The children have been fascinated by the book ‘Somebody Swallowed Stanley’ by Sarah Roberts which introduced some of the effects that plastic pollution can have upon marine life and our oceans. The children learned how dangerous plastic bags can be for many marine animals. We discussed how plastic is a good material for it’s different uses, but that it is polluting our oceans as plastic often ends up here. At the end of the story a kind boy rescues Stanley (a plastic bag), saves a turtle (caught up in the plastic bag) and then turns the plastic bag into a kite. We talked as a class about how important it is to prevent plastic bags ending up in the ocean and introduced the concept of reusing and recycling plastic and brainstormed ideas on how we could all do this.
The children were then challenged to make their own kites, like the boy in the story, by reusing a plastic bag and tying string to the handles. The children had great fun testing out their kites!