Lovely Rotters Outreach programme

Following a very successful trial, Sir Harold Hillier Gardens is delighted to offer outreach sessions to help students understand decay including worms, bacteria and composting. Visits are 1 hour for an indoor session or 1.5 hours for an outdoor session.

Who for?

1 class of year 2, 3 or 4 students with class teacher and SEN support. Programme can be scaled up or down, with prior notice.

Why? Because we can bring a wormery to you, for a fun engaging programme to:

Help children learn about nature and become more invested in protecting the environment.
Bring your school in line with 2025 Sustainability and waste collection (see below).
Use simple scientific equipment (magnifying glasses/microscopes) to investigate worms (notice that worms live in soil, need water, food and air, have eggs and young which grow into adults).
Identify and compare the suitability of a variety of everyday materials for composting, including food scraps, wood, metal, plastic, glass, brick, rock, paper and cardboard
Set up a simple longitudinal study (making a composter or planting a seed)
Recognise that their small actions (litter/recycling) are important to the environment helping/harming living things

When?

These sessions can be booked from September to February.

Programme outlines

Charges

Indoor session: £120 for the first class; second class £30

Outdoor session: £164 for the first class; second class £45

Charge includes mileage for schools within 15 miles of Sir Harold Hillier Gardens (SO51 0QA). Additional miles (over 30 miles round trip) charged at current Hampshire rates. Additional classes may be possible.

For more information or to make a booking please contact the Education team: [email protected]

2025 Sustainability and Waste Collection

From 31 March 2025, recycling and collection measures for all types of recyclable waste were required to be in place in your school, except garden waste and plastic film. For schools, this includes:

Food waste
Glass (bottles, jars)
Metal (aluminium and steel tins, cans, foil)
Plastic (bottles, tubs, trays, containers)
Paper (envelopes, magazines, copier paper, shredded paper)
Cardboard (cardboard boxes, corrugated cardboard)

You should ensure that both staff and pupils understand the importance of recycling and how to do this properly.

Recycling is one of the 3Rs: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle.
Rubbish needs to be sorted into different materials before it can be recycled.
Plastic, glass and wood can be recycled and made into new and useful things.
Support with declaring a climate emergency day in your school. What could you do to reduce your own impact, but also as a class and as a school?