The Growing Minds Hub

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Growing strong minds, connected hearts, thriving futures

Individualised educational psychology support
One-day school program
Supporting children, families and schools

As part of our SPCA and animal focus, the other week our GMA kids took a pile of donations down to the SPCA, rags and be...
21/09/2026

As part of our SPCA and animal focus, the other week our GMA kids took a pile of donations down to the SPCA, rags and bedding for the animals themselves, toys they'd made for the cats, plus other goods for the Op Shop.

Kids don't really believe they can make a difference just from being told so, they get there by watching it happen because of something they did, and dropping the donations off in person gave them exactly that. It's another piece of proof for them that they're someone who follows through and helps, not just someone who's told to.

Of course, the kids were most excited to meet the animals themselves, especially the five kittens who turned up just as we were leaving.

So the other week a few of our kids didn't want to go to pottery. Genuinely nervous about it, worried they'd be no good ...
04/09/2026

So the other week a few of our kids didn't want to go to pottery. Genuinely nervous about it, worried they'd be no good or get it wrong. They went along anyway, had a go, and two of them loved it so much they've since asked to join the pottery club.

Around the same time, one of our older kids came fourth out of four at a gymnastics competition. A few days later she came and told the group about it herself, said she'd had that same kind of thought afterward telling her the day was ruined, so she caught it and swapped in something kinder instead. Turned her whole day around.

We talk to the kids a lot about noticing when a thought isn't helping them, and it's worth trying at home too. If your kid's dragging their feet about something new, you can just name it, no big deal, something like "sounds like part of you isn't sure about this one." If something's gone wrong, ask them what they're telling themselves, and whether it's actually true or just loud. Then let them work out their own way through it, that's usually when it sticks.

As part of our ongoing SPCA learning series, the kids have spent the last while finding out about animal welfare, and th...
30/08/2026

As part of our ongoing SPCA learning series, the kids have spent the last while finding out about animal welfare, and the other week they took that out of the webinar and into the Redwoods. The clean-up was framed around what they'd learned, particularly how small pieces of litter can end up harming native birds, and they collected bottles, cans, lighters, wrappers, and a fair amount of tiny plastic fragments along the way.

One child looked at the pile they'd gathered and said, "You think it's just one piece of rubbish, but look at what one little piece dropped turns into."

The team's keen to make clean-ups a regular thing, and it's a good reminder of how far a bit of curiosity can travel once these kids get their hands on something real to do with it.

16/08/2026

Last week at The Growing Minds Academy we had a full day of it, starting with our second webinar with Christy from the SPCA New Zealand, where we learned about the five key areas of animal care and got answers to the questions the kids had sent through beforehand.

Then it was two and a half hours at The Arts Village, shaping, squashing, and starting again whenever a design didn't hold, which turned out to be a proper workout for patience and resilience. The kids stuck with it right through to finished bird feeders, now waiting to dry, be fired, and glazed, and we can't wait to see them!

After lunch we rounded things out with a look at healthy and unhealthy friendships, using a continuum game to get the kids thinking through different scenarios and where they'd sit. Thanks to Sharion for her time, skill, and patience in teaching them how it's done.

A lot of us worry we're not doing enough "proper" learning at home, and then can't work out where they'd even fit it in....
12/08/2026

A lot of us worry we're not doing enough "proper" learning at home, and then can't work out where they'd even fit it in. Between school, extracurriculars, dinner, and just getting everyone through the day, there's rarely a spare hour for worksheets and sitting at a table.

But I Spy in the car, car cricket on the drive to training, Bananagrams on the weekend, your kid discussing with you about why the tower fell down. It's all going in. And honestly, a question does just as much as any game. "How do you reckon they built that?" in the two minutes you've got is plenty.

You're probably already doing more than you think.

Read the full post on our blog: https://www.growingmindshub.co.nz/blog/post/166763/youre-already-doing-it/

At Growing Minds Academy, the activities are always in service of something bigger, the lifelong skills we're actually h...
09/08/2026

At Growing Minds Academy, the activities are always in service of something bigger, the lifelong skills we're actually here to build: connection, confidence, curiosity, creativity, self-regulation, motivation, empathy, and resilience. The different way of learning is just how we get children practising them in real situations.

It's been a full few weeks with that in mind. We settled back into term, picked empathy as our new focus, and had the children draw somebody else's shoe as a way of thinking about things from someone else's side. Since then there's been a chat about what makes a good friend, and an SPCA webinar that turned into a proper deep dive on what makes an animal warm or cold blooded, plus one unforgettable question from the group: do chickens have tongues? There was also a Bird Beak Challenge that chopsticks and sesame seeds made surprisingly tricky, and a day out at Lake Ōkāreka with Landcare, birdwatching from the hide and getting to see a predator trap in action.

A massive thank you to Landcare Okareka and the SPCA New Zealand for giving their time and knowledge to the children over these past few weeks, and to Waiariki FC for sharing their clubrooms with us.

PS. Yes, chickens do have tongues, small and pointed, and they use them to help move food around.

Meet Anita, who's supporting Abby with our tamariki at the Growing Minds Academy this term. She's a Rotorua local with 1...
27/07/2026

Meet Anita, who's supporting Abby with our tamariki at the Growing Minds Academy this term.

She's a Rotorua local with 14 years of primary teaching experience in Wellington and here in our own community, and she's good at helping kids build confidence and figure out what they're capable of. She's got a Bachelor of Science, a Postgraduate Diploma in Primary Teaching, and a Postgraduate Certificate in Digital and Collaborative Learning.

Nicole's on maternity leave but still involved behind the scenes with the educational psychology side of things. While she's away, Anita will be with Abby on Thursdays, helping lead the kids in their learning.

There's a lot of research now on what happens when kids learn in smaller, more flexible environments, and it's stuff we ...
07/07/2026

There's a lot of research now on what happens when kids learn in smaller, more flexible environments, and it's stuff we keep coming back to at Growing Minds Hub. Basically, when a learning environment feels safe, kids stop spending their energy on self-protection and start spending it on actually learning, so anxiety settles down and behaviour that looked like a problem often sorts itself out once the underlying stuff changes.

The bit that sticks with us most is that alternative learning doesn't pull kids away from mainstream school, it actually tends to draw them back toward it, because kids who get real, hands-on learning develop a stronger sense of why school matters in the first place, and that sticks with them long after. We've written up the full thing on the blog, linked here: https://www.growingmindshub.co.nz/blog/post/162412/skills-for-life/

27/06/2026

We asked the GMA kids one question at the end of two terms together: "What do you like about Growing Minds Academy?" Not one of them mentioned tests or grades. They talked about friends, fun, their teachers, and how it felt to be there, in their own words, and we managed to weave learning into all of those moments, whether it was the Zorb trip to explore forces, the supermarket to talk about cost per gram (and bus timetables), or learning how to look after a bike properly alongside the history of wheels.

What came through is a consistent feeling. Every child described the same place in their own way, and the picture that emerged was of somewhere they genuinely wanted to be. The pilot for Growing Minds Academy might be done, but we are so excited to continue after such a rewarding two terms, and none of it would have been possible without the generous support of our sponsors who believed in what we were building from the very beginning.

This week we went to the supermarket and challenged the GMA kids to find the best value for money across the aisles. We'...
18/06/2026

This week we went to the supermarket and challenged the GMA kids to find the best value for money across the aisles. We'd spent time beforehand learning that barcodes are actually a kind of language, just lines instead of letters, and that the same logic that organises a library organises a supermarket too. Then we got into the aisles and challenged them to find the best value for money, which sounds straightforward until you're standing in front of a shelf realising the lowest price doesn't always mean the best deal. A huge thanks to the generous checkout operator for letting every single kid have a turn at the till.

We've also been adding a new tool to the thinking skills we've been building over the last few weeks: instead of labelling thoughts as good or bad, we ask whether they're helpful or unhelpful right now. Try it on something low stake first, maybe they're nervous about a sports game or frustrated with homework, and just ask "is that thought actually helping you right now?"

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