Up-cycling and Recycling Workshop

When discussing Environmental Geography, we show your students that small steps can add up to big changes. We teach about ways to reduce our ecological footprint and help maximise our earth's precious resources. During this workshop we discuss a range of green issues in the home, at school, and in a global context. With the aid of an interactive presentation, we visit an award-winning building called 'Earthship' which is powered by renewable energy and is built from recycled materials.

After exploring some of the key issues involved, we examine a range of a diverse range of recycled and up-cycled objects and materials from around the world. We then get hands on and make a visually unique up-cycled notebook from old maps paper and card.

Small steps can add up to big changes. So let's all learn to reduce our ecological footprint and help maximise our earth's precious resources.

We open up a dialogue with the pupils to raise awareness on green issues coming up every day at home, in their school and out in the wider world. We will look at a variety of colourful up'cycled objects made from different materials followed by a Q&A session.

Making use of redundant materials challenges us to create new and useful objects from what we formerly regarded as rubbish. Our up-cycling workshop uses a Tetra Pac juice carton to created a wallet to demonstrate the transformation of an everyday item. This example shows how discarded cardboard, aluminium and plastic can be used again to create a new object which is both durable and hard wearing. By the end of the session the pupils have learnt that we can all take part in making our world a cleaner and greener place to live.

All of our workshops are completed by making or growing an eco item to take home to enjoy, they are also a reminder that we can all make a difference at home school and the wider world. We also provide colourful recycled and up-cycled handling materials the useful eco designed items add rich sensory experience the event.

Currently only 13% of our electronic waste is being recycled. The technological revolution has changed how we live and communicate, but at the same time has created new challenges environmentally. This workshop explores the mounting problem of electronic waste. When electronic devices are disposed of the non-biodegradable components that make up our phones, fridges, televisions, hairdryers and laptops, leave a toxic footprint and go on to accumulate in the environment, soil, air, water and living things.

In this workshop participants use a redundant retro disket and a wide range of recycled papers to make an Eco Ideas Booklet for their own personal projects. During the session students are free to select from materials provided to craft the pages of a booklet unique to them, which expresses their personal inspirations and influences. The potential pages inside range from plain, coloured, graphic, textured material pieces, photos and fold outs which each maker selects to reflect their own design ideas. The finished booklet can be used as a diary, travel journal, sketch book or for capturing other moments of creativity and inventiveness.

By making the Eco Ideas Booklet pupils will be inspired to think about using refurbished devices and know at the end of the technology's useful life, they can donate or recycle their electronics, rather than seeing them as disposable. To bring the subject to life in the classroom, we will examine a range of expired storage formats, including tapes, mini disks, old mobile phones and VHS tapes.

As a class we discover how far food travels by tracing the journeys of different varieties of fruit and vegetables. We discuss how food is grown, the benefits of fresh food and the responsibility we all share to reduce the huge amount of packaging and food thrown away every day.

This workshop is completed by making paper pots planted with vegetable seedlings or growing micro greens. Pupils will also be shown how to make a recycled watering can. The seedlings can be taken home or grown at school enabling pupils to observe how the plants change and develop over time. This hands on activity demonstrates how easy and fun it can be to grow seasonal food and thereby reduce food miles and packaging. The session emphasises the value of healthy eating for us all.

Curriculum topics available: Healthy Living, Healthy eating.

In our workshops we open up a dialogue with pupils to raise awareness on green issues coming up every day at home, in their school and out in the wider world. Our sessions help students explore climate change as a global issue and discuss the actions that we can take to make positive changes.

During our workshops students learn how to make informed decisions to enable them to take micro actions and make the right choices to live sustainably, buy better, consume less, create real environmental change. We will also explore and discuss a variety of colourful up'cycled objects made from different materials from around the world and finish by growing seasonal food or making a visually unique eco item to take home and enjoy.

Pupils will learn about sustainability in more depth so they can contribute to environmental stewardship. The workshops will contribute to emotional literacy by supporting students in voicing their fears and anxieties and starting to harness the resources they need to sustain personal wellbeing.