Next week sees the first of this summer’s school visits to the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust’s (GWCT) research farm.
Children from Holy Cross Catholic Primary School in Leicester will be visiting the Allerton Project at Loddington to explore the farm.
They will get involved in a range of activities to learn about food production, tree identification, and farming history, as well as seed dispersal and pollination.
Hundreds of children have visited the Allerton Project since its school events were launched in 2010.
Next week’s visit is being run in partnership with the Country Trust and is the first of eight such visits booked for this summer.
Bringing alive the working countryside
Gwyneth Shilleto, Country Trust Farm Discovery Co-ordinator for Leicestershire says: "The Country Trust is dedicated to bringing alive the working countryside for those children least able to access it.
"We provide transformative countryside educational experiences that can have long lasting impact.
"I know from experience how much the children will enjoy and learn from this fantastic visit to the Allerton Project."
"Many families just don’t have the money for day trips, holidays, and all the sorts of experiences that fuel children’s imagination, expand their vocabulary, build their self-confidence, and get them fired up to learn more about the world around them.
"Country Trust programmes help to fill that gap with hands-on experiences of food, farming and the countryside."
Taking education seriously
The Allerton Project’s Head Training and Development, Jim Egan says: "While research is core to the Allerton Project, we take our educational responsibilities very seriously.
"These days are a real highlight of my working year. The children have a great day out and go away happy, without realising they have learned some maths, English, science, geography and history, as well as about all the good work Farmer Phil does to produce food and look after wildlife."
"We are delighted to be working with the Country Trust who help us build the contact with schools as well as providing invaluable help on the day."
This is the first of the 2016 series of school events, during which over 200 children from across the East Midlands will be visiting the farm.
