Captivating Children Inspiring the up-and-coming green generation

Format for Workshop Introductions 5 mins Westmill Case Study 10 mins Planning fun and engaging activities 15 mins Sharing experiences of education work 25 mins Closing 5 mins

Alison Grunewald – WeSET Education Officer Engaging Schools and Children Westmill started as a group of local people who wanted to make a difference. Westmill Sustainable Energy Trust was set up to take forward some of the values that led to the building of Westmill. It is a charity dedicated to promoting renewable energy and sustainability, principally through education, but also through arts and local energy projects. WeSET is funded through 1% of the earnings generated from the renewable energy sales.

The five 1.3 MW turbines and 22,000 solar panels, generating roughly 17.6 GWh per year.

Community Owned One of the largest community owned sites in the world, wholly owned by its 6,000 shareholders, most of whom are local.

Site Tours WeSET’s main educational activity is running site tours. These are aimed at groups from primary schools right up to post graduate level. As well as education establishments, there are visits from the general public on Open Days, home-school groups, Brownies, Guides, Cubs and Scout groups. There are currently ten volunteer guides and five volunteer trustees providing all the tours and school visits for free. Several of these guides are retired teachers, lecturers and engineers. It is only in the last year of WeSET’s existence that there has been paid support for all this educational work. Two part-time employees, now work one day a week each. An incredible 10,000 visitors have been to the site in 8 years.

Marketing Named person at school / personal links Postcards Newsletter STEM network Link to curriculum / core subjects Westmill started as a group of local people who wanted to make a difference. The five 1.3 MW turbines and 22,000 solar panels, generating roughly 17.6 GWh per year. Brookes - Teaching maths outdoors Association for Science Education – 4 to 7 Jan Reading University (£85 per day, £66 for Sat)

Schools’ Poster Competition Challenge your pupils to design a poster, either promoting renewable energy or encouraging people to tackle climate change. The best entry will win their school a free coach trip to Westmill Wind & Solar Farm.

Interactive Compasses Anemometers Decibel meters Solar power meters Laminated photos/info WeSET have put together a large number of gadgets to use during visits to make it interactive as possible. Count the number of revolutions of blades Ask lots of questions

Sensory and Physical Tours are sensory and physical as possible. Children are encouraged to use most of their senses - hear and touch as well as see the turbines and panels. “Can we actually touch them” True and false game – all start in middle and have to run to one side or other if statement is true or false Turn whole group into a turbine playing the role of different parts in the mechanism Lynn Knapps – counting in Japanese example

Encourage physical interaction with their environment Encourage physical interaction with their environment. Who can find out the name of the next turbine – run and find out. Ask children to lie down on their backs and look up at turning blades Local schools got to choice a name for each of the five turbines – Huff and Puff, Wind Warrior, Gusty Gizmo, Zeus

Visual Use as many visual aids as you can. Ask children what different ways we have of generating energy. As children name sources of energy give them an A4 picture of their answer. Get them to come out and stand in front of the group reinforcing what has been said. Children want to be one of those holding a picture. Then divide into fossil fuels and renewables.

Educational toys – learn by doing Educational toys and games – learning by doing. Solar powered train – station master hat start and stop train Wind powered cars – what angle do blades need to be to make it work best

Solar powered milk float For large events there is even a solar powered milk float.

Prove to themselves WeSET also go into schools and run assemblies and classroom sessions on renewable energy.

Major Events Once every two years there is a major public event, such as last year’s community energy conference and open day Ensure there is something for all children to do even the very littlest so that older members of family can go off on tour – Lego big hit

Collaboration with Others WeSET collaborate with other organisations like the National Trust at Coleshill, who are local to our site. Once a year they run an Earth Summit, where a large number of local schools bring classes for a whole day of activities looking at different aspects of sustainability. We run one of the sessions on renewable energy within sight of the turbines. This year we are developing links to the STEM network, who regularly get requests from schools for support.

Planning fun engaging activities Either Examples of successful engagement with children What did you find engaging as a child 15 minutes

Experiences of education work Whole group brainstorm Challenges of working with children and schools Small groups Story of time when education session went well What specific techniques or resources made that session work well Whole group Do any of the ‘solutions’ meet the challenges 25 minutes

What support is needed from CAG Can CAG help provide resources or support to meet any of the challenges?