Preschool and after-school children at Portland House gathered during February half-term for a reading of ‘Little Turtle Turns the Tide’by the book’s fantastic illustrator Nico Williams.
We have recently achieved our Eco Schools Green Flag Award for environmental awareness and conservation and as part of their ‘Sustainability Week’ of activities Nico Williams was invited to read the book and speak to the children about plastic pollution. Following the book reading the children created a beautiful collage wall mural of the sea, made their own sea creatures from upcycled materials and even wrote their own little stories about different characters from the book.
The beautifully illustrated ‘Little Turtle Turns The Tide’ written by author and surfer Lauren Davies, follows the journey of Little Turtle as he discovers the plastic problem, learns more from his new friends in the sea, then has a big idea, and goes out into the world to make a difference with the help of his friends and the world’s children.
Illustrator Nico Williams commented, “The book aims to help raise awareness of plastic pollution among young children, without making them feel that this is an impossible problem. We hope it delivers the important message to inspire and empower children and families to work together to make a change and help save our oceans and make a better place for us all to live.”
Nursery Manager Julie Lister added: “The children had a fantastic time creating the mural while learning more about what they can do to help reduce plastics in the ocean. Educating the children on important environmental issues is very important to us here at Portland Nurseries and crucial if any real changes are to be made in the world. They are the scientists, environmentalists and activists of the future, and like Greta Thunberg these sparks can ignite from a young age. No matter how small they are they need to know we can all make a huge difference.”
The four nurseries and individual children bought copies of the books to be signed and a portion of the proceeds were donated to the environmental charity, Surfers Against Sewage.