Green corner

Staff and pupils from Calderstones School saw the fruits of their labours blossom with The Big Sunflower Project.
English teacher and teamlead, Emma Taylor said: “We have a green corner at Calderstones and planned to plant some sunflower seeds.
We enjoyed doing this last year and made a feature of sunflowers along the side of one of our school bike sheds.
“I got chatting, via twitter, to Toni Abram from the Big Sunflower Project, which aims to raise awareness of Centronuclear and Myotubular myopathy by growing sunflowers.
“When I learnt all about Toni’s project and the fantastic way she wanted to raise its awareness it was a complete no-brainer that our school got involved.
“Myotubular Myopathy is a rare muscle condition which affects mostly boys at birth, and sometimes an even rarer form develops later in life affecting both boys and girls.
“It causes profound muscle weakness. Most critically it affects the muscles that control breathing and swallowing and is a constant threat to life – even a simple cold could prove fatal.
“We have a team of young eco leaders in school who work on the allotment for extra-curricular enrichment, and along with our KS3 pupils who get to take part in green corner lessons as part of our PSHE SOW, all have been involved in sowing, growing and nurturing our flowers and produce at the allotment.
“The growing of the sunflowers has been a real highlight in the last term and we challenged ourselves to grow 100 sunflowers and show their progress via photographs on Twitter, Project Dirt and our school website.
“Pupils have enjoyed experimenting with different varieties of sunflower and monitoring their growth patterns, staff have got involved at home (and in school) by growing their own, and form classes have recycled tin cans, turned them into planters and grew sunflowers in them for their desks.
“One of our youngest and keenest eco leaders, Cameron (Year 7), had an opportunity to contribute further to the project by writing a little blog for Toni, which she added to Project Dirt. A proud moment for Cameron!
“The growing of the sunflowers has been a superb learning experience for all involved, given added value this year for all of our school community who have all been introduced to The Big Sunflower Project.
“We have learnt about those who suffer from the muscular conditions outlined and the impact on their families.
“It has been a pleasure to support Toni and this project in the small way we could and have enjoyed displaying the bright blooms .”