Our family recently went to a puppet-show-musical here in Nairobi called Leo’s Search for a New Home. It was a kid-friendly environmental advocacy production in which a sea turtle named Leo hatched from his egg, raced to the sea defying birds of prey and crabs coveting a tasty turtle treat, and arrived in the water only to discover his ocean home filled with trash. As the story advanced, Leo and his sea creature friends became ensnared in plastic bags. An anxious puffer fish got stuck in a plastic bottle when he accidentally – nervously – swelled after swimming inside. A swordfish physician performed surgery on Leo’s fish friend to remove all of the trash he had ingested.
It started getting too dark for my comfort.
We were submerged in a dystopian reality in which oceans were (are?) our global landfill. Nora (3.75 years old) mostly sat stock-still (HIGHLY unusual). She curled into me once, recoiling when Leo weathered a thunderstorm at sea. Clara (5.75) sat on Eric’s lap, transfixed.
This is a children’s production.
I reassured myself knowing (praying?) there would be a happy ending. An answer to the senselessness through which we were (are!) all swimming.
And then, almost exactly 45 minutes into the 1-hour show, it came.
The 3 R’s. Reduce. Reuse. Recycle.
Really?!
My heart sank into this thinnest of happy endings. My inner cynic coughed as I squeezed Nora more tightly.
Really?!
And then I watched as all of the kids — dozens of them — from the audience rose from their seats and dutifully, albeit competitively, raced around picking up trash that had been tossed around the theater during the course of the production. My own girls were disappointed that they arrived at the front of the theater from our back section seats (we arrived a tidge late for the show…as always!) after all of the trash had been collected.
Their sadness, though, wasn’t at the tragic situation of our oceans. Or even at the fact that other children had beaten them to the trash collection. It was about not getting to help. To do their part.
They were full of hope and agency. They were ready to act – to take matters into their own hands to clean up the ocean they have played little part in polluting.
Their sense of agency and commitment to action is a helpful reminder for me even though I think I’m already on the obsessive end of the 3 R’s spectrum.
Me
Most of you haven’t even seen me washing Ziploc bags and reusing them, taping them until they are basically sieves at which point they become storage for markers and colored pencils. Or carrying around an apple core from my on-the-go snack in my bag so I can put it in our compost at home. Like Grandma Ann, I gather every scrap of wrapping paper and ribbon after holidays and birthdays and neatly fold it for future wrapping. I usually just wrap presents in repurposed paper bags or old newspapers anyhow. I use scrap paper – some of my kids’ prolific drawings and junk mail – for notes and lists. I recently found a coupon from 2011 (!) on the other side of my to-do list. I often feel accused (though maybe the rolled eyes and sighs are just in my head) of being a killjoy when I refuse my daughters’ pleas for more plastic crap. More toys.
I love squirreling away toilet paper rolls and jars and candy wrappers for my kids’ school (which proudly flies its Eco Schools flag) for upcycled artwork and other learning projects. From their school, I learned you can clean, dry, and dye egg shells or old pistachio shells with food colors for a natural, biodegradable “glitter!” Now we have reused plastic containers filled with rainbow colored shells in our craft supplies.
With my girls, I gather seeds and make plans for beaded necklaces (I say “make plans” because we haven’t actually made them into beads yet). I hang plants in repurposed plastic containers and drink out of jars and make tin can lady bugs. I hired “Mr. Dudu” to join a recent gathering of Good Natured Learning’s teaching Fellows in Kenya to show us how to make recycled glass mosaics – a craft the Fellows will hopefully replicate with their students.
Role Models
Whenever we are on a roadtrip and pull over on the side of the highway for a “nature pee,” Clara and Nora begin picking up “taka taka” (trash in Kiswahili).
I feel instantly overwhelmed by the futility of their efforts as I stare at the 100-pieces-of-taka-taka-per-square-meter roadside. I am overtaken by impatience to get back on the road – and to carry on with life (and frankly more pleasant things) instead of dealing with reality right in front of me.
I feel so small and insignificant. And discouraged.
But our girls are not dissuaded by the sheer volume of trash. Or persuaded by Eric’s and my desire to get to our destination.
Their sense of agency and action endures.
That alone should motivate me to get out a trash bag and roll up my sleeves alongside them – my role models.
I look at them and I think about the 3 R’s and I hear this in my head…
Mead
"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed people can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has." - Margaret Mead.
Yes. I think this is part of why I am so passionate about mainstreaming apple-a-day nature-based learning in schools everywhere. Because I have seen and been part of small groups of thoughtful, committed educators who are doing this. I know there are more out there. Are you one of them? Do you know one?
On my bad days, apple-a-day nature-based learning feels as insignificant as the 3 R’s in the face of an ocean of trash.
And then I remember the kids in the audience. My own daughters’ conviction.
Apple-a-day nature-based learning is unequivocally a next right step. It is soundly rooted in how change happens in education (small changes over time) and in teachers’ agency to do what they know is right for their students and take action within their locus of control: their classroom.
But I think Mead got it wrong. It can’t be a small group. Sure, it can start small, but it can’t stay that way.
There are an estimated 81 million primary and secondary teachers in schools across the globe where some 1.5 billion students spend an estimated 20% of their waking hours for lots of years of their lives.
There are exactly 0 valid reasons why these teachers can’t all incorporate apple-a-day nature-based learning into their routine teaching practices.
As for the valid reasons why they aren’t *yet* incorporating apple-a-day nature-based learning…it’s time to get to work on those. As I like to say…
Imagine if when everyone in schools everywhere applieds the same fervent agency-and-action that my daughters do in the face of seas filled with taka taka.
On my good days, it’s NOT hard for me to see that future. What about you?
❤️,
Becca