Forward from Luke: Hey! I’m excited to host Ed Revil (traveling up from his small holding in Swansea) at the Meanwood Community Farm in Leeds this Thursday 21st Nov 18-20.00 it will be an inspiring and challenging presentation from his 20 years experience of building soils, capturing carbon and producing food using DIY appropriate technology to make bio char. Hope to see you there! Luke

I am working to improve Hockerton Housing Project’s educational programme and have come across a useful collection of teaching resources in a publicly open Google Docs folder. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1RIdW5qi_Rddp9T77V6yd8kjWIL65-WIoVTEnK4UsPiI/mobilebasic

In this folder there are a 14 climate change related lesson plans that will encourage students to think more sustainably. I have summarised these lesson plans so that they can be easily used for teaching purposes when school groups make site-visits to Hockerton Housing Project. For example:

Lesson 2 – Donald Trump Climate Quotes and Climate Denial

Summary:

• Fake News or ‘What Donald Trump Said’ activity – great activity about 15-20 mins long
• BBC News article on psychology of climate change denial. Students need to read this and complete an activity sheet asking them to summarise the article.

Google Docs Outline:

1. Starter: Trump or Fake News – Show students the quotes from Donald Trump relating to climate change. Ask the students to decide whether the quote is ‘Trump’ or ‘Fake News’. Use the information sheet to elaborate on the meaning of his words. Ask students their opinion of Trump’s attitude? Should he be allowed to have these views?
2. Scientific Consensus – Why does Climate Denial still exist? Explain the animated graph showing temperature models for a variety of organisations around the world all showing a similar trend. 98% of scientific evidence suggests recent climate change is manmade. Is there still a debate?
3. News Article – Brain Biases. Direct students to read the BBC news article. Using the worksheet students should read and then reread, pulling out different pieces of information as they go.
4. What’s the main reason for our inaction? – Students should rank the suggested factors and in pairs, develop reasons for why they think this might be the most powerful factor.

Open the document below too see my summary of all 14 lesson plans.

Liam Cox

Over the past two years we’ve hosted more school trips. From mapping natural resources to debating political issues, our tours can be adapted to suit any geographical or sociological aspect of sustainability.

On a visit, a resident shows small groups of students round. We show them how we harvest rainwater, generate green energy, and how we designed and built our homes to be as energy efficient as possible. This allows for a two-way conversation, and to explore the areas that the students are most interested in.

Alongside the formal educational element, we see the children’s understanding of a ‘good life’ being challenged and informed. We often see and hear attitudes change in real time, as they take away the conclusion that to live sustainably is not to go without, but is to live with… with comfort, with zero carbon, and with cooperation in the community.

The feedback from the students of Carlton Le Willows says it all:

‘The place is absolutely awesome, it is the future’.
“I think the Project was a great way to show how people can still live ordinary lives within a community without spending too much money but still doing great things for the environment and building a better more promising future for our relatives to come”
‘I thought it was a very educational trip and that it is amazing what some people can do!’

We make school trips to Hockerton Housing Project as accessible as possible and encourage you to contact us to set a visit up.

Spread Eagle pub at Hockerton

Our local pub is up for auction next week, so with unanimous support from a parish meeting, Hockerton has applied to list it as an asset of community value on the basis of:

• History of community events, from Jubilee fetes to Bin Day Beers
• Last accessible shared space in the village
• Site is unsuited to housing
• Potential for diversification of services
• Clear appetite for good food and drink in the area

The Spread Eagle has also played an important role in oiling the wheels of our village’s energy co-operative, Sustainable Hockerton, and in helping it celebrate its successes.

Any enterprising chefs or publicans looking to own a zero carbon pub – look no further!

Household energy use is falling but no-one’s really sure why.

We hope that it’s a long term trend supporting our ambition to make the way we live more sustainably.

Be part of our community!