Earth Day Activities

Teacher Resources - Environmental School Activities and Curriculum

Warmer weather and blooming tulips remind us that Earth Day is right around the corner.  Why not take some time to remind students to help our planet stay in shape.  Earth Day gives us an opportunity to reflect on how our decisions impact the environment and how we can reduce our ecological footprint.  

The following projects are hands-on service learning experiences that will build critical thinking, communication, and team building skills. 

• Plant a tree or work on the school garden.
• Organize a swap activity to show the importance of reducing and reusing.
• Write chalk messages on sidewalks around the school encouraging recycling.
• Start a club of recycling monitors to check bins and trash cans for items that don't belong. Keep track of contaminants and name the class that recycles the best every month.
• Assign energy-wise jobs for students such as turning off lights upon leaving classroom, pulling or opening the window shades to keep it cool/warm, watering the school garden, and making sure computers are logged off when not in use.
• Ask students to write letters to legislators to express why a
  healthy planet is vital to our environmental health.
• Make an Earth Day themed bulletin board (see ideas below).

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Bulletin board ideas:

• Choose an environmental issue to highlight  - students can research a topic, record facts to display and decorate using informative photos with captions
• Tree with easy go green tips as leaves - examples of tips: Use reusable drink bottles instead of disposable cups, walk or bike, pick up after yourself and others, buy things with less packaging, join an environmental group...
• The history of recycling at your school - 1982: began saving materials to reuse for art class, 1999: paper recycling established, 2001: aluminum recycling begins, 2005: started recycling ink cartridges and batteries, 2008: single stream recycling introduced...
• Diarama of a school gone green - recycling bins, school garden and compost bin, solar lighting, etc.
• Trash art - save materials from trash or recycling receptacles to be used for art sculptures to display at a school program
• Attainable environmental goals for your school - post important goals and objectives to share with students and staff
• Recycling milestones at your school - examples: $400 made in March from paper recycling, 3rd annual Earth Day
• The neighborhood goes green together - community gardening, carpooling to events, walking to local retail shops, biking and taking bus to school, etc.
• All about the aluminum can - energy saved when an aluminum can is recycled into new one, a can's wall is about the same thickness as a magazine page, journey of a can from being recycled to being manufactured into a new can is less than 60 days, soft drinks with sugar are more dense than soft drinks sweetened with artificial sweeteners.
• The Lorax by Dr. Seuss - give students different excerpts to write, decorate, and memorize from this cautionary tale. Then display each individual's work.
• 3R Natural Resource Conservation display - make a chart with different recyclable materials and show what type of natural resource from which each material is made
• Recycling -- Don't Throw it Away! - give details of what can be recycled at school and where, including photos or the actual recyclable materials
• Environmental top ten lists - have students conduct environmental surveys to determine the most popular answers from 1 to 10
• What to do with electronic waste - list different locations and places to recycle unwanted e-waste, such as cell phones, televisions, and video consoles
• Where does your recycling go? - create a diagram that illustrates what happens to your recycling after you place it in the bin.