Our work with schools.....
Learning And Having Fun
Many children, especially those living in urban situations, do not have
the opportunity to connect with the natural environment. It is part of
our job as Treesponsibility to awaken in children the realisation that
we are all part of Planet Earth. We have to challenge the idea that we
human beings have an inalienable right to use and abuse the planet in
the fufilment of our every desire.
Teachers can only do so much within the busy school schedule. It is up to groups like us to help children appreciate that everything they need in order to live comes from the Earth. We have to find ways to enable them to understand that the if Earth is to continue to sustain life, we all have a responsibility to care for it.
The Community Foundation for Calderdale gave us a huge helping hand when they made us their Project Of The Year for 2008. In our bid for Project of the Year we promised to work with new schools and to extend this work to parts of Calderdale such as Brighouse and Elland, where we had not worked before. It was not just the grant of £20,000 that has helped us. Our new status enhanced our credibility and broadened access to the services we provide. The announcement in the local papers caught the attention of a teacher from Old Earth Primary School in Elland. Within a couple of weeks of his call we were in the classroom with two year five groups delivering our brand new climate awarness programme for schools. This was to be followed later on by a trip out to the Upper Calder Valley for each of the two groups to plant trees.