Global temperatures are rising and pollution levels are on an increase across the world. It has been estimated that 1.2 trillion gallons of untreated sewage is dumped into the ocean each year. These alarming levels of pollution put our future generations at severe risk. In fact, pollution is one of the biggest global killers that exist, impacting over 100 million people. In order to meaningfully combat the menace that is global pollution, we need to sensitize our children to waste management techniques and systems. Happily, this key humanitarian lesson can be fun and informative.
5 Ways to Teach Waste Management to Your Child
1. Upcycling with Art
Children are naturally curious and creative, so gearing them towards craft is a great way of teaching them about waste management. First and foremost, you need to keep a carton where your child can put single-use plastic bottles, old tins, paper towel tube and cereal boxes. Instead of merely discarding these everyday waste items, encourage your children to get creative and upcycle waste materials.
You can drill tiny holes in these plastic bottles, fill it with soil and plant a seed to make a hanging pot. You can use paper towel tubes and cereal boxes to cut up and make into a periscope or a kaleidoscope. These small upcycled items will help them think creatively and innovate more, besides ensuring that they do not simply discard material as waste!
2. Effective Disposal of Household Waste
A major component of teaching your child about waste management is learning waste management yourself. Children learn by example, so if they see you making wise, environmentally-conscious decisions, they will be motivated to emulate your example. There is more you can do that simply separating recyclable and non-recyclable waste, such as effective solvent disposal.
Your household produces ecologically-damaging solvent waste—in the form of polishes, cleaning fluids and fertilizers. This solvent waste often goes untreated, damaging the freshwater sources it is dumped in.
Instead of simply throwing away residual solvent waste, collect it in accumulation centres or HPLC Waste Containers and get them treated before disposal.
3. Use of High-Grade and Alternative Material
Besides setting good examples of waste disposal to your kid, you can also sensitize your child to good environmental practices by using eco-friendly alternatives to disposable plastics. There are simple switches you can make.
Instead of using polythene bags that choke the seas, use cloth bags for groceries. Instead of buying single-use plastic bottles for drinking water, carry science bottles made of high-grade plastic when you are on the move. Another way of cutting down on your plastic use is by buying vegetables from farmers’ market, instead of purchasing vegetables that are wrapped in plastic, like you find in chain stores.
4. Organize Neighbourhood Clean-Up Drives
Another activity that is bound to solidify the importance of waste management while instilling the virtue of doing in your child is organizing or participating in neighbourhood clean-up drives. It is fairly easy to organize one. Contact your local school or club to gather motivated young people on a weekend. Provide them with gloves and other equipment required for picking trash off the streets.
In small groups, go around your neighbourhood collecting litter. Once collected, sort them according to its recyclability and have it suitably treated. This activity train children against littering, and make the importance of waste management apparent to them.
5. Teaching through Games
Waste management for kids does not have to be boring. Environmental care immediately concerns us, so its importance can be palpably felt through a number of fun games.
Take the Air+Water Power Experiment Kit. While building small machines, your child can learn about the laws of Physics and alternative resources. Or you can create beautiful art using recycled paper through the Spin Art Revolution Craft Kit. Through these games, your children will learn to be sensitized towards the environment, while having fun!
Conclusion
Our children are the future of our earth. As the leaders and makers of tomorrow, they need to be well-equipped to safeguard the planet. By making them more ecologically-aware, we can give them the keys to create a more sustainable world. With these ideas and some effort and action, we can ensure they will learn how to make the world a better place.
He has also written blogs in other verticals too like personal development, unique gifting blogs. His hobby is travelling and exploring unique things.
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Hi, if you don’t mind, I’d like to contribute to this with a coloring book about the waste management tips and information for children, available for free download here: https://d-rifter.com/2020/04/22/free-coloring-book-teach-your-kids-about-waste-management/
We created this as a part of EU funded project about informing and educating the local community of island Bra? in Croatia about waste management and the importance of recycling. Hope you find it useful!
Learning starts from home so kids should be taught early. As stated, learning starts from home and we treat each other as family in our new company!
Agree! We should also teach our children of danger it might cause if we don’t properly manage our waste especially the medical waste, well, they are too young for this topic, atleast they got some ideas.