Green Schools Initiatives

·         The Green Team continue to collect and sort our waste each week.

·         They help supervise the younger children who join us on our weekly “Walk on Wednesday” from the Hotel Car Park. We have walked every week since February. Great achievement!

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         Wormery

We are very grateful to Lismore Tidy Town’s Committee for developing a wormery in the school as part of “Stop Food Waste” initiative. On a very wet Tuesday, April 24^th, representatives from the Tidy Towns and Mr. Donal Leahy helped to mix all the materials to fill the timber box -wet straw, hay, paper, cardboard, to ensure the worms have a moist environment to live in. The worms are happy in their new home being fed raw fruit (not citrus), vegetables, egg shells and tea bags. In time, the worms turn this food waste into good quality compost that can be added to the school planters. What a wonderful way to use waste food!

Tearing the wet newspaper

Adding the wet cardboard

Learning how to care for the worms

Mr. Leahy showing us the finished product!

              

·         Global Citizenship Workshop

On May 16^th third and fourth classes were visited by Úna Halpin from Global Action Plan to talk to them about Global Citizenship. Úna travelled from Athy early that morning. She explained very clearly that our daily actions and decisions can have an impact on the world. We must have greater awareness of the choices we make. Improving knowledge about sustainable development will benefit us all.

           We have become a “throw away” society. We create more waste now than ever before and waste costs. We must ask ourselves before buying anything “Do I really need this?” Waste disposal is costly for us and the environment. We are only guardians of this earth and we must not do irreparable damage to it.
           We can influence how companies package goods. If we refuse to buy items that use excessive packaging, we will change the habits of the manufacturers. We also need to be aware of the “Fair trade” symbol and only buy products displaying this symbol. This means that workers have been paid a fair wage.

Úna Halpin in Fourth Class

                 

        
          Global Citizen Workshop 2

First and Second Class had a workshop with Will Mitchell from Global Action on May 30^th. This workshop was also on the theme of global citizenship. Will explained global warming and its effects to the children in very simple terms. Will explained that the ozone layer was like a blanket over the world, keeping everybody safe underneath. When we create too much carbon, we damage the blanket.  The children questioned him and wanted to know how to protect the earth.

Beekeeper Visit

On Wednesday June 13th, First class received a special visit from a local beekeeper, Marek Koziol. He spoke to the class about bees and beekeeping. He brought an empty beehive and a smoker into the classroom to demonstrate how bees pollinate and make honey and beeswax. In addition, the class saw a queen bee and her worker bees in a small container, showing the difference between them. The class had plenty of questions for Marek which he was delighted to answer. Finally, each pupil received a bee sticker. It was a very informative afternoon.  

 

Mr. Koziol in First Class

Smoking the hive

The Queen Bee and the workers

The delicious honeycomb