At Riddings Infant and Nursery School we enjoy being Travel Smart.

As a school, we strive to make our travel to and from school as smart as possible. On this page there is a lot of information about the initiatives we have carried out to raise awareness.  Also at the very bottom of the page there is lots of useful information and links to support you with your smart travel to and from school. 

After working really hard, we have achieved our Modeshift STARS Bronze, Silver and Gold awards!

To find out more about scooting to school please look at the documents below, including our Scooter Code.

Travel Smart 2023-2024

National Clean Air Day 20th June 2024

The road outside the Infant and Junior school was closed during dropping off and pick-up times on Thursday to coincide with the national Clean Air Day. The Derbyshire County Council trial was also aimed at cutting traffic congestion at the start and end of the school day.

Chris Henning from Derbyshire County Council said: “We’re pleased to see the schools trialling this scheme and the results will be of keen interest to us in informing future policy."

We are so happy to say that the day was really successful. The children were amazed by the emptiness of the roads. Our roads are very busy and very narrow, so to have no cars on it has been brilliant for the clean air day as well as the road safety aspect too.

Thank you to all our lovely parents / carers for your support.

On Monday the 28th April, Rob Bounds came into school to carry out smoothie bike workshops with Nursery and Reception. 

He spoke to the children about the importance of eating healthy and exercising. 

The children helped Rob to create their own smoothies which they tasted at the end of the workshop. They discussed with Rob if they liked the taste, and what they could change to make it better.

Thank you Rob for these fantastic workshops! We look forward to seeing you again soon!

Today, we have completed a balance bike workshop with Rob Bounds. We practised our balancing skills on stepping stones and a bench. We also played some games to improve our balancing. We then got to use the balance bikes and were shown how to balance, glide and use the bikes safely.

We had a brilliant day with the balance bikes, thank you Rob!

On Tuesday 17th October, during Travel Smart Week, was Happy Shoes-Day! All children and staff wore their happiest shoes for the day. We also met at the Shaw Street Car Park to walk to school together. It was a brilliant turn out with lots of families joining us on the way.

Thank you to everyone who participated in our walk to school!

We are proud to announce that we have maintained our gold travel smart accreditation this year!

We look forward to the next year and aiming for a platinum award!

Travel Smart 2022-2023

Every Wednesday morning in Summer Term 2, we met at Riddings Community Centre to walk to school together. 
We played music on our walk and danced with the grown-ups from school, who met lots of children at the park each week.

For every week that each child joined the walk from the Community Centre, they were entered into a draw to win a scooter at the end of the Summer term.

Thank you to everyone who joined us each week and a huge well done to our winner!

On Tuesday 18th April, Rob Bounds came to lead a Smoothie Bike Workshop with the Nursery children. 

During the sessions, Rob spoke about what we should put in the smoothie and how we could use his adapted bike to blend the fruit. 

The children then each had a turn at spinning the bike pedals with their hands before getting to taste their own smoothie!

We really enjoyed this workshop, thank you Rob!

On Thursday 30th March 2023, Rob Bounds visited the Reception and Year 1 children and led Scooter Smart sessions.

During these sessions, Rob spoke about the importance of staying safe when on a scooter and how to do so, as well as teaching how to move at different speeds, around objects and how to stop safely.

Reception and Year 1 children really enjoyed these sessions, Thank you Rob!

In October, 'Big on Bikes' visited our Year 2 pupils to support them with riding their bikes!

They taught the children how to use hand signals and supported them with pedalling the bicycles!

On the 19th of October 2022, Nursery had a very special visitor- Rob Bounds!

Rob visited Nursery to lead Balance Bike sessions for all of the Nursery children- Rob is the Senior Transport Officer for the Sustainable Travel Team at Derbyshire County Council, he works closely with school to promote sustainable and active travel. 

The children had so much fun taking part in activities that promote co-ordination and balance. They loved walking across stepping stones, moving in different ways and then riding the Nursery Balance Bikes. 

Since Rob attended Nursery to lead the Balance Bike sessions, the children have enjoyed using the Balance Bikes on other occasions too!

A huge thankyou to Rob for visiting us!

During Travel Smart week in October, we encouraged children to travel to school in a active and environmentally friendly way. As part of Travel Smart week, staff met at the local park and walked to school together with the children. 

Village Walk- September 2022

The Year 2 pupils went for a walk around the village of Riddings to support their English and Topic work, the children enjoyed visiting the local landmarks.

Despite the hot weather the children still managed to travel to school on their bikes. On Wednesday some children even decorated their bikes for 'Bling up your Bike Day' which earned them all an extra special security pack. Well done 

Thursday 30th June 2022 - Car Survey 

Today we counted the number of cars that passed by our school between 8.35am and 8.50am. During this time we counted 70 cars and also witnessed congestion and double parking. As a Travel Smart School we are always looking at ways to improve the way in which we travel to and from school. Your children were asked this week how they travelled to school on that day and also how they would prefer to travel to school. The majority of children said they would like to come on their bikes.  If you are able to accommodate this then please remember we do have parking pods for you to keep your bikes for the day.

New to school or need a reminder of smart ways to travel to our school, see the map below. Also visit the very bottom of this webpage for bus times, car share schemes, scooter pools and much much more!

Tuesday 28th June - New Nursery and Reception Parents Information Afternoon.

Rob Bounds continues to be our our amazing champion and welcomes new parents informing them about Travel Smart at Riddings Infant and Nursery School!

June 16th - Clean Air Day

Today is National Clean Air Day. To support the event we met at Shaw Street car park and walked to school together. The children could all talk about the benefits of walking to school both to their own fitness but also the environment within which they live. To celebrate the walk we all carried a windmill which we loved watching spin as walked to school. We all agreed walking to school was the best way of getting there.

We planted the windmills outside the main entrance to school as a reminder to all of the benefits of walking to school.

Look out for the competition winners posters that will soon join the windmills!

Wacky Walk Wednesday - May 25th 2022

On Wednesday we had our ‘Wacky Walk’  to school day. To make the walk to school more fun we added the wacky shoe wearing option. Children and staff dressed up their shoes and wellies, which they then showed off as they did the walk to school. 

The children in both Nursery and Reception enjoyed using Rob’s ‘Smoothie Bike’ to make their very own smoothie. The children chose the fruits they liked and then peddled the bike to create energy which then made the blender work. This was not only a very healthy and yummy drink but it was also a fun, healthy and clean way to make it. 😊

April 2022

Wednesday 23rd March 2022

As part of the ‘Big Walk and Wheel’ event, Rob Bounds and Chris Frost (parent) launched our ‘Run the School Run’ initiative. Children, parents and staff met at the Shaw Street car park and ran through Riddings Park all the way to the Community Centre. They were then met by

Mrs Townsend who walked with them the rest of the way to school. For some it was the very first time they had been on a run and they were all very proud of themselves.

Well done everybody 😊

Tuesday 8th and Wednesday 9th March 2022 - Riddings Infant and Nursery had a very special visitor - Rob Bounds!

Rob is the Senior Transport Officer for the Sustainable Travel Team at Derbyshire County Council, he works closely with the school to promote sustainable and active travel!

  Being Scooter Smart at Riddings Infant and Nursery School  

Useful Information

Cycling cont.

Grown ups – if you enjoy cycling why not sign up to Home : Love to Ride UK to win prizes!

Places and Routes to ride in Derbyshire at Cycling - Derbyshire County Council

Carshare

Find out more about how to share a car journey with others  -  Derbyshire County Council carpooling communities (kinto-join.co.uk)

Report to Governors July 2022