That brings us to the end of another year of Picker Pals here at VOICE

Like the teachers, the Picker Pals team are looking forward to our summer break as it has been another fantastic year for the programme.  

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This school year we had almost 1,400 classrooms from all over Ireland join us on the Programme. That’s over 32,000 children directly taking part!

We had over 80,000 people out litter-picking

If we include all of the mums, dads, guardians, siblings and dogs who go along on the litter-picking adventures then we had over 80,000 people out litter-picking and cleaning up their local neighbourhood. We estimate they picked up over 200kgs worth of litter from the environment across Ireland.

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That is pretty amazing work we think!  

We have also had lots of fun inside the classroom. This year we introduced some new elements to the programme so we could interact with our Picker Pals even more. Over the course of the year, we had 6 live Zoom meet-ups where our Picker Pals got to ask us their burning questions about the programme.

My favourite question was “Why are there so many people littering?” I wish we knew the answer to that one.......

KAHOOT QUIZ

We also introduced regular Kahoot quizzes with hundreds of classrooms at time. If you have not tried a Kahoot quiz for yourself yet – you should.....they are a hoot!! We quizzed the Picker Pals about how long different types of rubbish lasts in the environment and how much they know about the Picker Pals characters. Our Picker Pals are an extremely competitive bunch so there was lots of batting it out to be the winners – but only a few could claim the accolade of Picker Pals Kahoot quiz winners!  

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ART COMPETITION

The most exciting element of the programme this year (besides the litter-picking obviously) was our competitions.

Before Christmas, we had our first competition - an Art competition. We had so many amazing entries, but the winners were 1st & 2nd class in Carriglea National School in Co Waterford. Their prize was a wall mural for their school. The mural is an incredible addition to their playground and reminds them daily of their great work as Picker Pals.

Watch their playground transformation HERE

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STORYTELLING COMPETITION

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Building on the themes of creativity and imagination our second competition was a storytelling competition.

The Picker Pals team had another difficult job to pick a winner from all the amazing entries, but 1st prize went to Emma Gill from 2nd class in St Tola’s National School in Westmeath.

Emma's story “The Picking Party” was turned into a 3D animation that was featured in Picker Pals TV.

You can watch it HERE‍

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If you think all of this sounds like fun and you would like to take part next year, register your interest HERE

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As for us, we are off to put our feet up for a day or two...see you in September!