10 Tiny Things Artwork Competition

On National Walk to School Day, the St Augustine's Your Move student team hosted an inter-class competition.

While preparing for NW2SD, the team were reviewing our trusty activities planner for inspiration on an activity to run alongside NW2SD. After reading through all of the possibilities, they wanted to know more about the 'class collage' activity. We read through the lesson plan for the class collage activity, the team decided it would be great to take this as inspiration and turn it into an interclass competition and give prizes for the best artwork.

The team got to work promoting the competition via posters that were put up in all of the main locations around the school. They also booked time with each class to promote walk to school day and the competition by reading the 10 tiny things book and explaining how the competition would work.

Students were advised to find interesting things such as leaves, sticks etc on their way to school on Walk to School Day and bring them to class. On the event day students were encouraged to make a small A5 artwork by tracing leaves or glueing them to paper, with the intention to put them all together and create a collage for display outside the Italian Room. They were told that the best artworks would win prizes.

As the families came through the gates on NW2SD, baskets and bags were overflowing with the interesting things collected. Each student had the opportunity to create their own masterpiece. Below are some of the beautiful pieces drying before the judging took place. Freedom and creativity were on display. I wonder if fresh air and a walk in the outdoors can inspire great art?

After lunch, the student team got to work selecting the prize winners. They had purchased about 30 prizes from the your move store, so it was a big job to divide them all up between the classes! Below is a photo of the winners from the Yr 2 class with their prizes.

The way that the student team took ownership in the creation, promotion and running of this competition was really impressive. I am sure that their leadership and delivery were vital to the enormous buzz of excitement and increased rate of active travel participation from the school on the event day and subsequent weeks. I have heard feedback from parents that they are noticing far more families walking to school and fewer cars in the car park since this brilliant competition was held.