For the past five years, Moorlands Climate Action has joined with over 25 Staffordshire Moorlands schools as part of our various activities and events. Our most popular has been our annual Moorlands Wild Week.
Wild Week is a time when professional artists, storytellers and experts, plus knowledgeable volunteers from within and outside of MCA, come together to help children discover more about our Staffordshire Moorlands ‘At Risk’ wildlife and habitats. We hope to help children appreciate the natural world on their doorstep, encourage them to know what lives or grows there and to understand how much wildlife and the environment matter.
This nature-based week aims to raise awareness via workshops both inside and outside the classroom in a fun and accessible way. Workshops include storytelling and making, hands on art activities, music making, poetry and nature hunts - in fact all sorts of activities! In the past we have looked at wildflower meadows, curlews, swifts, butterflies, pollinators, reptiles, bugs and much more.
This year our theme is water - rain, rivers, streams, puddles and water capture, including what lives in, on or around water. Ten schools from across the moorlands want to be involved in our Wild Week this time. We are very lucky this year to have the wonderful professional artist and storyteller Gordon Maclellan (aka Creeping Toad) to share water based stories and the making of amazing river- or pondscapes. Lorna Stoddart, our long-standing friend and colleague, will share a tale of ‘The Rhythm of the Rain’ and use music with rainmakers; our other fantastic workshop leaders include Harvey Tweats, of Celtic Rewilding, who will share his knowledge of amphibians and maybe beavers too.
Our other amazing volunteer workshop leaders will introduce pupils to the importance of dragonflies, beavers and their dams, water voles, kingfishers, plants and river flies. Louise from Staffordshire Wildlife Trust will help children create mini ponds for birds, insects and maybe wildlife in their school grounds. So many wonderful workshops and more to inspire the children.
Resources and support for Moorlands Wild Weeks have been made possible through grants from local councillors, Nature in Your Neighbourhood, Outside Arts and The Wildflower Society. Plus, of course, the generous time and energy provided by The Staffordshire Wildlife Trust, our amazing MCA volunteers and workshop leaders.