Born Free Partnership
Born Free Foundation School Link
What is the Born Free Foundation?
Born Free are an animal charity that’s passionate about wild animal welfare and Compassionate Conservation. They were founded by Virginia McKenna OBE, Will Travers OBE and Bill Travers MBE in 1984. They work tirelessly to stop the exploitation and suffering of individual animals living in captivity or in the wild. From the start, they’ve campaigned for a future where animals and people can co-exist and where threatened and endangered species are protected for generations to come.
Born Free is committed to protecting threatened species in their natural habitats and preventing animal suffering, by building sustainable systems for co-existence. Wildlife is coming under increasing pressure from both environmental and human driven changes including habitat degradation and destruction, unsustainable exploitation of resources and human-wildlife conflict.
Education is a key to ensuring that young people grow up with an understanding of the issues facing our natural world, and that communities living alongside wildlife have the tools to co-exist, and flourish, alongside wild animals.
Born Free’s Education Programme works with schools and communities across the UK, Kenya, Ethiopia and South Africa, instilling a love of wildlife and igniting a passion to protect it.
Born Free Adopted Animals
Each year group, from EYFS to Year 6, has adopted an animal through the Born Free Foundation. The aim is for children to learn about the work that the Born Free Foundation do as well as learning about their adopted animal. Each year, the children will learn about their new year group adopted animal and share their learning with our school and the children from Ol Moti Primary School in Kenya.
EYFS: Timtom the Orangutan
Year One: The Brown Bear Orphans
Year Two: King the Lion
Year Three: The Giraffe Family
Year Four: The Cheetah Family
Year Five: The Elephant Family
Year Six: Gopal the Tiger
Born Free Foundation School Link
Last year, we set up a link between our school and a school in Kenya so our children can learn more about wildlife and conservation. The link will enable our children to develop an understanding of how life is different for other children globally. Through the Born Free Foundation, we want our children to develop a sense of global citizenship through exploration of biodiversity, in order to be aware of, and address, environmental issues.
Ol Moti Primary School is near the Mount Kilimanjaro National Park in Tanzania, Kenya. They have 223 children in the school. Their national language is Swahili but they are taught English at school, alongside maths, science and environmental studies.
So far, our joint projects have included writing letters to each other and creating fact files to learn about our different school and local environments. Our school Eco Club wrote letters and sent pictures to some of the children in Ol Moti Primary School. They told the children all about the plants that grow in our local area and the creatures we can see.
Some of the children in Ol Moti school then wrote letters back to us to tell us all about their environment! You can read some by accessing the presentation below:
The Eco Club also made a video to teach the children all about Autumn in England as they don’t experience the same seasonal weather as us. Click on the video link below to watch Eco Club's Autumn presentation:
The KS2 Choir recorded a song for the Ol Moti school children to learn. As well as sharing and comparing our different environments and surroundings, we wanted to share our school culture and music too! Click on the video link below to watch the choir's performance of 'Build It High!'. Can you spot the Autumnal themed link?
The Ol Moti children have also recorded us a special song that we have shared in a special assembly in school. The Born Free Education Officer in Amboseli, Elizabeth put together this short explanation of the song:
"The song is about unity of purpose, it's talking about the many Maasai sub tribes from all the regions coming together United to ensure they succeed because they are one people. It also contains a special verse to include Discovery School, saying that they too can join hands in their education journey because they are one and seeking the same knowledge while in school."
Born Free Educational Workshops
Charlie Baker from the Born Free Foundation came into school to deliver workshops for children in Year 1 up to Year 6. Children learnt about key environmental issues, threats to wildlife and the impact that this may have globally. In the workshop for Year 4, 5 and 6, children learnt about the story of 'An Elephant Called Slowly' or 'Pole Pole'. This inspired follow-up work including writing and debates.
Born Free 'Wildlife Art' Project
As part of our mission to learn more about each other's local environments, we undertook a 'Wildlife Art' project to share drawings and information about animals and plants. Click on the links below to see the drawings from children at Ol Moti Primary School and from The Discovery School:
Ol Moti Primary School Wildlife Art drawings
The Discovery School Wildlife Art drawings