Fearless5: Empowering Young Eco-Champions
How do you inspire ten-year-olds to tackle the world’s big environmental questions? At Santa Maria College, the answer is Fearless5 – Our Year 5 emPOWER project that challenges students to ask, “How might we provide a safe and sustainable environment to protect Australian flora and fauna?”
Fearless5 transforms learning into doing, giving our students the power to think critically, act boldly and make a difference. This year’s young Earth Heroes have taken action in ways that would make Sir David Attenborough proud.
Learning Through Head, Heart and Hand
In the words of Year 5 teacher Lindsey Fitzgerald:
“This year we structured the emPOWER project to incorporate the head, heart and hand. This involved being an expert in the problem they chose, encouraging their audience to care about it and then sharing real actions and solutions that could help. Every year we get a wide variety of topics and they all speak so passionately. I am always amazed by their creativity and ways they want to make a more sustainable future for our beautiful and precious flora and fauna.”
From flora and fauna spotting at Point Walter, to becoming Wildlife Explorers at Herdsman Lake, to diving into environmental art, our students connected classroom learning with hands-on experiences. They debated big ideas – should humans be friends or foes to flora and fauna?, and what is the importance of biodiversity? and they explored solutions through their own unique projects.
Spotlight on Student Earth Heroes
When it comes to making a difference, our Fearless5 students prove there’s no age limit on leadership. Here’s what they had to say:
Focus: Litter Impacts on Marine Creatures
Isla: “I enjoyed learning about different marine creatures and discovering how fascinating they are and thinking of real life solutions for change.”
Eve: “Learning about the impact of microbeads and what they do in such a little time was a key part of our problem solving journey.”
Emilia: “Seeing how much litter and how one piece of rubbish can have such an impact on the world was a shock. Finding out more about the Leafy Sea Dragon was inspiring to present our solutions on how to support these creatures.”
Focus: Protecting Koalas from Extinction
Xafae, Emily, Skye: “We shone a spotlight on koalas because they are endangered species and we thought it would be interesting to learn more about them. We wanted to let people know that we need to protect our koala population because they are precious to Australia. We want to keep doing the right thing to help our koalas!”
Focus: How can we create a safe and sustainable environment to protect our native koalas?
Eve: “I made a monitor for the koalas. It can track the koalas, see its heartbeat and can tell if its sick. It also can detect if the koala is in danger and it will play an alarm.”
Evelyn: “I wanted to get a group to plant more eucalyptus trees for the koalas to have a place to live and not get destroyed.”
Ruby: “I chose to do a no go zone where you can’t chop trees down and if you do, you will get fined $350. This solution helps the koalas without a home, to have a home.”
Focus: Numbats - Keeping Them Off the Extinction List
Hana: “The attributes we used through this project included curiosity and critical thinking. We had to pose questions and come up with solutions to the problem.”
Emilia: “We used collaboration, working together on our project and sharing our ideas. We also used creativity. We came up with creative solutions and also had to think about how we might display our research and solutions to capture our audience’s attention.”
Friends of Flora and Fauna Exhibition
The culmination of Fearless5 was the ‘Friends of Flora and Fauna Exhibition,’ where parents were treated to a showcase of the students’ passion, teamwork and problem-solving skills. From protecting nocturnal animals to promoting plant-powered plates, the ideas on display were as inspiring as the students themselves.
Parents, staff and students left the exhibition feeling hopeful, and perhaps a little braver about tackling big environmental questions together.
- EcoChampions, emPOWERProgram, EvironmentalEducation, Fearless5, Featured, MercyValuesinAction, ProtectingAustralianWildlife, Sustainability, Year5
Author: Santa Maria College
Santa Maria College is a vibrant girls school with a growing local presence and reputation. Our Mission is to educate young Mercy women who act with courage and compassion to enrich our world. Santa Maria College is located in Attadale in Western Australia, 16 km from the Perth CBD. We offer a Catholic education for girls in Years 5 – 12 and have 1300 students, including 152 boarders.
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