Cranbrook students have been working on a family project with their siblings, coming up with ideas for statues to celebrate someone of importance in our world today.

St Martin’s Primary School youngsters were tasked with looking at whose legacy they thought needed to be commemorated and why their statue should be sculpted.

Children’s ideas for statues included - Ariana Grande for her concerts to support children impacted by the bombing of her concert, Abby Bergman because of her positive attitude and for being a good role model, Stacey Dooley because she always listens, for someone’s cat, Florence Nightingale, Mother Theresa, Barack Obama, David Walliams for being kind and writing books for children and lots of recommendations for doctors and nurses for their commitment during pandemic.

There was also a number of suggestions for Captain Tom.

A year six student called Evie suggested a statue for ‘friendship’, saying it was ‘one of the most crucial parts of life...People will learn from it and hopefully do the same’.

Steph Harvey, acting head, said: “This week’s focus was on statues - how they originated - looking at the Sphinx and the Easter Island Statues - and then moving on to some famous images - Christ the Redeemer and the Statue of Liberty.

“I also discovered that Boris Johnson had written about this issue in the Daily Telegraph - ‘Would it not be better and more honest to ask our children to understand the context, to explain the mixture of good and bad in the career of Churchill and everyone else? Rather than tear some people down, we should build others up, and celebrate the people who we in this generation believe are worthy of memorial’.

“It has been really important to do this to provide a different focus for home learning - it enables collaborative family engagement.”

One year two parent said: “We’ve had an amazing day and looked at loads of statues.

“It’s led to loads of discussions over what statues were erected for. What an interesting and stimulating day.”

The day of learning was set for the whole school as a number of parents had told the school about how difficult it was when their children had different levels of work to do.