Case Studies

Project

Why did you decide to undertake this project and what aims did you have starting out?

More than a year ago we noticed the ground was littered with red elastic bands – long before it became a ‘newsworthy’ item. We had previously run a campaign/competition "Ways to reuse rubbish" and discovered that many items of ‘rubbish’ could be used again – for example cutting up the legs of old thick school tights made great stand-by hair bands, or cutting up old marigold rubber gloves made elastic bands! We wondered how we could use these red elastic bands again, then decided that there were so many all over the place that the best thing would be to return them to the postman who had dropped them. We ran a competition for the class who could come up with the most and in no time at all recovered more than 4500 bands.

Then we invited the manager of our local Sorting Office to come and collect them – but before we gave them back we asked each class from Nursery to year 6 to come up with some questions about the Sorting Office Eco procedures. Questions ranged from having plants in the classroom, to how they recycled the uniforms, to bikes, heating and turning off lights and computers. When the brave Manager arrived at our Assembly he was faced with about 20 questioners of all ages and he answered all their questions well – thanking them for their help in making the Post Office aware of some shortfalls, and confirming that they really do try to do their best to be Eco.

Action

How was the project delivered and was it integrated into the curriculum?

We run an Eco Club every Tuesday lunch time and the plot was hatched there. It just grew with Eco Monitors taking the challenge into each classroom following an assembly to introduce it. Eco Monitors collected the bands and they were counted by the club members at lunch time meetings. The older girls ran the counting sessions, with the tiniest members counting the bands into 10’s, older ones collecting the 10’s into 100’s and then writing up the 100’s on a whiteboard using a tally chart until we called a halt at 4500+ bands.

Each class was asked to put forward questions for the Manager. The Eco Co-ordinator sorted these questions to make sure there was no doubling up, then the girls asked their own questions in assembly. Thus, the Manager was faced with children from 5 years old to 10 years old asking their own questions.

Challenges

Did you have to overcome any challenges to make the project succeed?

Not really, this challenge was fun for all ages, but we are lucky to have a very supportive and active Eco Group which includes children and adults, so it was taken on with gusto! However, making a phone call to the Manager, introducing the idea and making the arrangements is very challenging to even the most confident child. So many people (not just children) are not confident to dial a number and speak to a stranger, explaining as clearly as possible why they are calling so it is a real skill to learn.

Pupil Leadership

How did you get the children involved? How did they have ownership?

At Leaden Hall it is easy to get the children involved - they love challenges and competitions! We have our weekly lunchtime club meetings which are open to all (Monitors are elected but Club Members are open to anyone who feels like the current ‘happening’ is for them. It might be that we are gardening, stripping lavender, making lavender bags or . . counting elastic bands or carrots). If the children don’t take to a project it goes no further because nothing happens.

Result

How have the children benefitted from the project and any other benefits for the school.

Well, I don’t think we have solved the elastic band litter problem but it was an excellent project on several scores. Firstly we used ‘litter’ to recycle a useful item and save the post office money. Secondly we used the project to highlight the global perspective of the Eco Schools programme – looking outside the school into the community. Thirdly in involving the Post Office we encouraged the children to consider problems beyond their normal sphere of interest and question what it might be like in another environment – uniforms and bicycles for example (how other people use transport to do their work).

Resources

Did you use any educational resources such as The Pod, receive any support from parents, staff and outside agencies? Did you have to source funding for the project?

Parents were supportive in helping the girls with their collection of bands. We had to ensure that they did the collecting out of school but safely (cleaning hands, not picking up things which were dangerous for example).

No other funding was necessary.

Lessons Learned

What advice would you give to schools that want to follow in your footsteps?

Challenges should first be fun. This was a ‘can do’ project for every age group in the school with the little people being closest to the ground! If the children are not inspired from the outset move on and find another project. Everything we have done in our Eco Schools programme has been to positively improve a situation rather than worry about the detrimental effects of not doing it.

Next steps

Has this project driven other Eco-Schools ideas and what is the school working on next?

Yes, that was just the beginning. Our Any Questions has continued with a brave Consultant from the NHS in Southampton facing another panel of around 40 questioners at an assembly last term. The challenge was to think of different questions about waste in the NHS (uniforms, needles, plaster casts and so on), so encouraging the children to think outside their normal environment. Even nursery children have experience of doctors so it was another ‘can do’ project for all age groups. Dr Davies brought along items for the girls to look at and explained why some just had to be thrown away for safety sake.

Our next ‘lamb to the slaughter’ is a firefighter on the emergency response crew who has just returned from Haiti. We will be collecting questions from the classes in the next weeks and he will be in front of the panel shortly. Following that we are looking for a public transport manager, someone from the Army/services and maybe more if the enthusiasm is still going strong.

Another project we are working on is our "Carbon Free International Airshow". This will involve the airlines and links with our Comenius partners in Poland, Sardinia, Cyprus and France.

Posted 26th March 2010