Audience: Youth
Outcomes:
Participants will be able to:
- Identify items that can be recycled in their home and building community
- Explain what recycling is
- Share facts about recycling
- Show their families how to recycle
30 minutes prep time;
45 minute activity time
KeyTerms:
Recycling, Recyclable Materials, Contaminate, Single-stream recycling
Materials:
1.Cardboardboxes or paperbags
2.Oldmagazines/newspapers
3.Constructionpaperor notecards
4.Markers
5.Glue and scissors
6.Recyclableitems(cleaned: bottles,cans,newspaper)
**avoidglass**
7.Artscraftssupplies
8.ListofRecyclingFacts
9.Lettertoparents
10.WhattoRecycleGuide / GettingReady:
1.Gatherallofyourmaterials.
2.MakecopiesoftheWhattoRecycleGuide,RecyclingFacts,lettertoparent,andifneededrecyclingstock images.
3.Organizesuppliesaroundactivityroom.
ActivityDirections:
1.Explainwhatrecyclingisandhowit works.(If youaredoing thisactivityfollowinganotherrecyclingactivity, askwhat recyclingisandgetthekidsto explainitto you).
2.Provideeachchildacardboardboxorpaperbag.
3.Usingtheconstructionpaperandart supplieshaveeachchild createtheirownrecyclinglabelof thefollowing recyclables:metal,glass,plastic,paper, and any other materials they choose to include that are in fact recyclable.
4.Pastelabeloncardboardboxorpaperbag.
5.Haveeachchilddecoratetherecyclingbinwithimages(stockimagesprovided)oftheitemsthatarerecyclableinthatgroup.
6.Talkaboutwhatgoesintoeachcontainer.UsetheWhattoRecycleGuideanddiscusssingle-streamrecycling.
7.Haveeachchildwriteafactaboutrecyclingonanotecard.
8.Haveeachchildtaketheirlabels and notecardshome,andaskthemtoexplainwhattheylearnedto theirfamilies.
YouthActivity1
Take Home
Recycling Bin
Supporting Document for Activity Leader
Make copies of this letter to send home with the activity participants. Be sure to customize it to meet your property and activity needs.
Sample Letter to Parents
Dear Parent,
Since recycling is an important way to reduce the volume of household waste that goes into landfills and incinerators, we have created our very own take home recycling bins for home. Using their take home recycling bin, your child will practice how to prepare items for recycling throughout our community. To continue your child's learning and understanding of recycling, we encourage you to let your child teach you about what can and cannot be recycled throughout our property. Also, using the What to Recycle Guide provided, help ensure you he or she is recycling correctly.
Thank you,
{NAME OF ACTIVITY LEADER}
Questions?{INSERT EMAIL OR OFFICE LOCATION OF ACTIVITY LEADER OR RECYCLING CHAMPION}
YouthActivity1
Take Home
Recycling Bin
Supporting Document for Activity Leader
Use these recycling facts to complete the take-home notecard portion of the activity. Encourage participants to make several notecards to hang up around the house and act as reminders to recycle daily.
Recycling Facts
Washington DC Facts
- In DC it costs $60 to haul and dispose of waste, but only $25 to haul and process recycling.
- DC generates 800,000 tons of waste annually.
- If we recycled one-third of what we throw away, we could save $250,000 a year!
- 21% of household waste in DC is recycled
- By 2032, DC’s goal is to recycle 80% of all waste.
- By recycling 1 ton of paper, we save: 17 trees, 7,000 gallons of water, 463 gallons of oil, 3 cubic yards of landfill space, and enough energy to heat an average home for 6 months.
- The average amount of recycled fiber in newspapers increased from 10 percent in the late 1980s to more than 30 percent today.
- 80 percent of U.S. paper mills rely on recycled paper.
- Recycled paper supplies 37 percent of material to paper mills
- Producing recycled paper takes 40% less energy than producing paper from virgin wood pulp.
- It takes 24 trees to make one ton of uncoated virgin (non-recycled) printing and office paper.
- Using recycled scrap paper saves 7,000 gallons of water per ton of paper produced.
- Manufacturers can make one extra-large T-shirt out of only five recycled plastic soda bottles.
- If all 8 billion pounds of plastic bottles produced in the U.S. in 2009 had been recycled, the material could have produced 22 million extra large t-shirts.
- The amount of plastic bottles recycled in 2009, provided enough raw material for about 7 million shirts to be made.
- Manufacturers can make one Ski jacket filler out of only five recycled plastic soda bottles.
- Manufacturers can make one sweater out of 27 recycled plastic soda bottles.
- Americans throw away enough aluminum every 3 months to rebuild our entire commercial air fleet.
- When one ton of steel is recycled, 2,500 pounds of iron ore, 1,400 pounds of coal, and 120 pounds of limestone are conserved.
- Recycling aluminum cans saves 95 percent of the energy required to make aluminum cans from scratch.
- Aluminum cans contain an average of 50 percent recycled post-consumer content, while glass bottles contain an average of 30 percent.
- In the United States, over 100,000 aluminum cans are recycled each minute. That amounts to 53 billion cans recycled in 2010. However, over $1.1 billion in aluminum cans were wasted in 2010.
- The aluminum cans recycled in 2010, stacked one on top of the other, would be 1,454 times taller than the Empire State Building.
- Every minute, an average of 127,093 aluminum beverage cans are recycled in the United States.
- If all the glass bottles and jars recycled were laid end-to-end, they would reach the moon and make it more than halfway back to Earth.
- Most bottles and jars contain at least 25 per- cent recycled glass.
- Every ton of new glass produced results in 27.8 pounds of air pollution, but recycling glass reduces that pollution by 14 to 20 percent.
- Over a ton of natural resources are conserved for every ton of glass recycled, including 1,300 pounds of sand, 410 pounds of soda ash, 380 pounds of limestone, and 160 pounds of feldspar.
- Recycling one glass bottle saves enough energy to light a 100-watt light bulb for four hours, power a computer for 30 minutes, or a television for 20 minutes.
YouthActivity1