With Christmas around the corner many of us with an interest in the natural world are seeking to reduce the amount of unnecessary plastic we buy during the festive period. The #PlasticFreeChristmas campaigns have been piquing the public interest year on year, particularly since the popular David Attenborough Blue Planet series captured the imagination of millions in 2017. Unlike other environmental phenomena where the causes are not always clearly visible, we can easily see the evidence of plastic in the oceans, and the source of it is indisputable. It’s down to us.

After researching the issue and feeling moved to do something, in 2019 Suffolk Wildlife Trust secured funding from the Galloper Wind Farm Fund administered by the Suffolk Coast & Heaths Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, to investigate the issue on our Suffolk coast, and increase awareness among children and their families of the dangers of plastic in their ocean. Aside from investigating the beaches themselves, engaging children on consumption and behavioural change around plastics seemed the best way to get to the root of the problem. Running in parallel to this was a desire to protect and enhance the rare vegetated shingle habitat along the Suffolk coast. We wanted to instil a sense of wonder and respect for it in the local community, and give more children access to explore it.

Soon enough, The Ocean Impact Investigators' Project was born. We were delighted to be granted funding to run it, and after a long delay resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic we were able to deliver an 8-week project on Sizewell beach with Leiston Primary School earlier this term. We engaged with every child and teacher in the school, through assemblies, classroom-based workshops and beach days, and encouraged them to take their learning home to their families.

The children learned about the life cycle of plastic and how plastic ends up in the ocean - from container ship spills to litter blowing in from the land, to UK recycling being dumped on developing countries where it escapes into the ocean and spreads into ocean gyres. Our workshops explored natural alternatives to plastic items within the home, in school and in lunch boxes. We challenged children and adults to do the ‘lunch box challenge’ and reduce the single-use plastic wrappers in their lunches, many of which end up in landfill or blowing into street drains and rivers and into the sea.

On the beach the children explored the coastline, cleaning the beach, identifying litter and materials and learning about our North Sea marine animals which could become entrapped in, or ingest, the litter. We had mindful and playful moments too, connecting with the landscape and creating art and sand sculptures, all the while making individual and class pledges around what we want to change.

A stormy celebration event saw only the hardiest of souls join us to celebrate the project in October half-term, but whatever the weather the children enjoyed the elements and loved exploring this special place on their doorstep.

We measured some excellent learning over the course of the project, and we are keen to collaborate with Leiston Primary School in coming years to see how behaviour continues to change within classrooms and the wider community. The teachers enjoyed watching the children focus on something important to them and have a different experience out in the open air, which has been so important during the pandemic.

“I’m just looking at them all and my heart’s about to burst. It’s such a different environment and all they’re focused on something they want to be focused on. They’re loving it.” – Miss Robertson

“We are so lucky to have had this opportunity. It’s an amazing experience we’ll all remember for a long time.” - Ms Hall

If any other schools in Suffolk wish to participate and become Ocean Impact Investigators on their own local beach please contact our learning officer on the coast, Kirsty Wilmot. We give thanks to our funders, the Galloper Wind Farm fund and the Suffolk Coasts & Heaths Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, and our wonderful volunteers Gillian and Pip, without whom we couldn’t run the project.

Whatever you can do, no matter how big or small, we wish you all a plastic-free (or plastic reduced) Christmas and a new outlook for 2022 and beyond.