Primary school children go organic

From left: Bilqis Khadija, Waleed Jama and Afsar Miah

THEY are the hippie values made famous by Richard Briars and Felicity Kendall in the classic 1970s sitcom, The Good Life.
But growing organic vegetables, and generating electricity from wind and solar energy are at the heart of the new curriculum at a King’s Cross school, thanks to the help of a leading centre-left think tank.
Argyle Primary School, in Tonbridge Street, King’s Cross – one of the top-rated schools in the country – has placed sustainable development and global citizenship at the heart of its curriculum with the help of boffins at thinktank Demos and campaigning charities Oxfam and the World Wildlife Fund.
Under the new regime pupils grow vegetables in the school garden, get lessons in online activism and are urged to write to Holborn and St Pancras MP Frank Dobson; every facet of their education is geared around “empowering them to change the world”.
It is a message with resonance for the school’s 400 plus pupils and their families, who come from 40 countries including many in the developing world, and score well above average marks despite living in one of Britain’s most deprived wards.
Although sustainable development and global citizenship may sound like buzz-words favoured by anti-globalisation protestors, deputy head Helen Adams has the full backing of the government, which now wants more schools to follow her lead.
The Qualifications and Curriculum Authority this month joined the WWF and Demos, the thinktank behind key New Labour ideas including ‘Cool Brittania’ and ‘no rights without responsibilities’, in urging others schools to adopt Argyle’s approach.
Ms Adams said: “With the challenges that the world faces, such as environmental degradation and inequality between rich and poor, it is important that children understand the issues and are empowered to make a difference. These are the issues that pupils say matter to them.
“As educationalists, it is also important that we put our values into action.
‘As far as I know, what Argyle has done is unique.”
She added: “A lot of schools run eco-clubs after school and go on field trips and one-off events, but they don’t follow it through in the other parts of the curriculum.
“We still follow the national curriculum, but the focus is on our core values.
“For example, if we study the history of the royal family in the Tudor period, we’ll look at conflict resolution.”
She insisted the changes were “neither political nor controversial”, adding:
“We don’t tell the children what to think – the values are there and we let them make up their own minds.
“It’s about developing universal values like empathy and respect, the same sorts of things that you might learn at a church school, but within a different framework.”
But politics played a role in the school’s decision not to apply for ‘Eco-School’ status – an award scheme taken up by many other environmentally conscious schools.
Ms Adams said: “We didn’t do it because burger giant McDonalds was a sponsor of that scheme and we didn’t agree with that.”
McDonalds has since stopped supporting the scheme.