Wilder School - Great Barton

Today, Wild Learning Officer, Lauren Mack, visited Great Barton CEVC Primary school to meet the Squirrel class children, who will be taking ownership of the Wilder Schools project in its first year. 

We chatted about what the project involves, before heading outside for a quick look around the Peaceful Pond area, which would be the focus of our work together. The children were very excited to be starting the project, and are already looking forward to the next visit!  

Today saw us back at Great Barton CEVC Primary School, where we began work on making their Peaceful Pond area a better place for wildlife. 

The children gave our Wild Learning Officer, Lauren, a guided tour of the whole school grounds, pointing out what was already in place for wildlife and providing tonnes (over 30!) of additional ideas of how else they could help. Split into small task groups, some children began weeding and clearing overgrown areas whilst others created leaf piles and undertook a mini invertebrate survey. We then began carefully dismantling the old rotten minibeast hotel, and with a donation of wooden pallets from parents across the school, we started to build a new one. We repurposed the rotten wood from the previous structure to fill up the inside; nothing was wasted! We even created a living roof by planting wildflower seeds in old plant pots!

We've had another great day with the Squirrel class children, making their school grounds better for nature. 

We finished building the new minibeast hotel, and whilst adding natural materials to it, the children spotted some invertebrate inhabitants, which is great news! The children then split into small work groups; one group created a rockery and planted wildflower seeds between the cracks, another group sectioned off an area using logs to create a mini wildflower meadow, and another group began clearing an overgrown area in the corner of the Peaceful Pond garden - which is where we found something very exciting. Beneath the weeds, was a historical plaque, that nobody knew existed! Dating back to 1860, this plaque had been hidden for many years; not even the Headteacher knew it was there. 

We were back with Squirrel class today, for another jam-packed day of making their school grounds even better for nature!

The children split themselves into small work grounds, with some planting cosmos plants and sowing seeds in the new wildflower meadow to help attract bees and butterflies, whilst others were investigating which creatures lived in their pond. With the hot weather, the children were particularly concerned that the birds wouldn't have access to water as they couldn't reach the water whilst on the dipping platform since the water levels had dropped. This gave us the idea of creating a mini pond especially for the birds, and we found the perfect thing to hold the water - an old compost bin lid! The children levelled out the ground, used stones to stabilise it and provide somewhere for the birds to stand. Great work! 

Today marked our final Wilder Schools session of the summer term and wow, what a difference the children have made to their school grounds over the last 6 months! 

We started off with two minutes of mindfulness, remembering what the area looked liked when we started in comparison to now. We discussed all the things that had changed, but also recognised that this was only just the beginning of the project and there were so many more brilliant ideas we wanted to action. 

The children then split into smaller groups to tackle different things in their Peaceful Pond garden. Some children repainted the wooden benches to make sitting in nature more inviting for their peers, whilst others watered the plants and seedlings that had now begun to grow in their wildflower meadow and the living roof of their minibeast hotel. We also had a kind donation of new bird feeders from the Eco Team, so these were filled up with seed to encourage more birds into the area. 

Well done Squirrel Class - you've been amazing and made such a difference for nature in your school grounds! 

Its been a whole 7 months since we were last with the children of Great Barton and they were SO excited to get back outside and put more of their brilliant ideas into practice. 

During our time together, the children reassessed the project area and created maps of where they’d like to add more wildlife-friendly features. We also spent time weeding the flower beds (around the swathes of snowdrops that had appeared!) where we found a frog and emptied an old compost bin that had previously been filled with soil and refilled it with green waste.

Super work everyone!

It was great to be back with the children at Great Barton Primary School and they were ready and raring to go! 

We started our morning by looking for signs of spring, and found in the last three weeks, lots had changed! The snowdrops had disappeared and daffodils had emerged. The children got into teams, with one team focusing on building a compost heap from old pallets, another team creating a rockery, and another team refilling the minibeast hotel. 

We also noticed that the sweet-pea seeds we planted a little out of season in July last summer had been successful and had survived the winter; they were growing up the mini bamboo frame we made, which was exciting to see. The wildflower seeds we planted in the living roof of the minibeast hotel were also sprouting - it'll be interesting to see what they are! 

The children finished off the day by creating bird seed mixes that they'll be selling at their upcoming 'Go Green' day to raise money to continue improving their school grounds. 

Today's session will forever be known as 'operation woodchip day', as the children worked together to move a mountain of woodchip donated by a local tree surgeon to create natural paths through their Peaceful Pond area. 

The children have worked so hard over the past year to improve their school grounds for nature, by sowing wildflower seeds, creating a mini pond from a bin lid and building a compost heap that they wanted to make it more accessible for the rest of the school to use during lessons. 

In addition to operation woodchip, the children also installed a giant hedgehog house (more like a mansion!), which was built and donated to the school by one of the parents. 

The children are now planning a 'Go Green' fundraising day to get all students involved with their Wilder Schools project and raise money to purchase extra resources to further improve their school grounds for nature. 

Well done everyone!