William Booth Primary School's year 6 took part in the REMOURBAN #SmartCity workshop. Representatives from Nottingham City Council worked with Mr McEnaney’s class to increase their awareness and knowledge of terms such as – smart city, sustainability, regeneration and climate change.
The children learnt about initiatives that make Nottingham a smart city and plans to become even smarter in the future. The school is located in the REMOURBAN demonstrator area and the children were already aware of project works and signage in their local area. A full explanation of what is happening in their local area was given to the children who were delighted to hear that their community was at the heart of such an exciting international project.
The workshops centred on the children working in small groups to come up with ideas for a future Smart Nottingham. They presented their ideas in poster format.
The children’s work really showed that they had a good grasp of the concept and lots of imagination. Ideas included
- an electric park that harnesses the energy created by children playing in it for the use of nearby homes
- energy saving technologies for homes to make it easier for people to stop wasting energy and money
- an electric bike that charges a portable power pack
It is never too early for children to discover smart city ideas; after all, they will be the creators of tomorrow’s smart cities. For an accessible explanation of a Smart City watch our short film.
The event was organised in the framework of the joint citizen engagement activities organised by REMOURBAN cities of Valladolid, Nottingham, Tepebasi, Seraing and Miskolc.