Over the past 6 months, Year 5 from Aycliffe Village Primary School have striven to “make a difference”. The Make a Difference Challenge is a Challenge given to the children by Young Citizens to encourage pupils to get involved in social projects. The children chose what to do in the challenge and they decided to help dogs over plastic pollution, palm oil, deforestation, eliminating black plastic and stopping children being forced to make balloons in Bangladesh.
One of their first tasks was to do litter picking to make sure that dogs in the area do not get injured due to the large amount of plastic and rubbish. They went out with bin bags and litter pickers (all supplied by Mr Cooper the Environmental Officer from Aycliffe Town Council) and filled the bags. The amount of rubbish shocked the children as all of their bags were full.
At their school’s summer fair the children set up three stalls supporting Dogs Trust. They did little games like pin the tail on the dog, guess how many dog treats are in the bowl and guess the name of the dog. In total they raised almost £70.
The children also wrote to their local MP, Mr Wilson. The reason they wrote to him was to tell him about Lucy`s Law and the situation with dogs. At the end of their letter they asked him if he would support Lucy`s Law.
Lucy`s Law is a law coming to Parliament, which will stop dogs being brought from different countries to our country illegally. This law also stops pet shops buying dogs from anonymous people online. This means that pet shops must either raise the dog or buy it from an official breeder.
After doing all of these activities a group of the children went to The Durham Centre for the Young Enterprise Make A Difference Challenge Presentation. Their performance was great and the people there were very impressed with it.
The children have enjoyed this challenge thoroughly and really feel that they have made a difference to how dogs are cared for.
By Ashton A and Harvey B
