fbpx
13 August, 2018 Academic

Hey, it’s Genius Hour

Genius Hour is an approach to learning that encourages students to explore different passions, interests, expand on background knowledge and ignite creativity in the classroom.

Year 4 students have been working on their Genius Hour projects throughout the year; slowly but surely building on their chosen topics through passion-based inquiry, personally designed learning experiences and navigating unfiltered content.

Below are a couple of student projects, sourced and produced with the purpose of making a difference in the world.

 

Food waste

By Darcey and Sienna

 

Hey, it’s Genius Hour

Each year, 4 million tonnes of food ends up in landfill; enough to fill 8,400 Olympic-sized swimming pools in Australia. 35% of the average household bin is filled with food waste. Almost half of all fruit and vegetables produced are wasted, which equals to 3.7 trillion apples. 8% of all greenhouse gases are also caused by food waste. If you put all the food waste together, it would feed 870 million hungry people.

The bottom line is, there is enough food to feed everyone.

Oz Harvest is Australia’s leading food rescue mission. It delivers food directly to more than 1000 charities supporting people in need across Australia. Oz Harvest collects 100 tonnes of food each week from over 3000 food distributors including supermarkets, hotels, airports, wholesalers, farmers, shopping centres, delis, cafes and restaurants.

How can we make a difference at home?

  • Don’t buy food if you’re not going to eat it
  • Don’t overserve food when cooking
  • Eat leftovers
  • Store food in the right places
  • Look at the expiry dates
  • Keep track of what you throw away

How can we make a difference at school?

  • Students can form a rubbish collecting group
  • Leftover food at Dolly’s Cafe can be purchased by St Michael’s parents
  • More compost bins for the Kitchen Garden
  • Competition between classrooms to see who can produce the least amount of waste

 

Preventing global warming

By Samuel

My Genius Hour is all about global warming — I want to stop it. The most reliable way is to reduce, reuse and recycle.

Reduce your need to buy new products or use less, resulting in a smaller amount of waste. Reuse bottles, plastic containers and other items bought at the grocery store. Reusing water bottles, yogurt cups, bread ties and other items is being conscious of what is already out there.

Recycling unwanted paper, bottles etc. is a great earth saving tip. If possible, upcycle tables, furniture and other outdated items to keep landfills clean.

One of the ways the School can help is using wood chip. Wood chip is chipped wood like tam bark but dried with 1% moistness. It’s more efficient than oil or fuel because trees can be regrown so it saves fossil fuels.