Ecover Schools Blue Mile brings the classroom to the seaside for 330 children
There was a mixture of sport, fun and education on offer to 330 children who took part in the 2013 Ecover Schools Blue Mile in Plymouth on 17-19 June.
The youngsters, from 11 schools across Plymouth, got hands-on experience of seashore creatures with the expert help of BBC Springwatch presenter Maya Plass; had a go at kayaking in the sea off Plymouth’s historic Barbican and learnt about the threats to our seas in an event at the city’s National Marine Aquarium.
Marine experts from Plymouth University set up a ‘Plastics Lab’ at the aquarium to highlight the problem of ocean plastics and the youngsters trialled an innovative red, amber and green ‘traffic light’ labelling system on packaging.
A green dot means ‘uses recycled material, can be recycled and uses the minimum amount of material’, a red dot means ‘doesn’t use recycled content, difficult to recycle and uses more material than it needs to’ and an amber dot would be somewhere in-between. The idea is to inform shoppers so they can choose whether or not to buy goods with ‘red’ packaging.
This message had a big impact on the children: “I will make sure my family recycles,” said one of the students.
Bringing the classroom to the waterfront was a great way for the children to learn at first-hand about the sea and the issues it faces, according to teacher Katie Rhodes from Holy Cross RC Primary School: “They got to do so many different activities that we don’t get to do in the school and it helps to enrich the curriculum. It makes it real to them and you get so much better work out of them.”
The sport went down well too and for some children, it was the first time they’d ever been in a kayak.
The two day event was a resounding success, with the children learning about the Blue environment – and having fun at the same time!
As one student said: “It was a fantastic day and I just want to do it again and again.”
You can watch our Ecover Schools Blue Mile video by clicking here.
