Meanwhile, more than 600 claims were made by teachers over the five-year period. The number of claims was highest in 2012, at 139 claims, but the total cost of claims was highest in 2010, at $153,199.
Fractures, dislocations and soft tissue injuries were among the most common causes of claims. Maunu School principal Cleve Boor was unsure why the number of claims had increased.
"It's hard to understand that it would be increasing as playgrounds are built with rigorous safety standards nowadays," he said.
"The only reason I can think of is that there's more awareness in that when parents take their child to the doctor, and the child's had an accident, they will be able to get ACC."
The school encouraged children to be active, he said. "The last thing we want is to wrap the children in cotton wool.
"We try to minimise the risk but there is always some risk involved. We allow them to climb trees to a certain height and we allow them to bring their scooters to school and so on.
"If you're going to allow kids to ride scooters, there's going to be skinned knees. If parents had a problem with it they wouldn't allow their kids to bring scooters, but they keep coming."
As with any workplace, the odd accident by staff was inevitable, he said. "I don't think teaching is a more dangerous profession. Like anyone, teachers have a trip or fall every now and then."
Nationally, 361,450 ACC claims were made by students in the past five years. The claims cost the ACC more than $100,000,000.
The number of claims increased each year to 79,622 in 2014. The total cost of claims was higher in 2013, at $19,390,681.
The national figures for teacher claims were not readily available.
New Zealand Principals' Federation president Denise Torrey was surprised the number of claims had increased.
"Are our kids being nice and active like we want them to be, are we covering our kids in too much cotton wool or is it just that we're getting better at reporting these things?
"I certainly don't think our school grounds are becoming more dangerous but we're becoming more protective of our kids and that could be reflected in those figures."
Standards of playground safety had improved greatly, she said. "There's certainly more of a culture around protecting kids. What we might have hobbled home on and put ice on when I was a kid is now becoming something major that turns up in the doctor's office, perhaps it's that parents are more anxious or schools are more anxious."
ACC spokeswoman Stephanie Melville said the figures were not specific to school hours or terms, and could include people using school grounds for weekend sport or other activities.
More than one injury could occur in one accident, such as a broken arm and a sprained ankle, so only the primary injury was used in the data. Students included 5 to 17 year olds in primary or secondary education and teachers included primary, secondary and special-school educators.
