On the 9th of July multiple schools entered Sparks to experience and interact with the Earth Day Heroes awards event. We had the honour to help with this event as part of our work experience placements where we introduced the different schools to sit in the Department of Imagination to listen to environmental speakers such as Naomi Wilkinson who discussed her many adventures across the world  and her interactions with rescue animals.This speech was followed by Alex Montgomery who runs Generation Soil. He shared many interesting facts, such as how there are ten billion microbes in a single tablespoon of soil. 

After the speakers,  the schools were presented with awards depending on how developed and sustainable the children’s projects were. Each school had the opportunity to explain their sustainable ideas to the audience and how their eco-friendly actions are contributing positively to the environment. There were three types of awards that they earned; the acorn, the sapling and the mighty oak, reflecting how their projects can continue to grow even stronger over time. For example, Fairfield School won three acorn awards and one sapling award to recognise their hard work. As volunteers we helped out by working closely with the children as they indulged in forming an artistic tree display based on what makes their school community strong, allowing their creative thinking skills to blossom . 

After this activity the children were asked for their feedback on how successful they felt today’s event was. We encouraged feedback by composing a rating scale consisting of green (meaning yes), yellow (maybe), and red (no) stickers to react to a series of questions relating to today. On top of this we had created paper leaves where they could write their opinions, and pin it to a flower wall display. Our favourite feedback leaf read “seeing so many schools taking actions to make our world a better, safer, and happier place to live.” and “ I really enjoyed learning about loads of different things about our planet and all the challenges that Naomi did. I like doing our project to save the planet”  Highlighting how enjoyable this experience was for them.

Overall as volunteers, we would rate this event very successful because it was not only educational to the children but also educational and inspiring for us.

By Elosie Pope and Rosabelle Wilson Year 12 work experience students from Bristol Free School