Weston Museum is pleased to have been awarded one of the ‘Talking Nature’ grants from Museum Development South West, with thanks to support from Arts Council England. The museum’s learning team will be working with children from 2 local schools to explore the climate crisis through fossil collections and celebrating the biodiversity in our environment.
Over the coming months, children from reception age, right up to year 9 will have the chance to celebrate nature and discuss what steps can be taken to protect it. This project will work particularly closely with 2 small groups, one class from a Junior School in North Somerset and another eco club group from a Weston-super-Mare Secondary School. These groups will visit Weston Museum to learn about past climates through fossil remains and be the ambassadors for a legacy action decided by all the children, in collaboration with school staff and the museum team.
Our global understanding of how the Earth’s climate has changed over millions of years is influenced by studying fossil remains and exploring the balance between biodiversity and climate change. Through understanding more about the Earth’s natural temperature cycles, scientists can better compare how human activity is throwing these cycles off balance and speeding up changes.
The Talking Nature project’s £5000 award will enable Katherine Bell, the museum’s Learning Officer, and museum learning volunteers to work with local children to explore what fossil remains can teach us, celebrate the biodiversity around us and then put into place a legacy action. Some of the funding will go towards this legacy action, which will be decided by the children and supported by the museum’s learning team. Katherine Bell stated that ‘it’s easy for children to feel like they have no authority over their surroundings. So I hope that giving them some power to work with us to decide on a project action and start to make some changes within their area will make them feel like they can make a difference. We will work with them to choose an action that will hopefully have positive and long-lasting impact, such as planting a wellbeing garden with native plants or campaigning for change. But it will be their decision to make’.
Project updates will be shared across Weston Museum’s social media over the coming year, with a small display in the museum’s School and Community Display Board planned for the Autumn.
If you’d like to know more information about this project, just email Katherine Bell (Learning and Events Officer) at katherine.bell@wsm-tc.gov.uk
For further information about Weston Museum, please see the website – www.westonmuseum.org, contact the museum team on 01934 621028 or email to museum@wsm-tc.gov.uk
About Museum Development South West
Museum Development South West are museum and heritage development specialists working with the museum and heritage sector in the south west of England to effect positive, lasting change and deliver public value. Together we create opportunities which build confidence and skills, encourage innovation, and celebrate our heritage and culture.
Find out more about the programme here: www.southwestmuseums.org.uk
About Arts Council England
Arts Council England is the national development agency for creativity and culture. We have set out our strategic vision in Let’s Create that by 2030 we want England to be a country in which the creativity of each of us is valued and given the chance to flourish and where everyone of us has access to a remarkable range of high-quality cultural experiences. We invest public money from Government and The National Lottery to help support the sector and to deliver this vision. www.artscouncil.org.uk