North Downs School Betchworth Wildlife Habitats Garden

One of the most important things we can do as adults is encourage the younger generations to learn about and respect nature and educate them in ways that will motivate them to do something to help nature. Schools have an important role to play in educating children to understand nature and why people have both a moral and pragmatic responsibility to help wildlife thrive.

North Downs School in Betchworth has a strong commitment to outdoor education. The school believes that,”all children have the right to experience the unique and special nature of being outdoors. We feel that it is important to enable children to use the outside environment as a context for learning. We are always seeking to use our grounds creatively, developing areas into outdoor learning spaces for classes to use.”  The school has joined the National Education Nature Park (NENP) which is trying to connect all the green spaces that are associated with educational institutions in the UK and involve children in learning about nature. More than this, the initiative encourages children to take action to improve biodiversity in their local area and see and record the results of their actions.

The 4Bs Biodiversity Initiative aims to increase and improve habitats for wildlife and enhance biodiversity in and around the villages of Buckland, Betchworth, Brockham and Box Hill. The team of volunteers is always on the lookout for projects it can assist with and following discussions with Rona Ottaway (N Downs Outdoor Education Teacher), it was agreed that the initiative would create a Wildlife Habitats Garden to provide a resource for teaching about the ways in which we can help wildlife flourish. The garden was finished last week just in time for the school to use it in its Action for Nature Day. About 30 children were involved in the event and 2 members of the 4Bs Biodiversity Initiative team helped to introduce the different habitats in the garden. We were impressed by the interest the children took in each of the habitats and the animals that might make use of the habitat and the considerable knowledge that some of the older children had developed about our wildlife.

This movie shows the different habitats we created. ​