The famous fairandfunky smoothie bike has been on tour to our local schools sharing messages of sustainability with almost 2000 young people thanks to funding from Holme Valley Parish Council. It’s an unusual prop to use and one that certainly captures attention and imaginations of students and staff alike! We are all very busy in our daily lives, especially primary school children who get dressed, eat breakfast, and leave the house like little dynamos every morning! The smoothie bike assembly is a prompt for all of us to stop and think about the things we do and how we’re having an impact on the world.
We all use power! The smoothie bike is pedal powered, but that isn’t how we usually power things at home – we just ‘flick a switch’ or ‘press a button’ and each time we do we are using electricity. Electricity that is sourced from fossil fuels and contributing to climate change. The bike kickstarts a discussion on where power is from and how we can reduce our carbon footprint, or even change our use to renewable energy sources.
We all eat food! A willing volunteer makes their own banana smoothie in assembly, and we always use Fairtrade bananas; a guaranteed way to make sure the farmers who grow our food are paid a fair price for the work they do. Not everything we eat can be Fairtrade so how else can our choices have a positive impact on the planet? We can shop local and buy local wherever possible. The shorter the distance food travels before it reaches our plates the better for our environments.
We all throw things away! Even a simple smoothie creates waste – we are left with a banana skin and a plastic juice carton at the end of every assembly. What do we do with this waste? We all use a lot of things that generate a lot of rubbish, throwing things in the bin creates landfill. We simply can’t throw it all away. Instead, we can compost – reuse our waste into new soil to grow our own vegetables and flowers; and we can recycle. Or we can re-create our rubbish into works of art! All the juice cartons we use get turned into bird feeders!
One smoothie bike, inspiring a community to take lots of little steps to change the world. And did you know the smoothie bike is available to book as a fairandfunky workshop for schools? A half day interactive session in which we explore sustainability issues in more depth and each child in the class gets to make their own smoothie and create an independent recycled artwork. Please click here: Smoothie Bike – fairandfunky – fairtrade products for more information and to book a session for your school.
The smoothie bike is also available to hire! It’s a brilliant way to attract crowds at your event and can be used as a eye-catching fundraiser. Please email helen@fairandfunky.com for details.
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