Teachers, Sunbirds & Gardens

With the end of the year fast approaching, CTEET hosted its second Eco-Schools Teacher Training Workshop on 21 July. The workshop was hosted at Mondeor Eco School, a CTEET supported Eco-School in the Helderberg Cluster. The day was well attended, with over 30 teachers and interested partners taking part in the workshop.

The morning began with a quick catch-up session around the schools’ portfolios, ironing out and assisting with any issues and challenges the schools may be facing. As part of the Eco-Schools programme, the schools need to compile and submit portfolios of evidence around their school-greening projects and incorporating environmental themes into the classroom.

Ceinwen from the Ingcungcu: Sunbird Restoration Project (one of the many projects currently funded by the CTEET and TMF Small Grants Facility) showed off this exciting project, and presented various ways in which the schools could utilize indigenous gardens as part of their lessons. The teachers were then given the opportunity to brainstorm lessons inspired by the Eco-Schools theme Nature and Biodiversity, as well as the indigenous gardens. Teachers are encouraged to not only design lessons for traditional classroom sessions, but also to make use of outdoor classroom settings.

After the lovely share sessions teachers split into groups to take part in various activities set-up by the CTEET educator team. Activities were both physical and craft-based, tying in cross-curriculum links to the Nature and Biodiversity theme. One of the activities included a competition to see which group could produce the most creative nature-inspired item out of waste. It was certainly a tough competition to judge as all the groups produced amazing creations, with wonderful environmental messages and stories as a basis for their creation!

Thank you to everyone who attended and joined in this successful workshop!