Curated OER
Where Should It Go? Recycle? Compost? Incinerate? Landfill?
Students discuss what happens to trash after it is collected. They sort "clean" trash into groups depending on whether it should be recycled, incinerated, placed in a landfill, composted or if it is something we could avoid using.
PBS
What We Do Adds Up
With so many tons of trash going into landfills each year, your environmentalists can calculate how much the average person is tossing away. This activity has a series of questions not only requiring math, but a conscious thought of how...
Curated OER
Landfills: A Solid Waste Management Plan
Young scholars are able to list the types of household waste that they produce daily. They are able to describe some other types of waste that are produced by industry or agriculture to help maintain their lifestyles. Students are able...
Curated OER
Buying in Bulk
Students investigate buying purchases in bulk. In this buying in bulk lesson, students consider ways to cut costs and reduce waste in landfills by making bulk purchases.
Curated OER
The Trash We Pass
Where does our garbage go? What is the difference between a recyclable and non-recyclable item? Pose these important, but often overlooked, questions to your class and invite them to consider the lasting and damaging effects of the...
Curated OER
Sort and Sift
First graders take a close look at the garbage they create by graphing different types of waste generated in one school day. This important lesson should lead to a greater awareness of how much waste can be generated by a small group of...
Curated OER
Trash Pizza
Students work together to identify items sent to landfills. They summarize percentages of the different items found in landfills. They create a pizza pie graph of all of the components found in landfills.
Curated OER
Solid Waste Takes Over
Students explore solid waste and its effects on the environment. They explain some of the major problems caused by waste disposal and the use of landfills. They suggest ways to reduce the amount of solid waste going into a landfill.
Curated OER
Making Decisions: Packaging and the Environment
Students work in small groups to redesign the packaging of several common items. They attempt to reach the goal of 25% reduction in packaging materials currently used and explore the impact of various materials and designs in landfills...
Curated OER
Applied Science - Built Environment Lab
Learners evaluate trash. In this Science lesson, students collect and weigh trash from their classrooms. Learners categorize the trash and the corresponding weights, recording the information on a data sheet.
Curated OER
Landfills: Building Them Better
Students investigate the three methods of waste disposal. They listen to a teacher-led lecture, answer discussion questions, and write a letter to the E.P.A. from the viewpoint of an environmental engineer.
Curated OER
Landfills and the Potential for Groundwater Contamination
Students examine how a sanitary landfill is constructed, how it functions, and how waste and leachate affects the areas around the landfill. After a discussion about landfills and leachates, students construct a Sanitary Landfill Model...
SF Environment
Sort and Color!
Sorting is a very important skill that can be used in math and even science. Learners get familiar with some environmentally friendly vocabulary terms as they practice separating objects that can be recycled from those that can't. They...
PBS
A Little Recycling Goes A Long Way
Every time you purchase something from the store, it goes into a bag, but what happens to the bag? This lesson encourages your learners to think about what happens to those plastic and paper bags and their effect on the environment. Use...
Curated OER
The Landfill Loafers Meet the Wise Buys
Students discover recyclable materials and the proper disposal of those items through Internet research. Working in groups of four, they search the Internet for uses of recyclable materials. After research is complete, they participate...
Curated OER
Eek, It leaks!
Students construct model landfill liners out of two-inch strips of garbage bags within resource constraints. The challenge is to construct a bag that will hold one cup of water without leaking. This represents similar challenges that...
Alabama Learning Exchange
Waste Not, Want Not
Pupils determine what materials are able to be recycled. In this environment protection lesson, students read The Three R's: Reuse, Reduce, Recycle and discuss landfills. They are given an item to decide if it can be recycled. They play...
Curated OER
Trash Pizza
Students identify items commonly sent to landfills and summarize percentages/fractions of different items in landfills Students create a pizza pie graph of landfill components
Curated OER
What a Waste
Students analyze components of garbage. They collect and sort a few days' worth of garbage. They chart the results of an investigation.
Curated OER
Design a Recycling Game!
Students discover that recycling is using a product more than once so that natural resources can be saved and so that we won't need so many garbage dumps and landfills. They see that there are different ways to recycle. Students design a...
Curated OER
It'll Go With the Flow...
High schoolers construct a water table elevation contour map and consider the direction and rate of groundwater flow to predict the actual runoff pattern. They discuss their findings and evaluate a hypothetical landfill site based on...
Curated OER
Earth Day Number Sense
Elementary schoolers count and order objects using numbers 1-300. They bring recyclable items from home. Students group the items, skip count by 2's, 3's, and 5's, and arrange the items on a number line. Recyclable plastic bags are put...
Curated OER
Kernel Count!
Here is an impressive and thorough lesson on estimation. Young mathematicians estimate how many kernels of popcorn can fit in a tablespoon, then how many tablespoons of kernels can fit in a baby food jar. The popcorn is then popped. All...
Curated OER
Junk Mail Overload!
Students discuss the "junk mail nuisance" with the teacher and share their opinions on the problem. Students collect a week's worth of junk mail, bring to class and complete a chart about the amount and weight. Students then complete an...