Category: Population

Pay Attention to Children
© Richard Grossman MD, 2009

We are faced with a global tragedy with climate change and decreasing supplies of fossil fuel. Despite a few people who deny that any problem exists, most scientists are expecting the world’s future to be very different from the reality that we have enjoyed.
The basic problem is that we are expecting the planet to support too many people who consume too much. I have written frequently about population and ways to slow its growth, and a bit about limiting consumption. These concerns are not so much for my generation, but for the future—our children and especially grandchildren. Perhaps we can not only live for them, but also learn from them.
I recommend Global Warming for Kids: http://globalwarmingkids.net/. It is a wonderful way to inspire children, and teachers will find it to be a great resource.
There are many examples of kid environmental heroes. Savannah Walters, when she was just nine years old, started the “Pump ’em Up” campaign. She was concerned about the proposals to drill for oil in the arctic, and realized that we could conserve millions of gallons of petroleum daily if all vehicle tires were properly inflated. “In second grade we studied the Arctic and its animals,” she wrote. “I wanted to protect that environment and then learned we could also save people money and cut down on air pollution too.”
The organization’s url is www.pumpemup.org . Not only does it tell the advantages of running a vehicle with full pressure in its tires, but it gives step by step instructions that any child (or adult) can follow to check and inflate tires properly. I carry a tire pressure gauge in my car for this purpose.
Advantages of carrying the correct pressure include better handling (and safety), longer tire life, saving money on gas and decreasing air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions.
According to Savannah, the pressure in tires should be checked when they are cold, and should be done every month. The correct pressure can be found in the vehicle’s handbook or on a tag attached to the driver’s side door frame.
BP&J (peanut butter and jelly sandwich) is the longtime kids’ favorite lunch. Surprisingly, it is also the focus of another environmental campaign. Compared to a hamburger or a tuna sandwich, a PB&J is much more earth-friendly. The people at the PB&J Campaign have calculated that consuming this kids’ delight reduces carbon dioxide emissions by two and a half pounds compared to a meat or fish meal. Feeding lunches to a family of four over the span of a year, that would be a ton and a half of greenhouse gas averted! Part of the savings is from not using animal-based products, and part is from avoiding cooking.
Tired of PB&J? (When I was a kid I had a half a PB&J sandwich in my lunch every day, and never lost the taste for them.) The campaign’s website, www.pbjcampaign.org, gives lots of alternative recipes and information about the advantages of eating plant-based foods. It also has a blog that includes interesting opinions and information such as “Save the planet with beans.”
Colin Carlson is another kid with an environmental mission. Colin founded the Cool Coventry (Connecticut) Club as a school service project when he was in high school. His motto is: “One person can make a difference—I can, and so can you.” The goal of this prize-winning project is to increase awareness of global climate change, and to encourage people to reduce their energy use.
Tehreem Rehman of New York is another future environmental leader. She was inspired to start Long Island Teen Environmental Activists. Among the goals of this group is to convince local school districts to implement district-wide recycling program. “I am part of the next generation to inhabit the earth. Preserving our environment is essential. There is no planet B.”
Locally there are many young environmental activists. One example is Columbine Christian School’s annual Earth Day River Clean-up. This year more than 85 kids helped gather trash beside the Animas along the bike path. This was the eighth year for this project, and they did a clean sweep from 32nd Street to the Durango Mall.
The examples above are of kids who may end up as leaders of the future environmental movement. I hope that they take better care of their world than we have of ours. I am ashamed that we will hand over the planet to them in worse shape than we received it from our parents.

This article may be copied or published but must remain intact, with attribution to the author. I also request that the words “First published in the Durango Herald” accompany any publication. For more information, please write the author at: richard@population-matters.org.

Educate with These Projects
© Richard Grossman MD, 2008

This month the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) publicized their report “Climate Change and Water”. It says that there is “…abundant evidence that freshwater resources are vulnerable and have the potential to be strongly impacted by climate change, with wide-ranging consequences on human societies and ecosystems.”
The report goes on to state that our current freshwater control technology is likely to be inadequate to deal with events in the future. The intersection of decreasing supplies of petroleum, increasing human population and climate change is liable to be calamitous. “Climate change challenges the traditional assumption that past hydrological experience provides a good guide to future conditions.”
Life is impossible without water! How can we prepare the next generation to deal with this huge problem? What can we do to help our kids and grandkids get ready for their future?
A series of programs teaches students not what to think about water and other environmental issues, but how to think about them. They have been carefully developed by teams of educators and scientists from all over the country. The projects succeed in helping kids from kindergarten to twelfth grade learn about the world they live in.
Project WET (Water Education for Teachers) is taught all over the country, and in many other countries, too. Project WET promotes appreciation, knowledge and stewardship of water resources by making classroom-ready teaching aids available to teachers.
The WET guidebook includes over ninety activities. Each is labeled for an age range, if it is best indoors or outside, for a large or small group, etc. Each has a teacher-friendly introduction as well as a detailed description of how to guide the activity.
“Dust Bowls and Failed Levees” is an example of one of these activities. Designed for high school students, its subtitle is “Witness, through literature, the effects of droughts and floods on human populations.” Students read passages from Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath, and try to imagine how a modern author might document the tragedy of Katrina.
The activity “Where Are the Frogs?” is aimed at middle school students. It shows the effect of acid rain on the growth of plants such as marigolds or beans. (Frogs are also affected by acid rain but it is better to observe the effects on plants in the classroom). First, the lesson explains what an acid is. Students then prepare solutions of weak and stronger acid that are used to water the plants. They observe growth over a month. The experimental procedure is given in an activity sheet that includes a data collection page. (These activity sheets, but not complete lessons, may be found on internet at: www.projectwet.org).
The water cycle is illustrated for younger kids by “The Incredible Journey,” an activity for a large room or playing field. Skills involved include organizing (mapping); analyzing (identifying components and relationships) and interpreting (describing). Students (or chance) determine the movement of water within the hydrosphere.
What about other environmental issues? They are dealt with in the other Projects: Learning Tree (www.PLT.org, dealing with plants, trees and forests), WILD (www.projectWILD.org, concerning wildlife) and Project Food, Land & People (www.foodlandpeople.org, focusing on the interdependence of agriculture, human needs and the environment). Although similar in basic structure, each has its own history, literature and website.
Too many kids in the USA spend too little time outside nowadays. They grow up neither understanding nor respecting the great web of nature. As adults they will be much more likely to destroy our planet than people who appreciate its intricate workings. This is why I feel that quality nature education is so important. The Projects offer superior learning opportunities.
Recently I was one of several people from Durango who attended a facilitator training. Our goal is to prepare teachers all over the state so they will be comfortable teaching the Projects. Most of the others at the training are professional educators, including two professors from Fort Lewis College, so it took intensive concentration (and my wife’s help) to get me up to speed.
Here in southwestern Colorado we are lucky to have an employee of the Colorado Division of Wildlife who oversees these Projects. As Southwest Regional education coordinator, Leigh Gillette added a big spark of enthusiasm to our training. If you would like to learn more or to teach from these resources, call her at 375-6709.
Unless kids learn to value the natural world, they will not be willing to protect it when they are adults. These four Projects help children understand the complexities of nature.

This article may be copied or published but must remain intact, with attribution to the author. I also request that the words “First published in the Durango Herald” accompany any publication. For more information, please write the author at: richard@population-matters.org.