I DON’T know Huntington School, nor did I know Mrs McKeown, but I congratulate the school for creating a wonderful, permanent memorial to her in the form of a learning pod, which I am sure will benefit the school and its wider community for many years.

You quoted a tribute which said she had a “strong sense of love and duty to her fellow man”.

It seemed a great shame to mar such an excellent celebration of her memory by encouraging children to pollute our world with plastic litter.

All the balloons that are released on such occasions will come down to earth. They will land in trees, hedges, rivers, fields and the sea, taking many years to slowly break down.

They will smother small creatures; they will be swallowed by fish and animals, causing a slow death, or some will end up in minute particles in our own food chain.

Only recently the Countryfile programme carried an investigation into widespread plastic pollution.

Please will schools and other groups think twice before teaching children that it is okay to spread litter if it is balloon shaped. It is no more okay than dropping plastic food wrappers.

Wendy Prendergast, Upper Poppleton, York