Sustainable Development

What Guidance Do We Receive From The Various Bodies Within Government/Education?
It’s relevant to the DFES’s National Framework for Sustainable Schools:
The DFES has published a National Framework entitled Sustainable Schools. This identifies eight “doorways” through which schools may choose to initiate or extend their sustainable schools activity and where the Government would like schools to be by the year 2020. The doorways include:

  • Food and drink. 
  • Energy and water. 
  • Travel and traffic. 
  • Purchasing and waste. 
  • Buildings and grounds.
  • Inclusion and participation. 
  • Local well-being. 
  • Global dimension.


The Department For Children, Schools And Families:
The Prime Minister, 14 September 2004


"Every school should also be an environmentally sustainable school, with a good plan for school transport that encourages walking and cycling, an active and effective recycling policy (moving from paper to electronic processes wherever possible) and a school garden or other opportunities for children to explore the natural world. Schools must teach our children by example as well as by instruction."


Five-year Strategy for Children and Learners
"Sustainable development will not just be a subject in the classroom: it will be in its bricks and mortar and the way the school uses and even generates its own power. Our students won't just be told about sustainable development, they will see and work within it: a living, learning, place in which to explore what a sustainable lifestyle means."


Eco Schools:
The Eco-Schools programme is not just about improving the quality of the local environment. There are many other reasons to get involved including:

  • The opportunity to integrate environmental and sustainability issues into the life of your school, altering your school ethos. 
  • Opportunities to deliver the Eco-Schools programme through curriculum work. 
  • The opportunity to raise achievement, and enhance learning styles and thinking skills. 
  • The potential for financial savings. 
  • Benefits for the community and the whole school. 
  • Access to a network of support agencies.  
  • A prestigious award at Bronze, Silver or Green Flag level. 
  • Opportunities for local and national publicity. 
  • Links with other schools in the UK and across the globe.

The Carbon Detectives:
Check out their site to see whether your school is doing anything to reduce CO2 emissions:

www.carbondetectives.org.uk/content/home/index.html

How About Within The National Curriculum:
National Curriculum and waste


Teachers are obliged by law to ‘teach waste’. The National Curriculum encourages teachers to use the environment as a tool in their teaching.
In brief:

  • The NC makes the study of environmental issues statutory. 
  • Such study can too easily be limited to one-off lessons. 
  • This would be to ignore a rich and exciting source of ideas that will enhance the quality of learning experiences in all curriculum areas. 
  • Teaching materials can be developed so that pupils encounter environmental issues. 
  • Pupils’ responses to and awareness of environmental responsibility will be activated. 
  • Teaching materials and support must be easily accessible to every teacher. 
  • Education and the environment will both gain from this partnership.

Education And The Curriculum:
Why have worms at home or in the classroom?

  • Turn waste into fertiliser and recycle organics back to the earth.
  • Reduce odour in waste food bins.
  • Save energy with worm energy.
  • Reduce need for municipal landfills.
  • Grow worms for fishing.
  • Use worms for science projects.
  • Excellent for year long classroom activities

A fascinating addition to any school's science/environmental curriculum by:

  • Actively exploring important life science concepts.
  • Developing responsible attitudes toward wildlife.
  • Cultivating environmental awareness and responsibility - Rethink Rubbish.
  • Develop compassion & responsible behaviour and respect for nature.
  • Become enquirers and problem solvers.
  • Promoting teamwork and collaborative learning experience.
  • Establishing international web based links with other vermicomposting schools.
  • Encourages internet and IT skills

Worms in the classroom activity ideas:

  • Left-overs from student lunches becomes dinner for the worms.
  • Students learn that even the lowest of creatures (the worm) make a difference. 

2005 to 2015 Has Been Declared The Decade Of Education For Sustainable Development By The United Nations (UN).

So we all need to take an active role in developing a more positive approach and attitude to sustainable development.

If to-day learners buy into the values associated with sustainable development, we are far more likely to enjoy our world for a longer time.

By what means can the key concepts of ESD be demonstrated in the Primary School setting?

The National Curriculum is not the only way to demonstrate the key concepts of ESD. Indeed, the nature of it suggests that it should be part of the ethos of the school as well as being bedded into the curriculum at all levels, with increasing degrees of sophistication, from Nursery to Year 6.

Ways in which this can be done include:

  • National Initiatives such as Eco Schools, Healthy Schools.
  • Giving pupils a voice, e.g. through debates, circle time, School Councils, suggestions boxes, assemblies, class and assembly presentations.
  • Competitions and awards – these help to focus the school community on a particular issue and build a whole school approach.
  • Giving opportunities for pupil participation, e.g. gardening or other environmental clubs, speakers from relevant organisations, raising funds for charities, twinning projects with other schools, locally, nationally and internationally.

Rethinking rubbish can help your school to:

  • Become part of a network of schools taking action on waste. 
  • Deliver the National Curriculum across a wide range of subjects, in a real life context .
  • Save costs on materials and waste disposal. 
  • Encourage social responsibility and citizenship. 
  • Develop pupil's teamwork, consultation and decision making skills.