At Plaistow Preschool, caring for our planet is woven naturally into our everyday learning, not treated as a separate subject. Because we are a mostly outdoor setting, sustainability is part of daily life for our children, not just something we talk about.

 

Reducing our impact

We only heat our hall during the colder months, and we encourage children and staff to dress for the weather so we can keep this to a minimum. Where possible, we send recyclable lunchbox items home for parents to clean and recycle, and we have labelled recycling bins that children and staff use every day.

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Building resilience and understanding

Through our forest school program and focus projects, children connect directly with nature and learn about the small steps we can all take to lower our impact on the planet. We teach children not to waste water, encouraging them to turn off taps and use only what they need, whether that's for play or practical tasks. We believe that helping children develop genuine care and curiosity about the natural world will encourage them to protect it as they grow. Children also help sort our recycling, learning to think carefully about where items belong, and we use recycled materials such as cardboard and packaging paper in our mark making area. In our garden, French drains help reduce flooding and channel water safely away.

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Supporting biodiversity

We have a compost area for our green waste, and we regularly feed the birds that visit our garden. Children help us grow plants, vegetables and flowers throughout the year, and we have planted trees in our garden to provide shade and attract birds and insects.

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Climate education, built into everyday life

Being mostly outdoors means children experience all weathers and seasons firsthand, giving them a real, lived understanding of the natural world. Our forest school program teaches children about nature and how we can look after our local woodland, and across all our activities and projects, we focus on how children can positively support our planet through hands on, firsthand experience.

 

Safeguarding: Operation Encompass

At Plaistow Preschool, keeping children safe is at the heart of everything we do, and we are proud to be part of Operation Encompass, a police and education early information sharing partnership that helps us support children who may have experienced domestic abuse.

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Operation Encompass works like this. If police attend an incident of domestic abuse involving a child from our setting, our designated Key Adult, Katy, our manager and safeguarding lead, is notified before the start of the next school day. This means we can offer that child gentle, timely support the moment they arrive with us, without them ever having to explain what has happened at home.

 

Operation Encompass now operates on a statutory footing and covers every police force and every educational setting across England and Wales, so this is a nationally recognised safeguard, not just a local initiative. Katy has completed Operation Encompass Key Adult training, equipping her to identify and respond to the needs of children affected by domestic abuse with care, understanding and the right next steps.

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If you would like to know more about Operation Encompass, you can visit the official Operation Encompass website.