What if London was a National Park City

Click here for a short video What if London was a National Park City

Making London a National Park City is a great idea. Celebrating what communities have already achieved in London, it’s a long-term, large-scale vision to make the capital greener, healthier, more enjoyable and prosperous.

This first of five videos explains what the London National Park City idea is all about. Subscribe now. We’ll be publishing more videos soon.

Visit our website to get involved and help make it happen.

http://www.nationalparkcity.london

Join us on September 21 for a landmark community event at Southbank to explore how and why it should happen. Hosted by Josie Long, speakers include designer Wayne Hemingway, campaigner Fiona Reynolds, firefighter Simon Jakeman, as well as the Bollywood Brass Band, artists and poets. You can expect an evening of entertaining performances, provocative ideas and proactive thinking.

http://www.southbankcentre.co.uk/what…

We need your help to make London a National Park City. London can become a National Park City once at least two-thirds (436) of London’s 654 wards and the Mayor of London have declared their support. The good news is that the Mayor of London and over 200 wards have already declared their support. We now need to recruit the support of 200 more! Live or work in London? Visit our website to find out how you can help.

This film was created by the Greater London National Park City Initiative and made with support from the National Geographic Society.

Director: Mark Chaudoir
Creative Director: Judy Ling Wong CBE
Producer: Siôn Elis Williams
Executive producer: Daniel Raven-Ellison

“Let’s make London the world’s first National Park City. A city where people and nature are better connected. A city that is rich with wildlife and every child benefits from exploring, playing and learning outdoors. A city where we all enjoy high-quality green spaces, the air is clean to breathe, it’s a pleasure to swim in its rivers and green homes are affordable. Together we can make London a greener, healthier and fairer place to live. Together we can make London a National Park City. Why not?”

#NationalParkCity

Maquette’s by yr3

Ice, Rock Salt and Food Colouring

As the temperature has been dropping over the last few weeks, I thought a bit of scientific fun with Ice, would be great for reception.

Leftover Popcorn

Thread the leftover popcorn onto cotton or leaf stems, to make excellent bird feeders.

This is a brilliant activity for improving fine motor skills, patience and communication skills.  It is suitable for children with nut allergies (see earlier post on bird feeders for more ideas)

Gardening with the RHS

This Term we are focusing on fruit click here to find out how our orchard is progressing

Perfect for Pollinators

We learnt about pollination, how we need bees to pollinate our fruit crops. We sowed hardy annuals in pots to plant out near our fruit crops.

Strawberry Patch Maths

How many strawberry plants do we need to make a strawberry patch? We measured out our plot, worked out the spacing between each plant and planted up the strawberries.

Travelling food

We posed the question “Where does most of our fruit come from?” We looked at the food miles of fruit grown in the world and compared that to locally grown produce.

Building houses for Barbie, ken and Action man

Year 6 have been designing shelters for our intrepid forest school explorers Barbie, Ken and Action man. They made a list of resources,  decided on the number of rooms and whether they would be in a tree house or bungalow.  Once each group was happy with the results,  they became estate agents tasked with viewings and creating a sales pitch.

Team Building

Torrential rain and high winds didn’t spoil the last forest school session of this half term. We split into 4 teams, the 1st used the kelly kettle to boil water for hot chocolate, they set up the cups in the hide and ensured the camp fire stayed alight to keep us all warm. The other 3 groups took part in the final team building exercise, ‘walking the plank’  The team challenge was to move from the large fire circle to the hide without stepping off the planks. Great communication and co-operation enabled all the teams to successfully complete the task. The prize, to dunk their biscuits in the hot chocolate instead of getting them soggy in the rain.

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Puppets in the forest

Sawing, drilling wholes, collecting, threading, being creative, sharing resources  and above all working together to create these wonderful woodland characters.

Making Bird Feeders

All you need are some toilet paper tubes, peanut butter and bird seed. You can either spread peanut butter over the cardboard tube and roll it in the birdseed, or mix the peanut butter with the bird seed and fill the tube. You can then slip it onto a tree branch or hang it off a branch with string.

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What to do with a collection of Leaves, Sticks, Berries and other Treasures

 

Reception sharing their collections

Reception sharing their collections

These were the children’s favourites

Andy Goldsworthy Art

Add yellow and orange cellophane and tissue paper

Bonfires