Swaffham Prior CE School in Cambridgeshire is the 1000th school to sign up to take part in the Green Day initiative. Its participation will help develop the school’s use of outdoor facilities to enhance the children’s learning.
Students and Head teacher accepting bird table as the 1000th sign-up to Green Day © Newmarket Journal
An active member of the Eco Schools initiative, the school is not new to the sustainability drive. Termly fundraisers have meant that the school can buy more environmentally-friendly equipment – for example the ‘dress as a fruit or vegetable day’ raised enough to finance a compost bin and eco pens and paper. The nature club have planted and cultivated crops in an edible garden, and a well organised system of re-using and recycling waste paper is in operation.
Taking part in Green Day has supported the school to take things a little further. By linking their activities to a target from their School Development Plan, sustainability is given a high profile. The school will be using Green Day to raise everyone’s awareness (parents, staff, children and the local community) of the many ways they can use the outdoor environment to enrich education.
Green Day itself
A carousel of activities will be on offer to pupils on Green Day itself, with visiting speakers from other organisations such as Safer Routes to School offering their expertise. The children will be taking part in an exciting maths trail encouraging them to explore their school grounds in a different way, and further activities are planned focusing on the importance of appreciating the natural world and caring for this precious resource.
The school hopes that the participation of students and staff in the Green Day activities will lead to sustained change, for example more teachers and students walking to school, and with the schools energy consumption reduced through regular monitoring and increased awareness.
It’s a big ask, but Headteacher Diane Hawkes is hopeful that Green Day will encourage “staff to take a refreshed look at eco issues” and pupils to “use the skills they have developed as part of an eco school, and put them into practice in other contexts”.
Students planting bulbs © Swaffham Prior CE School in Cambridgeshire
Why not do the same?
Green Day is a great way to encourage pupils and staff to use the school grounds to complement classroom learning. The Green Day teacher’s activity kit has loads of ideas to help support your planning. How about creating a school allotment (p24), constructing a bottle greenhouse (p34), designing a bike shed (p40) or launching a campaign to change people’s behaviour (p22)? Older pupils could think big and even design their own sustainable city (p30)!
