Here We Come to Save the Earth!

Dear Mom and Dad,

        Finally, Mr. Sun came out! It was a great day to continue our Earth Day celebration, and at the same time have fun in the park.

        At the big table, we saw a lot of used paper and plastic. We sat down with Hisami and thought of what we can make. We saw a big box, and decided it will be cool to make a train. A lot of us pitched in our ideas, until we were able to help Hisami finish it. Hmm, maybe we can add more to it tomorrow, right?

        Some of us enjoyed making drawings with the stencils. Others were content to complete a puzzle. You know what we noticed? That puzzles are more fun, and quicker to complete, when we share and do it with our friends. We just kept finishing one puzzle after the other- I think we can call ourselves “Puzzle Masters”!

        After cleaning up, we read a book called “Recycling” with Pauline. She asked us if we knew what the word “recycling” means.

 “It’s making something,” Barbara said.

“Do you know, I have a recycling book at home?” D quipped.

“Really? That’s interesting,” Pauline told him. “So, recycling is making something out of things we throw away. Just like a while ago, we had junk art, and what did you guys make?” She asked us.

“A train!” Everyone chimed in.

Then, Pauline read that the first step of recycling is separating the garbage we have collected.

“When there is recycled things on the road, then the recycling truck will come,” D told us, to which some of us agreed.

Pauline then showed us a picture of the garbage. She pointed out that in some places, a blue bin means we can just throw paper in it; the green bin is just for glass—

“What happens if it is a window?” B was curious to know.

“Well, if a window is broken, then can we use it?” Pauline asked. We answered “no”.

“Then the broken pieces need to be thrown away into this green bin,” Pauline said. Then she showed that the yellow bin is just for plastics. Hmm… Do you think in other places, there are different colors for the recycle bins?

Then, Pauline asked why we recycle.

“So the earth doesn’t go bad down, down, down,” M answered.

“That’s right,” Pauline said. “Because we live on earth, then we should take care of it and keep it clean, right?”

Then Pauline talked about a special machine where the garbage to be recycled needs to go, in order to create something new. She said that inside the special machine, the objects are broken up, crushed, and melted.

“What does melting mean?” Pauline asked.

“It means it’s gone,” M replied.

“Yes, it’s kind of like ice cream… When it’s hot, the ice cream turns into something that’s like water or juice, right?” Pauline said. We all agreed.

Then, she told us that upstairs, in the balcony, we were also doing some recycling. She explained that the trash we throw after eating, like banana peel or orange peel, is recycled by mixing it and burying it under soil, then it turns into compost, which is food for the plants. So, the teachers took us upstairs, and we took a peek in our compost bin. The teachers added more soil into it, and we observed how some of the things changed.

“Look at this banana peel,” Hisami said. “What does it look like now?” She asked.

“It’s brown!” we said.

“That’s right. And before it was--?”

“Yellow!” we answered. We then imagined that the soil “cooks” the garbage, in order to turn it into food for the plants.

Back in the classroom, before going to the park, Hisami told us a short story using an octopus puppet. She said that the octopus happily lives in the ocean, but one day, the octopus and other animals saw some floating garbage- like a plastic bag. They thought, “What is this? Maybe it’s food?” so the animals ate it, and they got sick later on. That’s why, Hisami said that we should help the animals, and the whole earth- so, on the way to the park, we did our “Cleanliness Drive”, and we helped out our teachers spot garbage with an eagle- eye, which they collected in a plastic bag. Even when we were in the park, we couldn’t stop, as we kept spotting pieces of trash that is calling out to be collected! Hooray! We’re good Earth caretakers, aren’t we?

When we went back to school, Liezel showed us the aquarium, and we were sad to see that our only tadpole had died. Liezel asked us how we felt, and some of us said that we were sad, some of us said that we were okay. One by one, we bid our tadpole goodbye; some of us said that we will miss it.

“It’s just sleeping!” YJ insisted. “Just give it some food,” she said.

“But, the tadpole, like you, they love to move around. This tadpole hasn’t moved for a long time,” Liezel explained sadly. So, we did another round of goodbyes, and we said that maybe we can bury our tadpole friend in the compost bin.

So, it’s quite an eventful Thursday, don’t you think so? We’re so sure that tomorrow will be yet another fun day again.

Love,

All the Earth caretakers in Petals Class