Posted on Thursday, September 27, 2007
Wednesday, September 26, was Environmental Day for the fifth graders in the New Wilmington Middle School. What a group of active and exciting kids! Four classes of about 30 rotated among four activities that related to our environment.
In keeping with the mission of ¾¨Ó㴫ý's Field Station -- education -- I loaded about 200 pounds of compost-related paraphernalia onto the truck early on Wednesday and drove the road to the Middle School. This load included bins, bottles, bagged compost and separately bagged compostables. I had old sneakers and a batch of cans and bottles to show how they can be salvaged from a landfill. At 9:00 the first class of 30 came adorned in white T-shirts with ENVIRONMENT clearly visible. That first class would be followed by three more classes before noon. The kids talked about what they would be doing today and the rest of the week. They were excited children. So was I, because they are the future!
We were, thankfully, outside on the schoolyard. The air was clear and the sun was shining. Kids were a bit noisy. That's okay. I gave each child a sheet with 13 "green" words -- that ranged from BIODEGRADABLE to VERMICULTURE. Those, I said, were their spelling and living words . . . much easier to spell them than live them, however. We talked about each word, especially the 3 Rs of the environment: REDUCE, REUSE and RECYCLE. To that list we added a fourth R, RESPECT. They gave examples from home that showed "green talk" is not just for the classroom. One child in discussing SUSTAINABLE said, "it is keeping things going." And with that we talked about the need to plant at least one tree for every tree cut down. We should use our sneakers as long as we can . . . and then recycle the worn out shoes by placing them into bins put out by the local Kiwanis Club. We talked about the possible environment that their children would have -- did they want their children to grow up in a littered and polluted environment? No! Did they know why flimsy grocery-store plastic bags could be dangerous to the environment? Yes! Would they encourage their parents to recycle their fall leaves rather than burn them? Well, maybe! I emphasized how the Field Station on the Fayette-New Wilmington Road can help the community recycle unwanted fall leaves, food waste and shoes.
Then we shifted from theory to action. I gave each child latex gloves and dumped some finished compost into a bin. They were to pick it up, smell it and then scatter it on the grass of the schoolyard. Very few flinched. Some of them actually said the compost smelled good. Everyone enjoyed throwing a little dirt around. Who as a fifth grader wouldn't like that? We shifted from COMPOST to COMPOSTABLE. And we laid out the zip-locked bags of manure, leaves, shredded paper, pondweed AND food waste! Oh, my! After the shock of seeing some of that "stuff," they begged to be the ones to dump these compostables into a bin. Then everyone with gloved hands got into the act, mixed the stuff, added water and finished with the addition of earthworms. With that, we had just set up a small composting batch to demonstrate VERMICULTURE. "What do you do with it?" some child asked. Good question! I explained that at the Field Station we lay the compostables out in long rows, stir the rows with our Brown Bear compost turner behind a tractor and, presto, in four months we have finished compost that can be used for planting trees, flowers and gardens. We work with 226 tons of compostables a year! Compost is good. No doubt about it. It is ORGANIC, another green word. Each class received some bagged compost for experiments in science.
After four groups cycled through this outdoor classroom I paused to catch my breath and utter a sincere "thank you" to children and teachers of our community who really care enough about the environment to have a special "E-day." The other three parts of this E-day for fifth graders were: "Indian Artifacts" by Jim Schneider, "Microscope Activity" by Laurie Martin and "Native Animal Species" by Tammy Sankey. All good topics and all good ways to celebrate our planet's heritage. I also remembered another road trip from the Field Station on Earth Day in April, 2005 when I carried similar paraphernalia to the Neshannock Elementary School for an equally upbeat time outdoors talking about and demonstrating sustainability. Life is good.
Clarence Harms, Director
Field Station
