Going green is a family endeavor. It can only be successful if every member of the family takes part and does his best. Children learn by example, no matter how many times you talk to them about doing something, they learn best by seeing you do it. Therefore, it goes without saying that the first step in encouraging your children is to practice being green yourself first.
Have a Go Green meeting
Schedule a family meeting; have it on Saturday or Sunday morning, when everyone is still at home, even any older children. Start the conversation by asking what they think of the environment to determine their awareness and understanding.
Use this conversation to educate them further regarding the environment and the actions they can take to help protect it. Tell them about any green practices you are already a part of. Tell them of any celebrities they know or like that are also into saving the environment. It’s even better if it’s someone of their own age so they can have a like-minded role model to look up to.
Make a Go Green shortlist
Following your meeting, make a list of all the green practices that the family can participate in. This can include household practices like conservation of electricity, composting of household waste or recycling plastic and paper wastes.
Plan a weekly Go Green challenge that the family will take part in. Make it a fun challenge for everyone to participate. For example, for Week One, have the family participate in energy conservation. It can be lights out by a certain time of night, or having the computer shut down instead of on standby mode overnight. For Week Two, recycle paper and plastic. You can assign certain tasks to each child, if you have more than one child. The older sibling can take care of recycling plastic and paper products and selling them to a recycling factory, and you can assign the younger child to sort through his belongings for scraps of paper he can recycle.
Planting is also a Go Green initiative that children can understand, even the younger ones. Start off by planting herbs that they normally eat. It can be parsley, cress or a mint plant. It must be something they recognize so they will enjoy doing it.
Keep updated on Go Green initiatives
There are more and more accessible green initiatives to take part of. The government has launched the Green Deal Initiative that allows homeowners to recover hundreds of pounds of cash back for energy efficiency improvements.
Homeowners can get as much as £1,000 cash back. Tesla Motors, an American company has successfully manufactured electric cars that are viable for everyday usage. The Model S is a luxury car that happens to be run by electricity and not gas. The company ships the electric cars to the UK. Its supercharger network has reportedly delivered more than 1 GWh of energy to its line of Model S cars. This is equivalent to gas saved amounting to 168,000 gallons and an offset of 4.2 million pounds of carbon dioxide emissions, and that’s just for one month – just imagine a whole year!
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