Are schools doing enougth to teach kids about the enviroment?

Discussion in 'The Environment' started by shedtroll, Oct 22, 2006.

  1. toothfairy

    toothfairy Member

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    Which do you think is more common Shedtroll, kids who have seen cow's etc and know where their food comes from or those that haven't?
     
  2. Rigamarole

    Rigamarole Senior Member

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    Come on toothfairy, everyone knows food comes from the grocery store. Now you're just being silly.
     
  3. shedtroll

    shedtroll Peace, Love & Linux

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    At the moment, kids who haven't. My mum works in a nursery (pre-school) annd according to her, some of the kids have never visited the countryside and thinks that food is made and sold in the supermarket. Hell, I've heard of 7 Year olds saying that!

    Luckly, a visit to a farm is now a compulsury thing in the curiculum over here.
     
  4. PIMPSTAR

    PIMPSTAR Member

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    i dont really think they are...i wasnt taught about anything to do with the environment when i was a kid.
     
  5. Piney

    Piney Lifetime Supporter Lifetime Supporter

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    I'd be happy if the kids can read and write and spell and do math.
     
  6. gardener

    gardener Realistic Humanist

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    Kids that have never experienced the environment ruled by Mother Nature are at a great loss. I hope the world never comes to that. I'd rather they knew which direction the sun rose and set, then understand man's theories. Not that I think the three Rs aren't important. It's just that they are only important within the context of the living world.
     
  7. MIIDAJ

    MIIDAJ Member

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    i totally agree
     
  8. drumminmama

    drumminmama Super Moderator Super Moderator

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    so would you want environmental awareness taught simply as how you do things? nonwaste, recyling sorting, etc, or should there be bits of the curricla that have impact such as using environment centered writing, sneaking it into word problems in math, hands on in early science (class gardens, field trips, etc)?

    Sure I chose to take environmental issues at college and again at uni, and my son will have it as a high school option, but what do you do in an underfunded school struggling to keep teachers in and crooks out?
     
  9. dont worry be happy

    dont worry be happy Member

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    i seriously think more about the environment should be introduced into schools. i'm almost finished high school now but i dont think we are told enough. they tell us that we should pick up rubbish (which i 100% insist on) but the only reason they give us is becos it looks untidy. they never tell us anything about recycling and what kind of effect rubbih just lyin around has on the environment and the wildlife. its really quite sad actually.
     
  10. gardener

    gardener Realistic Humanist

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    I agree that that would be a great way to make man's impact on the environment and vice versa more relevant through all disciplines. Afterall the environment has an impact on all facets of life.
     
  11. shedtroll

    shedtroll Peace, Love & Linux

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    exactly....
     
  12. runningstream

    runningstream Member

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    In Australia there has always a big focus on teaching the kids about the environment in school. I learnt before i went to school to be nice to the environment and protect what we have we learnt that our country is known for is beauty and landscapes a desert turned into our own paradise a piece of of the world not so consumed in consumerism were getting there not far behind Europe.USA etc but things are changing fast. Alot was recognised and it's sad it takes a loss famous conservationist to stir the pot again. Steve "Crickey" Irwin lol reminded us that our environment is very important and i think the universe chose the right time for him to go cos it's a time when people are believing we can change the world. And him being so popular with kids helps at least the next decade to come when we might actully start to see some results. Ours schools are doing well in teaching the kids cos the kids wont to learn about it. But i think teachers and parents should be doing more at getting the kids outdoors. To many electronics and stuff.You never see kids out on weekends or at christmas where i am we have some of the best wether in the world and there stuck in front of the computer,play station and the rest. Thats what worries me and they wonder why ours kids are getting more obese.
     
  13. Wasteland

    Wasteland Member

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    When I was in primary school, I didn't learn anything about the enviroment. But in 4th grade, they made it a requirement to learn, and special programs for every grade were set up with funding from the government. But after 2001, all of those programs were cut from my school system, and with the exception of one non-required class in high school, no other class in my county taught anything about helping the enviroment.
     
  14. SunshineChild

    SunshineChild Mad Scientist

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    My school teaches pretty much nothing. A little bit in first grade from "Reader Rainbow" videos.

    It's pretty sad cuz I know a lot of people who need to treat the earth a little better. Or a lot.
     
  15. Wasteland

    Wasteland Member

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    It shows you how much has changed in this country. In 1990, when I started kindergarden, helping the enviroment wasn't taught. By 1993, it was being taught at my school, there were tv shows and specials about protecting the enviroment (remember Captain Planet?). By 2001, any government funded programs that taught enviromental protection were cut from the budget. And here it is, 2006, and kids are being taught to be wasteful consumers.
     
  16. Woodpoppies

    Woodpoppies Member

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    At my one elementry school we were taught about the environment we always celebrated earth day ... we would learn how to tell time by the sun,roll around on the earth ball and they would tell us what we can do to help the envionment at home and at school, we spent all day outside taking in mother earth It was great ... I think they should have told us more stuff but otherwise they did a great job. It would be nice if more schools did that
     
  17. Green

    Green Iconoclastic

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    I'm a junior and so far I've been told almost nothing. I got a little bit in biology last year and that was it.
     
  18. Benther Dondat

    Benther Dondat Member

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    We breath, we drink and we nourish our bodies with the phenomenal bounty of this earth. When the cold winds of winter or the harsh days of summer threaten our wellbeing we seek earth’s shelter. Satisfying our daily necessities we then strive for peace and love within our community.

    Peace and love go to the very heart of our being. The clouds of derision and division are reflections of a mind’s I blinded and lost in the wilderness of a conceptual sleight of hand. The Truth is that the nature in human nature IS Mother Nature and the mother of nature is the garden..

    Mother Nature is an amazing expression of universal harmonies and resonance. The rhythms of our heart beat, our breath, day and night, winter and summer, tides, orbits, atoms. Each is an echo of the other.

    Every important lesson in life should be taught in the wholist of all places…the garden. But unfortunately most are taught in the Holy cathedrals of American education…public, private and religious schools that plant the seeds of competition, capitalism, materialism, monotheism… the conceptual foundations of American thought.

    We worship what we don’t have and piss on that which we do.

    "You must teach your children that the ground beneath their feet is the ashes of your grandfathers. So that they will respect the land, tell your children that the earth is rich with the lives of our kin. Teach your children what we have taught our children, that the earth is our mother. Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons of the earth. If men spit upon the ground, they spit upon themselves.
    This we know - the Earth does not belong to men - man belongs to the Earth. This we know. All things are connected like the blood which unites one family. All things are connected."
    " Chief Seattle,


    The great paradox! The salvation of civilization rests in the hands of our youth and the most irresponsible people on the planet today are their parents...parents that never seriously lift a hand to help resolve overpopulation or the suffering of the children that are already here...parents that figure the best way to save the planet is to produce more kids that will join the rest of us to consume what is left of this wondrous planet...parents that spend their life punching the time clock, paying the mortgage, putting food on the table and teaching their kids to compete with the Jones...and worst of all parents that send their kids to schools without gardens!
     
  19. palaeopeasant

    palaeopeasant Banned

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    They live in communities without gardens. The food for the USA is grown in agribusiness concentrations, e.g., the San Joaquín Valley, and shipped nationwide. Once even the cities were surrounded with a farm belt which produced the vegetables, meat and dairy needed by the urbanites.

    You can see how much land there is that could grow food. It is used instead for decoration, every suburban yard a miniature tacky-imitation Versailles with poisonous shrubbery and sprayed grass.

    When the Spanish arrived in Tenochtitlán, it was a city full of gardens. Food plants grew in public places. One could pick things to eat hanging from the walls as one walked down the street. Modern Mexico, by contrast, is malnourished and often undernourished.

    Wherever we are now, we could be involved in managing the environment around us so that the toxicity and ecological dysfunction of corporate society is replaced by sane ecologically-integrated culture. Start by growing as much of your own food, medicine and other household products as you can. Encourage the growth of farmers markets. These are often superficially supported for public relations purposes by local businesses and chambers of commerce, but in reality they will nearly always impede the progress of a farmers market. This is not surprising. Farmers markets represent not only competition for produce sales but also are an example of more autonomous independent economy of the sort which does not make THEM rich...

    Imagine the amount of energy and pollution required to produce a head of lettuce in the Salinas Valley, California, and then ship it to you in New Jersey or wherever, compared to the environmental effect of growing your own lettuce. Not to mention the superiority of the lettuce varieties you will grow yourself! This is where the "Green Revolution" has to start.
     
  20. HippyHippyShake

    HippyHippyShake Member

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    last week we watched an inconveniant truth and it touched alot of people..... i was surprised at the numbers of people who i never expected to care really think :] i was extremly happy :]
     

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