Our Nature area and Eco Club.

At High Down School, we are incredibly fortunate to enjoy beautiful grounds and a range of outdoor learning spaces. Our Nature Area includes several dedicated zones where we grow a variety of plants and vegetables. Children have access to an outdoor classroom, fruit-growing areas, raised vegetable beds, quiet reflection spaces and a wonderful leafy area for outdoor learning.

Our Eco Club, led by Miss Bennett, Mrs Blackford and our school grounds manager, Kevin, meets weekly and is open to our junior pupils. The club runs a wide range of hands-on projects including gardening, sowing seeds, planting, weeding and creating items from recycled materials. As part of our commitment to sustainability, we also collect and recycle plastic pens and glue sticks. Across the school, we recycle toners and cartridges, electrical items, scrap metal, fluorescent bulbs, batteries, aerosols, stamps, and clothing and shoes. One of our latest projects is building a greenhouse made entirely from recycled plastic bottles.

This year, High Down proudly hosted a successful Eco Festival. Children from St Peter’s, Portishead Primary and Backwell Junior School joined us for a day of learning and collaboration focused on recycling, sustainability, growing produce and the importance of composting. The festival included team-building activities and hands-on workshops delivered by local charities and community groups, including Sustainable Travel, Portishead in Bloom, Garden Organic and North Somerset Council. Turn the Tide also taught us about the impact of plastic waste on our environment and local waters.

Following the success of our Eco Festival, we were awarded a grant to create a ‘Pollinator Corridor’ within our school grounds—a project we are excited to begin designing and building.

Looking ahead, we are delighted to have been invited to the 2026 Eco Festival at Watercress Farm in Wraxall. There, our pupils will join other schools to explore conservation, rewilding and how we can all take care of our environment.

Environmental Education

We encourage the use of our wonderful outdoor space as well as our nature area for creative learning opportunities across the curriculum.

We also take year 5 to Tyntesfield (a local National Trust site) annually to take part in the IEE Earth Keepers programme level 1. This is a 3 day course which incorporates active hands-on learning about our world alongside encouraging individuals to take greater interest and responsibility in the environment in which they live and will grow up.

Our annual report for the IEE (US)

Earth keepers UK -High Down Junior School England

90 children participated in the Earth Keepers Level 1 programme last year when we utilised the National Trust site of Tyntesfield. This year a further 90 children have been immersing themselves in nature and learning about how they can have a part to play in supporting our planet. They have been enjoying the beautiful grounds of the National Trust property and were well supported by the Trust and enthusiastic parent volunteers. Activities at Tyntesfield were followed up by the children at school and home to achieve gaining their KEYS creating great immediate and long term learning memories which will hopefully play a small part in helping the future of our fragile environment.

Environmental Gallery