This week is the launch of ‘Beat the Street’ in Rotherham, a giant game played in real time in the roads, parks and green spaces surrounding throughout the town. Walk, run, cycle, scoot or skip between Beat Boxes, tap in and collect points, whilst exploring every nook and cranny of your local area. ‘Lost Wor(l)ds’ has teamed up with Sheffield & Rotherham Wildlife Trust and ‘Beat the Streets’ to share activities designed to make your journeys to accumulate kilometres and points much more interesting. ‘Beat the Streets’ focus on getting families out and about, the Wildlife Trusts specialist knowledge of nature and green spaces in the area combined with ‘Lost Wor(l)ds’ approach to connecting language, multilingualism and the natural world, makes for a great partnership.
The activities work in any place, with any group of children and in any language/s. We want everyone in communities across Rotherham to join in the fun and language not to be a barrier. The whole family can get involved!
i) ‘Exploring the environment’ – the following activities focus on being outdoors observing, monitoring and investigating nature, the changing seasons, birds, mammals and insects. The activities suggest new approaches to exploring nature and encourage purposeful ways of connecting and looking with fresh eyes at the environment: ‘Minibeast Survey’; ‘Spring Scavenger Hunt’; ‘Nature Egg / Star Hunt’; ‘Bird Watch’.
ii) ‘Protecting the environment’ – everyone is increasingly concerned about protecting the environment and addressing global challenges such as climate change. This series of activities focus on steps that can be taken at the local level to protect the environment, in addition to connecting with global issues and lobbying to make lasting change: ‘Multilingual school allotment / garden’; ‘Recycling’; ‘Letters for Change’.
iii) ‘Thinking creatively about the environment’ – engaging with the environment provides great stimulus to produce poetry, stories and art work. This is just a small selection of activities that encourage creative outputs: ‘Who has seen the wind?’; ‘Calligrams’; ‘A day in the life’; ‘Minibeast Display’.
Being the ‘Lost Wor(l)ds’ project we are marking this occasion with the launch of a new activity. Whilst you’re out and about exploring your local area, you might notice or learn about aspects of your local environment that could be improved! ‘Posters for Change’ is an opportunity to try and make local change in your area a reality. This activity is about producing posters that i) communicate positive actions people can take to improve the environment – whether it’s picking up litter, using less water or not disturbing local birds whilst they’re nesting and; ii) communicating the key message and action in English, as well as additional language/s spoken by people living in the area.
We’ll soon be inviting schools across Rotherham to produce ‘Posters for Change’ and curating an online exhibition to showcase posters created by pupils . . . but you don’t have to live in Rotherham to get involved. If you or your class would like to have a go, we would love to see your posters, share them on the ‘Lost Wor(l)ds’ website and feature your school on our blog and Twitter account.
Check out for opportunities to play ‘Beat the Street’ across the UK . . . or make up your own game for your street, class or school! Follow us on twitter for the latest updates: @LostWor_l_ds, @WildSheffield & @BTSRotherham, but most important of all, get outdoors and have some fun.
On your marks, get set . . . go!
