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What Do Kids "Calculate" When It Comes to Conservation? It's Not $$$!

For Earth Day, author Terra Wellington offers this guest post brimming with suggestions on how to get closer to nature with your kids. You'll find other great ideas in her new book, The Mom's Guide to Growing Your Family Green: Saving the Earth Begins at Home.

"One of the sweetest things about children is that when you get their attention, it is 100 percent.  They aren’t thinking about politics, or what bills are due, or planning a million things in their head.  Nope, they are just in the here and now.

Likewise, if you explain to children why you want to conserve water, protect habitats, or keep bees healthy they're also right with you.  They don’t calculate costs, or party affiliation, or what their friends might think.  Kids are natural conservationists.

Here are some fun ways you can explore conservation with your children for Earth Day or any day:

Make a Date: Check the online event calendars for your local science center, arboretum, zoo, aquarium, or nature center.  These calendars are full of fun days that make an average excursion unforgettable, and the focus is nearly all on hopeful conservation.  They also often list kid camps, classes, and volunteer opportunities for teens.  Look for ways to get your kids engaged by touching, feeling, learning, and helping.

Grow with a Purpose: Plant a garden this year with a lifecycle and habitat in mind.  For lifecycle growing, have your kids help you start and maintain a compost pile(which in itself is fascinating science at work!) that prepares and feeds your garden.  Also, encourage your children to help you plant and keep up native flowering plants for the bees and trees, with seeds and other fruits for birds and little tree critters, plus your vegetables – all organic, of course!

Bee Happy: Get into beekeeping.  It’s one of the fastest growing hobbies right now, and importnat giving the way bee populations are dying, a likely consequence of industrial pesticide and herbicide use.  Have your children learn with you about the necessity of bees, how to take care of them in a non-toxic way, and set up and take care of the bee hives together.  Enjoy delicious honey as a reward.  Check with your local municipality for any ordinances or permits.

Entertain for Good: There are a lot of television, film, and print resources that educate on conservation, the environment, and nature in a fun and entertaining way that kids embrace. Examples include the Ranger Rick Magazine from the National Wildlife Federation, Disneynature films like “Earth” and “African Cats,” and the captivating Discovery Channel series “Life” narrated by Oprah Winfrey which is now available on DVD or through a subscription service like Netflix.

Put on Your Flip-Flops: If you are going on vacation this summer, pick a beachside getaway that coincides with a local beach cleanup day.  Heal the Bay and Surfrider Foundation are great resources.  Your kids will spend two inspirational hours helping nature – and they’ll think twice about where trash goes after that!

Pump Up the Tires: Dust off your bikes and peddle to the local store or explore bike paths to make conserving energy fun.   You will be surprised how much kids enjoy biking and the diversity you will find outside your car window.  To find safer biking routes, if you go to Google Maps, type in your city and state, and then click on “Get Directions,” and you’ll see a bicycle path layer that clues you into designated safe bike paths in your area.  Many states also list nearby recreational bicycle paths for weekend adventures – do a browser search."

Terra Wellington is the author of The Mom’s Guide to Growing Your Family Green: Saving the Earth Begins at Home (St. Martin’s Press).  Her family finds a lot of fun in cleaning up Southern California beaches, especially when it includes an ice cream treat!

 

 

 

 

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Matt Damon and Leo DiCaprio move over. Sita, cheetah mother, gets my vote for "action hero" when it comes to thrillers that will keep you on the edge of your seat.

"African Cats," Sita's star vehicle and this year's Earth Day release by DisneyNature, doesn't at first seem like an obvious nail-biter. Gorgeous shots of Kenya's extraordinary Masai Mara grasslands open the film before it homes in on the animals that steal the show: Sita and her mischievous cubs, and Fang, the patriarch of a large pride of lions and their playful offspring. But you know what's coming next: The breathtaking scenery is only a backdrop to the life-and-death struggles that play out between these cat "families" and the animals that prey upon them. It's the "Lion King" in the flesh.

The Mara is one of the few remaining places in Africa where lions, cheetahs and leopards live in large numbers and in close proximity. The River Pride, a dominant group of lions led by "Fang," roams the hills south of the Mara River. A second group of male lions—a powerful father and his four sons—rules the area to the north. The River Pride is threatened by these lions from the north who are awaiting the perfect opportunity to move in, depose Fang, and take over his pride. Meanwhile, Sita must defend her babies against the lions, as well as ravenous hyenas and even other cheetahs.

The young cheetah and lion cubs are gosh-darn cute, and the filmmakers make the most of their playful antics and mewling cries to set the stage for the inevitable clashes between protective mothers and their hungry adversaries. The films' directors insist on building suspense by creating a very human story line intent on driving home the point that a mother will do anything to protect her babies. But the story and its corny script get in the way of the pictures unfolding on the screen. The movie would have been wonderful to watch with music alone, sans narration. 

That said, I loved the film's high definition cinematography and "you are there" shots. I've been on two safaris, including one in the Masai Mara. I saw first-hand lions eating their way through the steaming belly of a zebra they'd just killed, and watched a cheetah kill an eland then effortlessly haul it up into a tree for safe-keeping. The filmmakers show the animals exactly as I remember them in the wild, foregoing special effects, animation, and other cinematics in favor of spellbinding close-ups of animal eyes, rippling muscles, and jaws dripping with fresh blood.

DisneyNature hopes "African Cats" will do more than entertain. The company is partnering with the African Wildife Foundation in a campaign to "Save the Savanna" where these big cats live. Throughout Earth Week, April 22-28, a portion of the proceeds from ticket sales will be donated to support AWF's program to protect the Amboseli Wildlife Corridor. The corridor is the expanse of land that stretches across the Savanna between three national parks in Kenya. Lions, elephants, cheetahs, zebras, and other wildlife traverse it when they migrate and look for food and water. AWF's work will help insure that the corridor stays open and wild enough to help these animals thrive despite the pressures put upon them from tourism and encroaching development.

NOTE: "African Cats" is sometimes graphically violent and may not be appropriate for children younger than 13. The scenes of predators chasing down and devouring their prey are totally realistic - which means they're brutal and bloody. At one point, the little girl sitting next to me in the theater just put her head down and covered her ears.

African Cats is DisneyNature's third Earth Day feature. Here's a review of last year's film, "Earth."

 

Kids Launch "Green My Parents" to Save the World

Can kids save the world?

The kids who founded GreenMyParents sure think so!

This youth-led movement is officially launching on Earth Day with a plan to inspire peers, parents and millions of American families to go green.

In the process, they aim to save $100 Million by this time next year. How? It will start with 100 "youth champions." Each of them plans to recruit 100 more kids, then train them to promote easy, everyday steps that protect the environment and save money, too, at least $100 per family. It’s hoped each of those kids will recruit another 100, and another 100, and another 100, until tens of thousands or even millions are involved.

The program kicks off April 22 at 1 p.m. EST with a youth-led webinar  via The National Wildlife Federation's SchoolTube.com, plus the downloadable publication of the Green Your Parents book.

But don't wait until then to learn more about the amazing kids behind this initiative. They include:

•   Adora Svitak, a 12-year-old who is a published author and was the youngest speaker at the TED 2010 conference. 
•   Jordan Howard, 17, a senior at Environmental Charter High in LA, Green Ambassador Youth leader, and prolific speaker and blogger who inspires at her blog jordaninspires.com;
•   Alec Loorz, a 14-year-old who founded Kids Against Global Warming as a 12-year-old. He is  the youngest trained presenter with The Climate Project.
•   Ally Maize, who three years ago, as a 15-year-old started the Green Youth Movement and
•   Erin Schrode, a freshman at Columbia University and founder of Teens Turning Green  

Said Adora at the TED conference recently, “We kids still dream about perfection. Our audacity to imagine helps push the boundaries of reality.” Adora, could you deliver that message to members of Congress, please?!!!

Though GreenMyParents begins on Earth Day, it doesn’t end there. The group’s organizers plan to run the program for at least a year with the hopes of creating chapters in every school in America.

Here’s how you can learn more or get on their mailing list.

Ten Low Cost, High Impact Ways to Celebrate Earth Day

Low Cost:

1) Go outside. Take a walk, sit on your porch, have lunch in the park, eat a picnic dinner with family or friends. Looking outside doesn't count. Get out there and just...relax.

2) Plant something. If the idea of relaxing drives you a little bit crazy, do something useful. Plant a tree, sow vegetable seeds in your garden, transplant seedlings, fill your porch pots with flowers you'll enjoy the rest of the spring and summer.

3) Look out your window. Okay, for all you people who want to be "eco" but really hate the idea of digging dirt or lunching en pleine aire, pull up a chair to your favorite window and take a gander outside. Notice the birds in your yard, the buds on the trees, the clouds in the sky. Sound sappy? Maybe. Try it, just for half an hour. Let me know what it does for you. 

4) Go see a movie. AFTER you've connected to your own backyard, connect to the world. "Nature," the new Disney movie, offers stunning cinematography of some of the most spectacular natural places on the globe. Plus, Disney is planting a tree for every ticket sold (so...it's an easy way for you to take credit for #2, above).

5) Swap stuff with your friends or family. So far, Earth Day is about the only major U.S. holiday that does NOT masquerade as an excuse for a shopping spree. Let's keep it that way. If you need something, send a note to your personal e-mail list and ask if you can borrow it or swap for it. You can also try Craig's List and FreeCycle.

6) Sign up for the One-in-a-Million Campaign. We've inspired thousands of people to shift their spending to products and services that offer the greatest environmental benefit. Joining the campaign is free, and over time, the actions you take will save you thousands of dollars.

High Impact

7) Prepare organic food. If you've been thinking you should switch to organic produce, free range meat, and hormone-free milk, now's the time to make your move.  You should be able to find organic milk, meat, and produce at your local grocery store, food coop, or natural foods store. If not, ask the store manager to order it for you. Give the manager your name and phone number and say you'd like to be notified when the items come in. Let the manager know you and your friends want to see more organics on the shelves.

8) Plug into a power strip. Computers, fax machines, printers, televisions, microwave ovens and other appliances use almost as much energy when they're plugged in but turned off as when they're turned on. Plug into energy-saving power strips (one in the office, one next to the family tv, one in the kitchen) so you can easily cut the current; the money you save will pay for the cost of the power strips.

9) Carpool, telecommute, bicycle or take mass transit. Burning gasoline for transportation is a major cause of air pollution, smog, and climate change. On Earth Day, change the way you commute to work or get kids to sports practice and music lessons.

10) Make every day Earth Day. Yes, it's corny, but it's true. Taking one action on Earth Day may make you feel good, but it won't add up to much unless it's repeated over time. Besides, don't you need an excuse to spend a half an hour just looking out the window?