I’ve spent a year speaking to schools — here’s why climate change must be in the new national curriculum

By Lee Jowett
Climate Change and Sustainability Research Fellow
Sheffield Institute of Education

In July, the new Labour government announced a review of the national curriculum. Two of its stated aims are to ‘ensure children and young people leave compulsory education ready for life and ready for work’, and to ‘reflect the issues … of our society.’

Today is the last day for submitting evidence which I am currently in the process of doing myself, my usual tact of leaving things to the last minute!

If the review is to succeed in these aims, it cannot ignore climate change — arguably the defining issue of our age, and certainly key to many jobs of the future as the UK moves towards net zero.

Over the last year, I have been interviewing senior leaders and teachers in primary schools, secondary schools, further education colleges and local authorities to find out how climate change is currently taught. I have discovered a lot of great work, instigated by passionate staff members.

But in all of my conversations, one thing was clear — for climate change to be given the time and attention it requires, it must be embedded in the curriculum.

The current situation — an inconsistent picture

The Department for Education brought out a climate change strategy in 2021, but crucially it wasn’t mandatory. This has meant that — with so many competing priorities and all the demands of the mandatory elements of the curriculum — many schools are only dimly aware of it.

Of course, schools and their staff recognise climate change as one of the most important challenges facing our species, and therefore they want to teach it to our children. But this is happening almost despite government policy, rather than because of it.

One headteacher told me, ‘The whole curriculum needs a massive overhaul, and schools shouldn’t be so outcome-driven. Climate change is as important as reading and maths. There’s no point in being able to read, write or do the times tables if we’re all living off rubbish heaps.’

In all of my conversations with educators, nearly every one of them has singled out a lack of time and space in the curriculum as a key barrier to teaching climate change.

It means current efforts at climate education are piecemeal and inconsistent, largely driven by the heroic efforts of individual members of staff rather than an overarching strategy. There are great initiatives happening, but whether your child will get to experience them currently depends entirely on where they go to school.

Interestingly, in the further education colleges I spoke to, sustainability was much more embedded in the curriculum. This is because these institutions tend to collaborate with employers, who need college leavers with these skills.

But the college staff I spoke to said that students were coming to them with a lack of awareness, because it’s not taught to the same level in primary and secondary schools.

Learning from success stories

The good news is that in all of the schools I spoke to, there was excellent work happening around sustainability and climate education.

From the Tiny Forests and Edible Playgrounds projects which help schools make the most of their outdoor space, to the EcoSchools scheme for schools, children and young people across the country are taking part in practical, solution-focused climate programmes.

Alongside these national schemes, I found that local authorities can make a huge difference. Leicester City Council are the shining example. Their Sustainable Schools team provides free support to all Leicester schools, focusing on carbon reduction and increasing biodiversity on school grounds.

They also run a huge number of projects that schools can take part in, including Less Litter for Leicester, the Mealbarrow food-growing competition, and Sustainable Drainage Systems for Schools. As a result of all this work, Leicester has the highest number of Eco-Schools Green Flag Awards of any unitary authority in England.

So what can we learn from the best examples of schools teaching climate change and sustainability well? From my conversations, two things stand out as crucial to these success stories.

The first must-have is a passionate sustainability lead with the remit to oversee climate education across the whole school. Sometimes this is a teacher, sometimes a group of teachers, and occasionally it’s part of a wider leadership role. One eco-lead told me, ‘You need to have someone who’s willing to really champion it, to make it easier for the rest of the staff to engage in the projects.’

The second is senior leadership who recognise the importance of climate education and give it the time and institutional backing needed. Without this, climate change risks being lost among other priorities.

One college leader told me, ‘It is successful at our college because everybody from the board down has bought into it. When I’m speaking to colleagues from other settings, sometimes they haven’t got that whole organisational buy-in. They’re always battling against it because although it’s a good idea, it’s seen as an add-on.’

What needs to be done

The current climate change strategy needs to be strengthened. It talks a lot about buildings and procurement, but not so much about teaching and learning. The curriculum and assessment review is an opportunity to change this, and provide the political will to truly embed climate education in our schools.

Again and again in my interviews, teachers said they didn’t have time to focus on climate. This could be resolved by slimming down the overall curriculum. Teachers also need time to be trained in climate education and sustainability, so they have the confidence to deliver it.

Finally, climate education must be made a mandatory part of the curriculum. Having a sustainability lead in each school would mean it is embedded in all decision-making, in a similar way to safeguarding. This is already happening in the best examples I spoke to, but it needs to be rolled out nationally. Having attended one of the live events in Doncaster yesterday, I was encouraged to hear colleagues asking for climate change and sustainability to be part of the national curriculum. Becky Francis herself reflected on climate change and sustainability being a theme across many of the events. 

Climate change should become a golden thread that runs throughout the curriculum. It’s what the teachers I have spoken to want. And it’s what our children and young people deserve.

Lee Jowett is a Climate Change and Sustainability Research Fellow at Sheffield Hallam University. Previously he worked for a local authority and has been a secondary school science teacher. He can be contacted on l.jowett@shu.ac.uk

‘The enthusiasm of the students has been brilliant. They’re coming up with ideas and driving it forward themselves.’

Rob Chambers is the national lead for geography and the trust sustainability lead at Astrea Academy Trust, which comprises 26 schools. We spoke to him about working across a multi-academy trust to embed sustainability.

What is your role?

I am part of Astrea Academy Trust’s Central Education team, and my role is national geography lead, leading on geography education across the trust’s secondary academies. In addition, I have a voluntary role as the trust’s sustainability lead, leading on and coordinating our sustainability work across all of our primaries and secondaries alongside our chief operating officer (COO) Jonathan Timmis, working with eco-leads and senior leadership eco-links in our academies.

How many schools are in your academy trust?

We have 26 schools in total spread throughout South Yorkshire and Cambridgeshire. 17 are primary schools (all of which are in South Yorkshire), and the rest are secondary (Cambridgeshire, Barnsley, Doncaster and Sheffield).


Why is sustainability important to you and your trust?

Astrea Academy Trust fully recognises the importance of integrating sustainability within all aspects of the work that we do. Our CEO and COO are committed to supporting this, which has been crucial for driving forward our successes so far in embedding sustainability across both our academies and central team. The trust’s inaugural work on sustainability was a sustainable estates strategy launched back in 2022 by Jonathan Timmis (our COO), this was a crucial starting point which set the foundation for the work that we have gone on to do. Not only did it acknowledge the importance of investing in infrastructure to reduce costs and carbon footprint, but also the importance of considering all aspects of activities in our academies through an environmental lens, including the initial push for our Go Green Campaign.

To take this forward we used the Department for Education’s Climate Change policy as a framework on which to base our initial thoughts and actions and to plan ahead. On the basis of this we later created our Climate Action Plan, which sets out our goals and actions for tackling climate change and promoting sustainability.

Personally, I’ve always been passionate about global change and the environment, thanks to my geographical background. This personal interest has driven my dedication to embedding sustainability within education, and it is a privilege to be able to lead on driving forward our vision for sustainability through coordinating our GoGreen strategy.

We believe it’s crucial to teach our students about global change and sustainability. We want them to know how they can be part of the solution and help build a sustainable future. We also want to ensure that they have the opportunity to develop the skills and knowledge required for the growing green jobs sector.

It’s important for our students to understand how their decisions affect both local communities and the wider world and understanding social and environmental justice issues related to climate change and sustainability is essential to help them develop as global citizens who can make informed decisions.

In short, by fostering a culture of sustainability across our trust, we’re preparing our students to be informed, proactive members of society who can make a positive impact on the world whilst actively advocating for and demonstrating the principles and practices that we teach our students to ensure that they are a lived reality.

Have you had any training around sustainability or climate education?

In 2019 I undertook an online training course to become a UN Climate Change Accredited Teacher, which was run by UN CC:e-Learn in conjunction with eduCCate Global.

I have also taught climate change as part of the AQA GCSE and I have taught a climate change module as part of the OCR A Level specification which launched in 2016. I have attended numerous sustainability webinars online, including through Let’s Go Zero as well as other organisations, and attended conferences such as the ASCL Conference for a Sustainable Future.

I also network widely via X (formerly known as Twitter) with other sustainability leads and those involved in climate change and sustainability education. 

What activities have you undertaken? 

The first step in our sustainability plan was to ask each school to nominate an eco-lead. It was crucial that this individual was genuinely interested and motivated to take on the role, as they really need to be the driving force within their school. Additionally, we requested that schools nominate a senior leadership team (SLT) eco-link to ensure there was representation at that level, which is vital for driving initiatives forward.

Each eco-lead was then tasked with setting up an eco-committee, comprising students from as many year groups as possible. This inclusivity ensures a broad representation and engagement across the school community.

As the sustainability lead, I organise meetings of eco-leads once a term and provide termly bulletins. These bulletins showcase and share good practices happening within our schools, fostering a culture of collaboration and continuous improvement.

Our regional operations managers play a key role by regularly touching base with the eco-leads in schools. They help promote the GoGreen strategy, working closely with me and the COO to ensure alignment and support.

When we launched the GoGreen strategy in October 2022, we asked all our academies to focus on energy, alongside any other initiatives they wished to pursue. To support this, we signed up all our schools centrally to the Let’s Go Zero campaign. We also support three trust-wide events annually: Switch Off Fortnight in November, the Sustrans Walk and Wheel in the spring term, and World Environment Day in June.

For World Environment Day in June 2023, which focused on plastic pollution, we encouraged schools to raise awareness through social media. Two of our eco-committees visited a local waste recycling plant and participated in a workshop on plastics recycling with the charity Recoup.

Beyond these trust-wide initiatives, schools undertake their own activities, such as creating school gardens, organising community litter picks, and building bug hotels. These activities focus on various topics, including biodiversity, recycling, and litter. Some of our primary schools’ eco-committees have even collaborated to hold their own mini-COP-26 events, and several South Yorkshire schools have participated in the South Yorkshire Schools Climate Conference.

In July 2023, after running the GoGreen strategy for a year, we evaluated our progress. Based on the successes we observed, we decided to adopt a more strategic approach moving forward. We recognized the importance of integrating our efforts in a holistic manner, further strengthening the links between the central team and our academies regarding sustainability. Consequently, we decided to develop our first Climate Action Plan. Our goal is to evaluate our work at the end of each academic year to inform the development of a strategic plan for sustainability for the following year.

Tell us about the climate action plan.

Our Climate Action Plan (CAP) embodies our trust’s philosophy and approach to sustainability, with objectives set across various timescales and sustainability themes at the trust level. When we began drafting our CAP, there was limited guidance on the format, so we decided to proceed with our vision of what it should be. The key was to create a holistic plan that encompassed the entire trust, linking the efforts of our academies and the central team.

We started with a comprehensive meeting that included me as the trust sustainability lead, Jonathan Timmis as COO, and all major stakeholders from the operations side, such as the chief financial officer, regional operations managers, head of IT, head of estates, and head of catering. As a member of the Central Education team, I was able to represent the curriculum perspective.

During this meeting, we outlined what each area was already doing and had achieved regarding sustainability. We then set clear objectives under the following headings: energy, waste, water, IT, operations, healthy living, school grounds, biodiversity, climate literacy, green careers, and information campaigns. These objectives form the foundation of our CAP.

We structured our CAP by starting with the context and our ambition as a trust. We then established our sustainability leadership structure, which includes leadership at both the trust and academy levels. Our work aligns with the four strategic aims of the Department for Education’s sustainability and climate education strategy and is underpinned by the ten sustainability themes outlined in the Eco-Schools framework. Current objectives and examples of achievements then make up the bulk of the CAP.

In addition to our Trust Climate Action Plan, we have tasked each academy with creating their own mini-CAPs. These plans align with trust priorities but are also tailored to reflect each academy’s unique context and are driven by the students in the eco-committees. Currently, several of our academies now have these plans in place, and over the next year, we will work with those that do not yet have them.

Our goal for the end of the 2024–25 academic year is to ensure that every academy not only has an eco-lead and eco-committee but also has its own mini-Climate Action Plan outlining its objectives. This approach ensures a cohesive and comprehensive strategy for sustainability across our entire trust.

What benefits have you seen?

One of the most rewarding aspects of our sustainability initiatives has been witnessing the enthusiasm of the students in our eco-committees. Their creativity and drive have been instrumental in pushing forward various projects and ideas. It’s been incredibly positive to see students having their voices heard and engaging with each other on climate change and sustainability. This engagement has led to real innovations and a sense of responsibility among students to bring about change within their academies.

We are also working to ensure that students can collaborate with academy operations managers, allowing their voices to be heard and enabling them to see the tangible differences being made. For instance, as part of our energy-saving initiatives, we share academy energy usage figures with students. This transparency supports students in asking questions about energy use and identifying practical ways to make a difference.

We have also seen real potential for strengthening community links. For example, one of our schools is developing a school garden and is collaborating with a local rotary club. They are also receiving support from Skanska, a road construction company as part of their community outreach. As part of this students from one of our eco-committees have participated in a series of climate change workshops. Additionally, some of our primary schools have engaged in community litter picks, and we continue to focus on strengthening these community connections.

From the trust’s perspective, there are multiple benefits, including financial savings, environmental improvements, and fulfilling our ethical and moral responsibility to act on sustainability. It also represents good governance. Our efforts have been recognized with the Chartered Governance Institute’s 2023 award for social governance, where we were shortlisted alongside large companies such as John Lewis and Legal & General. We also recently won the Environmental Trust of the Year award in the MAT Excellence Awards. Some of our schools have also now achieved the Eco Schools Green-Flag award.

What barriers have you faced?

Time and money are the primary barriers we face in implementing our sustainability plan, which is a common challenge for most schools. While we have been able to use operational funding for sustainability investment in initiatives such as photovoltaics, increased building and roof efficiencies in energy retention and installing LED lights, there is little to no funding available specifically for more individual sustainability projects at the academy level. Projects like school gardens and eco-committee activities often rely on fundraising efforts or small grants, which are not only limited but also time-consuming to secure. Funding is often also targeted and not necessarily available to all academies. For example, a small number of our academies, those in Doncaster, have been eligible for funding from the National Education Nature Park (NENP) which they have been able to use to good effect to increase biodiversity in their grounds (for example Woodfields Academy).

Our eco-leads, who are crucial to driving these initiatives, take on these roles voluntarily without additional time or financial support. This inevitably limits what can be achieved. Additionally, time constraints and other pressing priorities, such as Ofsted preparation, can understandably divert focus away from sustainability efforts at times. Balancing these priorities can be challenging and sometimes acts as a barrier to ensuring all schools are fully engaged. For instance, while we have mini-CAPs in place for several academies and many have eco-leads and eco-committees we recognise the need to re-launch our efforts in some academies in 2024–25 to maximise buy-in across the board.

This ebb and flow is natural in schools, given their busy environments and the multitude of priorities that need to be managed. However, our trust leaders are deeply committed to supporting sustainability work. We continue to collaborate and explore ways to overcome these barriers, but in a fast-paced educational setting, this remains an ongoing effort.

How do you communicate with your schools?

I have found that Microsoft Teams is one of the best ways to coordinate and communicate across our large number of schools. It allows eco-leads to contact each other and contribute to discussions and ultimately, I hope it will foster a self-driven network. While I coordinate and moderate, my goal is for eco-leads to seek advice and share good practices amongst each other.

I frequently post about upcoming sustainability events, important links, and key stories. I also provide access to bulletins, meeting agendas, and videos of meetings for those who can’t attend live. Additionally, I have been using SharePoint to create a GoGreen hub, which includes a homepage, and academies showcase page where each academy will eventually have their own sustainability page to share good practice and news of what their eco-committees are working on. I am also developing a sustainability resources page based on the ten topics that sit under the Eco-Schools framework.

How are decisions made about what projects to take part in?

As mentioned, we have three trust-wide projects that we encourage all academies to participate in each year. This central guidance is particularly helpful for schools with limited time, as it provides focus, resources, and links to save time. This year, we have asked schools to concentrate on energy and biodiversity.

Beyond these trust-wide projects, we encourage academies to pursue their own initiatives. We believe the most significant gains come from the innovation and drive of the eco-committees within each school. For example, one school noticed a lot of plastic bottles left after sports day the previous year, so they implemented a water refilling station at the next sports day to reduce disposable bottle use.

We have also encouraged all academies to sign up for the National Education Nature Park, aiming to have all schools enrolled by the end of 2024–25. This approach ensures a balance between central guidance and individual school innovation, maximising the impact of our sustainability efforts.

How do you find out about projects and funding?

I use social media a lot, particularly X (formerly known as Twitter), where I follow various individuals and organisations involved in sustainability. We also have the Astrea Go Green X account, which helps us connect with others doing similar work. Additionally, I’m part of the UK Schools Sustainability Network operations group, which is a great source of funding ideas.

I’m in regular contact with the climate advisers from Let’s Go Zero, who provide numerous ideas and information about competitions open to schools. I make sure to flag these opportunities and consolidate them for our schools. I also network with one of the coordinators for the new Climate Ambassadors scheme.

Furthermore, some of our schools in Doncaster are eligible for the National Education Nature Park grant. Two schools have already been awarded £10,000, and I’m currently working with two more schools to access this funding in the current round.

Do you think your approach would work in other schools?

Absolutely. I believe our approach could be successfully implemented in other schools. However, I would strongly advocate for a holistic sustainability policy, and this requires robust connections and commitment from both the central team and operations and the academies and curriculum teams.

A key element is having a leadership structure in place which can effectively bridge these two areas. I have been very lucky as a sustainability lead as my background as a teacher in our academies has given me a deep understanding of the practical working of our academies and the curriculum but additionally as a member of the central team, I have access to the operations teams and the full support and leadership of the COO. This dual perspective has been invaluable in helping to drive our sustainability initiatives forward by being able to connect the two and working to foster a truly holistic approach to sustainability within the trust.

We still have a lot to do, but our priorities and objectives reflect curriculum as well as operations. For example, in 2024–25 we are looking to embed climate literacy and education into our curriculum and strengthen our work on green careers.

‘This is a way of shaping young children to make positive changes for the future.’

Vicky Featherstone is the Eco-Lead at Highfields Primary School in Leicester. We spoke to her about how she encourages and promotes climate education at her school.

What is your role in climate education at your school?

I’m a class teacher in EYFS (early years foundation stage) and I’m also the Eco-Lead. My role is to teach the school and the children about climate change and sustainability and try to start some good practices. I come up with ideas for how we can live a more sustainable lifestyle, for the children, the staff and the parents.

What’s your school like?

We’ve got about 370 pupils, all the way from age 3 to age 11. We have a lot of EAL (English as an additional language) children. Our children speak quite a range of different languages.

It’s an inner-city school in a built-up area. We haven’t got much ground and that’s typical of the whole area. A lot of the children live in flats and don’t go out of the city much. Not many of them would go to the countryside on a day trip.

Why is sustainability important to you and your school?

It’s important to me because when you hear what climate scientists are saying, it’s quite a scary future we’re looking at. Eco-Schools is a way of trying to rectify some of those mistakes that we’re making. It’s shaping young children who can then go on to make positive changes, and encouraging our school community to be more environmentally minded.

Have you had any training around sustainability or climate education?

When I first took over as Eco-Lead I had training from the Sustainable Schools team at Leicester City Council. They do things throughout the year. I’ve just done the Carbon Literacy training, which was eye-opening.

What activities have you undertaken at your school?

Last year, we took part in the Urban Nature Project. Our school is quite urban — we don’t have many green spaces. We had a pot of money from Air Wick and the WWF to make our environment more ecologically friendly.

We planted wildflowers and installed bat boxes, hedgehog boxes, bird houses and bird feeders. We introduced a water table because we haven’t really got room for a pond, and bug houses to get a bit more insect life. The children really enjoyed it. I think they found it quite beneficial and it’s nice to do something a little bit different led by someone coming in from the Sustainable Schools team.

This year we’ve focused on energy. With the Eco Group we’ve labelled all the switches and talked to the staff about the Energy Sparks scheme. The Sustainable Schools team came into assembly to talk about saving energy. It’s really useful when external people come in as the children take it on a bit more and are more engaged.

We also do litter picks. We did the Less Litter for Leicester campaign and we had over 60 children volunteering. They really enjoyed that because it is something a bit different to do on their lunchtime and they can see the positive impact it has. The children found it quite eye-opening how much litter there was. We’ll be doing it again this year.

This year we had someone from Walk to Schools come in and talk about  travel tracker. We’ve had really high engagement with it. We entered the school badge competition and I had so many entries, it seemed like the whole school was interested in it.

We have done other things too, including the Leicester Mealbarrow food-growing competition, and we completed the Plastic Clever Schools scheme to reduce single-use plastics.

How do you decide what projects to take part in?

At the start of the year we conduct an environmental review. Each Eco-Schools topic is given a score and we can see which areas we need to focus on. This year, litter was one of our lowest scoring areas, so that was part of the reason why we chose to do something around that. In general, we also look for things that we don’t have to pay a lot of money for or that are convenient.

But it’s also what’s available to us. Sustainable Schools lent us the litter pickers, so we had the resources provided. And from past experience, we know the children are really keen and really interested in it. It’s quite a clear project — you do the litter pick, you weigh it, and you can see the difference.

In terms of including climate education in the curriculum, there are links included in our long-term curriculum planning. From looking at the children’s books, the teachers do a great job of making this engaging and relevant.

What benefits have you seen for the students and the school?

You get the bonus that you improve the school grounds. For example, as part of the Urban Nature Project last year we got a water butt, which has massively changed how we can use the allotment. It’s a lot easier now to go and water the plants which was quite logistically difficult before. We’ve been able to see insects in the bug hotel, and the plants we planted are slowly establishing themselves.

The feedback from the children is really positive as well. They are very invested in it. We recently attended Leicester City Council’s Eco Celebration event and I was so impressed with how well the Eco Team were able to talk about the work we have been doing and how passionate they are.

What barriers have you faced?

I think for me, time is quite a barrier. As Eco-Lead and also a class teacher, I’m limited on how much time I can ask to be taken out of class to work on eco projects. A lot of the things I do in my own time.

Finance is another — we wouldn’t take on a big project where it would be costly. In previous years we’ve done the Great Big Green Week, where you get £100 to do a project. Even for things like buying seeds, I don’t have a budget, so we needed that money to go and buy seeds and sort the allotment out.

Where do you find out about funding projects and opportunities?

Mostly through Sustainable Schools emails and news bulletins, but also through following Eco-Schools on Facebook.

Do you think your approach to climate education could be successful in all schools?

Yes. I don’t think our children are exceptional in being concerned about climate change. And we have shown that even with limited garden space there is a lot you can do.

I think a lot of teachers are already linking climate and sustainability to their existing curriculum. When they do science and geography, climate change is unavoidable.

‘A successful project requires time, energy and an end product that you can see.’

Richard Smith is the Eco-Schools lead at Inglehurst Junior School in Leicester. We spoke to him about his experiences of climate and sustainability education.

What is your role?

I run a specialist unit in the school for autistic children, I’m a designated safeguarding lead, and I’m also the lead for Eco-Schools here at Inglehurst Junior School. We’re an inner-city school with about 320 children from many different countries.

Why is sustainability important to you and your school?

I think it’s important to do things that are good for the environment. We need to change our habits to make the future better for the children.

Have you had any training around sustainability or climate education?

Yes. We’ve been doing Eco-Schools for quite some time. I did the Carbon Literacy training from the council, and the Less CO2 programme delivered by Ashden.

What activities have you undertaken at your school?

On the energy side, we’ve got solar panels placed on the roof, and we’ve had the LED lighting changed. We are part of the Plastic Clever Schools programme. We’ve been doing the Litter Less campaign, and we took part in the Mealbarrow competition last year. We also have Severn Trent doing some assemblies about water at the moment.

Every year we have a Global Goals week where each class takes one of the UN’s sustainable development goals and runs with that for a week. So for example, one class might do rainforests, another might do marine life, and then we have an exhibition at the end where parents come and look around the stands.

We’ve also been part of the Tiny Forest programme. We have a field at the top of the road and we’ve turned part of it into an outdoor learning area. We’ve planted hundreds of trees and installed an area with seating.

How do you decide what projects to take part in?

The energy one is quite important because it’s saving the school money. At the moment we’re doing the school grounds, so when I feel it’s looking a bit scruffy I try to do something. I had four tonnes of bark delivered yesterday.

We always tend to do the Litter Less campaign because our field always needs a bit of a spring clean by March or April. 

What benefits have you seen for the students and the school?

Obviously there’s a monetary benefit from the solar panels, and we’ve also got a new boiler to make it more efficient. And I think it just puts a bit more pride into the school when the school grounds are looking nicer. We’ve also been part of the Healthy Schools project, so that’s given children a much greater awareness of healthy eating.

How do you decide what projects to take part in?

It’s a mixture of me and the students. We meet on a regular basis and sometimes the children come up with their own ideas. At the start of the year we do an environmental review and see what areas are slipping. So we might say, it’s not looking so good on how we look after our water. Then the premises officer will join us at the meeting and he might come up with different types of taps, or new water butts. So we’ll have a look at the topic and the children will come up with ideas and decide what’s feasible.

The children can be quite right. They’ll come up with a litter picking rota. And we’ll send a newsletter out and the children have said it’s a good idea to put top tips on there on how to save energy. 

What barriers have you faced and how do you overcome them?

The number one barrier is finance. Resources are expensive. Another one is not having the right grounds to have a proper forest school or an area where we can have a little fire. The way to overcome that is to train somebody up, but the cost of training that person would be a barrier.

It also needs people who are enthusiastic, and not just one person. You probably need to have a team of more than one or two or three people if you’re going to have a few projects going at the same time.

How do you find out about funding opportunities and projects? 

We get a newsletter from the local authority which contains project ideas. Quite often the headteacher will tell us about emails they’ve received or projects that different heads have been talking about.

How do you decide which projects to take part in? 

I decide if it’s of interest. For example, the Mealbarrow competition was good because I know the gardening club grows things that we could enter. The Litter Less campaign was quite an easy one because we’ve already got the equipment. 

I look at the jigsaw and see what pieces are going on in the school and then try and put them together so we’ve probably got a good half-a-dozen projects on the go. 

I don’t invest in things that I don’t think will be worth the effort. When it comes to something like battery recycling, we could do it for three months and end up with 15 batteries. It may be the case elsewhere that children turn up with 300 batteries, but in our kind of catchment area, we’ve tried in the past and it’s not been successful.

What makes a successful project?

The energy that people put into them. For example, with the Mealbarrow competition, the children really enjoyed it and we came in second place and won some vouchers. It looked really, really nice and the children got a lot of pride out of doing it.

So the successful ones are the ones that you invest a bit of time and energy in and there’s an end product that you can see. Another example is our garden area. Making it look nicer is a quick fix that’s both visually pleasing and creates a good resource for the children. 

Do you think your approach would be successful in all schools?

I don’t see why not. With Eco-Schools there’s a standard process that you go through and then you can customise it to your school. For example, there’s no point in us saying we’ll go and count the plastic on the beach because we’re nowhere near a beach. And it’s sometimes a little bit much, getting on your high horse and telling the children they should be eating fresh plums and pomegranates every day, when the bottom line is they can only afford a packet of crisps and a chocolate bar. You have to cater to your demographics.

But the basics of litter picking, reducing plastic, having nice environmental school grounds, collecting water from the water butts — these things don’t cost a lot of money and are almost generic. In the main, it’s just common sense. 

‘It’s great for the children to feel the soil on their fingers and eat food that they’ve grown themselves.’

Queensmead Primary Academy is a primary school in a disadvantaged area of Leicester. We spoke to Principal Liz Latham and Premises Officer Simon Ingall about the importance they place on climate education in their school.

What are your roles in climate education at your school?

Liz: I’m the Principal, so ultimately the buck stops with me. I manage the resources and, along with the senior leadership team, make sure the children are listened to and facilitate what they want to do around climate change and sustainability.

Simon: I’m the site manager. My main responsibility is to try to make the school carbon-free as much as possible, which includes things like electricity, gas, LED lighting and solar panels.

I also work with the children on the Eco Group. We nominate a child from foundation right up to Year 6, and they are responsible for making sure that the rest of the children and teachers recycle correctly in classrooms. When the children have had training through the year groups, they become an Eco-Warrior in Year 6. This involves all sorts of activities including recycling, tree planting and litter picking.

What’s your school like?

Liz: In terms of the community that we are very proud to serve, we’re in the top 10% on the national social deprivation indices. We have a high number of children who live in very challenging circumstances, with around 40% on free school meals and many with parents who traditionally don’t tend to engage with school life. We see it as our moral duty to prepare the children as citizens of the future and give them the opportunity to formulate ideas about what society should look like.

Why is sustainability important to you and your school?

Liz: On a personal level, our generation has messed up the world and we’ve got to put it right. For the children, they have an awe and wonder of the natural world and they want to protect and preserve that. It’s our job to harness that and give them the tools they need to be proactive. And we often find that we can get to the parents through the children, because the children know how to make real practical changes that have a positive impact on their home life.

Have you had any training around sustainability or climate education?

Liz: Our local authority is phenomenal. They have a team of people who are really active and really engaged with getting into schools, sharing resources and offering training. Simon has been on lots of training through the local authority, but also through other agencies like Earthwatch Europe.

What activities have you undertaken at your school?

Liz: We got all sorts of things going through Polli:Gen. We had the Tiny Forest, which took no financial commitment as it was all charity-based. We were very proud to have the first Tiny Forest planted in Leicester, enabling our children to be citizen scientists. Our Forest School lead now uses it as a resource, so it’s giving the children that experience to be outside and increase their knowledge.

We also got a polytunnel through the Edible Playgrounds project. Again, there was no cost to the school, which is a significant issue because of our tight budget. We were given a grant by the David Cock Foundation to build a polytunnel and some planters so the children can grow food. It’s great for them to be able to feel the soil on their fingers and pull out a radish that they’ve grown themselves and eat it. It’s really important for children to see that cycle of growing.

How do you decide what projects to take part in?

Liz: Funding is a big one. If we’d have had to pay for the Tiny Forest ourselves, it wouldn’t be there. And the same with the Edible Playgrounds, because I haven’t got the money in the budget for that sort of thing

What benefits have you seen for the school?

Simon: It helps me cut down the cost of running the school. Recycling has reduced our waste bill from £11,000 to £4,500. The solar panels and LED lighting are going to save us money because our carbon footprint has gone down considerably. It means we can invest more money back into schoolbooks and things like that.

Liz: It can also make happier and more contented teachers, because they’re not tied to timetables as much. They can go outside and give space to sustainability, climate and the range of biodiversity projects that we have here.

It also helps build the children’s characters and aspirations. I am utterly convinced that the strong personal development in our school that runs across every year group is why our results are so high. We’re 20% above national levels for SATs, which for this area is utterly phenomenal. It gives the pupils a voice and makes them take pride in the school, and that translates to their own personal life. They’re invested emotionally in making a difference to their local environment, not just at school but in the local community as well.

What barriers have you faced and how do you overcome them?

Liz: The obvious barrier is financial. We apply for grant funding and look out for free opportunities. We always say yes to things because you never know where it’s going to lead.

Another barrier can be staffing. It can be difficult for teaching staff to let go in terms of driving forward academic considerations. The pupils go outside and have their Forest School experience but they also need to learn to read, so it’s finding a balance between academic achievement and character-building activities. But we have strong leadership and we’re all committed to developing the children to become the best they can possibly be.

What would it take to be successful at this in all schools?

Liz: The DfE have got to take more responsibility in pushing sustainability forward. It’s going to take a particular sort of senior leader to embrace that and run with it because timetables are very busy and accountability is high It’s got to be embedded, and it’s got to come through things like the science curriculum and the geography curriculum.

It’s tricky, but it has to be done. Because if we keep on doing the same things to our world, we all know what the consequences are going to be. Things have got to change, and it starts with the pupils because they’re the ones who are going to lead it.

Everybody can do something, whether it’s turning the lights off or making sure your recycling is on point.

Simon: Absolutely. For example, we recycle all our unused fruit and compost it, and use the compost in the edible playground. By the time they get to Year 6, the children are running it themselves and just get on with it. It’s all about giving them responsibility and getting them to make the right choices. They learn leadership skills, decision-making and resilience.

‘We’re giving city children an opportunity to experience the outdoors.’

James Perry is the Eco-Schools lead at Buswells Lodge Primary School in Leicester. We spoke to him about his experiences of climate and sustainability education in an urban area.

I’m the special educational needs and disabilities co-ordinator (SENDCo) and I’m also the lead for Eco-Schools at Buswells Lodge. We’re a primary school in an economically deprived part of Leicester.

How do you approach sustainability and eco work at your school?

I’ve recently started targeting children who I feel would benefit the most, based on their social and emotional needs. I want to give them the opportunity to get out of the classroom and develop their confidence.

I think being a city school is a key thing for us. I was brought up in an area where you could access the countryside within a five-minute walk. When we take a lot of our children on a trip to the countryside, they are amazed by seeing green space and animals. It reminds you that as city children they don’t necessarily get the opportunities that I did, especially with the level of deprivation some of them have. In the past, teachers have taken children to Bradgate Park, which isn’t that far from us, and you realise lots of them have never done that before.

For me, one of the driving forces behind Eco-Schools is to get some of these children outdoors as much as possible. We may not have a farm, but we have a space where we can grow some vegetables, and a school field for the children to learn on.

I think it’s imperative that the children help to retain and make use of these spaces. After all, it’s going to be their world, and their children’s world, and their grandchildren’s world. If they don’t start making changes, there’s a good chance that it might not be the world that we have now, and the natural spaces that we have now might not be here for them.

Have you had any training around sustainability or climate education?

I have accessed the training through the Sustainable Schools team at Leicester City Council. The last training which I took part in was Carbon Literacy, which was particularly insightful. There’s always a variety of training on offer and we get termly updates on this.

What activities have you undertaken at your school?

We tie activities into our Eco-Schools action plan. We have taken part in the Sea Starts Here project about plastic waste and we’re currently involved in a World Wild Fund for Nature project where we’ve planted hedgerows. We were involved in the Litter-Less litter-picking and we acquired a grant from Severn Trent Water to build an outdoor classroom and refurbish our pond area. We’ve also had a large amount of trees from the Woodland Trust, which are now growing beautifully on our school field.

How do you decide what projects to take part in?

Initially, we complete the Eco-Schools Environmental Review on an annual basis. Some elements of the review are instilled as everyday practice now, such as battery and pen recycling and litter-picking. And then it’s been a case of looking at other elements that we could feasibly target each year, and trying to enlist as much external funding or support for the children as we can to complete these targets.

Has this extracurricular work on sustainability influenced how subjects are taught at your school?

Not as much as I would like. There are links — geography and science are easier for teachers to make links to. We have science lessons where the children go out mini-beast hunting and looking in the pond and through the hedges. We also complete fieldwork in geography using our outdoor spaces.

Our biggest challenge is ensuring that teachers feel more confident to use our outside spaces. For example, it’s a nice day, why not read to the children out on the field instead of in the classroom? I’ve organised CPD run by the Sustainable Schools team to support teachers in using the outside more, so hopefully that will give teachers more confidence.

It would be worth the government considering giving schools more of an incentive to have the environment linked to the curriculum, like they do with British values — then you could have it running through the whole curriculum as a golden thread.

What barriers have you faced?

One barrier for us is parental engagement. Getting parents to engage is difficult for us as a school, so getting them to engage with sustainability is equally tricky.

Time is another barrier, and that’s staff release time more than anything else. There are also financial barriers to some extent, but there are always pockets of funding which you can apply for.

Your school has an Ofsted grade of ‘requires improvement’. Has that changed anything in the way you deliver Eco-Schools?

Ofsted have always been extremely complimentary about the fact that we’ve had  Eco-Schools work as a high priority and we’ve held the Green Flag award for three years.

Ofsted always wanted to meet the School Council or Eco-Team and, again, were always very complimentary about what the children had achieved and how we as a school had targeted specific children almost as in intervention. So no, I don’t think that Ofsted has changed our delivery.

Where do you find funding opportunities and projects?

As a city, Leicester is lucky because our Sustainable Schools team are fantastic at updating us on funding and projects, usually through their monthly newsletter. They’ve also been supportive in making applications for funding and access to projects.

Once you make a start on the Eco-Schools process, you end up signing up to lots of  initiatives, and you get regular updates and emails about future projects.

What makes a successful project?

Ease of accessing and maintaining projects is a key one for us. Having somebody who will come in and help you set up that project is always extremely useful. For example, we recently had our Walk to School Champion come in to lead a refresher assembly to re-engage the children and staff.

Another factor is a project that’s not going to take up a huge amount of staff time. It’s fine for me to say I want to do this project for school, but then I’ve also got to think: am I going to be impacting on staff workload when they’re already busy enough?

What does it take to be successful at this in all schools?

You need to have someone who’s willing to really champion it and get stuck in and have a go. Ideally, it’s someone who is eco-conscious themselves and is willing to do the heavy lifting for the rest of the school, to make it easier for the rest of the staff to engage in the projects.

You need to set time aside too. You need time with the children, and that time is usually when you’re supposed to be teaching, so release time from class is essential. You can choose to work with them in your lunch and in after-school clubs, but for me that wasn’t sustainable, and there hasn’t always been enough time to do everything well.

I personally don’t think I’d have been able to run Eco-Schools as well as I have if it wasn’t for the opportunities that have been highlighted to me. People have said: we’ll support you to do this, and there’s this training, and that project, and this pot of funding that we’ll help you apply for. The support of the Sustainable Schools team in Leicester has been vital.

‘In our concrete jungle, we’ve been learning about biodiversity and urban wildlife.’

Naina Platt is the eco-lead at Charnwood Primary School in an urban area of Leicester. We spoke to her about how the council’s Eco-Schools network is helping her teach her children about the importance of sustainability.

What are the climate-related responsibilities of your role?

I oversee making our school eco-friendly by educating the children about sustainability and what that means to us — looking after the environment, how we can use our planet’s resources in a sustainable, manageable way, and what renewable resources we can use.

Can you give us some background on your school?

We are a happy, open, thriving primary school. We have approximately 440 students, who come primarily from an ethnic minority, with about 96% of Islamic faith. Others come from European and Caribbean backgrounds. A lot of our children come into school with English as an additional language, and a lot of our children receive the pupil premium to help them out. We’ve also got quite a few with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND).

What sort of space do you have?

We are extremely limited with our school environment. Indoors, space is a big issue for us. We have our classrooms, but for any additional space we are really limited.

We are also tight on space outdoors. It is a concrete jungle — lots of tarmac which we’re trying to green over, and maybe just small spaces. Parts of the building are also Grade 2 listed so we are limited to what we can do, and even in the playground we have a World War Two bunker under the tarmac which has restricted us from doing certain things in terms of digging, for example. But we do try.

Why is sustainability important to you and your school?

It’s such a big issue for human beings. And communicating it to the younger generation is really important. The children at our school may not be aware of what sustainability or carbon footprints are. It’s important for us as a school to empower our children and help them grow up to be adults who can look after their own environment and the planet.

Have you had any training around sustainability or climate education?

Through the Leicester Eco-Schools network I took part in carbon literacy training, which was invaluable — just making you aware what a carbon footprint is and what we can do to reduce it, and how to pass that information onto staff and the children.

Leicester City Council and their whole sustainability team do a wonderful job in keeping school eco-leads informed about things like the Great Big Green Week, Switch off Fortnight and the Plastic Clever Schools initiatives.

What activities have you undertaken, and what benefits have you seen?

We have a lovely green-fingered staff member who does a gardening club, which the children absolutely love. We maintain things in planters and grow things. That’s out of school hours. 

During school hours, we have noticed that children with behavioural issues like to dig, so during play time they will be planting or weeding. We’ve noticed a difference in their behaviour — they’re a lot calmer and happier.

The other thing we’ve been involved in is the Urban Wildlife project. Children from primarily across Key Stage 2 learned about biodiversity. A man from the council visited and encouraged the children to think about how to encourage wildlife in the school grounds. And it’s a hard thing to do, especially in our concrete jungle. But they absolutely loved it.

The project lasted a good five to six months and saw the children planting and growing. They were given a pot of money to spend on equipment. They were monitoring the wildlife in the school grounds and they absolutely loved it. They showcased it often in assemblies so the whole school took part in that.

We are also part of the National Educational Nature Park project. We’ve received funding to green our spaces, and we’ve made links with our local community gardens. It’s very urban here, but there are pockets where green spaces are growing and thriving. It’s really important for our children, especially those who don’t have that space at home, to be part of that and their local environment.

What barriers have you faced?

The biggest barrier is time — cramming it into a packed curriculum and making it meaningful, not just doing it as a one-off. It’s keeping it ticking along throughout the school year and making sure that, year after year, the children are growing up with these issues. We trickle sustainability into the curriculum, especially through geography, science and PSHE.

I’d love to see the children do more events and get out and about more, but costs, time and staffing are the biggest barriers for any school.

How do you overcome these barriers?

I think just going to school leaders and saying that I need time out. They are great and take that on board and give me the staffing and the resources, so that’s a great positive.

For an urban school like ours it’s about saying to staff: we’ve put in place these planters and green spaces, but you need to give this time with a group of children in order to maintain that during the school days.

I would say getting the parents and the wider community involved is important. For the Polli:Gen project, we invited the parents of the children involved in the project and we had a great morning out where they took part in discussion and took photographs. I would like to see more of that because it gets the message out to the wider community about what we’re doing.

How do you decide what projects to take part in?

The children are always at the centre of our decision-making. They are at the heart of our action plan. Through the school council and the eco-team they prioritise what we need, what comes first, second and third. The children tell us what’s important to them, and we take it to the leadership team.

How has the local authority supported you?

They have been great. Right from the start they helped me fill out my Eco-School application and got me onto my first Bronze award. The time they spent with me was amazing, and they continue to support me.

At the drop of an email I can speak to the sustainable schools team. They’ve come into school, looking at what we can do to monitor energy use, what software we can use to reduce our energy use, keeping us informed of funding and projects — it’s been really invaluable. We’ve also done projects with the council where we get together with children at local schools to share initiatives.

I’m just a busy school teacher trying to do my job, and I’m thankful for the links we’ve been given and the contacts that have come our way. The sustainability team at the council do a wonderful job.

Do you think your approach would work in other schools?

Yes. Any school, no matter how big or small, can do what we’re doing. We have shown that even with very limited space there are plenty of activities you can do to get the children engaged with their environment and thinking about sustainability.

‘School leaders can see a city-wide network working on sustainability, and they don’t want to be left behind.’

Laura Barke is an Education Officer (Eco-Schools) for Leicester City Council. We talked to her about how she works with schools to help them implement activities around sustainability.

What are the climate-related responsibilities of your role?

My main focus is going into schools across the city and supporting them with their Eco-Schools Green Flag applications. I work with designated members of staff, typically the school’s eco lead, to complete their application.

My team also runs workshops for students and discusses with staff what they want to do and how they want to make a difference. There are about 120 schools in the city, and we work with about 80 of them.

Are there any costs to schools?

Our support relating to the Eco-Schools Green Flag work is free for schools and we offer that support as part of our core offer for schools. However, there is anaccreditation fee for the Green Flag award. . And some of the other projects we run are externally funded, so they don’t have a cost for the schools. There are then additional parts that schools can pay for, like carbon literacy training for their staff.

Why is your work important?

As an ex-teacher, I know the sort of time constraints placed on teachers. A lot of the time staff are really interested in it, but trying to fit it into the timetable is more challenging.

A role like mine is really valuable for schools because they have somebody there to take away some of those pressures. I can support schools in whichever way they want. I can run sessions with the children without into much input from school staff, or equally I can go in and give  the staff a starting point, or talk through some of their ideas.

Senior leaders can see that we’ve got a real network of schools across Leicester and they can see that there’s lots of staff working on this, so they value it more and they don’t want to be one of the schools that is left behind. They can see that 60 schools in the city have got the Green Flag, and they don’t want to be one of the ones who don’t.

What projects and activities have the council undertaken to enhance climate change education?

We’ve been working with classes of children teaching them about carbon literacy. We’ve also done a lot of work recently on outdoor education in nature. We’ve worked with the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) for a couple of years now, and in the most recent year we have been improving school grounds — planting hedgerows, adding or improving ponds, introducing nesting boxes and creating hedgehog-friendly spaces.

Alongside the physical work on school grounds, we run education sessions afterwards with the students, so they’re involved in things like the hedge-planting. Then we’re doing further follow-up sessions, getting them to understand why we’ve done it and how nature is important.

Tell us about your work with Eco-Schools.

We have an offer open to all schools. They can contact us and we will do whatever it is that they want to support them with their application.

We run training three times a year for school staff where we talk them through the process and provide ideas for what they can be doing to work on the project, and we also run projects throughout the year that specifically fit within some of the topics of Eco-Schools. This year we’re running a litter project, and we’ve also done the Grow Your Own Grub scheme.

What’s that?

Grow Your Own Grub has been going for multiple years now. It’s open to all schools across the city and the idea is to get schools growing their own food. This is run alongside the public health team. So this year we’ve got the ‘mealbarrow’ competition, where schools are tasked with growing at least five different fruits and vegetables in a wheelbarrow. Then they must plan and design a three-course menu using the items they’ve grown. At the end we bring all of the wheelbarrows together from across the city in a celebration event where members of the public can come and see the work.

It’s suitable for any school, because even if they are one of the more urban or concrete type schools they’re going to have enough space to put a wheelbarrow in.

Schools usually have to pay for the Green Flag award. Does the council offer any financial support towards this?

We do look to subsidise the Green Flag application. Normally it’s £200 for a school to pay, which may be off-putting to many schools because it’s quite a significant cost. It’s entirely worth it, but trying to get that through could be challenging for some schools.

As a council, we look for different sponsorship opportunities and use support from

our social value programme. So last year, schools had to pay £50 for their

application rather than the full £200.

How do you choose what projects to undertake?

I think it’s a combination of reasons. A lot of it is to do with the funding that’s available. But we also look to put on projects that fit within the Green Flag work in particular, helping schools with that overall aim.

It’s also slightly based on the skills within our team — we’re more experienced with outdoor learning, so that drives some of the project proposals like the work with WWF. And often the work fits with different priorities in the wider council, from biodiversity to the climate emergency action plan.

What benefits have you seen from these projects for pupils, staff and parents?

When we work with students, 90% of the time they really enjoy it. Having someone new come in is exciting and increases engagement. For staff, it gives them the opportunity to do work they want to do but may struggle based on the different pressures of timetables and teaching time.

We often get really positive feedback from schools after a project to say that students have enjoyed it or the schools have seen really positive outcomes.

What barriers have you faced?

Definitely timetabling is a huge barrier. Often our contacts are really keen to get us in, but getting that designated time signed off by senior leaders can be challenging. Having space in the school can also be challenging. We are very flexible and happy to work in any space, but a lot of the time schools don’t have anywhere at all.

How have you overcome these barriers?

By sharing the value of the projects and making it really clear to the schools what they’re getting out of it and why it’s so important. That can be shared at different levels in the school, so everyone is on board and everyone knows this is something that they need to make accommodations for.

We also remind schools it’s free. And as a team, we make sure that we’re flexible, working with the school to fit around their timetables and the spaces that they have.

How do you ensure activities continue once your projects end?

Ultimately we rely on schools to take it on and maintain it, but it depends on the staff that are there. As a team, we’re pushing for follow-up funding and future-proofing. For example, we try to make sure that schools have multiple members of staff trained so if somebody leaves there are still people there to take over.

But I think one of the biggest things is having buy-in from senior leaders. This has a trickle-down effect, and they can then make sure that there’s multiple members of staff working on it throughout the school. If senior leaders are on board from the beginning, they can see the benefits to the work that we’ve done.

Do you think your approach would work elsewhere?

I think it’s definitely replicable across authorities, if you have buy-in from relevant people to make sure that your team is supported to build those connections with schools. It’s not the sort of thing that can just happen in a year — it’s an ongoing process.

The climate change and sustainability strategy is still optional. Is that a problem?

It depends on the viewpoint of the school. Some schools will use that as an excuse to not be involved. But equally, some staff understand the value of having a written strategy on climate change.

For me it would definitely make our work easier if it was mandatory because we could go to the 40 schools in Leicester that we’ve not got strong connections with. Ultimately our goal is to work with all schools in the city. But I don’t think it would be fair to make it mandatory without offering suitable support to schools.

‘When you make it part of the curriculum it becomes truly embedded in the school.’

Stephanie Holden is a Year 6 teacher and Eco-Schools lead at Lydgate Junior School in Sheffield. We talked to her about how she is introducing and embedding climate and sustainability education at her school.

Can you give some background on your school?

We’re a junior school, so year 3 upwards. We have about 480 pupils, 120 a year. I guess it’s a fairly affluent area, but we do have a very high number of EAL [English as an additional language] children as well.

We have two school yards and then we’ve got a Forest Schools area. And we do have quite a bit of green space dotted around, where we do gardening — we’ve planted apple trees and plum trees.

How did your interest in teaching more about climate change and sustainability begin?

We’re a Rights Respecting School [part of a UNICEF scheme]. Part of that is getting the children to be global citizens. When we started working towards gold accreditation I realised that we weren’t really doing enough about climate change and the environment. So I started the Eco Club.

Why do you see climate education as important?

I think it’s twofold, really. It’s personal, but it’s also the children. There are a lot of children that are interested in climate education, and I felt like we weren’t doing enough as a school, so that was my drive for doing more.

I’m not trained in any way in climate education: I am learning with the children. We’re trying to increase the children’s understanding but also our understanding as adults as well.

What kind of training would be useful to you?

I guess the science behind everything. Although on the surface I understand it, it’s putting all the pieces together. It’s not just physical resources, it’s about getting the people to lead us. After all, we’re not experts in environmental science, we are primary teachers.

Tell us about the Eco Club that you set up.

It’s been running for three years. We opened it up to any child in years 4, 5 and 6 and they became part of the committee. It’s an afterschool club as opposed to in the school day, so the idea is that they’re ambassadors for the school, but they’ve chosen to come along to the club.

We started by becoming an Eco-School, so we followed their seven-step plan and got that last year. The three main areas covered were biodiversity, waste and energy. The children have done assemblies to spread the word across the school.

On top of that, I introduced the new role of eco-lead to our school council. We meet every two to three weeks, and they bring up any eco issues as part of that.

Do you include Forest Schools in your curriculum?

Some year groups are receiving Forest School lessons by a trained Forest School person. Our year group currently isn’t at the moment, but we’ll take them in the woods and we do things related to the curriculum. We try to get in the woods as often as possible, but realistically it’s probably twice every half term.

How do you choose what climate and sustainability activities to do?

I think it’s about having more of an understanding of being a global citizen, and preparing them for the future. I enjoy seeing the children get excited about being outside. Last week at Eco Club the kids all wanted to come outside so we spent 45 minutes raking up leaves, and they had a great time doing it. Sometimes, you just have to go with the children and their interests.

Some of the children come in with ideas about what we could do in Eco Club. They’re at the stage where they’re really inquisitive and interested, and actually what’s great is that they’re also teaching us as adults.

We’ve had a focus on waste, we’ve run bring-and-buy sales at Christmas, and then we had a massive influx of apples and plums that we’d planted a couple of years ago and we sold those at the school gates. It’s about trying to spread the word amongst the adults through our actions.

Have you found any barriers that have stopped you from doing what you want in school?

The main thing is time and also communication, because it’s quite a big school. Sometimes, with everything else going on in the school, the eco side of things can get pushed to one side and other things take priority, like curriculums and Year 6 SATS.

Everyone sees it as important, but when you juggle so many things as a school it can be hard to make it a priority.

How can you overcome these barriers?

I think when you make it part of the curriculum then it becomes truly embedded in the school. For example, in year four they do the Amazon rainforest and they talk about deforestation. And in year five they do a whole project on water, and as part of that they learn how some people don’t have access to clean water and how that links to the environment.

As part of our Rights Respecting School, we always have a summer campaign, and we’ve done things like reducing traffic around the school, using less plastic, and raising money for endangered animals.

Making it part of what we do means it’s not an add-on. It’s the world’s largest lesson, because it’s embedding things in what we already do as a school.

How do you ensure that it is embedded across the school?

We work as a team and we share ideas, so it’s not down to one person. All staff are part of being a Rights Respecting School, so it’s their responsibility to make sure that children’s rights are being met — and they’ve got to understand what that means.

We’re taking it slowly because we don’t want our sustainability not to be sustainable. We’re not trying to introduce too many things at once. I think that slow progress is probably better than trying to do everything at once and then failing. I do think it’s a whole staff approach, particularly teaching staff.

Do you think the approaches that you’ve used in school would work in all schools?

I think a lot of things we do would work at any school, particularly if they’re a Rights Respecting School because they can link it very much to that ethos. In terms of things that we’ve done like selling second-hand stuff, any school could do that.

Why do you think your climate projects have been successful?

I think when everybody gets behind something, it’s successful. When we do campaigns as a whole school, we all push for it and it can be quite exciting — one of our campaigns on plastics ended up being in the local news.

In terms of gardening at school and things like biodiversity, you can see that the children just love it. And I think the fact that they love it makes it work. Seeing things grow, digging up potatoes, tomatoes and all those sorts of things — they just get a lot out of it themselves, and that’s lovely to see.

Carbon Literacy

Carbon Literacy is an awareness of the carbon dioxide costs and impacts of everyday activities, and the ability and motivation to reduce emissions, on an individual, community and organisational basis.

The course is the equivalent of one days learning and is best delivered face to face, but can be done over half days or one full day.

At Sheffield Hallam we are using a teacher and governor course, and student course to help individuals to understand their carbon footprint and take action on climate change in an education setting context.

For more information or find out when the course will be launched for teachers and governors please see below

To find out what staff and students think about the course please take a look at these YouTube videos.

For more information please email Lee Jowett, L.Jowett@shu.ac.uk