w. 2 pics
Area’s youngest learning big conservation lessons
By Roberta Baumann
Managing Editor
An overflowing bin of scrap construction paper in Maheen Ott’s kindergarten class provides resources for her students’ projects. Students call it the Second Chance box, the place where reusable scraps of paper go.
Each day, students in her class turn on only one row of lights, and when they leave for recess, little Amanda Rusch makes sure those lights are turned off.
Students now pack their sandwiches in reusable containers rather than in disposable bags.
These are all small steps but Ott’s students seem to know that together, the littlest students in the school can take big steps to conserve the planet’s resources.
Ott has taught her students that they they will, of course, use some electricity, paper and other resources.
“They need to remember not to waste them,” she pointed out.
Ott’s students and all youngsters in Madison Country Day School’s lower grades have been studying green practices for the past month.
Ott said the conservation unit is new among the school-wide monthly themes discussed during the weekly assemblies.
She and teachers Kristen Jansen and Danika Rzentkowski organized a variety of activities that have had students reducing, reusing and recycling.
Matt Muldowney, a fourth-grader, said he’s learned that many conservation practices – like rinsing a yogurt cup for recycling – take just five seconds to complete.
In Matt’s class, the students collected all the toys they had stopped playing with.
“We put them in a box and gave them to charity,” he said.
Fellow fourth-grader Rachel Patzold said she’s been packing her lunch in reusable plastic containers.
Ott’s 5- and 6-year-old kindergartners seem to have made several conservation practices part of their everyday lives.
Alec Wagner said, “To help the earth, don’t litter.”
The students have learned a new way to wash their hands. While they lather and say their ABCs, they make sure the water is turned off.
The conservation unit culminated at Tuesday’s assembly when students were presented with homemade green napkins to take with them in their lunch boxes.
Ott said she has always been conservation minded. Two years ago, Shirley Buckmaster, grandmother of one of her former students, created cloth napkins for her class.
So this year, Ott contacted Buckmaster to make 160 green cloth napkins for the entire lower school. Her students also made green construction paper by blending water and used yellow and blue paper, then draining the water and allowing the pulp to dry on screens.
That paper provided green signs that each lower school class received at the assembly – signs that will serve as “a constant reminder in homerooms,” Ott said.
The lower school students were also encouraged to wear their green shirts with their uniforms for the assembly, she added.
“I just hope that when they see the color [green], they will think about conservation,” Ott said.
An overflowing bin of scrap construction paper in Maheen Ott’s kindergarten class provides resources for her students’ projects. Students call it the Second Chance box, the place where reusable scraps of paper go.
Each day, students in her class turn on only one row of lights, and when they leave for recess, little Amanda Rusch makes sure those lights are turned off.
Students now pack their sandwiches in reusable containers rather than in disposable bags.
These are all small steps but Ott’s students seem to know that together, the littlest students in the school can take big steps to conserve the planet’s resources.
Ott has taught her students that they they will, of course, use some electricity, paper and other resources.
“They need to remember not to waste them,” she pointed out.
Ott’s students and all youngsters in Madison Country Day School’s lower grades have been studying green practices for the past month.
Ott said the conservation unit is new among the school-wide monthly themes discussed during the weekly assemblies.
She and teachers Kristen Jansen and Danika Rzentkowski organized a variety of activities that have had students reducing, reusing and recycling.
Matt Muldowney, a fourth-grader, said he’s learned that many conservation practices – like rinsing a yogurt cup for recycling – take just five seconds to complete.
In Matt’s class, the students collected all the toys they had stopped playing with.
“We put them in a box and gave them to charity,” he said.
Fellow fourth-grader Rachel Patzold said she’s been packing her lunch in reusable plastic containers.
Ott’s 5- and 6-year-old kindergartners seem to have made several conservation practices part of their everyday lives.
Alec Wagner said, “To help the earth, don’t litter.”
The students have learned a new way to wash their hands. While they lather and say their ABCs, they make sure the water is turned off.
The conservation unit culminated at Tuesday’s assembly when students were presented with homemade green napkins to take with them in their lunch boxes.
Ott said she has always been conservation minded. Two years ago, Shirley Buckmaster, grandmother of one of her former students, created cloth napkins for her class.
So this year, Ott contacted Buckmaster to make 160 green cloth napkins for the entire lower school. Her students also made green construction paper by blending water and used yellow and blue paper, then draining the water and allowing the pulp to dry on screens.
That paper provided green signs that each lower school class received at the assembly – signs that will serve as “a constant reminder in homerooms,” Ott said.
The lower school students were also encouraged to wear their green shirts with their uniforms for the assembly, she added.
“I just hope that when they see the color [green], they will think about conservation,” Ott said.
