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September 2024 LfS Updates

  1. Eco Schools Journey – a new Eco School Support channel has been created in our Falkirk Learning for Sustainability Team (join code h7cr6l2). The Eco school process has been simplified to make it less bureaucratic and more pupil-led. Keep Scotland Beautiful will facilitate 2 online Eco-schools training sessions for children and young people between 1.30 – 2 pm on Wednesdays 11th and 18th September (your group need to attend both). Contact Yvonne McBlain by Monday 9th September to sign your class or Eco-group up and receive the links for these meetings.
  2. Our first Falkirk Carbon Ready Classroom training for teachers took place last week (a new collaboration with Keep Scotland Beautiful).  This training was provided to support class teachers of upper primary children who want to build a Carbon Ready Classroom(CRC) and become climate-informed together. The CRC experience can contribute to your school’s Eco Schools journey and supports upper primary teachers and their classes with this vital aspect of Learning for Sustainability.  The teacher support materials are in a CRC folder within the Eco Schools channel of our Falkirk LfS Team. Our CRC children’s training day is Thursday 28th November between 9.15 and 2.45 pm. Please email Yvonne McBlain by Monday 18th November to register your class for participation or to request another training session for staff.
  3. We are glad that our very own Falkirk LfS Peer mentor (and RMPS Teacher) Samantha Wilson-McCaw from Braes HS will continue in her role this term. Samantha is happy to engage with schools and staff who have LfS as an improvement priority this year.
  4. Our Falkirk Learning for Sustainability blog has been refreshed over the summer here. This is our space for sharing and celebrating good practice and valuable ideas relating to LfS so please email Yvonne to add a post about your work.
  5. News from Education Scotland LfS Team – The DECS have updated their Climate Justice through Human Rights education resource. It can be accessed through the resources section of our website, and directly: ttps://wosdec.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/ECJ-T5.pdf
  6. Education Scotland’s new webpage on Children’s Rights is available Children’s rights in Scotland | Resource Themes | Education Scotland
  7. Social Enterprise Academy support opportunities – 26.9.24 teacher information session on Preparing for an SEA Dragon’s Den PLUS Understanding Social Enterprise – 18.9.24, 4- 5 pm – both online. Practitioners should register by emailing SarahRogerson@socialenteprise.academy
  8. Secondary School Global Social Leaders membership – more information here about this interactive, project-based learning programme where students, aged 11-18, work in teams to design and deliver a social action project. Students will connect with others across the world to learn from each other’s social action journeys through live virtual sessions and student-led, self-paced activities that encourage autonomy and agency. The programme is designed to support problem-solving, communication, creativity, critical thinking, and collaboration, enabling students to adapt and thrive in life and the future world of work
  9. Falkirk Secondary Schools Climate Summit takes place in Braes HS on 18th This event was organised by young people in Braes and Falkirk High Schools and delegates from each secondary school have been invited to attend. Yvonne contacted cluster chairpeople to invite primary pupil representation, but this does not appear feasible this year. We look forward to their involvement next time.
  10. John Muir Award – Information about changes to the running of the award: The John Muir Trust is redesigning and improving the John Muir Award – aiming to launch in 2025. Updates on progress through the autumn and winter via website and Award e-Bulletin. Due to the current challenging financial environment the Trust is making the following changes to how they run the John Muir Award:
    • No new Proposal Forms for the Award are being accepted at this time.
    • Any Proposal Forms that have already been received by the Trust will be reviewed and registered, providing Award Criteria can be met and the Awards are intended to be completed by 1st September 2024.
    • Upon Award completion, where registered participants have achieved the Award Criteria, electronic certificates in PDF format will replace hard copy certificate

11. The Scottish Government  have released this information and this toolkit to support Scotland’s Climate Week and climate action across the country:

Scotland’s Climate Week, held annually since 2016, brings together communities and organisations across the country to support climate action. This year, Climate Week will take place from 23 – 29 September. The focus of the week is on sharing “Stories for Change”, and we’ve created a toolkit for early learners, schools and caregivers, to get involved in this fantastic opportunity.

And finally, we hope to have your support with our first Falkirk LfS audit between October and December of this year. The audit is designed to establish what LfS looks like in our schools and centres and how we can support you better. We’ll keep it short and snappy but thought you’d like to know it was on its way.

Secondary Schools Energy Reduction Competition

Sharing the energy reduction challenge

Between October 2024 and March 2025 Falkirk Secondary Schools will compete to see which school can reduce their gas and electricity use the most. This competition will be led by a group of young people in each school who will be supported by a teacher and other staff members.

Prizes:

  • The school which reduces their unit usage most will receive £2000
  • For second place it’s £1000
  • And for third place £500
  • There will be other prizes
  • Prizes will be awarded at a ceremony in May/June 2025

The challenge to reduce carbon emissions and energy units/costs was issued by the Falkirk Council Place Services Extended Management Team. Our Falkirk Council Climate Change team are working with Children’s Services Learning for Sustainability colleagues to support schools with their efforts to reduce energy use.

Scroll down to explore the support which is available to staff and pupils taking part.

The Climate Change team support for young people and their adult:

  • We have created this guidance for the competition lead teacher or person in each school.
  • We will lead an information session for lead staff members on 17th September 4 – 5 pm via Microsoft Teams. (Lead staff members should sign up via CPD Manager code LfS 6-25).
  • Each school can have one remote or in-person lesson for their class or group of young people (just email climatechange@falkirk.gov.uk with 3 potential dates and times). 
  • We will provide access to a platform where you can access past, present and real time information about each schools’ energy use.
  • This webpage will include the leader board information and monthly energy use reports for each school. 
  • We are happy to offer advice and support at any point via email climatechange@falkirk.gov.uk .

SSI Learning for Sustainability & Digital Learning Team Support – what’s available?

This project fits beautifully with our Falkirk Learning for Sustainability Framework bundle 1 – exploring sustainable practices. Yvonne McBlain can support pupil voice or eco groups and staff members who lead this challenge. She can help them to plan & document this learning if needed and has created this interdisciplinary starter plan which captures the learning and skill development young people could gain from their participation.

Our digital learning team have created this document. to help with digital campaigning also.

Victoria Primary 6/7 S’mores and Hot Cocoa

Primary 6/7 children from Victoria PS took part in the Falkirk Social Enterprise Dragon’s Den event in November 2023. They pitched their social enterprise idea so well, that they won seed funding of £100 from the dragons. They wrote this blog post to tell everyone about their achievement.

We used the seed funding to organise an event in December for parents, carers and pupils in our school.  This took place at Christmas time, and we made and sold gingerbread men and candy cane gifts. We even had edible reindeer with twiglet antlers to give away free! Our food was so popular that we raised around £400. After the Christmas event we went around all classes to find out how to make our next event better. Some children told us to have a bigger choice of treats and to have more things that were free.

We decided to donate the money we made from these events to a charity called Victim Support Scotland (VSS).  We chose this charity because our school has been vandalised and VSS help anyone who has been affected by crime.

 

We took the advice of our fellow pupils then worked with primary 7M to organise more activities for our next event at Easter. We made Easter themed treats this time including cookie s’mores. We made sure that we had Halal food available and organised boxes so that those who were fasting for Ramadan would enjoy theirs at the right time. We sold hot chocolate, tea, coffee and cold drinks. Lots of our customers wanted water to drink and we had to keep going to get more to meet this demand. This was only one of the problems we had to solve, Another was not getting too stressed when long queues formed.  At this event we also held a raffle, and sold second hand books.

Our final event will take place on the second last day of term. We will make s’mores and cocoa for primary 7 parents and carers and primary 5, 6 and 7 pupils.

What have we learned from doing this social enterprise work?

  1. Counting and using money
  2. Responsibility
  3. Kindness
  4. Confidence in speaking to people
  5. Resilience (we learned from our mistakes to make the events get better each time)
  6. Problem-solving

How do we feel about getting a social enterprise award?

  • We feel good.
  • We feel proud that we have a Social Enterprise Award plaque in our school reception.
  • We loved using some of our earnings to treat our class to a Dominos pizza.

We would love to do more social enterprise next year when we are in primary 7. Thank you for reading this blog post about our award.

Exciting Partnership with Social Enterprise Academy

Social Enterprise Academy Scotland is a social enterprise organisation which “enables every young person to step up, realise their potential, and create the change they want to see in the world.”

Practitioners and senior leaders in Falkirk Children’s Services can get more information here and can also access professional learning offered in collaboration with Social Enterprise Academy (SEA) via CPD Manager.

Practitioners in some Falkirk schools have already signed up for support from SEA and will take part in our very first Falkirk SEA Dragon’s Den event on 4th November 2022 at Larbert High School. This event provides an opportunity for pupils to pitch a social enterprise idea to a panel of dragons in the hope of winning seed funding to support the growth of their social enterprise idea. These events can be incredibly inspiring for young people, to meet and network with likeminded peers, but also to engage in something they are truly passionate about and to have meaningful social or environmental impact.

SEA deliver pupil workshops to help school groups develop their enterprising ideas in preparation for the Dragon’s Den. The workshops are delivered by experienced facilitators, who are either social entrepreneurs in their own right, or have experience working within social enterprises. At this stage, the groups are expected to pitch their social enterprise ideas – meaning there is no need to have their social enterprise operational or established before the event. This support is all free to schools because it is fully funded by the Scottish Government and you can watch the promo video here from a recent Dragons’ Den in Glasgow. Click here to see SEA Getting Ready for the Falkirk Dragons Den PDF.

 

Working in Partnership – Scotdec

Our LfS partners are an essential part of our LfS Framework in Falkirk and there are so many great resources out there to support schools and ELCCs with the LfS bundles.

 

One of our key partners – Scotdec continues to offer brilliant courses and resources to support our practitioners.

Click here  to see the wide range of CLPL courses which Scotdec are offering this session. October is Black History month, and this link shares excellent resources for anti-racist education.

Over the years we have also had several Falkirk teachers taking part in a year long CLPL opportunity which is accredited by GTC Scotland and the feedback has been really positive.  More information can be found in this flyer .

 

An exciting new initiative this year has been the development of a resource which will allow staff to access a wide range of materials which have been mapped by Scotdec to our 5 LfS bundles.   This canva is an excellent resource which assist planning our LfS bundles.

Creative Tools Which Teach Pupils about Biosecurity

Pupil power takes saving our seabirds to another level

Online education resources designed by school children launched by conservation project

RSPB Scotland is encouraging primary schoolteachers to inspire Scotland’s young nature conservationists to save our seabirds by signing up to a free education resource.

Designed by pupils for pupils, with the support of RSPB Scotland’s Education, Youth & Families team, the resources are all available in English, Gaelic and Welsh. They have been produced as part of the Biosecurity for LIFE project which is working to raise awareness of the threat of invasive predators to seabirds and put in place systems to prevent their accidental introduction to islands. Click here to watch a short video which explains this biosecurity threat.

The education resource pack is available here, and includes online modules including:

  • an online snakes and ladders style game created by pupils from Small Isles and Raasay Primary – the aim of of the game is to collect as many eggs as possibly whilst avoiding predators,
  • a module showing how pupils launch a campaign to share this important conservation story
  • a free physical board game designed by pupils from Small Isles Primary with the aim of eradicating rats from islands.

For more information on the six modules, visit http://www.biosecurityforlife.org.uk/educaton. Click here to read the full press release about how the resources were developed. The programme is easy to navigate and celebrates the creative ideas of children as a way to teach school pupils about biosecurity.. If you would like to sign up to this FREE programme, please fill in and return the request from attached to educationscotland@rspb.org.uk and we will get it sent out in the post. Please note, the board game is part of module 3 of the programme and there is a digital snakes and ladders game included as well. 

Bintastic names for Falkirk Council’s waste vehicles

Waste Services and Street Cleansing want to say a huge thank-you to all the schools that participated in our Name the Vehicle competition.

Thanks to the creativity from both High School and Primary pupils, we now have 24 vehicles with names such as:

  • The Trashinator
  • Binnie the Pooh
  • Bin Kardashian
  • Sweeping Beauty
  • Lightning McClean
  • Bindianna Jones

 

Our overall favourite was from Archie from St Margaret’s PS, who named one of the scarabs ‘Haggis, Sweeps and Tatties’. He is pictured below with Gordon Ross, from Falkirk Council.

Keep your eyes peeled for the rest of the vehicles when you see them!

 

It’s Time for Spring Clean 2022

Litter levels in Scotland are at their worst in a decade. Research from Keep Scotland Beautiful shows that 88% of Scots agree that litter is a problem across Scotland, and 70% are concerned about the problem in their area.

The Spring clean runs from the 21st  March to the 21st April 2022 and is the perfect opportunity to make a difference by picking up litter from your playground, beach, streets, parks and beyond.

We know young people feel strongly about caring for the environment and want to do something about the harmful effects of litter on their communities. Every action, however small, makes a difference. Just half an hour of picking up litter and disposing of it safely can help an area look cleaner and feel safer, and evidence shows it also prevents more litter being dropped.

45,000 people volunteered their time to do a litter pick during Spring Clean in 2019 and this year, we want to encourage as many schools as possible to take part!

Use the hashtags #SpringCleanFalkirk to showcase what you and your school are doing to get involved!

How to get involved:

Falkirk Council specific events

  • Organise a Clean Up. Register your litter pick at Rubbish & litter – Organising a local Clean Up | Falkirk Council with the reference ‘Spring Clean’ to support individuals, groups and schools with organising their own Clean Up activity. We will register your event with keep Scotland Beautiful so you don’t have to.
  • Create a Litter Prevention Action Plan. Sign up to our help session (date and time will be confirmed closer to event) to hear about previous schools’ experience with their Action Plans and what you need to do to create one.
  • Listen to our pre-recorded session. This session will be uploaded to the website closer to the event and will feature what specific actions are being done across Falkirk to tackle litter, flytipping and dog fouling.
  • Use hashtag #SpringCleanFalkirk or #CleanUpFalkirk for all Spring Clean activity.

  Keep Scotland Beautiful events:

  • Pledge the number of bags. As part of the #BigBagChallenge, fill out the pledge form (will be uploaded on website closer to the date), and pledge the bags you will collect.
  • Join a public event listed. The Clean Up Scotland map will have public facing events individuals can join.
  • Complete a survey in your community. If individuals can’t do a Clean Up then they can always help Keep Scotland Beautiful by gather data using the citizen science toolkit.
  • Tune in to the Litter and Waste live lessons. During the Spring Clean, Keep Scotland beautiful will be investigating about the harmful effects of litter on wildlife, why modern plastics are such a problem when disposed of incorrectly, and how litter dropped on land ends up in the sea.

Dandelion Project

All Falkirk secondary schools, and their associated primaries,  have been invited to take part in this exciting, fully funded, food growing initiative.  The Dandelion Schools’ Growing Initiative (DSGI) will take place between April and September 2022 across Scotland and will involve 500 invited schools.

There are free resources, including a specially designed vertical growing cube, tattie growing packs, training materials and support packs.  More information can be found in the  Dandelion Schools Brochure. 

 

Falkirk schools have until the 10th February to register. 

This would be a great transition project and could be led by a secondary faculty, LfS lead, ECO or similar pupil led group, or maybe a team of secondary staff whose subject areas link with the project aims.

If anyone would like to discuss this further contact jane.jackson@falkirk.gov.uk  or  yvonne.mcblain@falkirk.gov.uk

Introducing our Litter and Waste Education Enforcement Officer

Ella Gorman is our Falkirk Council Waste Services and Litter Education Enforcement Officer. She can support learning about litter and its impact on our communities for Primary and Secondary schools. This includes lessons on litter, recycling and overall waste reduction (virtually or in person when possible). Ella has currently worked with 10 primary schools and 2 high schools to create their Litter Prevention Action Plan and to support local litter picks. Ella has compiled the following information about how she can help and she can be reached via this link.

 

Say no to litter!
Litter is dangerous, disgusting and damages our Falkirk communities. The environment is something we need to take care of and keeping Falkirk clean and tidy has never been more of a priority.

Falkirk Council has a 5 year Litter Strategy and Litter Prevention Action Plan to support recycling, litter and waste reduction (click here to view). It outlines the steps we want to take to encourage a joint responsibility over Falkirk’s streets, towns and green spaces so that everyone can enjoy their local environment. Litter ruins the environment and our local communities, and we want to work with schools, businesses, community groups, landowners and individuals to take pride in their communities and keep Falkirk litter free.

Waste Services are currently working with schools to spread the slogans ‘bin it’ and ‘take litter home’. By supporting the creation of artwork, giving litter presentations and helping to organise litter picks we encourage pupils across Falkirk to respect and value the environment and their local community.

 

How can we support you? We can: 

  1. Deliver lessons about litter and waste
  2. Support litter picks
  3. Loan litter pick equipment
  4. Get involved with waste and recycling projects
  5. Help create your school Litter Prevention Action Plan
  6. Help define your Litter Prevention Action Plan actions

Use the contact link here to see how we can help support your school in the fight against litter.