During this year the P5 classes in St. Paul’s Primary School will be involved in piloting a new teaching resource entitled Healthy Places, Healthy Children which has linkages with the World Around Us curriculum. The resource was developed by Belfast Healthy Cities in conjunction with the Education Authority, Belfast Region.
The resource aims to give children the opportunity to express their views about their local environment. As part of the project, pupils will be taken on a short walk in the immediate area around the school and supported to take photographs of things they see that they like and also things that they don’t like. The aim of the project is to help children think about how their environment – streets, footpaths, parks and open spaces affects their lives and how it could be made better for them. The overall outcome will be a proposal developed by the children to improve something in their local environment making it more child friendly.
The children’s views may also help inform the work of statutory agencies and decision makers as a key part of further work by Belfast Healthy Cities and partners on creating a more child friendly Belfast.
The resource will be piloted throughout the year in 13 schools across Belfast with some children attending a celebratory event in early June 2016.
Belfast Healthy Cities (www.belfasthealthycities.com) is a citywide partnership to improve health and wellbeing for people living and working in Belfast. Our focus is on improving social living conditions for prosperity in a healthy way and we are one of the leading members of the World Health Organization European Healthy Cities Network.
