Students donate te reo card game to charity
In celebration of Te Wiki o te reo Māori, a group of Taranaki high school students donated several of their Māori language card games to a children’s charity.
New Plymouth Girls’ High School students Meg MacDonell, Brooke Hoskins and Natasha Gouldbury created Ora Cards, a game which aims to increase the use of te reo Māori, and last week donated 30 packs to Gabby’s Starlit Hope.
The charity was started by Gabby Devine, who died of Ewing’s sarcoma at age 13, and gives presents to children in hospital.
Sarah Devine, Gabby’s mum, said the card games would be added to the Boredom Boxes – a box full of activities – handed out to young hospital patients.
‘‘Gabby was in hospital a lot and through that time she realised hospital is so boring, and she would have loved to have got one of these so that’s kind of our inspiration. Now we can stick another activity in, and it’s great because they can play it with their families, so it’s a good quality time game.’’
More than 7000 Boredom Boxes had been donated to hospital emergency departments, surgical outpatients, day surgery, children’s wards and radiology departments around the country.
Sarah Devine said donations like the Ora Cards helped Starlit Hope continue Gabby’s legacy.
‘‘It’s always more special when younger kids do things for us because it’s like Gabby is inspiring young kids to do good stuff and give back.
‘‘They are more than just a play toy too, they distract kids from the treatment, being in a foreign environment, and it creates a great relationship between the nurses giving them out to the kids.’’
Meg, Ora Cards chief executive, said the group, who started the business at part of the Young Enterprise Scheme, had donated packs to schools in Taranaki last year but wanted to give to a charity this year.
‘‘We wanted to change our angle and give back to the local community a bit more.’’
The group chose Starlit Hope because of the work the charity already does in the community, and wanted to help out while celebrating Te Wiki o te reo Māori.
‘‘We wanted to focus a lot on maori language week this week and get it out into the community,’’ Meg said. ‘‘We thought back to when we were in primary school and how we learnt te reo off the whiteboard and a pen and paper, so we wanted to make an interactive resource.’’