Here you have information and activities related to the environment and its protection.
Our school is taking part in a project called GREEN SCHOOLS and two of our teachers, XAVIER and JOSEP MARIA (remember him, from our tour around Solsona?)are carrying out some activities students from the last year will tell you soon. The first activity is related to RECYCLING and this is what they’ve done so far. Guess what it is.
We’re five students taking part in the green project: Aitor, Sergi Vilana, Sergi López, Jordi and Jesús. Two weeks ago our chemistry teacher told us to do a “green information board”. He said we had three classes to do it. The first day we had some good ideas, and finally we decided to make a recycliyg container with a robot form. Then we began to design it and chose the materials we’d use. We prepared two containers, one for paper and another for plastics, some plastic glasses and bowls, six bottles of water, a lot of straws, some boxes, a face mask, old newspapers, two rubish bags and two gloves. We decided to use the head as a letter-box. During the second day we started to build our creature. The last day we finished the ecological robot, and afterwards the five constructors carried it to a visible place, near the stairs, on a table. Now our school has its own recycling container “all in one”, and we are very satisfied ’cause we’ve helped and improved it.
This project will make our school more ecological and more responsable for the environment. After two years our school will have the nacional title of “Green School”, and it will give us a better reputation.
When the students and the teachers from Oliana visited our school (in February) we played an environmental game called “The Greenhouse Effect”. It is about energy consumption (electricity), its (negative) effects and how we can change our attitudes in order to protect the environment.
If you are also interested in environmental issues you can have a look at the game (it’s really simple) and maybe have a go too.
EXPERIMENTAL GYMNASIUM OF CORINTH
78, STEFANOU Str. -20100
CORINTH – GREECE
« The Greenhouse effect »
« The climate changes! What about you? »
Play-action in class.
The teacher:
1.Paints the Earth on the blackboard.
2.Puts a globe on a chair in the middle of the class.
3.Places the chairs for the pupils around the globe in ? formation.
4.Has colored chalks, sponges and cellophane (one transparent and two orange-colored).
5.Brings photos from factories, arid soil, wind generators…
Action
Teacher:
We shall study a type of energy, which we use in our house… because we have many… appliances and then we receive a…huge bill!
What type of energy is it?
Pupils:
Electricity.
Teacher:
What electrical appliances can you think of? (Brainstorming)
Pupils:
Refrigerator, washing machine…
Teacher:
Come and write them around the earth on the board.
I?ll begin.
(S/He writes refrigerator and paints three small clouds with CO2 – Carbon Dioxide inside).
•The first cloud-CO2 comes from the factory which produced the refrigerator.
•The second cloud-CO2 is for the automobile which carried the appliance home and
•The third one stands for the CO2 that is produced when the power plant uses lignite.
(The teacher gives the chalk to a pupil. Then the whole class takes turns in drawing electrical appliances and clouds around the globe following the above-mentioned procedure)
Teacher:
I will explain what is happening here in a few minutes.
(The teacher approaches the globe in the middle of the class, handing the transparent cellophane and explaining).
1.If a planet lacks atmosphere, its temperature rises during the day. But at night it is very-very low because heat escapes into space.
2.If a planet has atmosphere like the Earth, (he extends the transparent cellophane around the Globe slowly), temperature rises during the day. But at night it doesn’t fall very much because the atmosphere withholds parts of the heat, so it’s friendly for life. This is called:
“The Greenhouse Effect”
And it is very good for us!!! And our life!!!
3.As far as the gas that is called carbon dioxide (CO2) is concerned, we must keep in mind that … it can withhold a lot of heat. So all these clouds around the Earth can trap large amounts of heat (the teacher slowly unfolds the orange-colored cellophane around the Globe), and the temperature of our planet keeps rising … (He extends the second orange cellophane slowly) and…The Greenhouse Effect increases continuously. (He shows relevant pictures saying):
4.The climate changes…
5.?rctic ice melts…2007 is IPY: international polar year…
6.Desert expands…
(The teacher takes a sponge, approaches the globe and embraces it)
•Our planet is getting hotter and hotter!!!
•Just like us, during summer time, when we enter our car after a bath in the sea!!!
•What can we do? What is your opinion? (Brainstorming)
Pupils:
(The teacher listens to their opinions. S/He might give them a little boost if necessary.)
?Turn the lights off before leaving the room
?Turn the tap off while brushing our teeth
?Plant trees as they absorb the CO2
?Walk more
?Use bags made of cloth instead of plastic ones
?Use green and renewable sources of energy: solar, wind, waves…
Teacher:
So you suggest:
1.Conserving Energy!!!
2.Green-Renewable Energy!!!
Ok. Very good!
Look what I am going to do and then you will continue…
(The teacher, holding a sponge on his/her hand, touches the Globe and gives a promise 🙂
•I will come on foot at school every morning!
•I will not use my car so I will not send exhaust-gases out in the atmosphere…so I may …rub out …some clouds around our Earth!!!
(The teacher erases some clouds from the board and stretches his/her hand with the sponge to a pupil)
•It’s your turn now…
(Every pupil, takes the sponge, touches the Globe, gives a promise, rubs out some clouds and gives the sponge to another pupil…
So when the earth on board is completely clean as it was in the beginning the teacher asks:
Are we going to leave our earth covered?
(S/He slowly uncovers the globe from the orange cellophane and leaves the transparent one-Atmosphere).
-Our planet is happy now!!!
-We can help our Earth by making minor changes in our everyday routine!!!
-We deserve a big applause!!!
Bibliography: http://www.cres.gr http://www.windday.eu http://www.managenergy.net
At home:
Each student can draw renewable sources of energy:
Solar – wind – geothermic – hydroelectric – of waves – tidal
Or verbs in the imperative form:
Turn off – walk – plant – change – recycle – decide…
And then they can place the projects on the announcement board in their classroom.
Here are some more web pages for anyone who is interested in energy issues
http://honoloko.eea.europa.eu/Honoloko.html
http://www.windday.eu
http://www.windpower.org/en/kids/index.htm
http://www.energie-cites.eu/IMG/pdf/barcelona_en.pdf
One day I thought: can our class do something for the enviorment? The answer is “Yes, we can”. For this reason we have designed a green robbot. This isn’t an usual robbot because it’s to put inside the rubbish that we can recycle. It’s very ecological because it has been made with recycled materials, for exemple, papers, plastics, carboards… The body of our robbot is built with two carboard trash cans. The arms are two big air-pickets with two gloves. The head and the neek are small boxes.
We are the environmental group of Peiramatiko School in Corinth and we went a school trip to a little village called Thermo in Aitoloakarnania (that is a place in central Greece)for three days!! We stayed in a very nice hotel and we did a lot of interesting but also exhausting things! In the centre of environmental education we chose the program about Trichonida Lake which is the biggest lake in Greece.
Here is some information about the place -Thermo – in case someone wants to visit it.
Ancient and modern Thermo:
Thermo is a town of Etoloakarnania. Thermo is built in the mountainous province Trichonida and the municipality is very extensive and includes a number of mainly mountainous villages. It 32 kilometres away from Agrinio.
History:
Thermo’s history is very important. The ancient city was the most important centre in entire Aitolia and also the administrative and religious centre of (Aitoliki Confederaton). The archaeological site with many public buildings and temples is the witness of the history of the city.
The village Mega Dendro (Big Tree),in the vicinity of the city is the native place of Kosmas Aitolos -a Christian who has become saint and who is famous for his prophesies about the future of humanity.
Sights:
• The archaeological area and the museum of the city.
• Lake Trichonida, the largest in Greece.
• The centre of Environmental Education.
• The monastery of Agia Paraskevi (Saint Friday) with the wax models that represent the Secret School that existed there.
During the Turkish domination Greeks were not allowed to have schools so there were many secret schools ran mostly by monks.
• The Evinos River crossing the mountainous regions full of small villages, picturesque bridges and sheer drops. The area is ideal for rafting.