Today’s children are growing up in a world where sustainability and environmental issues are constantly being discussed around them.
The future of the planet is the future of our children so it’s really important to include them in the conversation and to raise their awareness of everything from recycling to composting food scraps.
There are some really fun and interactive ways that you can gently engage your child in environmental issues.
Here are some of our favourite ways to introduce topics including the environment, pollution, recycling and the great outdoors to your child.
1. Start at home
Home is where your child will learn most of their behaviours, and where they’ll begin to construct their ideas about the world around them.
Look around your home and see where opportunities might lie. This could include:
- Whether or not you have different recycling bins and if so, are these at a level where your child can reach them and start learning about which materials go where?
- Checking that you always turn lights off after leaving a room. This can be a fun game to play with children – tell them they need to check after you as you might forget!
- Turning off the tap when you are brushing your child’s teeth or after washing hands. This is a good way to start a conversation about conserving water and why that is important.
2. Look at your transport
Start talking to your child about the different methods of transport. Most children love vehicles such as buses and trains. Your child may already have books about different ways of getting to places, and they’ll probably enjoy songs like “Wheels on the Bus” too.
Talk about how you get to daycare. If you always drive in your car, you could explain to your child that not everybody has a car and that there are different ways of moving around. It’s good to talk about how trains, buses and trams can fit many more people in than a single car.
If you have bikes and enjoy cycling, consider getting a baby or child bike seat. This allows you the freedom to go for bike rides with your child who will enjoy sitting up high and watching the world go by. If your child is older they may have started to learn to ride a bike themselves – this can also be a lovely family activity.
3. Be a role model
As a parent or caregiver, you’ve got a huge amount of influence when it comes to teaching your child how to act and live sustainably.
It could be something as simple as remembering to always take a reusable coffee cup with you – talk to your child about it and tell them why you’re trying to reduce the amount of plastic you throw away on a daily basis.
Your approach to recycling and reusing items will be mirrored by your child. If they always see you making use of old cardboard delivery boxes to make toy cars or dens from, they’ll likely grow up doing the same.
Always vocalize to your child when you are switching off lights or turning off the taps to save water – show them as and when you do things and they’ll quickly follow suit.
4. Bring sustainability into playtime
It’s easy to bring the concept of sustainability into the world of your child’s play. There are tonnes of activities you can do to teach children about the world around them and how to look after it.
From recycling paper to use for drawing and painting, to collecting rainwater in the garden to use for water play – simply making your child aware of nature and its resources is a brilliant place to start.
Have a look at your children’s toys. We understand that children often gravitate towards brightly coloured plastic toys and we’re not suggesting cutting out everything that’s not 100% eco friendly. However, you may want to consider how you can make interesting and engaging play things from recycled materials.
- Why not wash out old jam jars or plastic bottles and fill them with dried beans or rice to make a shaker?
- Use unwanted large cardboard boxes to create pretend boats or cars for your child to play with. Let them decorate them using other scrap materials or items from the garden such as feathers or leaves.
- Head to the library and look for storybooks with environmental themes. There are lots of beautifully illustrated children’s books featuring this type of topic – from ‘Where the Wild Things Are’ to ‘The Last Tree in the City’
- Start a toy swap with friends. Instead of buying new toys, borrow a toy that a friend no longer wants and offer them one in return. Children love playing with something different and it doesn’t have to be bought brand new from a shop.
5. Get Outside
Giving your child an appreciation of the natural world as early as possible in life is key in helping them to engage with the environment.
If you have a backyard, why not make it a regular event to go out once a day and take a look at what is growing, what animals you can see and what noises you can hear. Children love being outdoors and will naturally gravitate towards sights, sounds and smells that take their interest. Let them lead you to areas that interest them.
You could make a compost bin with your child to help them to understand how food wastage can be turned back into the natural world and how insects help to break down the soil.
If you don’t have a backyard, try and visit parks and community gardens wherever possible. There are lots of activities going on for children in and around South Australia – from the Botanic Gardens at Mount Lofty to the Himeji Garden in the Adelaide CBD.
Conclusion
We’ve compiled this list of suggestions you might like to try but many of these will lead onto other exciting activities that may develop organically.
Let your child explore these ideas and encourage them in any way you can – this may be by helping them find out more about certain topics, by helping them find resources for use for an extension project or simply by helping to answer their questions and keep the conversation open.
Use resources such as your local library or national park information centres. They will often have activities specifically designed for children such as treasure hunts and trails.
Most of all, make it fun. Helping your child to enjoy the natural world, appreciate its resources and learn to value the world around us is one of the best gifts you can give.
