What bothers you?

We asked the children in year three what they would like to change about their local community. The children said they didn’t like grownups smoking in public and dropping their cigarette butts, or people  chewing gum and spitting it on the pavement,  plus when  litter is left at our beautiful and main local attractions – the Thames riverside and Walton park.

What will you do about it?

The children decided to make posters to put in local newsagent shops where cigarettes and chewing gum is bought, to remind customers that cigarette buts and chewing gum must go in the bin as they cause a mess in our town and take tens of years to biodegrade.  We also decided to investigate litter along the river by doing a litter pick, we found many plastic bags and few bins! From our findings we are currently writing to the local council to make suggestions to solve the problem. In problem areas such as the high street where we counted 65 pieces of chewing gum in one hoop next to a bin, we would like to use some ‘put your gum here’ posters which could be checked and replaced on a regular basis to keep gum off the street. Plus, we discovered there are many benches in the park and along the river with no bins beside them. We hope to do another investigation at the start of next term to see if our actions have made a change. In the meantime... If you’re by the river and you drop litter, be aware swans will be bitter! Drop gum on the floor, we say no more! And as for cigarette butts... we say no buts!

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During our walk to St Mary’s Church for our Harvest performances, several children from our class complained about the about amount of litter and rubbish along the pathways and grassed areas that we passed to get there.  After taking a vote against other issues they had raised, it was agreed that this was something they wanted to improve.  

The children made a list of things they could do and split into groups as to who would do what.  The children have taken photographs of the litter and dog mess and sent them to the council with letters requesting more rubbish and dog bins along the pathways.  Other children have designed posters to go up reminding pedestrians to use the bins or take litter home.  Rabbit children felt it necessary to clean the area so some have collected the rubbish and taken the abandoned shopping trolleys back to the supermarket.  

Another group of children rang a double glazing factory whose site backs onto the paths to ask them what they think of the area and see if they can make any changes.  They then wrote to the manager sending him a sample of the rubbish.  Rabbit class are waiting eagerly for a response from the Council and the glazing company.

The KS3 students of Stepping Stones School have organised a campaign called SAME that stands for Smile at Me, which aims to raise awareness about how differently-abled people feel, the challenges that they face and how they would like to be treated.  

They are designing a website and arranged a Funday in Grayshott Village to launch it and to start raising money to cover the costs. They are also designing a disability access scheme and are trying to arrange a National Smile at Me Day.