Creating Value In Schools
Please enjoy this free content - for more Need To Know articles please consider a subscription
In the podcast From prom shop to polytunnel: sustaining eco-activity in school, we asked Wendy Litherland, Head of Education at Solar for Schools, about advice for schools considering solar. What tips would she give? Top takeaway: use your building as a starting point for learning!
|
Questions for reflection and action
|
I think the first tip would be to get your governors on board. I spent about eight years trying to get solar in our school, and what I haven't realised is our chair of governors was a surveyor and he'd come across all the problems with solar roof panels, so every time solar was mentioned, his response was no.
Eventually I connected him with the head of engineering from Solar for Schools, at a conference. And he signed the day after, because he then understood it properly. He was rightly protective of the school roof, because there had been people, probably considered cowboys, who had left schools with leaky roofs.
My next advice is to do your reading and check the details. Find out what this is about, what you’re getting into, how you’re either going to fund it yourselves or with another kind of funding scheme. Think about how you can benefit.
There’s a lot to learn in schools from the estate itself. The building is an educational tool that is completely missed in most cases! At Solar for Schools, we believe it’s all about education – even before any solar panels are installed.
So once it's agreed at the right levels in school, that solar is the way forward – which in most cases is a no brainer because we use the buildings during the day when it's sunny – you can start getting the children to think about questions such as:
Children can help in the design of the panels. We’ve got an app that the children can use, similar to what our designers have, just slightly less powerful. It can predict how much energy you can generate, which is great for Key Stage 3 physics, and maybe Key Stage 2.
Then you can look at appliances, and how much they cost. A kilowatt hour is really hard to understand for a child, and even for adults it might have been brushed over at school, or just one line on the physics syllabus. So it’s a great opportunity to understand energy bills as well.
So there's lots of learning points, before it's even installed. And then there’s the actual installation itself: an opportunity for learning about green careers. These are people whose jobs didn't exist 10 years ago!
My mantra is we are teaching children for jobs that don't exist yet. We can't even imagine some of the jobs. Think of the roles AI is creating that we’d never dreamt of!
Also, these are opportunities for jobs that are outside. You might be able to do something different every day, work with different people. The children have seen things like the option of going to university, hopefully getting a professional job. Or if not, you’ve got your supermarkets or you’re at a computer. This doesn’t float everyone’s boat!
A lot of children want to be outside, doing things. They want something that’s more manual, not sitting down all day. So we always introduce them to the installers, who will do an assembly or talk.
There's various things that can spin off this, in fact thousands of things that can spin off this! We've had children who have gone on to do architecture because they've been using the app and understanding some different things, and it really prompted an interest in building and design.
I’m very keen on using what we’ve got and just opening our eyes, very much like we do in nature – or don't, maybe. When we go outside, let’s take a look at what’s there and get children to reconnect.
I spent many times on the school field, doing quadrats and then saying, right, we're going to have 10 minutes and we’re just going to look at the grass.
‘Oh, it's grass. There's nothing there, Miss.’
‘Well, go on. Let's have a look a bit closer.’
And before you know it, they've spotted something. There may be a worm that’s moved or an insect, or the fact they've noticed there's different types of grass and you've got your vetch, you've got your clover. And something that sounded dismally boring has now become something that's slightly different.
And we forget. It's just reconnecting. Our grandparents, great grandparents, were probably much more connected. They knew the bird sounds, they would identify the trees without problem. They knew the little tips to make you better, with various herbs, which we seem to be losing very quickly.
For me, it’s all been self-learning. My degree is physiology, which is really nothing to do with all this!
But I think, as a teacher, you do have a passion to learn, don’t you? If you can learn and be passionate, the children can be passionate about their learning as well. I always feel like I learn something new every day with things.
Listen to the full podcast (36 minutes)
