The Hilltop Road Public School’s website states that the school is “committed to providing quality teaching and learning programs that enable students to maximise their learning potential and be the best they can possibly be”.
This year, the Year 2 group were asked to select a school relevant subject for Project Based Learning. The students had recently learned about Nepal’s earthquakes and the effects of these earthquakes on the children of Nepal. One of the problems identified was the lack of access to clean water. With this in mind the children elected to study how they could save water within their own school community and considered how this could translate to help the community in Nepal.
Renee Cowpe, the Deputy Principal and Year 2 Teacher, said ‘Through the course of this project it has been possible to track our water savings authentically using the SUMS portal. It was decided that any water savings achieved through this PBL (over one billing period) would result in cost savings for our school and this money would be sent directly to Nepal. The children were already familiar with SUMS data from previous maths exercises and this unit of study was designed to cover the science syllabus and a writing unit (Persuasive writing).”
Here are a few of the activities completed by the children as part of this unit of study:
- Students wrote a persuasive letters to their parents about water savings
- Creative Slogans and visuals representations were put up around the school to encourage water wise behaviour
- Year 2 pitched their plan to the school in a morning assembly
- Students wrote speeches that were presented to other classes
- Water stickers and awards (called GOTHCA’s) were designed and handed out to students displaying water wise behaviour in the school environment
- Meetings were held to include school cleaners and maintenance staff in the school’s water saving efforts
- A MUFTI day was held where students were asked to donate a gold coin for Nepal
The image below shows one of the posters created by the students:
Finally, a Wishing Well was created to provide a visual illustration of the school’s weekly water savings and students would colour the well in blue to show weekly savings.
Paul Marsh, Managing Director at SUMS, said: “It is great to see students and teachers engaged in water savings and utilising the SUMS platform in daily learning. The final savings at Hilltop Primary School are as yet unknown…but the eagerness of these Year 2 students (and the broader school community) to make a difference is not lost on us. For this reason, we have decided to match any money saved at the school through water savings, enabling these students to make an even greater contribution to the children of Nepal. Thank you to Hilltop Road Primary School for your commitment to water savings, the environment, quality teaching and inspired learning.“
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