David Gawith - Our own intrepid explorer



David Gawith - Adventurer from the 'Our Far South Voyage'

 Today we were extremely fortunate to have a visit from a true adventurer, David Gawith.

David was lucky enough to have been involved with the "Our Far South' Voyage that visited Antarctica earlier this year. He has also just returned from an expedition to the Himalayas in Nepal.

David shared videos taken on board the ship that they journeyed around Antarctica on. It was some incredible footage of their ship breaking through ice floes as they navigated their way through the frozen waters of Antarctica.

He showed us a presentation which included photos, videos and diagrams about Antarctica. The main purpose of the journey was to educate New Zealanders and to encourage students to learn about Antarctica so that we can all appreciate how important it is to New Zealand and understand why we should protect it in the future. A lot of David's photos inspired us to do exactly that, and it was exciting to see how informed and passionate Room 4 were about the history and the wildlife of Antarctica.

It was terrific to have a real life Antarctic explorer in our classroom. We were able to ask him so many questions, and the students had some truly fantastic questions to ask. They also had a lot of information to share, and it was wonderful to see them bring so much to the conversation, and to see some real depth of thought in their questions and responses. The students of Room 4 have done a LOT of learning throughout this unit!!

David was very impressed by all of the artwork and the projects that the students had completed, so it only seemed fitting that we take a group shot in front of our fabulous penguins.

The students were enthralled by David's presentation, and it was a wonderful way to cap off what has been a truly amazing unit or work. I don't think anyone will ever forget the time they studied Antarctica in Room 4.

Great work guys!!!!