Our experience at the Roots & Shoots Awards 2023

Well, where do I start? Last year when I first started this group, I had just finished reading one of Dr. Jane Goodall's books and felt so inspired and positive about being able to make a positive impact on the future of our planet. Dr. Jane had mentioned in her book about her Roots & Shoots programme and I loved the sound of it. After reading up on the website, I decided that I wanted to go for it and make it a free, eco-conscious group for my local home educators community. From this, our Swindon Saplings Home Educators Group was born.Fast forward to being asked to attend the awards ceremony in London.We had completed a number of small projects and felt excited to go along to the awards and talk to people about what we had been up to and see what other groups had been doing. The idea that we might actually get to meet Dr. Jane Goodall was crazy and we tried not to get our hopes up that she would be there. We prepared what we wanted for our board and off we trotted to London - on the train, of course, because it is better for the environment!At the event, we loved the buzz and excitement. Soon after setting up, the crowds arrived and the children were fantastic at talking to others about our projects. However, they became a little star struck when Dr. Jane arrived and came to talk to them about what we had been up to. It was honestly like a dream. We then recomposed ourselves, took some time to look at the other groups stands to see what they had been up to, and drew inspiration from such a wonderful variety of projects.Then it was time for lunch. What an absolutely delicious vegan feast! We all really enjoyed the food and loved sitting out in the conservatory amongst the trees and the plants, chatting about projects that we had seen and how excited we were for some of our upcoming projects.Everyone then started filtering upstairs ready for the awards. Now, at this stage I need to point out that we had absolutely NO idea that we had been invited along to win an award. Absolutely none. We thought we were just there to showcase our projects. However, when we found out that our group, along with the other groups invited along were invited in order to be given an award, we were stunned. Our little home-ed group of environment loving kids had actually been recognised in a huge list of groups! Not only did we get to receive our award from Dr. Jane Goodall herself, with a host of wonderfully generous gifts, we could not believe our ears when we found out we had won "The Do School" prize too. I still can't believe it. We really enjoyed watching the other groups videos and the awards being given out, loved the Trashion Show (such amazing ideas!!) and hearing a really moving and inspiring speech from Dr. Jane. We left the event feeling so blessed, honoured, inspired, hopeful... it was truly a magical day.So now we're back to it. Doing little things every day that help to make the world a better place for people, animals and the environment. We are so excited by our upcoming projects and cannot wait to tell you all about them.With lots of love and hope,Swindon Saplings