Our year 6 students have done it again! This time last year, we were celebrating our first batch of saplings finding their final planting site, and this year we are once more proud of our planting achievement. Different cohort of children, different secondary school, but the same appalling bad weather(!) and the same successful outcome.
The weather was actually even worse this year than last; cold driving wind and heavy rain, and the site at Longhill was exposed and a little distance from the school buildings. Despite these disadvantages, our children showed remarkable steadfastness and determination to finish their task. We took 21 children in a minibus kindly loaned by Brighton College, a local private school. We were joined by a few year 8 students from Longhill secondary school and their science teacher Mr Alex Hinks-Roberts and several other staff.
Stuart Davies, our Woods for the Trees volunteer, and tree planting expert, gave us a demonstration for the first tree, and then the children got stuck in. I’m not going to say there were no complaints about the mud and the worms and the weather, (one of the secondary girls was complaining that the rain was making her make-up run!) but, on the whole, the children were hard-working and good-natured about the work.
One of our children was a self-appointed stake basher and enjoyed wielding the mallet. It’s great to see how children who can be challenging in a school environment can find their niche when they have a job to do out in a natural environment.
We planted 31 trees, mostly oak with a handful of sycamore. Some of our year 6 children will be going to Longhill School next year and will be able to watch with pride as these trees grow and develop.
