relates to our goals as a community farm. We will evaluate relationships in terms of being 'beneficial' and 'non-beneficial' to our efforts towards producing food and maintaining a therapeutic community space.

This activity is recommended to

Duration: 15-30min

Level: All Ages & Levels

NZ Curriculum

English
Maths & Stats
Science
Social Sciences

Join us with your group

Benefits of Biodiversity

🪁 Primary & Intermediate School Level

The Village Green is our central community space, the only area where grass is favoured over cultivating food, and where we can gather together and spend time over kōrero and kai.

You are invited to make the most of your trip to the farm by taking the time to pause and relax in the space, park up on the Green for a picnic, or simply enjoy the farm outside of a structured activity. Learners are welcome to spend morning or afternoon tea breaks, lunch, or free time on the lawn and around the gardens.

This recreational opportunity is recommended to allow learners to connect with the environment on their own terms and at their own pace. Food and drink not provided. Certain organic scraps may be collected on site, otherwise all rubbish must be taken away.

Duration: 15-45min

NZ Curriculum