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Green Your Offspring
Natural Eco-Friendly Kids’ Activities
Getting kids outside with activities that involve them in the environment, instill respect for the planet. Eco-friendly activities don’t have to mean a trip to the wilderness. It can mean working on an outdoor service project, growing a garden, or getting crafty with nature’s art supplies.
Green their thumb
Include kids in every step of growing a garden, and a vegetable garden is the easiest way to start. Ask them what they would like to have as a fresh ingredient in a family dinner and go from there. Let kids get right in there in the dirt when planting, tending and picking. Even toddlers can use a small plastic shovel, put seeds in the soil, and pull a carrot out of the ground.
Take a Hike
The best way for children to become wardens of the earth is to get them outdoors from an early age. Once older, hiking becomes a great physical activity that gets the entire family moving appreciating nature. A good guide on how to behave in nature’s backyard comes from Leave No Trace (LNT), the national and international program designed to assist outdoor enthusiasts about how to reduce their impacts when they hike, camp, or climb outdoors. lnt.org
Go For A Bike Ride
The number of children biking or walking to school has dropped 75 percent within a generation, while obesity rates have tripled, only 1 percent of all trips are taken by bicycle, and yet more than 100 million Americans own bicycles. Get on your two-wheeler, pack a basket or a backpack of food, and take the kids for a bike ride. It’s great exercise — and a great opportunity to talk with kids about how using fossil fuels impacts the Earth. Take them shopping by bike and bring along a stash of reusable shopping bags with you to cut down on paper and plastic.
Get Crafty
Papermaking is a centuries old craft that is both practical and great fun – and used as a way to recycle your waste paper it is also extremely eco friendly! It’s a fantastic way to reuse old scraps of paper that you would otherwise throw away. The unique texture and finish of homemade paper makes it attractive and distinctive - perfect for making greeting cards. From pulp to finished sheet, kids will enjoy the entire process.
Reduce Your Carbon Footprint Together
From recycling to composting to using less water, eco-friendly activities can start before you leave the house. Calculate your environmental footprint together using Be Green’s carbon calculator. Let kids type in the numbers, and talk with them about what your footprint means. Then involve your kids in steps you can take to make it smaller — such as switching to light-emitting diodes (LEDs), electroluminescents use 75 percent less energy than standard incandescents. begreennow.com