We all know that the world is buzzing with the word recycle and go green but what does it mean to our students. Is it just a fad to them? Do they really know the impact of the excessive waste that is overtaking our land fills?
This lesson will help them to learn just what this is really all about and empower them to make wise, mindful choices. It’s so important to teach our students (of all ages) to not just recycle but to create less waste and a smaller carbon footprint. The statistics are staggering. Check out a few of the facts on just how long it takes common trash items to biodegrade.
- Plastic soda bottles ............ forever,
- Glass bottles ............ 1 million years,
- Batteries ............ 100 years,
- Aluminum + tin cans ............
- 50 to 100 years,
- Plastic bags ............ 10 to 20 years,
- Orange peel ............ 6 months,
- Paper ............ 2 to 5 months,
- Banana Peel…….3-5 Weeks ,
- Wool Cap ……. 1 Year ,
- Cigarette Butt ……. 2-5 Years,
- Disposable Diaper …….10-20 Years,
- Hard Plastic Container …….20-30 Years,
- Rubber Boot Sole ……. 50-80 Years,
- Plastic 6-pack Holder ……… 450 Years
The objective of this lesson is to help students to gain an understanding of the amount of time it takes commonly used items to leave the earth, biodegrade. A second aim is to enable the students to come to see how they contribute to this excess of ‘trash’ and to make a plan to leave a smaller carbon footprint.
Have a group discussion to create a list of items that students use everyday that are used only once or twice and discarded. Cups, paper, plastic baggies, cans, plastic bottles, glass bottles, etc. This list can be long and probably will be long. Discuss with the class how certain items are easily biodegradable and others are not. Talk to them about landfills being full and show pictures of the huge amounts of trash at the land fills. Give facts on trash and how much room it takes and the effects it has on our world and planet. Illustrate these facts with discussion, real world examples, whatever you can think of to make it real to your students.
Return to the list. Divide the lists into even groups and divide the class into groups. Assign each group of students a group(s) of trash items. Each group should have 6-10 items on their list.
Instruct the groups that they will be creating an animal or ‘creature’ they design out of the items on their list. (This project will take time to complete.) Have the groups come up with the animal or new creature they will make, plan the creation and assign roles to each group member for collecting items or whatever is needed. The plan should coincide with the teacher provided timeline for completion and presentation of the project.
Ask the students to keep a written record of all the items they throw into the trash that week both at school and at home. This will be their ‘trash’ journals.
The second part of this project is for the students to research each item on their list and find out the average time for the item to decompose and an estimate of how much of that item is discarded each year. These facts should be presented when the groups introduce their animal or creature to the class.
Upon completion of the presentations have the students discuss what they discovered about their waste in the trash journal that week. Using that journal have each student create a plan (written) and briefly discuss it with the class of how he or she plans to 1) cut down on their own contribution to waste and 2) recycle.
