Every day is Earth Day for people who care about the environment. But for one day each year, people all over the world join forces to call attention to the beauty of the Earth and the ways in which we can protect it.

Here are a number of activities to help you call attention to this special day.  These activities are from KRP’s Ultimate Holiday Activity Guide distributed by the NIE Institute.

1. Talk about environmental problems in your community. Have students find a newspaper story about one of those problems. Ask them how they would solve the problem, then have them write a letter to the editor of the newspaper expressing their thoughts.

2. Have students look through the newspaper’s advertisements for products that are promoted as environmentally friendly or safe for the environment. What conclusions can they draw from their findings? Encourage discussion.

3. Ask students to pick one product advertised in the newspaper and discuss the effects that product might have on the environment.

4. Instruct students to look through the newspaper for items that can be recycled. Ask them to list the items and find out if each can be recycled in your community. Conclude by having students come up with their own ways to recycle the newspaper (use as wrapping paper, line the bird cage, etc.). Encourage them to be creative.

A Curriculum Guide to Teach Environmental Education 

Click here to download the guide

Here is a 53 page guide you can download from the EGBAR Foundation titled “THE EGBAR Clean-Up Challenge.”  This curriculum was developed to help educators effectively and easily integrate environmental education into their classroom teaching. This curriculum guide covers a variety of environmental issues such as: sources of pollution, hazardous wastes, recycling, energy, renewable and non-renewable resources, global warming, and environmental laws. Each lesson is designed with a student objective, grade level recommendation, list of materials, discussion of teaching strategies for the lesson, and an opportunity to extend the lesson through additional activities. For each lesson there is an accompanying student activity sheet. The activity sheet is ready for you to copy and can be used as an independent assignment or cooperative learning activity.