How We Affect the Environment

This week, Lessons 1 & 2 are combined.

Objectives

To think of various positive ways in which we can help the environment.

To understand the importance of recycling.

To understand the importance of disposing of waste appropriately.

Resources

Lined paper | Assignment 2

Today's Lesson

Main Activity

Spend two lessons on these activities

Discuss the past two weeks’ lessons with your child. It paints a very gloomy picture for the future of the planet. It is important to point out that all these problems can be reversed, and the Earth can recover, if we all (individuals and governments) do the right things.

Explore the PowerPoint How We Can Help the Environment.

📊 EXPLORE - How We Can Help the Environment

We cannot control what large industries do to damage the environment, but as individuals, we can do our little bits to help.

Ask your child to look at your household waste and make suggestions for how to reduce the amount thrown away, e.g.:

Recycle some of the rubbish: Plastics can be taken to various companies to be converted into furniture or fence posts etc. Aluminium cans can be melted down again to make more cans. Glass bottles can be taken to certain places to be converted into spectacles for poor people. Coloured glass can be made into ornaments or drinking glasses. Recycling, it should be remembered, does use more energy...
Raw ‘vegetable’ matter can be turned into compost;
Other food waste might be collected locally by council/ municipal waste services to be ‘digested’ and used to produce methane which, in turn, can be used to generate electricity;
Reuse some of the rubbish, e.g. a water bottle can be made into a bird feeder; yoghurt pots can be used for planting seeds
Reduce, reuse and recycle are key words. Watch the Reduce, Reuse and Recycle video and see how you can fit that into your life.

Access the internet and look at various ways in which plastic water bottles have been recycled to make useful or decorative items. In some countries, whole miniature islands have been created on floating rafts of water bottles. Other places have built greenhouses, boats or actual houses out of them! There are very many ingenious ideas for their recycling uses.

Explore the story A Place For Plastic.

Research the effects of plastic waste on sea creatures. Write a report explaining how plastic gets into the sea and how it harms creatures. Suggest what can be done to help the situation.

Ask your child to reflect on their learning on the environment over the past few weeks. What has been memorable and new learning? Encourage them to have discussions with friends and family members over the next few days about their learning, so that they can benefit from listening to other people’s opinions that they may not have considered before.

Resources

Assignment

Please ask your child to complete Assignment 2.

Citations

[1] www.youtube-nocookie.com [2] www.youtube-nocookie.com [3] www.youtube.com