Sunday, January 6, 2008

Going Green in Preschool

Green. That seems to be the buzz word for this generation. But preschool teachers have been "green" for the longest time and didn't even know it in many cases.

As preschool teachers in our lesson plans, we reduce, reuse, and recycle everyday. When we cut the plastic butter tops into Christmas ornaments, take that weeks worth of old newspapers and make paper mache, or make plastic soda bottles into an experiment about the ocean or the rain forest we are being "green". We have been doing it for years and never gotten credit for it. We were just stretching the meager budgets we are given to educate our children.

But what if we continued our "green" ways and taught the kids those same values? Reduce, Recycle, Reuse. In 2027, we may have solved the energy problems, fixed that hole in the ozone and ended air and water pollution. But how could a population with such small resources like teachers solve such big issues as these? Because we are leading today's biggest resource- our children. We teach them and they go out and solve the problems of the past and save this beautiful earth for our grandchildren and great grandchildren. I know how corny it sounds, but the children ARE our future. And if we, as teachers, not to mention, parents lead them in the right way, we can contribute to the resolution of all of our environmental issues.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

So, I live and teach in an extremely rural area and, with no recycling plan available, wanted to teach the children about reusing and avoiding wasteful behaviors. I was saddened/sickened to find that my search for "recycle lesson plan" led me to a large quantity of activiyies that required using new materials (construction paper, paper plates, etc) and almost no new uses for old materials