Treehouse Nursery Woodbine Place, chose to work on the Healthy Living topic by growing their own food. Staff members supporting the Eco-Committee decided on this project because they knew how important it is to teach our youngest members of society about the benefits of healthy eating and the value of self-sustainability. The project was discussed with children with a particular emphasis on explaining the benefits of growing their own food. A small garden area was then set up where children could plant and care for various fruit and vegetables. Children were involved in every step of the process, from preparing the soil to watering the plants. The project has had a massively positive influence on the children at Treehouse Nursery, as they learnt about different types of plants and how to look after them, the importance of looking after our environment, and the satisfaction of growing produce and developing healthier eating habits.

Gardening is used in Windermere Day Nursery to build confidence and self-esteem, whilst teaching their young children about the importance of a healthy lifestyle. Following discussion on their favourite foods and researching the care and resources needed for a variety of plants, the Eco-Committee at Windermere (consisting of six pre-schoolers) decided they wanted to grow: strawberries, carrots, beans, corn, courgettes, potatoes and herbs. Allowing the children to decide what they want to grow not only fits in with the pupil-led nature of the Eco-Schools programme, it also leads to increased engagement and encourages children to take additional responsibility to nurture and harvest their plants. Children have taken great pride in seeing their crops used in sensory tasting activities and as snacks or part of healthy meals. They even collect and compost any leftovers to ensure they have quality compost to keep their plants healthy!

Nursery Children at Penshurst Primary enjoy nothing more than growing their own vegetables. For their latest potato project, they began by chitting potatoes, which they then planted. Next they watched and waited for shoots to grow, before harvesting their produce. Finally, they used their potatoes to cook and eat a mashed potato feast!

Year 3 children in Lutley Primary School managed to tackle two of our topics in one project. All 90 children in y3, are given the opportunity to grow their own fruit and vegetables in their school’s sunny little allotment as part of our Healthy Living topic. They prepare the soil, sow seeds, and germinate using their polytunnel. In the process, children are also given the opportunity to tackle our Waste topic, as their fruit and vegetables are all grown using recycled materials – pumpkins seem perfectly happy starting their lives in recycled plastic food trays and old ice cream sticks from the canteen make perfect plant identifiers!

When ready, year 3 then move their produce to a new home, taking responsibility for watering, harvesting, and (the best part) sharing the delicious and healthy fruit and vegetables they have grown… everyone in Lutley is always desperate to try their produce and all agree it is a great way to make young people more positive and excited about eating more fruit and vegetables. Each year the project is rounded off in Autumn Term when y3 (now y4) complete their harvest (carrots, squash, and sweetcorn), save some seeds, pot up strawberry runners, and tidy the vegetable beds ready for children entering y3 to take over!

The Eco-Council at Dunstable Icknield Lower School wanted to introduce a meat-free day every week! Their first steps were to invite their headteacher to an Eco-Council meeting to explain the plan, the headteacher informed the Eco-Council that they would need to first ask the other children in their school for their opinion, before a decision could be made on introducing a meat-free day. Members of the Eco-Council visited every class in the school (Nursery to year 4), explaining their rationale and the environmental and health benefits of plant-based food. They then asked pupils to vote yes or no for whether they wanted to introduce Meat Free Monday. The Eco-Council found an overwhelming amount of support amongst their schoolmates and armed with their results, they arranged a meeting with their headteacher and kitchen manager. They both happily accepted the results and have now designed branding (which you can see in the image) and a new plant-based menu for every Monday, which will be introduced at the beginning of the next academic year!

The Eco-Committee and School Nutrition Action Group at Laurance Haines have been reducing food waste and encouraging healthy eating by running a ‘tuck shop’ to redistribute the fruit and vegetable snacks that Key Stage One and Early Years children don’t consume to Key Stage Two children each afternoon. This counts towards the Healthy Living and Waste Eco-Schools topics!

Pupils at Penshurst Primary School have participated in the Eco-Schools Project Mindfulness Minutes… You can find out more about the project by clicking Eco-Projects in the menu bar above.
All pupils participated ranging from nursery to year 6 and they completed a variety of simple and free activities. These included: cloud-watching; yoga; gardening; body-scanning; and mindfully walking to name a few!
The project has helped pupils and staff learn more about the importance of mindfulness, which has now become a natural part of the school day at Penshurst!

With food having now overtaken tobacco as the leading cause of early death worldwide, the Eco-Committee and Coordinator at Rickmansworth thought Healthy Living (in particular Healthy Eating) was such an important topic to tackle in their Action Plan. On top of this. the Eco-Committee also wanted to raise awareness of how diet affects not only our bodies but also the environment.

Action points included: working closely with their caterers and having them attend Committee meetings termly; whole school assemblies on Veganuary and Healthy Living (gut health); working closely with their Food Tech dept to encourage them to use products grown in the school garden, and also to cook more plant-based dishes in class.

The Committee also asked their caterers to have more meat-free options and, as a result, there is now a daily vegan offering and the Eco-Committee are hopeful that meat-free days will be introduced going forward.

Finally, the Eco-Committee followed this all up with an internal and social media 30 a week fruit and vegetable challenge. Just before submitting their Green Flag application, a questionnaire was sent out to their whole school.  42% of students who ate in the canteen had tried a vegan meal and 60% said they would like (or maybe like) more vegan choices.

Young eco-warriors at Highfield and Brookham schools in Liphook realised their ‘green dream’ by removing meat from their school menu for a day! Meat-Free Monday was the brainchild of Year 7 Eco-Committee members, who wanted to highlight potential environmental and health benefits of plant-based and vegetarian diets. They decided that, despite their school canteen offering meat-free options on a daily basis, they wanted their canteen (for the very first time) to offer only meat-free options! Working with their skilled catering team, they developed a mouth-watering vegetarian menu including: Quorn bolognese in a puttanesca sauce; halloumi fries with chipotle mayo in a sourdough pitta; tortilla chips with a bean chilli; and hummus and falafel flatbreads.
At the end of their service, contented faces, big smiles and clean plates told the Eco-Committee that their action had been a huge success!

Over the last few years Ganton has worked hard on a Healthy Living and Biodiversity project. In a specialist school Healthy Living is an obvious choice; and in this instance they teamed their Healthy Living work with bee and butterfly conservation to fantastic affect evolving the project to something so much more. Ganton now have a ‘Cycle Safari’ social enterprise that is staffed by our students and ran for profit. The project generates money by inviting school groups, mums and toddlers, community groups and other SEN charities to enjoy cycling, conservation and gardening activities. All profits are reinvested in their eco-activities. The project has been a vehicle for raising employability, self-worth and social skills. It has been a HUGE success and transformed their life-skills curriculum.