Music Studio at St Martin’s at Shouldham Primary in Norfolk

In the New Year, St Martin’s at Shouldham C of E Primary School officially opened their recently completed new eco friendly Classroom.

Situated in the heart of Norfolk, St Martin’s is an established school of excellence when it comes to sustainability and it’s one of the focuses of their curriculum.

Located in the lowest lying county in the UK, the pupils are very much aware of climate change with predictions like the sea levels are forecast to rise by 80cm over the next 50 years means they are eager to act now to ensure they grow up in the most eco friendly environment possible – starting with their school.

St Martins has taken several steps to ensure sustainability is part of every pupils routine at the school, with each class appointing an energy monitor whose job it is to make sure everything that can be turned off is turned off, this guarantees no unnecessary energy is expended. The school also boasts an impressive garden which teaches the pupils not only about living a healthy lifestyle and eating a balanced diet, but the garden itself is sustainably maintained. Rain water is collected to keep the garden watered and a school compost bin provides a healthy and sustainable source of soil.

To stay in keeping with their environmental attitudes, and to ensure they can keep growing and moving forwards, St Martin’s have recently replaced an old temporary classroom with a brand new state of the art eco friendly classroom. This new classroom will have a multitude of different uses including being used as a music room, an art room and a food technology room during in school hours with plans to use it as a breakfast club, an after school club, and a church club being considered too. This means that the whole community can benefit from this addition as well as the pupils.

The children have spent the last couple of weeks eagerly watching the erection of their new classroom and have had a say in not only what it’s used for, but also what eco friendly extras are added to their new building too, with sun pipes being one of the most popular suggestion which let a lot of extra light flood into the classroom dramatically cutting down on electricity needed to light the room. St Martin’s are also planning to add photovoltaic cells to help generate electricity too, all of which will lead to a dramatic reduction in their carbon footprint. All this along with their rain water collection and school compost and recycling incentives prove this school really deserves its reputation for being a pioneer in sustainability in schools.

St Martin’s are rightly proud if their reputation and are eager to spread the word about what they’ve learnt to their neighbours. They are planning on inviting other local schools to their new classroom and showing how their eco friendly incentives are benefiting their school and how these incentives can be implemented at other schools too.