Effective teaching

What other schools are doing

Check out what’s been happening at other RoadSense schools.

Taking pedestrian safety in their stride

Year 6 students at New Plymouth’s Central School went right to the top with their concerns about pedestrian safety on the city’s award-winning Coastal Walkway.

They presented the New Plymouth District Council with a summary of their concerns – and a list of suggested solutions

According to their teacher, Juliet Ormrod, the children decided to look at pedestrian safety on the walkway as part of the RoadSense matrix, Being a Safe and Responsible Pedestrian.

In particular, they wanted to find out whether there was a case for making the walkway pedestrian-only, rather than allowing cyclists and people on wheeled vehicles such as skateboards and mobility scooters to use it as well.

They began the process by visiting the walkway armed with survey forms and lists of questions.

“We had a whole day out, identifying hazards and then either interviewing people, or getting them to fill in a survey about the walkway. They wanted to find out whether they’d had any close calls or suffered any injuries while using the walkway.”

After analysing their results they decided that there was a place for both pedestrians and wheeled vehicles on the walkway. But they came up with a list of six problems – and six possible solutions.

The main one was a proposal that the council should paint a line down the middle of the walkway to separate walkers and runners from people using wheeled vehicles.

Ms Ormrod says the exercise provided many different learning opportunities, and it also gave the children valuable insights into their own behaviour on the walkway.

“They now know about the importance of keeping to the left, especially if they’re on their bikes. They’re also much more aware of older people using the walkway, and how frightened they can be of people on bikes.”

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