“Do your little bit of good where you are; it's those little bits of good put together  that overwhelm the world.”

Following the death of Desmond Tutu, we discussed one of his quotes in Collective Worship. This quote reminds us that if we can all do our little bit towards improving our environment, when we work together, there will be a powerful impact.
 

The Seven Steps to Eco-Schools Green Flag Success

Following our successful application for our Green Flag Award with merit on 2021, we will continue to improve our awareness of local environmental issues. As a Eco-Committee, we will select a number of projects for the year including creating Hedgehog  Highways in the local community.

Our first step is for the children to form a committee to guide the school and children through an action plan.

We are looking for children who care deeply about environmental issues and want to take steps to improve our planet. We will be following the seven steps to gain the Eco-Schools Green Flag. Follow this link to find out more about the seven steps to success.

Eco Committee members are selected at the start of each academic year. We ask the pupils to write a letter to Mr Sim outlining why they believe they would be a successful representative for their class. 

We are looking for someone with the following qualities:

• Enthusiastic about environmental issues
• Willing to lead by example and support projects in school
• Confident to encourage others to change their behaviours in school

Responsibilities - You will:

• represent your class at committee meetings
• encourage your class to become more environmentally friendly
• help organise events in and around school
• keep your class informed of the Eco Club Action Plan
• need to be a role model for other around school

In your letter, you could :

• Explain why you are interested in the environment
• Describe activities you have carried out in school or at home to improve the environment
• Suggest how you will encourage other children to get involved
• Explain how we can further reduce waste going to landfill
• Suggest ideas on how we could improve our school grounds 

Litter Picking in the Local Community

With the support of the school PTA, we have purchased 12 litter pickers. Each week, on a Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, children can borrow a litter pucker and bag and collect litter on the way home and on their way to school in the morning. The litter is collected by members of the Eco Committee at the school gate. 
this has been extremely well supported by children and parents and is having a positive impact on improving the local environment. Very well to those who have already taken part.

School Meadow

You may have noticed some children in school have been digging up the turf around where the bike pods are currently located. Our School Eco Committee are exploring how we can increase the biodiversity of our school grounds. The children decided that we could create a grass meadow on our site and add some trees. We have planted 30 trees from the Woodland Trust and sowed the seeds of a plant called Yellow Rattle as well as wild flower seeds. The seeds will germinate after a cold winter and over the coming years we look forward watching this area to develop in future years, We are very grateful to the parents and pupils from the Eco Committee who were able to work on this during and after and school and are particularly grateful to Alex Clark for her support and guidance.

Year 6 Meet Alex Chalk to Discuss Environmental Issues
Four pupils from Year Six were invited to attend a conference with Alex Chalk to discuss issues around COP 26 as well as more local issues. All four pupils were invited to ask a question which raised issues such as the need for more clean energy for charging cars, location of charging points, funding to improve schools to reduce the CO2, reduce costs for public transport and the introduction of no idling zones in the local area.

Our four pupils spoke with confidence and clarity and Alex Chalk’s responses clarified the issues around funding as well as the responsibilities of the local council.