At a glance
Recycling is a 60-minute workshop for grades 1 to 5.
With a wooden sorting box (paper, plastic, metal, glass, compost, deposit return, eco-centre and garbage), students become professional sorters, then apply what they learned by sorting the items in a real recycling bin: plastics, old light bulbs, pop cans or a broken glass bottle.
Recycling seems like a simple habit, essential to keeping life on Earth in balance. But did we really know how to use the recycling bin?
Which plastics go in it? Can we put in old light bulbs, pop cans or a broken glass bottle?
We turn our young environmentalists into professional recyclers with our wooden sorting box: paper, plastic, metal, glass, compost, deposit returns, depot drop-off and garbage!
Then they put their new knowledge to work by sorting the items in our real recycling bin, where a few mistakes have crept in!
Their creative reactions and deep concern for the environment will surprise you… and reassure you!
Learning goals (elementary)
- Describe the 3Rs (reduce, reuse, recycle and compost, recover).
- Sort recyclable objects from non-recyclable ones.
- Tell recyclable plastics from non-recyclable ones (triangle symbols).
- Describe the impact of waste management and pollution on the environment.
- Come up with ways to improve waste management.
Learning goals (secondary)
- Explain the idea of an ecological footprint.
- Describe processes behind natural recycling (for example, micro-organisms and decomposers, erosion).
