Woolenwick Infants School, Stevenage
A school in Stevenage has developed its school grounds into a Community nature trail. Christina Anderson, teaching assistant co-ordinator at Woolenwick Infant and Nursery School, started a Wildlife Explorers Club after finding out about our Wildlife Action Award scheme. Christina, an RSPB member for several years, discovered the scheme whilst searching our website. She sent off for the Wildlife Action Award booklet, looked at the activities and thought they would be perfect for an after school club. That was back in 2006, and so far 74 children have gone through the scheme achieving bronze, silver and gold awards. The scheme has proved popular with staff, children and parents, Christina explains. 'The scheme is fantastic. All the activities in the booklet get the children outside and using the school grounds. This complements the schools child-friendly, first-hand experiences curriculum perfectly. The scheme also lends itself naturally to the three school terms. 'We've completed a range of activities including designing and making minibeast and hedgehog homes, making bird food and growing flowers.' Transforming an underused and stale site Christina and the Wildlife Explorers have been instrumental in persuading the school to develop their school grounds, which were underused and stale but had some interesting features – the last remaining elm tree in Stevenage stands in the grounds. The Wildlife Explorers were the first to inject some life into the grounds. Putting up bird feeders, putting water out for wildlife and planting a meadow was just the start. The school has gone on to create a Nature Trail which includes a meadow, bird hide, pond, bog garden and a habitats trail. An igloo created from Lemonade bottles – containing messages for wildlife - sits on the ground for children to enjoy. Living willow structures and an outdoor theatre have also been introduced.
With the expert help of Stevenage Borough Council tree officer, who walked the trail and identified all of the trees, labels have been made for them all by routing or chiselling out the tree names and leaf shapes into slices of tree trunks. The trail includes numbered trail posts and will soon have accompanying trail activity sheets (tree trail, Early Years trail, maths trail, habitats trail, senses trail etc). The trail was opend in July 2008 by the Mayor of Stevenage, and is now a BBC Breathing Place. The school has also become a BBC Breathing Places School. A trail for everyone A team of volunteers, both staff and parents, have helped throughout the process, working tirelessly to get the Community Nature Trial up and running. The trail is not just for the pupils at Woolenwick. The wider community, including groups such as scouts, churches, holiday clubs (including children from different schools), have all benefited. Lauren Tight, Year 2 teacher at Woolenwick, added: 'The Wildlife Action Awards have been brilliant for the Wildlife Explorers and provided them with many opportunities. They love learning about plants and wildlife and get so much out of exploring the school grounds. We recently held an outdoor learning week and were able to introduce some of the activities from the scheme to all the children at Woolenwick. 'Without the help of the Wildlife Action Awards, the school would not have developed its grounds and nature trail, nor fed into the children's interest in science activities and added to the programme of out of school activities. 'The scheme has made the children more aware of their environment, and of environmental issues, as well as giving them confidence to talk about what they have learnt to others. It has definitely benefitted all our pupils.' |
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