Hello and welcome to our School/Eco Council page!
We are so pleased to be the new councillors for this year and cannot wait to update this page with all the exciting things we will be getting up to a planning for around school and the local community. Our councillors are…
Today the councillors delivered their first ever in-class presentation all about pirates, ready for our exciting change in lunch menu for today. They were quite nervous but did ever so well, staying cool, calm and collected whilst teaching their class about what pirates used to be like! They taught about the Jolly Roger flag, famous female pirates and even some pirate phrases…”yo ho ho” and “shiver me timbers”.
The School/Eco councillors delivered another in-class assembly today, to celebrate our new menu for National Apple Day! Did you know that the first ever Apple Day was celebrated on 21st October 1990 in Covent Garden and there are 7000 different kinds of apple in the world!
A HUGE congratulations to the School Councillors for their sponsored silence on Thursday last week. Every single one of them took it very seriously, showing so much determination to get through the day without talking, despite their friends and adults talking around them! I am so proud of them and they are proud of themselves, as they should be! So far, we have raised £155.70 towards KS1 outdoor resources which is amazing 👏 Thank you so much for your support, it means a lot to them and encourages and inspires them to persevere with more fundraising!
Next week we will be celebrating the annual ‘Anti-Bullying Week with this years theme ‘Power For Good’. The School Council presented an assembly on this, their first one to the whole-school! They were very nervous, but also very excited to be taking on such an important task within their Council roles. This year the theme is ‘Power For Good’ and the team explained that this means knowing what is meant by the term ‘power’ and how we can use it responsibly and carefully. This includes speaking up if we see someone being treated unfairly, and speaking in a kind and respectful way to others. Well done Council!
On Sunday, Elsie in Year 6 (Head girl and School/Eco Council member) was our school representative at the Remembrance Service at St Swithin’s Church. She proudly wore her school cardigan and respectfully assisted in laying the poppy wreath to remember the soldiers that died for our country. The church looked beautiful with decorative pieces, including artwork created by the pupils, displayed wherever you looked!
Today we were so lucky to have our local member of parliament Manuela Perteghella, join us for a litter pick in our local park. The children were in absolute awe to meet her and were so proud to show off our school! We were even lucky enough to have our photo with her, put into the local newspaper, The Herald!
Some festive cheer to brighten everybody’s spirits! The School/Eco Council worked hard at home preparing some festive treats which they then sold at the end of the day to parents and children to raise money for some seeds and compost ready for some spring gardening! Goodies included cupcakes, flapjack, cookies and cheesecake. The council members did a great job of handling money and working out change as well as packing up multiple orders, and they raise just over £50!
The School/Eco Councillors kick-started this special awareness week with another whole-school assembly detailing the theme for this year which is ‘Belonging’. They talked about what the word means and the different ways that children can feel that they belong in a group or community, and times when people may not feel like they belong and what we can do to help.
On Friday morning, any children who had volunteered for and taken part in litter picking in the school grounds this half term, were invited into the hall for a hot chocolate. This was our way of saying a huge thank you for helping to look after our school grounds and the environment.
The councillors delivered another in-class presentation about this special day. ready for our Irish menu! They gave information about who St Patrick was, his life journey and what some traditional celebrations might look like. Mrs Martin, who was originally from Ireland, even baked the staff some yummy Irish cakes!
The councillors have been getting their hands on some flat-pack DIY, making up wooden boxes to use as democracy voting boxes in classes! They really enjoyed doing this and the older children demonstrated great teamwork with the younger children. They then painted them with some gloss and added some scrabble letters to show the name of each class!
This month the School/Eco Councillors planned for a special Easter Bonnet competition where the bonnets needed to be made completely from recyclable materials. They worked in pairs to create posters to advertise the event and then on the 24th March, we held a whole-school Easter parade.
The children got the chance to show off all their wonderful creations to the rest of the school in our assembly. They proudly paraded with their bonnets down the centre of the hall to the front, where they sat and eagerly awaited the results of the runner-up and winner in each class. The School Councillors chose the winners with the KS2 children judging KS1 and vica-versa. They based their decisions on how much of the bonnet was made from recyclable materials, the uniqueness of the design and if it had been made by the child with a small helping hand from an adult.
Congratulations to our winners and runners-up from each class (see photos below) and a huge well-done and thank-you to all the pupils who participated and for all the parents hard-work at home behind the scenes.
The councillors held a class meeting in their retrospective classes, recapping events they have held, money they have raised and things they have achieved since the beginning of the year, and opening the floor up to some pupil voice. This included discussions and writing down things that the pupils feel are working well in school and anything they would like to be changed or introduced. These ideas will be fed back to Mrs Hopkins and Mrs Timms who will then give feedback for the councillors to share with their classes.
Today, the councillors delivered an in-class presentation about the life of the famous William Shakespeare, in preparation for our special menu for lunchtime. The children learnt all about his life events, saw some photos of some buildings associated with him from our local town of Stratford-upon-Avon and learnt some famous sayings that were used in some of his plays, including ‘wild goose chase’ and ‘a laughing stock’.
This year our school have chosen to take part in this amazing event as part of the London Marathon celebrations, on Friday 24th April. On the 17th, the councillors delivered an in-class presentation about the event, and information on 3 charities that we could raise money for by doing the event. All pupils were then given the opportunity to vote using our new democracy boxes, and the councillors counted the votes to reveal the winner as ‘Blue Cross for Pets’!
And as for the event itself, the weather was beautiful and the children were so excited! From the minute they came into school, all I heard was “when are we doing the marathon?”! Every single child put their best effort into the run, walking when they needed and then running when they got a spurt of energy. We are so proud of them all!
Today we celebrated the 100th birthday of the amazing Sir David Attenborough with a special lunch menu, an in-class presentation from the councillors on this extraordinary man and then a vote to adopt an endangered animal from the WWF in celebration of David’s work.
A huge thank you to the children who have helped to litter pick in the school grounds this half term, and it couldn’t be a better day for it…ice lollies all round 🌞😋
The councillors designed posters to advertise that our school will now be recycling batteries. To kick start this initiative, we created a class competition where the class who recycled the most batteries during the last half term of the academic year, would receive a reward! The winning class were Reception with over 2000 batteries in total! The children enjoyed a well-deserved ice lolly and some stickers to take home. Well done Reception!!
Today, the councillors began with a whole-school assembly all about this special day alongside World Ocean Day which was held last week. The theme for this year was ‘A Global Call for Climate Action’. The assembly was packed with information about climate change, sustainability and how we can all make a difference to help our planet. Each class then went and did their own activity for this day, using ideas from our Green Flag Eco Award document ‘100 eco-education ideas’ which showed activities that span across the range of the whole curriculum.
The School/Eco councillors have been working hard, learning about how to make some different animal homes and feeders using recyclable materials, so that they can demonstrate these to parents who can they try them out themselves with their children. Crafts included bug and hedgehog homes, bird feeders and butterfly feeders.
On Friday 12th June we held the event after school and invited parents and children in. The councillors worked in pairs to give their demonstrations and then the parents had a turn as well. We asked for a £2 donation towards our own eco-friendly resources, homes, feeders and flowers for in our school grounds. Everyone had a great time, getting involved, learning new things and taking their finished products home with them!
As part of our submission for the Green Flag Eco Award, the councillors needed to work together to come up with an eco-code that best represents our schools eco values, as well as what we feel we do best, keeping it simple so that it is memorable. Take a look!
