A school in Reading has launched a bid to smash a Guinness World Record with a climate conscious message.

St Edward’s Prep School in Tilehurst Road, Reading has attempted to break the record for the number of plastic bottles used to spell a sentence.

The sentence the school went for, “There Is Only One Earth”  was chosen by a reception child and was made out of 3,325 plastic bottles.

The record attempt was attempted yesterday (Thursday, February 17) with excited children, parents, and teachers attending the event at the school.

READ MORE: Reading SEND school wins right to increase pupil numbers

According to the headteacher, the record attempt tops off a half term of learning about the global climate and the environment.

Headteacher Jonathan Parsons said: “This half term we studied our planet, learning all about the environment, learning about climate change in lots of different ways, and all the science, history and everything that goes along with that.

“What we’ve tried to encourage the children to do is to do something with their learning, and apply their learning and hopefully to maske it a better place.

“This big action at the end of it is our children, making a statement to Reading and the world that St Edward’s Prep we stand against climate change, we don’t want to sit back and let it happen, we want to do something about it and the world record bit is just so we can get as noticed as possible.

“Obviously it’s exciting, it’s a world record, it gives us lots of motivation, it’s a lot of fun, and it’s really brought our community together as well, which is lovely after covid because it’s been very difficult.”

The world record bid has been a community effort, as school staff figured out how many bottles were needed, and a parent was responsible for drawing up a design for the slogan.

Mr Parsons added: “The children have been really instrumental in working out how their classes build their letter.

“They’ve all come up with their own strategies and ways of doing it, and they collected the bottles as well and that was the big thing.

“The children have been speaking to their neighbours, going on litter picks, cleaning their surrounding environment, they’ve been asking their local shops, and then family members have been helping as well.

“It’s been a massive community effort. It's brought us all together. We had to close our doors to covid, but now we can open them up again, and it’s been brilliant.”

READ MORE: Reading to get new 'school street' 

The event was attended by councillor Rachel Eden (Labour, Whitley) the Mayor of Reading.

Now the attempt has been undertaken, St Edwards Prep must submit evidence to be verified by Guinness World Records team.

Volunteers from the community have helped to witness and give evidence for the record.

The previous record for the  largest plastic bottle sentence was held by Transmed and LuLu Hypermarket in Dubai, which was achieved in August 2020 and spelt ‘#We Are All Responsible’ out of 2,560 bottles.

If the school team’s calculations are correct, they will have comfortably surpassed the previous record with 765 more bottles.

The school used to be for boys only, but has now become co-educational, with the first girls accepted into the school in September 2021/at the start of the acamedic year.