“We wanted to have a deeper discussion of ‘who are we’ and ‘how are we really living into these ideas of diversity, equity, and inclusion?” – Robin, High School teacher

At Green School, we talk often about our mission as an education institution – to nurture a community of changemakers who will make our world sustainable. It’s always exciting to talk about change-making, about going out and doing things, having impact and maybe even starting a revolution! 

But what about the other part of that mission statement? 

In order to “make our world sustainable,” we need to go beyond simply inspiring change and make sure the change we inspire is indeed sustainable. To do that requires a quieter, less flashy but equally important part of change-making – reflection and introspection. This is the goal of the High School unit, “Talking About a Revolution – Social Action in our Communities.” 

One of the many things we love about our High Schoolers is their deep commitment to our school values, and to exploring important concepts like Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. We see them get fired up when we talk about these values. We understand their eagerness to take action on them. First, however, we need them to undergo a process of deeper inquiry. In this unit, we guide them through that process by first looking at ourselves as a School community – discussing the assumptions we make about ourselves when it comes to these values, discussing the assumptions others might make who view Green School from the outside. Finally, we examine how we do or do not live up to these assumptions, especially whether we’re truly walking the talk when it comes to inclusion and belonging.

Our High School students hosting an International Women’s Day panel on diversity, equity and inclusion.

“Our students have been super engaged and willing to be reflective about who we are,” says Robin, one of our High School faculty who teaches this unit alongside our Head of High School, Harriett. “One of the main aims of this class was for our students to really think about ourselves as a community before we start asking others to take action with us,” says Harriett. “How do we create belonging and inclusion for different identities within our community? And when we look at gender identity and equality, how are we considering things beyond just boy vs girl, for example? What about other aspects of identity like race, religion, family size, socio-economic background, etc?”

The Talking About a Revolution unit was designed to stop students before they take action. To create space and time for them to dig deep and really understand the intention behind an action. They may have an idea for a desired outcome, but to get to where they want to go, students first need to know from where you’re starting out.

As part of the unit, students worked with Shiza Malik, campaigning expert, journalist and Regional Media and Communications Lead for Oxfam in Asia, to learn how to run a social action campaign that is intentional and thoughtfully executed in order to have the greatest impact possible. 

“Teaching the students about campaigning was an incredibly rewarding experience,” Shiza shared. “Their passion for social justice causes is inspirational. I hope they’re able to take their learnings from our time together to develop campaigns and lead real change.”

The students indeed took lessons from their workshop with Shiza and applied them to Green School’s annual V-Day movement to decide which actions would make the most sense for V-Day 2022.

“Having a conversation about what V Day is about, and reaching a consensus on that was actually really challenging,” says Robin. “We did an exercise where students wrote down responses to the question, “What do you RISE for?” – it was an exercise in taking part in a revolution that already exists, the One Billion Rising movement,” she explains.

Students across our campus collaborated on a RISE mural comprised of notes stating what our students rise for.

So what do our students rise for? Here were some of their responses to the “I Rise For…” prompt:

• • • Women
    • My Community
    • Racial Injustice
    • My Mom
    • Gender Equality
    • Food
    • Peace
    • Representation

These commitments and many others were shared as part of a campus-wide, collaborative collage that spelled the word RISE and was showcased at the school for the duration of our VOICES season, which began on V Day and culminated on International Women’s Day last month.

“What came out of that exercise and our conversations with Shiza and the other activists we spoke to was this feeling of empowerment, ” says Robin. “Students began to realize all the ways they could still take part in larger movements, even when they’re not the person who is comfortable speaking to a crowd with a microphone in hand.” 

With a greater understanding of the intention behind their actions, students feel newly empowered to channel other skills and passions into these movements – be it through art, music, poetry, dance, even cooking! Through this unit, we show our High School students that their voices matter, that there is power in their voice and that they need to take that power seriously and be intentional about the ways they use it.

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“Are you proud to be a woman? What makes you proud to be a woman, Ibu?” asked one of the students in the first meeting. A simple question, and a deep one.

 “Women are great at multi-tasking!” I answered spontaneously. 

And then I thought, a better question might be, what DOESN’T make me proud to be a woman? 

Women have played a significant role in the development of our country of Indonesia, whether they get credit for it or not. And although today we have women represented in many different roles in society, they are still often neglected in country-wide development and planning. This despite the fact that, at the household level, they hold equal decision-making status and are often described as the silent head of the home or “informal” power. 

Why do these roles persist? And how can we change them?

Students and teacher collaborating on  “I AM RISING” painting in celebration of V-day

In the “Women Rise for System Change” unit, I’m helping my high schoolers dig deeper into the current roles of women in social spheres, economic development and social justice, and discussing with them how women can rise for the betterment of ALL. The unit begins with a brainstorm and discussion about the book “How Women Rise” by Sally Helgesen & Marshall Goldsmith. This book outlines a basic template for change:

• Start with one thing – Making sustainable and lasting change requires focus. Not just momentary “let’s do it” enthusiasm, but the willingness to make a sustained and consistent effort over time. We accomplish this by taking one step at a time, not trying to change everything all at once and burning out.
• Don’t do it alone – It’s difficult to change a habit, but it’s almost impossible to change it alone. Why? Because, as humans, we all have built-in operating systems that can be hard to overcome. For instance, when we find ourselves in a familiar or triggering situation, we tend to default to our habitual response. Having a supportive partner in the work can get us back on track when we falter.

With this template in place, we work together to start identifying our “next best step” – making connections with our community and local organizations who are working towards the same goals and creating social action.

Ibu Sari, the founder of PKP Community Center in a panel discussion with our high schoolers for  V-day last year.

For instance, we are collaborating with PKP Community Center, a local organization founded to facilitate the empowerment of Balinese women and girls and advocate for gender equality in the local area of Payangan, north of Ubud. PKP empowers women by providing valuable job skills through education and programs that teach women cooking and catering skills or making and selling clothes and accessories. Their center also provides a critical safe haven for divorced women who are often highly stigmatized and ostracized in their communities. 

In the last unit we ran with PKP, our students worked alongside Ibu Sari, its founder, whose boundless energy and desire to improve the lives of local women, men, and children proved to be an inspiration and left a lasting impression on our learners. 

The high schoolers were self-directed in their efforts to support the center in whatever way they could. They thought long and hard about how they could be genuinely useful for the long-term. In the end, they decided to help PKP sell some of its products, as the organization’s market had shrunk dramatically during the pandemic. In the process of helping them, our students learned about taking stock of inventory, assessing the accounts, marketing the products, and selling products to a consumer. In a broader sense, they learned how smaller, local actions like this can really ladder up to make a difference, and eventually help create system change.

The “Women Rise for System Change” unit is a perfect example of how Green School focuses on REAL learning:

• Relationship-oriented – In exploring topics around social justice, students often have their own worldviews challenged by diverse perspectives. Their relationships to one another shift through class dialogues that encourage tactful disagreement and respectful conversation. 
• Experiential & Evolving – We don’t just learn about social justice theory and best practices, we take action on it by partnering with local organizations like PKP. Through these collaborations students experience what social action looks like in practice and how it evolves depending on global contexts – be it shifts in government policy or the impacts of a global pandemic.
• Authentic & Interconnected – Students start by connecting with, and more deeply understanding, social movements/questions and historical occurrences within a local context of Indonesia. Identifying the role of women in social, economic and development processes here gives them a framework for identifying those roles in other contexts.
• Local – At the end of the unit, our students can feel that they’ve made a real difference in their local community. Our continued collaboration with the PKP Community Center allows students a real opportunity to facilitate the empowerment and lasting financial independence of women and girls here in Bali.

At Green School, we believe when learning is REAL it is internalized, it plants a seed in the soul that is nurtured into a deeply held and life-long belief in the power of individual action to affect system change.

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“A little less conversation, a little more action please.”

Earlier this month, our High School students came together to host an all-day Sustainable Solutions event. As world leaders gathered in Glasgow during COP26 for more “talk talk talk” about future plans and commitments, our students sought to demonstrate the many ways they are taking action today to regenerate our world. The theme, fittingly, was “a little less conversation, a little more action please.”

In the photo gallery below, we share the actions our students are taking to create a sustainable world, and how we shared and celebrated their work with our Sustainable Solutions event.

Our High School students opened the event with a warm welcome and explanation of the day ahead, followed by a musical performance by the Green School Marimba band. Then, before all of the students dispersed to their separate activities, Ibu Isabelle from our community-led the students and faculty back to the present moment with a mindfulness session.

“What is really inspiring is that this event was a student-led event, I was so so happy to see our high school students taking ownership over this incredible piece of activism and engagement. As they join our community here they find their passion and are able to activate on that passion. This event really showcased that.” Leslie Medima, Head of Regeneration.

Our High School student, Noli, organized a sustainable fashion show featuring clothing from repurposed materials, thrifted clothing and a recent student clothing swap. She re-”modeled” these old clothes to make them more current and fashionable, supporting slow fashion as part of her sustainable solution.

The Green School community came together to paint an inspirational mural about climate activism. High School student, Tiago, shared his sustainable solution to create volleyball nets from discarded fishing nets collected from the ocean. The Sustainable Solution event had four learning objectives behind each session:

1. Inspire Green School students to care about issues revolving around sustainability
2. Bring various sustainability projects and conversations at Green School into one place
3. Provide real, tangible opportunities for students to take ACTION on combatting the climate crisis
4. Live and model the Green School mission – a community of learners making our world sustainable

The student organizers put so much effort and detailed thinking into the day’s itinerary. There were sustainable sports panels and volleyball games for students who are into sports, planting bamboo seedlings as part of our carbon zero initiative, a bio-cosmetic workshop for students to make sustainable DIY cosmetics and more. As part of our student-led “Menstruation Mission” project, students came together to stitch reusable menstruation pads.

The day also featured several panel discussions, including this one with the Green School Carbon Zero team, alongside representatives from our European Commission collaborator, su.re-co.

A discussion with Sungai Watch, Terra Water and our teacher and resident ocean ambassador, Pak Francis, on taking action to create healthy waterways and clean our oceans, Pak Made Janur, recently named one of CNN’s Heroes for 2021 shares his work on providing rice to local villagers in Indonesia during the pandemic, in exchange for plastic they collected around the island. 

“We were able to see a variety of workshops given by different experts and climate activists. We had this cool, engaging, and interesting conversation and wrapped it all up with some cool music and a great documentary on plastic pollution – Pulau Plastic.” – Lucas grade 12.

Some inspiring performers also participated in the event. Rizal is an inspiring musician with a sustainable bamboo guitar. We also had a special performance from Roby Navicula who is also an activist advocating against plastic pollution through his documentary Pulau Plastic.

After all of the panels and workshops, all of the participants went back to our Sangkep, or assembly hall, to discuss their commitment as a community of learners making our world sustainable. Green School alumna, Melati Wijsen, co-founder of Bye Bye Plastic Bags and founder of Youthtopia, also joined the discussion and shared her journey. How she started as a student here at Green School Bali and how, today, she works to empower youth around the world by providing a platform for them to grow and make a change.

The day-long event culminated with a ‘Fridays for Future’ youth march, where High Schoolers joined students from Primary and Middle School on the field to make their voices, and demands for change to be heard.

Students created paper signs and shared their hopes for the future with one another.
It was an energizing day of inspiration, activism, and, most importantly, solutions.

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“I’ll have a cricket brownie and cricket crepe.”

“OK! Would you like butter and honey with the cricket crepe?”

“Yes please and I will also have a cricket cookie too!”

This is NOT a typical conversation in Middle School unless you happened to be at the Green Warung at Green School in Bali during their first term in October.

During Term One, Eighth Grade students at Green School studied sustainable food article as part of their science class with Pak Kenny. It’s the perfect age for students to tackle global issues and investigate complex topics such as sustainable food for the future. As teens in their last year of Middle School, they have built a solid foundation in science and have a natural and innate curiosity for controversial and potentially off-putting ideas (like eating crickets).

While they learned the science of crickets (anatomy, classification, food webs and ecology) they also investigated the possibility of entomophagy (eating insects) as a sustainable alternative to other protein sources such as beef and chicken. 

During their lessons and activities, they discussed the impacts of factory farming on cows and chickens – such as the use of antibiotics to prevent rapid disease spread in spaces where animals are packed so closely together, or hormones to speed-up animal growth.  This discussion included a distance learning online session with a viewing of The Meatrix and The Meatrix II.

Middle School students design and create their cricket habitats with recycled materials from our Kembalil center

Students also researched the amount of water and feed needed to produce a kilogram of beef as well as environmental impacts of animal waste on local streams and waterways.

To help focus their ideas and thoughts, students brainstormed the impacts of cricket production and consumption using the Compass Model for Sustainability Education and noted how raising and eating crickets might impact Nature, Economy, Society and Wellbeing.

During their analysis, students identified one issue that became a HOT discussion point: Was Society actually ready to eat insects or crickets?

Or, would they need to do a bit of marketing to re-brand crickets, much like we do with beef? The logic was that people don’t go into a restaurant and order a leg of “cow.” Instead, they order a burger, a steak or a beef dish. The simple act of calling it by another name impacts the psychology of the consumer and makes it more palatable to eat beef versus eating a leg of a cow.

It was a fun debate which also led to discussions about vegetarianism, veganism and even Meatless Mondays that some schools implement. As part of those discussions students learned the impact of food choice on the environment and how some diets are eco-friendlier and more sustainable than others.

Their final project was to design a cricket habitat, raise crickets, and for the Grand Finale students would cook and eat crickets in a recipe they had researched. Unless, of course, they were vegetarians or vegans in which case they would never be forced into entomophagy!

The students sourced cricket flour from a local business which could be used to make cakes, cookies, brownies, crepes and other types of bread or desserts. The cricket flour was high in protein and nutritious. Although, the class did learn that anyone with seafood allergies shouldn’t eat crickets. They reasoned that this is because crickets are arthropods and their exoskeletons are composed of chitin just like the shells of seafood like shrimp and crabs.

On the last day of the term they conducted a blind taste test with a few visiting parents and some of the Green School teachers. The final result?

  Students experimented with cricket flour to make everything from brownies to crepes to cookies

The taste-testers couldn’t really tell the difference between the brownies made with regular flour and the brownies made with cricket flour! The only slight difference was that the cricket brownies were slightly crunchier and a bit crumblier in their texture.

SUCCESS!

It was a fun day! A HUGE success and plenty of learning about entomology, ethical farming, the environmental impact of food choices as well as real world skills of raising and caring for crickets and ultimately preparing and eating our own food source!

So, if the idea of eating crickets doesn’t BUG you then JUMP right in and give it a try!

Written by Kenny Peavy
Middle School Teacher, Green School Bali

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Green School’s Heart of School features bamboo beams flowing and spiraling upward into three, interconnected nautili. Other buildings feature similar arching structures, structures that inspire much more creativity than a concrete box. “We could have built Green School out of concrete, but then what are we modeling for the future?” asks our Green School founder, John Hardy. “We could have built it out of very fancy recycled wood, but will there then be any wood for our grandchildren? So, we built it out of bamboo.” 

In addition to keeping our minds open and inspired, anyone who spends time in our bamboo forest school will also internalize one very important lesson: how to bend like bamboo. Our students know there is strength in flexibility when navigating life’s challenges. But this isn’t all bamboo has to teach us – not by a long shot! 

Starting in 2018, our early years students helped to plant a bamboo nursery on our on-campus permaculture gardens as part of the Green School Carbon Zero Program. The nursery is a place for our students to learn about the anatomy of bamboo as a sustainable material. Technically classified as a grass, bamboo is one of the fastest-growing grasses and thus fast replenishing. It can also produce 30% more oxygen for the atmosphere than other plants, which makes it ideal for clean air circulation.

Beyond knowing what it is and why to grow it, students quickly learn how to apply the versatile material to solve different problems. For example, after realizing how much plastic trash can accumulate in Bali’s rivers, Kurt, a primary school student from Sweden, used bamboo to create a floating barrier that will catch trash in the rivers of Bali before it reaches the ocean.

Our Middle Schoolers explore using bamboo as a sustainable building material to refurbish our Green School chicken coop – a perfect example of our REAL approach to learning. The students created a budget detailing their costs, including chicken feed, construction materials, and the chicks themselves. Alex, a student at Green School Bali, shares, “we then visited the student bank and filled out a loan form to borrow money, so we could pay for the chickens.” Once the hens started laying, the students paid the loan back egg-by-egg, selling them to the Green School community at the fortnightly Farmers Market. When it came time to remodel the coop, the students of course turned to bamboo. First, they made models from the recycled cupboards that they took from our Kembali recycling center. Next, they took measurements to examine the feasibility of the new bamboo structure. Finally, they built the chicken coop with the help of the school’s resident bamboo carpenter.

And in High School, our students have been learning how to use bamboo to make bicycles! Used as an earthquake and cyclone-resistant material by the construction industry, bamboo is strong like steel, but has the advantage of not emitting GES at all. Because of this, students work in teams and learn the fundamentals of bamboo bike building, including understanding the geometry of a bicycle, making bicycle frames, wrapping and polishing the bamboo, and final assembly. The entire process takes approximately 50 hours per bike.

Bamboo buildings, bikes, and water barriers – and we’re only scratching the surface of this incredibly versatile material! This year, for World Bamboo Day, we share our deep gratitude for our bounty of bamboo, and all that it has taught us. 

If you’d like to explore more of our bamboo campus, you can watch our virtual campus tour, to hear more about bamboo, the creative vision behind our campus, and how we live our mission to make the world sustainable.

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Building Bamboo Homes for Bees: Primary School “Footprint” Project

Did you know that the health of humans and the health of bees and other pollinators around the world are dependent on one another? 

Pollination is fundamental to the survival of our ecosystems. According to the United Nations, “90% of the world’s wild flowering plant species depend, entirely, or at least in part, on animal pollination, along with more than 75% of the world’s food crops and 35% of global agricultural land.” In other words, pollinators contribute directly to global food security as well as to the conservation of biodiversity.

Understanding the vital role bees play in our world was a major motivator for Green School’s young learner, Alma, who chose to help the humble bee for her primary school capstone – or Footprint – project.  Today, in recognition of World Bee Day, we celebrate this changemaker’s inspiring efforts to support our local bee population.

Alma had the idea to make bamboo bee homes because she loves bees but was having a hard time finding any on campus. Perhaps they needed a better place to live?

So, she got to work in our iHub and is currently constructing three, cylindrical bamboo bee houses, about 15x15cm in size. The bee houses are designed to attract a special, stingless honey bee known as the “trigona” bee. They will be installed in the Primary School garden (every learning neighbourhood at Green School has its own garden). 

In addition, Alma will work with our gardeners and Kul Kul Connection students to teach them how to make their own bee homes from bamboo and how to mix the special water and sugar concoction that will attract them into the cylinders. Alma’s creations will serve as a safe space for our bees to reproduce and nurture new generations of bee families. 

It won’t be long before the local bees are “buzzing” on the front door to their new home!  The Primary School Footprint capstone projects will be presented at the end of June at an exhibition-like event called Community Share – BEE sure to follow along on social for when we share the finished product!

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While the topic of gender equality is integrated into our year-round curriculum at Green School, the period from Valentine’s Day through Earth Day holds a special significance. In alignment with the global V-Day activist movement to end violence against women (cisgender, transgender, lesbian and others who hold fluid identities that are subject to gender-based violence), our classrooms put extra emphasis on promoting gender equality and dismantling sexist systems during this time, what we call “V Season.”

During V Season our students explore elements of gender inequality expressed through art, dance and theatre, via educational workshops – led by high school students and presented to parents and local community members – and through outreach to vulnerable women in our community. This year, our high schoolers helped fundraise for Bali Street Mums Project and the KIM Women’s Center, local organizations that help further women’s rights and safety from sexual violence in Bali. Last year, one of our Middle School students, Chenoa, worked to build bunk beds that were donated to Bali Street Mums, as part of her Middle School capstone project.

V Season is an opportunity to expand awareness around issues of gender inequality and gender-based violence from the classroom to the rest of our community, to teachers and parents as well as beyond the campus to our neighbors in Bali. It’s a pleasure and a privilege to join this global movement, but our approach to gender equality education isn’t limited to this annual observance.

What does gender equality education look like at Green School? 

In one of our High School classes, it looks like learning about, and celebrating women scientists throughout history. Students survey the community to determine the level of awareness of female scientists (or lack thereof), and use that as a baseline to create presentations on women who have made significant contributions to science throughout history. The presentations are then shared with our Primary and Middle School students on International Women’s Day (March 8).

It looks like film studies. Through class exercises and discussions, High School students develop proficiency in visual literacy and film history. Students write reviews on films and engage in socratic discussions with their peers concerning cinematography, narrative development, racism, sexism, homophobia, colonialism and deconstructionist philosophy, expanding their awareness of how these issues manifest themselves in movies – both vintage and modern – and allowing them to think critically about the media they consume going forward.

It looks like “The Menstruation Mission” – a student-led project to make sustainable menstruation products available to all High School students on their period. The products are 3D printed in our on-campus Innovation Hub – a rapid prototyping zero-waste maker’s space – and support de-stigmatization around menstruation. The Menstruation Mission has helped to open up the conversation about periods to benefit the community of learners that is Green School. 

Or it looks like a capstone project by our Middle School student Stella, who wanted to tackle the issue of sexual violence against women and girls by using ‘Hollaback,’ an app that allows people to anonymously report sexual harassment cases and identify the location on a map. For her project, Stella collected stories of sexual harassment from around Bali and placed them on a map on Hollaback, encouraging others in the community to do the same in an effort to put an end to Violence Against Women.

Even with our youngest students, gender equality is about teaching our young girls to use their voice, to speak up for themselves about what they want or don’t want, and to stand up for their friends and others who might be in vulnerable positions. 

These are only a few of the examples of how we at Green School seek to integrate issues around gender equality and intersectional feminism into our curriculum. Of course, we’re all too aware that it is a complicated, systemic issue and, in the words of Kate Druhan, our Head of Community & Environment, “trying to dismantle these issues can feel like trying to unscramble an egg.” And yet, as with all of the challenges of our modern age, Green School students know that it’s better to be a part of a solution. They know that having these conversations and working to expand awareness locally & globally is still an essential part of having an impact in the world at large.

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Here are the details:

Green School’s Primary Science teacher Olivier Bourdon, or as his students fondly call him, Pak Olly, routinely parks his motorbike on the east side of the school’s campus to give himself a morning nature walk before the bustle of his day begins. Each morning he noticed frogs, belly-up in the man-made ponds, or water catchments, he walked by.

“They’d gone in to spawn, but they couldn’t scale the walls to get out,” Pak Olly says. “It was a sad sight. They were belly-up, sometimes eviscerated, and putrefied. It really stunk.”

In a tangent, Pak Olly mentioned what he saw to a group of third-grade students.

“They just lit-up,” he says. “Every single kid was fascinated. They wanted to know more and more, so I took them to see it. That’s when they wanted to be guardians of the frogs.”

Green School Primary students at the garden

Frogs play an essential part in the ecosystem. They feast on insects, which helps control mosquito populations. They serve as food for birds and snakes and their tadpoles help filter water by feeding on algae. Frog populations are also on the decline worldwide due to climate change, pollution, and disappearing wetlands.

Saving the frogs became a mission for Primary School students!

At Green School, the focus on teaching sustainability and love of the earth is developmentally-appropriate. In the Early Years, the focus is on facilitating biophilia, a child’s innate connection and bonding to nature. In the Primary School, this expands to ecophilia and nurturing a love for the natural world. These connections very naturally build towards a desire to take action. Careful consideration is given to the unfolding of these stages, to ensure that ‘premature abstraction’ doesn’t occur, which can be the result of weaving too much ecophobia into the learning. But sometimes, Primary School is ready to take a stand and to activate an urgent solution. Operation Save the Frogs was launched.

Olivier Bourdon, or Pak Olly, teaches Science and Green Studies to the Primary students

“It seems like a small thing to try to save a handful of frogs,” says Pak Olly. “But, it’s actually quite significant for those frogs, for the environment around the school, and for the kids to feel like they can be guardians of the Earth.” (A term that comes directly from the Green School song).

“We are children of the Earth. Bumi Bumi. We are guardians of the Earth.”

– Excerpt from the Green School Song

Along with Pak Olly, the third graders brainstormed how to save frogs. Many good ideas came up but were either unachievable or inefficient.

“We were stuck on the idea of a raft for the frogs, but that was just going to delay the inevitable and prolong amphibian suffering,” says Pak Olly. “It was a sweet image, but not going to work.”

Finally, the class hit on the idea of a simple ladder.

They set off to work, collecting bamboo, sticks, and yarn as their construction materials. They then built a ladder and placed it in the pond, complete with a repurposed plastic water bottle from the school’s waste management centre as a floatation device.

“Every morning, I’d walk by the pond on my way into the school and I’d look. No more dead frogs,” says Pak Olly. “That’s when we decided to expand the project.”

Water catchments with steep embankments are dotted throughout the campus, so the class set up a workshop during Sustainable Solutions week to invite members of the community to help construct frog ladders and set them up in various ponds. Working with the prototype they had created, students and parents worked together to lash the yarn with a clove hitch and then set them up in ponds around campus.

Primary students observe the frog ladder

Life has improved for little amphibians all around campus. The nightly croaks and ribbits are slightly louder and maybe a bit more confident. Ponds with frog ladders are delightfully corpse-free. Walk by one and you may even spot a frog making its way to safety.

Just snap a photo and share it with #GSfrogladder.

“Last school year (March 2018), in Grade 3A Science with Pak Olly, we learned about frogs and made frog ladders for the whole Green School campus. Frog ladders are a way to help frogs and toads to get out of ponds with high walls. You can help frogs and toads, by building a sustainable frog ladder. Frogs and toads go into ponds to lay their eggs, then do their best to climb out again because they can’t live their whole life in the water, swimming around and wasting their energy. A frog ladder is made from old wood/bamboo, string/yarn, and one plastic bottle to keep it afloat. Please help animals.”

Francesca, Green School Grade 4 Student

“If you look at the project from wanting to protect an animal, to using recycled material, to working in teams and making a difference, there’s a lot there to make us feel really gratified,” says Pak Olly. “This is the essence of why we’re here.”

This is REAL learning. This is Green School.

Learn more about Green School here: www.www.greenschool.org

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