ARK in Schools
The River Kennet and its tributaries make an excellent topic for introducing many areas of the curriculum at pre-school, primary and secondary levels. Our activities are fun and educational, feedback from teachers has been extremely positive:
'The lessons were so varied and interesting. The children loved release day, especially seeing the trout swim off and then later seeing the redds.'
'Our children have really benefited from learning about their life cycle in such a practical and first-hand way. The workshops that ARK delivered were very informative and covered much information and education in just the right way for our pupils.'
'Learning about how we can all play our part in keeping our rivers a safe place for all the creatures that live in them and how we can conserve our water was an important life skill for our pupils.'
The marjority of our projects and individual classroom sessions are funded by and delivered in partnership with Thames Water. This enables us to provide our time and equipment at no cost to schools within the Kennet catchment.
We welcome the opportunity to work closely with our local schools - to find out more about either our formal projects or one off learning opportunities please email anna@riverkennet.org
Preschool & Key Stage 1
We have a range of activities suitable for younger school children. From our hands on interpretation board to enrich children's understanding of chalk stream wildlife to a River School river visit.
Key Stage 2 & beyond
Trout in School
Hatch trout eggs and raise them for several months, get to see first hand several life cycle stages of the brown trout. This project ends with students releasing their baby trout into their local river!
The project begins early in January and runs until just before Easter. Schools in the Kennet Catchment are eligible to participate, do get in touch to find out more. The ARK Trout in School project can be tailored for primary and secondary students and lends itself to many topics.
This project is not currently available, however if you are interested in having Trout in School in your classroom please email: anna@riverkennet.org
E
Beyond primary - ARK in secondary
We are also able to offer more bespoke learning opportunities by subject along with support for ongoing school initiatives.
Em River Model - a river in my classroom
How rivers work. Our Em River model demonstrates basic principles of river behaviour, subtle channel morphology and sediment transport processes. Fun and interactive.
Suitable for all age ranges. For GCSE and A level we have project material written by Professor Malcolm Newson.
For more information on any of the above projects or to discuss how ARK can support and enrich any water or environment based curriculum topic please contact anna@riverkennet.org or 07780381709
