St Michael's CE VC Primary School

Term 4 St. Michael's Big Spring Clean 

Green Team members have surveyed the waste in the classrooms and playground and found that we could do better with separating our food, paper and card, plastic and landfill waste.  We have created new waste stations, made posters to re-label the bins on the playground and will encourage everyone in assemblies to separate and waste and use the bins correctly. We hope to reduce the amount of waste in the landfill bins and to increase the amount of waste that we compost.

Please put food and fruit waste in the bucket at the compost station so that Green Team can add it to the compost bin.

Please put clean plastic bottles and cartons into the plastic bin.  Foil, tins and glass can be recycled in the children's kitchen and staffroom. 

Please put paper and card in the classroom "sort it bins". 

In term 2, we are aiming to encourage all pupils, parents and staff

to increase their number of journeys to school using active travel. 

Sustrans supported a poster competition to promote active travel with the winning class, Class 6.3, producing the most posters and winning an active travel breakfast with Dr. Bike!  The pupils who produced the posters chosen as "best poster" from each year received a bag of bike accessories from Sustrans.

We had a fantastic response with over 400 poster entries from across the whole school.  Please see some of the brilliant entries below.

As part of sustainability week, we welcomed Alistair Jones, from Sustrans, to our assembly.  We learned about the benefits of active travel and how to stay safe when walking and biking in the darker winter months.   The documents and links to resources below support biking, scooting and local travel.   

Active Travel Video (60 seconds): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B48Yu4LCano

Scooter skills and safety: https://www.sustrans.org.uk/our-blog/get-active/2019/everyday-walking-andcycling/learn-how-to-ride-a-scooter

Living Streets: The UK Charity for everyday walking https://www.livingstreets.org.uk/

Cycling for Beginners: https://www.sustrans.org.uk/our-blog/get-active/2020/everyday-walking-and-cycling/cycling-for-beginners/ 

Cycle Safety checks: A video-guide to undertaking a cycle safety M check. www.sustrans.org.uk/our-blog/get-active/2019/everyday-walking-and-cycling/the-m-check-for-your-bike-in-11-steps/

Free 1:1 Adult Cycle Training: FREE One-to-one cycle lessons for all adults who live or work in South Glos https://www.southglos.gov.uk/transport-and-streets/transport/road-safety-transport/road-safety/cycle-safety/what-is-bikeability/

Sustrans Get Active Blog:  Lots of guidance and support on the Sustrans blog https://www.sustrans.org.uk/our-blog/get-active/

How to correctly fit a bike helmet: https://www.sustrans.org.uk/media/7781/btsw-resources_helmetcheck_eng.pdf

Bikeability  Bikeability level 1, 2 and 3 courses are provided free to school children: https://bikeability.org.uk/

Better By Bike  An internet resource for cycling in the West of England

Regional Cycle Maps: https://betterbybike.info/maps-and-guides/regional-cycle-maps/

Cycling Clubs: https://betterbybike.info/community-support/local-cycling-clubs/

Local Bike Shops: https://betterbybike.info/shops-and-repair/bike-shops/

Travel West: Journey Planner, routes and travel updates for Bristol https://journeyplanner.travelwest.info/directions

IMMOBOLISE The UK National Property Register. FREE to register your bike details on this national database https://www.immobilise.com/help/registerbike

British Cycling: Lots of cycling resources and information. www.britishcycling.org.uk/

Cycling UK https://www.cyclinguk.org/

Well done to everyone for joining in with Sustainability Week at the start of Term 2. 

Each year group learned about a different environment or threat to an environment and created some art to highlight the people, animals and environments under threat.  We are celebrating the Earth with our display...."Our precious Earth: Environments Worth Saving". 

We also learned about renewable energy and created and tested wind-powered boats and cars and built different types of wind-turbine - all built by re-using house-hold waste.  Photos coming soon...

As part of our "Covid-Recovery Curriculum", we have been learning about how to live Sustainability with local trips,

Zoom speakers, and in our lessons and in clubs.  

 Year 5 compared the number of species of tree per area in Mead Park (our local environment) with the density of species in the Amazon Rainforest. 

Year 6 pupils all took part in an orienteering competition in our local environment at 40 Acres.  They used their navigation skills and worked on their fitness.  

Scientists have talked to us via zoom including  to Year 3, Dr. James France, Polar Explorer, and to Year 4 Dr. Christina Manning, Vulcanologist.  Year 6 had talks about climate change and adaptation with Professor Dani Schmidt and Professor Katerina Michaelides.

We thought about our Eco-code and what we felt is most important to looking after the planet. 

Our Sustainability Curriculum 

We want children to be very aware of the environment in which they live, but also of their responsibility towards the wider environment. This includes developing their understanding of local and global issues – and also helping them know how they can make a difference.  "Learning and Understanding are the first steps to action"...https://worldslargestlesson.globalgoals.org/resource/call-to-learning/

Intent

We aim to combat climate change now and develop pupils’ cultural capital to continue to do so in the future.  Get inspired now with“The World’s Largest Lesson, 1 and 3”  Videos

We aim to teach the key concepts of sustainability, embedded in our curriculum.  Pupils practise associated skills through enrichment and whole-school and extra-curricular activities.

We use six UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) as a framework for teaching and learning of sustainability.  

https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/sustainable-development-goals/

Implementation

Teaching and learning for sustainability is focused on six of the SDG: 1) Use sustainable travel; 2) Reduce waste including plastic pollution; 3) Use sustainable energy and reduce greenhouse gas emissions; 4) Protect the natural environment - reduce water waste; 5) Protect the natural environment – in local and remote environments;  6) Support sustainable food production; healthy lives and eating. 

The SDG for health and well-being - develop resilience - is the focus of separate policy for Growth Mindset and Challenge https://www.stmichaelssg.co.uk/our-learning/more-able-gifted-and-talented

For each of these SDG, teaching and learning of sustainability is implemented in 3 ways.

1. Embedded in curriculum subjects (photos below)
2. Curriculum Enrichment e.g. theme weeks and trips 
3. Extra-Curricular Activities.  In a "normal year" Year 6 take on role of Sustainability Leaders; each class has sustainability leaders/ Green Team leaders.

THIS school year 2020-2021, it is particularly important that everyone in school takes responsibility as part of Green Team  https://www.stmichaelssg.co.uk/our-learning/our-curriculum/environment/green-team

Sustainability Curriculum Overview 

Across our curriculum, children are taught and learn “key concepts” of sustainability so that they understand the evidence and scientific knowledge needed to make informed decisions.  This links to our curriculum vision to understand the past: to understand how the world works based on previous experience and evidence.

Enrichment and Extra-curricular:  Everyone is on Green Team. 

Pupils have opportunities to apply knowledge of key concepts and to develop key skills in the present, to make decisions and to take actions.  Pupils develop cultural capital for the future: they know they can, and do, make a positive impact within our school and local environment, thus contributing to national and global goals for sustainability. 

Green Team  are leading actions towards our second Eco-schools Green Flag Award using our 5-point action plan and by following our Eco-Code.