Underhill Junior and Brackenbury Infants schools: Our flower power plan (From Dorset Echo)

Underhill Junior and Brackenbury Infants schools: Our flower power plan

10:43am Monday 26th March 2012 in Education By Rachel Stretton

CHILDREN have been getting green-fingered for a commun-ity project.

Underhill Junior and Brackenbury Infants schools are now joined as a federated school and the temporary head is Darren Marklew.

Gary Hockett, who volunteers with Portland community group Revive, has donated planters for the youngsters to grow and nurture flowers and crops.

Mr Hockett, who runs a garage across the road from the school, made the planters by recycling wood that he found in a car park.

He said: “We hope they will get the kids interested in gardening.

“It’s important that they know where their food comes from and they learn to care for the environment.”

Since the first planters proved so popular Mr Hockett has made eight more for the pupils to grow vegetables in. Two children from each class, from reception to Year Six, collected the planters from Mr Hockett’s garage, and each class then decided where to place their planter and what to put in it.

Nikki Fryer, a music teacher at the school, said the project was one of several environmental schemes Underhill Primary was involved in.

She said: “We’re working with Revive to make artwork from plywood, we’ve been up to the quarries sketching fossils and we’re going to put down 5,000 plants to create a sustainable legacy from the Olympics.”

She added: “Growing things is part of our science curriculum, so it’s great for the kids to see this coming alive, and we also try to teach them to take responsibility for the community.”

Revive Portland was created to try to improve the communities on the island.