Year 4 Investigate What Our Kura Can Do

Do you remember when we wrote to the Prime Minister?  Well he didn't take them in person, but he did send a video reply.

Today we wondered how our kura can further help the sea.

We read a play about some Eco Awards. How did the children help their school environment?

Bryn: "Eat less meat."

Millie: "Bike to work or school."

Gayanuka: "Stop littering."

We wondered if litter was still a problem at our kura ...

After collecting rubbish from around our kura for just 10 minutes, we came back to analyse the data.

In 10 minutes, Room 26 collected:

Plastic pieces = 202

Paper = 76

organic = 22

random = 10

What do we think about this?

Henry: "I think Waka can do better."

Grayson: "It's horrible because we collected a lot in such a short time."

Elora: "This is really bad for life, sea and everywhere."

Midhush: "It's bad for the ocean because then the wind blows it to the drains."

Theo: "I saved 3 plastic bags that were heading for the drain!"

The category we had the most of was plastic.

When we looked even closer....

we realised the plastic had come from our lunchboxes!

How can we solve this problem?

Maddison: "Unwrap the muesli bar at home."

Leo: "I use a sustainable cupcake holder for my crackers etc."

Isabel: "Just bring a litter-free lunch!"

Room 23 collected litter from each lunch eating area and compared:

Maia: "There's the most rubbish in the Year 3 and 4 area"

"The Year 3 and four rubbish pieces might just be bigger" 

"Most of the litter in the Year 2 area was small" Bryn

"The litter comes from lunchboxes" 

What can we do?

Make posters for litterfree lunchboxes

Make a commercial 

Make a video about can happen if we make rubbish

Send a letter to the people who make Glad Wrap telling them not to make it and send a letter to supermarkets asking them not to sell it.

Make a booklet about litterfree lunches

Put reminders around the school about litter

Send notices to all of the parents for litterfree lunch boxes

Show how much litter is collected per year so people will reduce

Ask Ms Von to have a litterfree lunch day each week.

Awards for the tidiest area

Have a daily litter pick up

We read an interesting article about the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

The Plastic-Free Challenge - school journal Level 2

Room 24 discovered the drain by their classroom as FULL of litter.  How sad! That leads straight to the sea.  We worked with Ms Daniel to clean it all out.  How can we stop this happening?  We decided to make posters to encourage more children to bring litter free lunches.

Room 25 were amazed at the big pile of rubbish collected, even after 3 other classes had already collected litter around the school. We divided the rubbish into 3 piles. The biggest pile was definitely the plastic brought in from home in our lunchboxes. 

Lots to think about. 

Remember: "When we know better, we can do better!"