Update #17: Organising school events in 2023 / December 7, 2023

This year, we introduced a new way to involve schools with kids from the village of Lurë and around Albania. The main scope was to have educational activities during the planting season as an additional program to the project.

We had an opportunity to show the kids the whole process, from the seeds - to saplings in the nursery - to planting trees in the National Park.

To give the kids a better understanding, we prepared a daily program to show and experience the entire cycle that a tree undergoes before being planted.

At the nursery

The first part of the day started at the nursery of Trees for Lurë. Besides showing the kids the seed extraction process, we ensured they experienced it by giving each of them one pinecone from where they extracted seeds. You can fully understand how complex this step is only by trying!

We moved to the area of the nursery where planting substrate is ready, and here started the fun. We gave everyone empty trays, we use reusable containers to minimise the waste from the tree nursery. Here, we took the opportunity to explain the concept of recycling, and then they proceeded to fill the trays and plant. Everyone was excited to plant the seeds they extracted into trays they prepared. When the kids finished watering, they would carry the trays into the nursery, and the seed-planting would conclude.

Lurë kids getting their hands dirty on the substrate, before planting seeds

Monitoring system and new trees

In the nursery, we grow three different species: pinus nigra, abies alba and pinus peuce; all three typologies already grow within the National Park. The kids were curious to see how different each sapling grows and looks. However, the monitoring system (which we started using this year) mainly attracted everyone’s attention. Pavel explained shortly the data the monitoring system collects, such as soil humidity in trays, temperature and lighting levels (inside/outside the nursery), and the battery charging system through the small solar panel. Then he showed them the graphs where all this data gets analysed and stored. Everyone was so engaged with this little experimental device, and they asked so many questions!

Lurë kids checking the difference between Abies alba and Pinus nigra saplings

Peshkopi kids checking the monitoring systems graphs

First nursery

Next, we moved to our first/old nursery, where we showed everyone the 2-year old trees (pinus nigra) that we planted in spring 2022; where also they could see the difference in growth a tree from the same species has as a 1-year and a 2-year old sapling. We asked everyone to pick and load a few trees into the truck we call Kësulkuqe before heading to the planting area.

Explaining the difference between 1-year and 2-year old pinus nigra tree

Finally planting trees

At the planting area, everyone was thrilled. They were looking forward to finally being able to plant trees! It was important for us to explain to everyone that the most critical task was to plant correctly rather than plant a lot. What surprised us the most was how attentive and careful they were when planting trees. They worked in pairs, taking turns carrying the bags with trees from the truck, checking if the hole was suitable for planting, removing the plastic bag of the tree and then planting. With every group of kids, we faced the same problem: they all asked for more trees to plant!!!

Training how to plant correctly at the planting area

Daniel and one of the kids planting 2-year old pinus nigra tree

Peshkopi kids planting a 2-year old pinus nigra tree

When the kids finished planting, we showed them the pinus nigra trees planted in 2021 and 2022, as well as the monitoring system method for each year.

The last part of the day was the fun part! We spent some time all together around a big fire at the camping area next to where they planted their trees. This was some precious time! We ate byrek (prepared with care by a local woman), had some herbal tea, and finally had a chance to relax and talk about their day experience.

Three school events during 2023

This year, we managed to have three separate events with three different schools. The requests from schools were higher, but we were disadvantaged by the rainy weather on the first days of November.

On the first activity, we had local kids from Lurë, thanks to the great help we got from Daniel Hoti (@hoti.daniiel), who organised a group of 14 kids aged from 7 to 14 years old. Everyone was so excited to finally see what the people behind Trees for Lurë do.

At the second activity, we had “Nënë Tereza” school from Rrëshen, 14 ninth-graders and three teachers joined us for a day, thanks to great help from Gjergji (teacher) and Dorinela (Director of the school). This group was particularly excited to plant trees, and it was so fun to see how the kids and teachers were racing over the number of trees each group was planting.

Our last activity was with “Myslim Shehu” school from Peshkopi; 15 eighth-graders and one teacher joined us on the last day of the planting season for 2023. We have to thank Dallëndyshe (teacher) for the great help. These kids were exceptionally engaged and interested in the monitoring system at the nursery in Fushë-Lurë.

Considering the enthusiasm and interest shown by all kids, we will repeat these events in spring, during the seed planting season, as we already have a few schools from Rrëshen, Peshkopi and Tirana on the waiting list.

On behalf of the whole team,
Pavel