This week we have installed some talking bins in the school playgrounds to encourage pupils to pick up their litter and make sure it goes into the bin. We have Derek the Duckling in the small playground and Percival the Penguin in the large playground. Anyone contributing litter is greeted with a phrase acknowledging the gift!
On Tuesday 6th November, we were assessed for the gold standard eco schools award, the Green Flag. The Eco committee showed the assessor, Ray Harrington-Vail, from the Footprint Trust, around the school and told him about the different schemes that we had carried out to make our school more environmentally friendly. They were really enthusiastic and at times Ray struggled to get a word in edgeways! Of course, this enthusiasm is what the project is all about and we were successful in our application, making NOdehill the first Middle School and only the second school to become a Green Flag school.
Our large Green flag came this week and we are currently looking into getting a large flagpole from which to hang it, and whether or not we will need planning permission for the pole!
Thank you to everyone who has participated in this project and helped to get us this far along the road. Of course, the work doesn't stop here, and we need to keep working to become more and more sustainable.
This week each pupil has been given a book of pledges as part of the recycling rewards for schools scheme.
Pupils simply ask family and friends to make a recycling pledge to recycle as muh of their rubbish as possible. Points are awarded to each school participating in the scheme based on how many households make a pledge and rubbish is recycled each month.
Its not just the school that benefits. For collecting 3 pledges, pupils receive a special recycling for schools lanyard and for collecting 5 pledges, they receive a special medal.
Thank you in advance for helping with this scheme and happy recycling!
This week has been 'Bike to School Week' on the Isle of Wight, a scheme run by the Highways department to promote safe cycling to school. The theme for the week is 'if I can cycle at this time of year, I can cycle at any time of year!'
It has proved very popular at Nodehill with 30 pupils coming on their bike each day and another 8 coming on their scooters. Obviously this is excellent news and provides the children with much of their required daily exercise.
As these pictures show, our substantial bike racks have been full all week. The pupils get a sticker for each day that they have cycled and receive a participation prize at the end of the week. All their names will go into a draw for a prize of some high visibility cycle gear to reward their efforts.
This week we received 15 promotional mouse mats made from recycled car tyres from the Footprint Trust. A close up of the mouse mat can be seen below and they can be seen in use in the year 7 computer suite.
Nodehill is proud to support Bike to School week on the Island running from the 5th- 9th November 2007, with the theme being 'if you can cycle at this time of year, you can cycle at any time!'.
As part of the Transport section of the Eco School sproject and in accordance with our school travel plan, we actively encourage pupils to cycle or scooter to school and have improved our cycle storage facilities to promote this.
Next week, whenever pupils cycle or scooter into school they will collect a sticker from Mr Peace and at the end of the week they will receive a small participation gift if they have managed to do it every day. At the end of the week, all pupils who have cycled/ scootered during the week will be entered into a draw for a cycling related prize.
Ultimately, parents take responsibility for their child cycling into school and need to ensure that all bikes are in good working order and the child is a competent cyclist. Please make sure that your child wears a helmet and high visibility clothing at all times.
For any hints and tips on safe cycling, you can visit the Highway Code at www.highwaycode.gov.uk
The Eco schools committee met on Halloween (just a coincidence!) to discuss the action plan for the coming year and look at the progress we have made since we started this project a full 3 years ago, which as these pages show is not insignificant.
The action plan can be accessed by clicking on the link below or you can click on the topic categories to identify the progress we want to make in those topics this year.
This year Nodehill celebrates 100 years of education on the Nodehill site and to commemmorate this we have signed up to a very exciting project to build a mural along the playground wall which borders Church Litten. Ecclestone George are a company which work with the whole school community to develop and install murals made entirely from recycled materials and the consultation process with staff and pupils to get ideas for our very own mural is underway.
I can't think of a better way to celebrate 100 years than a project like this which brings us totally up to date as we think about reducing, reusing and recycling at the start of the 21st century. How different the ethos was 100 years ago!
At the start of October, Mrs Riddett the mother of one of our pupils came in to do a presentation to the cleaning staff and interested teachers on behalf of a company she works for called Enjo. This company produce a range of cleaning cloths that clean using only water and dispensing the need for chemicals.
The cloths work using microfibre technology. Whereas the cleaning we are used to relies on chemicals killing any bacteria and the cloths picking some of the dirt up, these Enjo cloths have microfibres, which pick up dust and bacteria etc when cleaning and when you have used them you simply put them in through the wash with your own clothes - yes even when you have used them in the bathroom on the toilet etc!
The presentation was fascinating and provides a way in which we can dispense with using chemicals at the school - we will now go away and work out costings for implementation of such a scheme.
The Eco schools team has hit the ground running at the start of the new term. Our numbers have multiplied to a group of 14 and they have been working hard to produce a power point presentation to inform the new year 5 pupils and new members of staff of the work we have been doing towards the Green Flag.
The group presented this to the whole school in assembly last Friday and you can see the presentation by clicking on the link below:
Download assembly_pres_0907.ppt
Accompanying this presentation was a piece in the newsletter in which we informed parents of the work we have done and asked them to take the opportunity to get involved with the project in whatever way they can and reminded them of the eco suggestion box in reception for their ideas on future projects.
This week we are concentrating on deciding what we want and need to tackle this year and from this we will develop our action plan
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