From Spring 2021 we ran an Erasmus+ funded project called 'Small Steps to a Better World'.
This project focussed on raising our awareness and understanding of environmental and climate goals, in collaboration with our French partner school, Ecole du lac. We took part in activities, workshops and education with our stakeholders and the wider community.
Because of the interruption due to Covid-19, the project was extended into the academic year 2022-23. It has now run its course. On this page you can see a record of the activities that were carried out under the umbrella of the project.
Year 6 Visit to St Cyr June 2023
16th June 2023: World Ocean Day
Whole school display for World Ocean Day. Each class was given a different endangered animal and created them from recycled materials.
19th May 2023: Investigate plastic in the oceans.
Craft Club's fabulous display about this important topic is now complete!
4th May 2023 Watty à l'école.
Programme d'intervention de la Communauté de communes de Poitiers. Travail sur les transports. Comment réduire la pollution des transports ?
Work on transport. How to reduce transport pollution?
https://www.watty.fr/organisme/communaute-urbaine-du-grand-poitiers/23rd April 2023: Rags2Riches4Schools
Don't forget our collection for Rags 2 Riches 4 Schools this Tuesday. We will be collecting from 8am until 9am.
Thanks for your donations to Rags2Riches4Schools collection. 100 bags
19th April 2023: Rivers Workshop with ARK. Years 3,4 and 5.
Look at all these interesting river creatures!
Compare what happens to toilet paper and a wet wipe if you shake it in water. Never flush wet wipes - bin them.
27th March 2023: What's under your feet? All classes
Ecole du Lac visit to Wanborough March 2023
In the morning, a rain planter workshop for adults in the Wanborough community was held by ARK. They built a rain planter to collect water from the roof of the library building, to feed the plants instead of rain water running straight into the drains. In the afternoon, the French and English children planted plants in the rain planter.
21st March: Ecole du Lac and Year 6 Wanborough visit The Living Rainforest in Newbury.
During the visit, a workshop on a sustainable future.
14th & 15th March 2023: Our World, Our Future drama workshops. Years 1-6
Using drama to explore Climate Change.
10th February 2023: Sustainable and healthy travel
Florence from Platform talking about sustainable and healthy travel. She has delivered a whole school assembly and is spending the rest of the day in workshops to KS2 on how we can make travel choices in order to protect/limit damage to the environment. @platform_rail
26th January 2023
All our classes are having sessions in the Science Dome to learn about our planet, pollution and the oceans.
January 2023: Watty à l'école.
Programme d'intervention de la Communauté de communes de Poitiers.
Travail sur l'économie d'énergie. Work on saving energy.
https://www.watty.fr/organisme/communaute-urbaine-du-grand-poitiers/
https://www.watty.fr/les-minutes-economise-lenergie/
December 2022
On our first frosty morning, the local wild birds will be happy to see the fat balls made by Cookery club
December 2022: Christmas cards
Oak Class have been making Christmas crackers to send to their penpals. Also, Christmas cards and mini books about themselves.
Ecole du Lac made Christmas crackers and cards.
November-December 2022:
Travail en sciences sur la consommation d'énergie : D'où vient le carburant, d'où vient l'électricité que nous consommons ?
Science work on energy consumption: Where does the fuel come from, where does the electricity we consume come from?
World Beat 2022: 29th November 2022
Today saw the return of our international song contest. It was a fabulous morning. Details of the winning class soon, but here is the interval entertainment, staff performing Trois Petits Cochons in a Lady Gaga style!
And the winner is... Elm Class representing Colombia with "Mi Gente". Great performance with lighting effects!
26th September 2022: European Day of Languages
Thank you to all our visitors who told us about their languages.
November 2022:
Les CM1-CM2 ont participé au projet eTwinning "the 4w's" : the World We Want noW
9th-13th October 2022: Participation à la Semaine du gout sur le theme "Local food".
Les élèves de maternelle et de CM1-CM2 ont fait des gateaux locaux avec des produits de la region Poitou-Charentes.
Local food week - each class made cakes using local recipes and ingredients.
Aujourd'hui nous avons préparé des grimoles aux pommes, recette traditionnelle du Poitou! #semainedugout
5th October 2022: Rags2Riches Clothing collection
Year 6 helping to load the van with today's collection.
Today's collection was 495kg which has raised just over £195 for PTA funds. Thank you!
Citizen science survey, What's Under Your Feet? October 2022
23rd Sepember 2022: L'école du Lac a particpé à l'opération nationale "Nettoyons la nature".
Les élèves de toutes les classes ont ramassé les déchets dans le village et autour du Lac de Saint-Cyr.
https://www.mouvement.leclerc/environnement/nettoyons-la-nature-2022ARK Water Workshops July 2022
On Monday 4th July we were visited by Mia and Glyn from ARK - Action for the River Kennet.
Mia is a former pupil of the school, so we were pleased to welcome her back.
Years 5 and 6 had individual sessions where they explored their knowledge of rivers and the kinds of wildlife to be found in and around them. In particular, the River Kennet which is a chalk stream. Chalk streams are very special and rare. There are about 200 in the whole World - 180 of them are in the UK.
We learned about the birds, mammals, fish and invertebrates that live in the environment and how they fit into the eco system.
We also found out about the water cycle and the pressures on the river habitat created by the extraction of water for human use. Various ways to reduce water usage were discussed - many are featured in Ecole du lac's award winning video below.
The children were then able to search for may of the smaller creatures in some samples of River Kennet water which had been collected in the morning - and was returned later.
Year 6 Visit to St Cyr June 2022
Food Waste Bins June 2022
We have installed new bins in the playground that will allow us collect compostable food waste for the school garden.
The bins are recycled plastic and the frames are reused wood.
Ecole du lac Recycling Collection June 2022
Nous allons vendre 32 kg de gourdes de compote et 21 kg de stylos usagers.
Il nous manque encore 3 kg de brosses à dents et tubes de dentifrice vides pour pouvoir les envoyer!
Earth Summit 23rd May 2022
Year 5 are at Coleshill all day learning about how we can help the environment.
Composting and seed planting. Wind power, the Water Cycle, plastic waste, re-usable food wrapping.
Living Rainforest 20th May 2022
Yr 6 and CM2 visit to The Living Rainforest.
Workshop on sustainability.
Earth Day 19th May 2022
This morning Y6 and CM2 have walked around Wanborough litter picking as we walked. We collected 3.5kg of rubbish.
We're designing our bi-lingual environmental commitment mobiles.
Year 1: handprint Earth ornaments and t-shirt designs.
Y6 and CM2 making salt dough World ormaments.
Y4 mixing bird feeders.
Year 3 handprints and Worlds.
Ecole du lac March 2022
Notre jardin dédié à la biodiversité! Notre jardin avance...
Nous avons mis des boules de graisse et de graines dans un support pour nourrir les oiseaux.
Mardi après-Midi, nous avons fait des lignes courbes avec des pierres blanches, il y a une partie faite en briques, avec un tunnel en tuiles et des petites maisons en pots pour insectes et escargots.
Mardi après-Midi, nous avons desherbé un bac pour ensuite y planter des fraisiers que nous avions fait pousser en automne dans des petits pots.
On a commencé à enlever les mauvaises herbes, puis on a mis des fraisiers.
Save Water - Economisons l'eau
Congratulations!
This is a video produced by Ecole du lac to show ways to save water.
Thanks to the public vote, this video was the winner of a competition organised by their local water company 'Eaux de Vienne'.
Planting our Orchard:
On 18th & 19th of January all the classes took part in sessions to plant an orchard in our meadow area at the top of the school site.
In keeping with our international theme, we have chosen many varieties with French or European names as well as a few familiar types.
As well as the general benefits of trees, orchard fruit trees have the benefit of being early blossoming, so helping bees and other pollinating insects, they have their own particular eco-systems and, of course, will produce fruits to enjoy.
We should see some growth in the first year, but realistically it will only be the younger classes which will see the trees produce significant crops. But tree planting is for the long term; pears in particular can live for hundreds of years!
We planted 4 apple varieties:
2 pears:
2 plums:
Queen's Green Canopy:
As part of the celebrations for Queen Elizabeth's Platinum Jubilee, our Year 6 class took part in tree planting event at Church Meadow in Wanborough on 14th January 2022.
Christmas Cards and Gifts
Just in time for the end of term, we received a wonderful package of Christmas cards, Christmas Stocking and Crackers from our friends at Ecole du lac in St Cyr.
Merci beaucoup et Joyeux Noël!
September 2021 onwards:
22 au 26 novembre 2021:
Durant la semaine européenne de réduction des déchets nous avons pesé les déchets alimentaire de la cantine afin d'essayer de sensibiliser les élèves au gaspillage. Nous avons jeté 72 kg de nourriture.
During European Waste Reduction Week (November 22-26) we weighed the canteen's food waste to try to raise awareness among pupils about waste. We threw away 72 kg of food.
le vendredi 8 octobre 2021: Opération Nettoyons la Nature.
Toutes les classes ont ramassé les déchets dans le village et autour de l'école. Nous avons ramassé 27 kg de déchets.
Farm Days 28th, 29th & 30th September:
On these special days all our classes from Year 1 to Year 6 visited the National Trust Coleshill estate.
The day was in two parts: one session at Coleshill Organics, focussed on sustainable organic fruit and vegetable production. The children looked at the kinds of produce grown and how they are grown, the importance of seasonality and reducing food miles, the role of pollinating insects and how compost is made and used.
The second session was at Eastrop Farm where the children looked at organic milk production: They saw cows about give birth and newly born calves. They found out about how they are fed, how the cows are milked and what happens to the milk afterwards. They also got to sit on a tractor and pet the new born puppy!
Massive thanks go to The National Trust team and volunteers for the really engaging and stimulating sessions.
Below are a short sampler video of our days and slide shows of the activities.
Le lundi 20 septembre 2021:
Les 5 classes de l'école sont allées visiter le Festival des Jardins à Chaumont-sur-Loire pour trouver des idées afin d'aménager le jardin de l'école.
Our latest project for Term 6 is to create habitats for beetles by re-purposing old plastic buckets.
Groups from Years 2, 4 & 5 have created these bijou beetle habitats around the school site - look out for the signs!
This is part of a wider campaign being promoted by the Wildlife Trusts and The Royal Horticultural Society in their Wild About Gardens scheme.
You can do this at home too - see below:
More about beetles and this project
Upcycling T shirts 05.07.21
Wanborough children tie dyed t shirts with Bekha Whalley and whole school wore them on the 5th July 2021.
Skype link and Kahoot Quiz 30.06.21
Year 6 & CM2 Skype to introduce themselves and showed posters on Reduce, Reuse Recyle. This was followed by a Maths Kahoot Quiz.
Front Garden Bric-a-Brac:
On Sunday 27th June, we ran our first Front Garden Bric-a-Brac sale in support of the theme of the 3 Rs of "Reduce, Reuse and Recycle".
Green Day:
Green Day has been part of the school's summer programme for 5 years, although last year it could not be held.
All the classes go to enjoy both sporting and environmentally themes activities at the Parish Council's Hooper's Field and the Woodland Trust's Warneage Wood.
This year it was three sessions on 24th and 25th June. You can read more details and see a video on the Green Day page.
Wild Flower Meadow Update 17.06.21:
It's been a tricky spring, with cold and dry weather followed by very wet and now, hot and dry. The season is as much as 4 weeks behind a typical year, particularly compared to 2020.
However, nature adapts and our wild flower meadow area is beginning to develop. Now that it is not being cut, the grasses themselves plus buttercups, daisies, dandelions, clover and many other species which were already there, are able to flower and provide opportunities for pollinating insects. Also the denser undergrowth provides better cover for small creatures.
We're now beginning to see some of the plants that we have added, notably the Yellow Rattle, which was sown back in October and has been waiting for the right moment to appear.
Community litter pick by Ecole du Lac June 2021
Ce matin, nous sommes allés Nettoyer la nature au Lac de Saint-Cyr... Notre classe a ramassé plus de 25kg de déchets !
Envoi des cartouches d'encre vides! 140€ au profit de la coopérative scolaire et un grand geste pour la planète! Gardez vos cartouches vides et ramenez-les à l'école à la rentrée!
Aujourd'hui nous avons vendu 32,5kg de gourdes de compote, qui vont être recyclées.
Fantastic news!
Our partners at École du Lac's superb video about "Protect, Reduce, Reuse, Recycle" (P.3Rs) has won the Grand Prix in French schools competition "Ma classe a du talent".
Congratulations to them for a prize well deserved! Ma Classe a du Talent website
