During mobility 2 the participants  kept their school community informed about their activities in England. One of the main events during the week, was the fashion parade using recycled clothing and other materials prepared by the pupils before the meeting.

Like our Superhero Wastebuster,children are great recyclers, often without even realising they’re doing it. Their imagination fuels their creativity and this project module aimed to harness that recycling creativity to turn our children tools. Primarily their environmental science but also their creative art and design, language and IT studies.

Between meetings schools studied the impact of waste on their locality and country. Was it recycled, upcycled or reused in any way? Did their town have creative ways of dealing with waste? Or did it all end up in landfill? Each school looked at how much waste they and their family created in a week and how they might have reduced it. The children discussed ideas in school and tried them out at home to see how much less waste they produced in a week.
We live in an age of fast fashion and far too much energy is wasted through this quick turn over of clothes. The result is cupboards full of clothes that they no longer wear because it is no longer fashionable or has a small stain or imperfection. Using such clothes from home as their starting materials, the children designed new outfits. They cut things up, sewed things together, added decorative beads or whatever they chose. They also created a ‘useful’ accessory. For the project meeting they prepared a small exhibition of artwork, written work, photos and models which were on display during the meeting. They also prepared a five-minute presentation to make to an audience of school members, about their work at home.

During the meeting participants had a structured programme of activities. They attended the host school each day where they took part in workshops as well as off-site visits. They studied how waste has impacted on our daily lives, visiting a waste management centre at Ardley. They watched as unrecyclable waste was treated and burnt in a new process that created enough electricity to power 60,000 homes. The only waste products from the process were air and water vapour. The children had a photography workshop where they learnt to consider light, poses, and framing, in preparation for a ‘fashion shoot.’ The host school presented a fashion parade to show off the recycled creations they made at home. Later, all the project pupils took part in a fashion shoot at the scenic location of Blenheim Palace, where they filmed and photographed the ‘fashion’ in this beautiful place. The children went on a cultural tour of Oxford, seeing the history and architecture of this ancient city. It was also the day of the funeral of Queen Elizabeth II and the children saw some of the pageantry of the funeral on a big screen.