What is Earth Day and when is it celebrated?
Earth Day is an annual celebration that honours the achievements of the largest environmental movement and raises awareness of the need to protect Earth’s natural resources for future generations.
This year, Earth Day is taking place on Wednesday 22 April and follows the theme Our Power, Our Planet.
Special Earth Day collaboration: Green Bean Studios® and Anita Frost
This Earth Day, the National Literacy Trust was delighted to collaborate with multi‑award‑winning author, entrepreneur and founder of Green Bean Studios®, Anita Frost, creator of the Green Bean series. Together we offered an engaging environmental-themed event and resource pack designed to support literacy enjoyment for children aged 5 to 7 (suitable for ages 4 to 7 with adaptation).
This resource explores key themes from Green Bean’s Garden, including conservation, preservation and caring for nature, through three core literacy activities: reading, writing and oracy.
Although the event focused on ages 5 to 7, the materials can easily be adapted to suit younger pupils.
What’s included in the download?
- Literacy activities: reading, writing (3) and oracy.
- An excerpt from Green Bean’s Garden
- Two colouring activities
- A comic strip template (ideal for the writing activity or for creative use in class)
Download the full resource pack below to help your pupils explore Earth Day themes through stories, creativity and literacy. The event has now taken place, but you can watch on demand on our YouTube channel: Celebrate Earth Day with Green Bean author Anita Frost!
Additional Earth Day activities for schools
In the downloads section, you will find a set of environmentally themed resources designed to develop pupils’ literacy skills this Earth Day.
Suitable for ages 4–14 (KS1–KS3/P2–S3), these activities explore pollution and planetary health through reading, discussion and creative tasks, ending with pupils producing their own environmental message.
The free resources include:
- Two 45‑minute sessions for KS1 and KS2
- One 60‑minute session for KS3
- Teacher guides for ages 5 to 7, 7 to 11 and 11 to 14
- A booklist for ages 5 to 14
These cross‑curricular sessions focus on plastic pollution and are closely linked to English curricula across the UK. Everything you need is included in the downloads.
More resources
- Initiate exporation of global goals in the early years through our resource: Talking to Young Children about The Global Goals
- Dive into stories exploring climate and the environment in the Caring for the Planet selection in our Young Readers booklists