Westmount School is celebrating Earth Day this week with a bottle drive to help bring education outdoors.

Funds raised from the bottle drive are going towards expanding the school's outdoor classroom.

A trailer is parked outside of the school for anyone to drop off their recyclables to help the school raise $3,000 to purchase new trees for the outdoor space while a pair of local companies are donating a few boulders and logs along with fresh mulch from the Town of Okotoks.

Steven Kotowich, teacher at Westmount School, says students have been making a large effort for the bottle drive.

"We're slowly building it and the trailer is getting filled as we speak, and students are going to be really excited when they see the bobcats come with the trees and we actually start putting a shovel in the ground."

Danielle Linkletter, grade 5 student, says she has a lot of experience with the outdoor classroom and enjoys being outside.

"We've done a lot of science in the outdoor classroom because when we were in grade 3 and grade 4 we were learning a lot about plants so we were learning about the different plants in the outdoor classroom," she says. "We've also done art, nature art."

Kotowich says the outdoor classroom presents opportunities that students don't have inside the school.

"It's a natural outdoor space where teachers can take their students and you could teach a traditional math class, a language arts class, or you can take them outside and start making some of those natural connections with the environment which is really important because working with students at a ground level, teaching them a little bit of stewardship for the environment, it goes a long way as they're growing up."

Everyone is welcome to drop off bottle or cash donations at Westmount School, or bottles can be donated directly at the bottle depot with a request for the proceeds to go towards the school.  

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