A FUN and thought-provoking play which teaches children about the importance of recycling is currently being performed at schools across West Devon.
?What a Waste? is one of the current repertoire of educational shows performed by well-established theatre group BZents.
Children at Chagford Primary School were among the first to benefit from the show, organised by West Devon Borough Council?s recycling team, which was performed at the school recently. The show will be visiting eight primary schools in the district over the next few months ? including Okehampton, Whitchurch, Buckland Monachorum, Bere Alston, Tavistock, South Tawton and Hatherleigh.
The performance uses the clowns Bozo and Zizi to deal with issues surrounding the recycling of household waste using the format of a television game show with plenty of audience participation.
Sarah Chubb, science and PSHE co-ordinator at Chagford Primary School said the performance had been a great success. ?The children?s faces said it all. They thoroughly enjoyed it from the four-year-olds up to the eleven-year-olds.?
She added: ?It helped children to build on what they already know about recycling and clearly demonstrated how much of what we throw away can be recycled and put to good use.
?It presented rubbish as a resource, not a waste. The use of a TV game-show type approach, along with lots of audience participation, worked extremely well and the children loved every minute.
?We?ve also been given a number of ideas to continue building on the theme and developing the topic in the classroom, from Year 1 to Year 6.?
Jane Savage, recycling officer at West Devon Borough Council, said: ?The theatre group is helping us to ensure that, in addition to all the efforts to encourage adults to recycle more, our children are getting the message too! As ever, they can help to make it happen ? and are of course vital to ensuring that we continue to reduce waste.
?We are gradually rolling out support to schools to help make the separation and gathering of recyclable materials even easier and to provide a regular collection by the council.?
Clare Stanton, spokesperson for Devon Authorities Recycling Partnership said: ?Every school ? and I hope every household! ? is far more aware of the vital need for recycling and reuse to increase.?
BZents have been organising tours around schools all over the UK for the past 20 years, specialising in shows with an environmental theme.
The group left recycling boxes and a programme of follow-up work connected to the national curriculum which was designed to help children cover different aspects of the topic and remember the message of the performance.