Sunday, April 17, 2016

How my 4 year old turned into an Environmentalist! (Practical Mondays #9)



Have you seen any adult excited about taking out the garbage? Little kids can be obsessed! Have a look at my ebullient 4 year old religiously emptying our recycle bin:





And picture this:

He is rushing out for school with a sniffy nose. Our maid hands him a few tissues and he yells “NO! Tissues are a wastage! I’ll go get my hanky instead!”

Or picture this:

We’re having lunch with a nice family and my son points out that we don’t need the light on, since it’s day time and “we’re wasting electricity”

And later our host let the tap run (only to let the warm water out!) he chimes in again “you’re wasting water!!”

Kind of like Jesse Eisenberg in his guest appearance in Modern Family. Remember? The one where he was all high & mighty about the environment and his last words were: “No one wants to be friends with me…I can’t remember the last time I had someone for dinner. Which is probably a good thing since solar power takes 4 days to roast a chicken, If you want it cooked all the way through. You know I had salmonella three times?” !!

I blame the “Let’s Go Green” Series of books that I’ve been reading to him the past 6 months. In the past 6 months, we’ve read their 6 books over and over again, till their lines were drilled into his tiny brain and poured out like a walking talking environmentalist.

Well.. Maybe it’s not really a bad thing. Maybe when he grows up he’ll save paper and use normal cooking gas to cook his meats?




The Let’s Go Green series is depicted by conversations between family members, Candy, her little brother Bon Bon & their parents, to increase children’s awareness about the environment. The 6 Titles are: Let’s Save the Earth, Let’s Conserve Water, Let’s conserve Energy, Let’s stop Global Warming, Let’s Go Organic and Let’s Recycle. As the back cover says, children are receptive to any logical explanation of facts, so it’s never too early to explain the enormity of danger our planet is facing and what we can do to protect it. 


The first time I read Let’s Go Organic, I almost stopped halfway thinking it’s too much for a 3.5/4 y.o. to digest but he wanted me to continue. The ‘family' hit the chord right away, as conversations between family members are the easiest way to connect to a child! So I figured the content is not too heavy duty and in it's own simple way, makes sense to little kids. 

He is going dressed up as a Recycle Bin to perform with his class for Earth Day at school! 
(& *ahem* that's not an actual bin, but something I made out of paper- and is still unfinished!)

The Books: 


Let’s Conserve Energy
Dad describes what is energy and that it is needed to run, work and grow, not just humans but plants and animals too. It is needed to run our cars, bake a cake and switch on a lamp. Then they discuss renewable energy that is derived from the sun, wind and water, which is green energy as it doesn’t pollute and non-renewable energy that is coal, oil and fossil fuel that were formed millions of years ago under the ground from the remains of plans & animals. But the way we waste energy on a daily basis could prove to be a big danger eventually, imagine if there was no gasoline to fuel cars or electricity to charge the computer! So we must save energy!

Let’s Go Organic
They show Candy buying normal bread from the market instead of organic bread that her mummy had asked for. So then mummy explains why organic is better, how compost is made, how natural means are adopted to keep pests at bay. 

Let’s Conserve Water
It mentions the water cycle. Where does water come from? Earth is a blue planet, yet why is water a limited resource? 



The Practical Mom: Let’s Go Green: Books & Conversation to Increase Children’s Awareness about the Environment

The Conversations:

*Most* of the learning happens in day to day chitter chatter. While washing an apple with tap water I ask “so where does water come from in the tap?” or “Look! the tap’s dripping! Let’s put it off so we don’t waste water” or “It’s nearby, so let’s just walk down and save fuel”. 

Or teaching him all about garbage segregation, that food waste such as a banana peel goes in wet or organic bin and the rest goes in the dry bin. So he would ask each time before tossing any item in the bin! Also showed him the compost waste site, where organic waste is turned into compost. (Then one day we even ran away from the terrible smelling composite that was just lying in a heap in the garden!). 

When he asks why isn’t the heating on? I say we don’t put on the central heating when it’s cold, only when it’s very, very cold! Because it burns a lot of energy. So we keep it switched off when we are comfortable enough in warm clothes in the cold.

I believe repeatedly discussing these issues goes a long way in cultivating important habits at an early age. I highly recommend these books to be read aloud to kids, not just for kids but parents too! I mean, we already know this stuff but repeatedly explaining it to your kid kinna has a different impact altogether. Plus it is a reiteration of facts that we knew but had forgotten. These books are a bit elaborate and teach more than what an average 3/4 year old will understand, but for some reason, my kid is very fond of them! And selects one of these almost every time for bed time reading. 

While I could not find the amazon link to buy these books online, here is the publisher’s link(I’m not an affiliate).

More!





The Practical Mom: Let’s Go Green: Books & Conversation to Increase Children’s Awareness about the Environment




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22 comments:

  1. Thanks for hosting!

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  2. There can never be too many reminders of the importance of recycling. And trying to use less too!

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  3. There's nothing like an enthusiastic 4 year old to keep the family recycling! :)

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    Replies
    1. I know! haha.. thanks for joining in Emma:)

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  4. This is fantastic. I'd love to get my kids on board with these issues too - will check out the books.
    Thanks for hosting!

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  5. Thank you so much for hosting and for featuring my daughter's post! I can't wait to share with her when she gets home! She has been overwhelmed with the kindness of complete strangers and its really given her an extra dose of confidence to keep reading! Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!

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  6. How cute! It's awesome to recycle! Thanks for hosting and hope you have a wonderful week :)

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    1. Thanks for sharing with #SocialButterflySunday! Hope to see you link up again this week :)

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  7. It's great that he's so into it. Imagine if the whole next generation where so conscious. It would surely undo some of the damage we've done.

    #fartglitter

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  8. Sounds like somebody's been reading The Lorax!
    #MMBH

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  9. Aww I love this. So great he is into looking after our planet at only 4 years old. Unfortunately, my 2 year is the opposite and gets upset every time I turn the tap off haha xx #passthesauce

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    1. that's exactly how he was when he was 2 too! took hour long baths everyday! I would just let him cuz it would keep him so utterly occupied ...it would salvage my left over sanity ! thanks Wendy!

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  10. What a wonderful way to get your son interested in taking care of our planet!

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  11. As a high school science teacher, this makes me proud! I try and get my high schoolers to think a little more like this and not be so wasteful! Thanks for linking up with Blogger's Spotlight and please come back again!

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