Nursery near Northampton on track to raise £250 for Australian charities

Guilsborough Preschool is set to raise hundreds of pounds for important Australian causes helping the wildfires. Pictures taken by Kirsty Edmonds.

Staff and children at Guilsborough Preschool have been face-painting, kangaroo hopping and creating crafts for their Australian fundraising week.

They hope by Friday (January 31) they will have raised £250, which they will donate to good causes helping to fight the blazes.

It comes as the country has seen the largest ongoing wildfires in decades.

Sheila Bailey, Judy Brady and Clinical Director Cheyne Flanagan tend to a koala named Paul from Lake Innes Nature Reserve as he recovers from burns at The Port Macquarie Koala Hospital on November 29, 2019. (Getty Images)

Large swaths of the country have been devastated since the fire season began in late July, with the BBC reporting how almost half a billion (480 million) animals have been killed.

The children kickstarted Austrailia week on Monday with a cake sale where they sold £100 worth of sweet treats.

On Tuesday they had a face-painting session, took part in a kangaroo hopping competition on Wednesday and they are doing Austrailian-themed crafts today (Thursday).

Tomorrow, though, they are in for a special treat and are taking a trip to Guilsborough fire station to sit in the engines and use the hose pipes.

Guilsborough Preschool boss, Dawn Greenfield, said: "The children have really enjoyed it and have had lots of fun but they talk about how the koalas have nowhere to live.

"They are really aware people have lost their homes and how others are trying to help them.

"Children have been bringing in their show and tell, which is related to Australia. We've had aboriginal art brought in and digeridoos, which is helping to make those connections with the country."

As well as the fundraising, the children are each being asked to bring in a teddy bear.

One parent, with connections in Australia, told the preschool about how some children were without their teddy bears after they were lost in the flames - which inspired an appeal.

Dawn is planning to send the teddy bears to her friend in Australia who will donate them to families affected.

She hopes she will receive some photographs in return so the children can see where their teddys went.

She said: "The teddies triggered it for me. I thought 'you know what I've got teddies in my house that I would happily send over'.

"We've had some teddy bear donations already and we are really hoping to send them to children who have lost all their toys."