Later, hotter summers and colder winters prove that global warming is a real issue. The impact of this will affect those we care about most- our children.
In 2020, working toward protecting our environment and global warming has never been more important. We should, every day, be doing our bit to help to protect, sustain and care for our natural world before these irreversible issues take hold too quickly.
As adults with children, it is our job to teach them about the damage being made to the planet- a vast topic to understand, but a valuable, lifelong lesson to learn.
Here are some of the things to teach our kids about the environment, and how they can care for the world around them.
What areas Should You Cover When Talking to Young Children About the Environment?
Children are very receptive to life lessons. They will be highly influenced by the people around them- friends and family, and will want to start doing some of the same things as them. If they see you recycling, then they’ll want to know how and why they should do that and want to get involved.
Some topics of conversation to help to engage your children with environmental issues should be: deforestation, global warming, recycling, and endangered animals. Talk to them about how some of the smaller changes and habits they engage in now will help them to make an essential impact for the future generations.
Help them to understand the ways in which they can help to save electricity and water around the home such as, turning the tap off when it’s time to brush their teeth, and to unplug items when they are not being used, as well as turning off the lights when they leave a room.
Here are Some Fun Activities to Help Children to Understand the Importance of Caring for the Environment
- Invent craft projects using items that would usually be thrown away- for example a jar for pasta sauce can be used again to hold trail mix snacks, or painted brightly and turned into a pencil pot.
- Get outside in nature. Visit a nature reserve, a farm or a national park and help them to point out all the wildlife they see. Why not create a finder mission activity where they can tick off each animal or bug that they see. You can laminate an activity sheet and have them circle pictures with a dry wipe marker so they can be used again.
- Read articles and listen to talks about the environment. Stephen Troese has a wide range of these that are accessible for most audiences. You can read some before speaking to your children to get a better understanding of this area yourself.
- Create a small compost box to keep outside. Teach children the items that can and cannot be collected in the food waste tubs, and have them watch these items decompose to turn into compost.
- Use the compost to plant their own vegetables. It’s exciting to watch a seed begin to sprout and then turn into something recognizable as something to eat!
