Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Waste Not, Want Not?

 For most of us, conservation is just part of our consciousness.  Many of us recycle. We reuse things that can be saved. We try not to use things we don't need.  This all seems simple, right?

Well.....not necessarily to kids.

When I first tried to explain the idea of "waste" to Anna, it was in the context of not using more than you need. She had spilled juice on the table and decided to wipe it up herself, which was great.  Except she used about 25 wipes to do it instead of 1 or 2, necessitating an unplanned trip to the grocery store for more wipes.

Photo from thisparentingadventure.blogspot.com


So we talked about how you shouldn't use more than you need because that wastes things and it costs too much money. It's also bad for the Earth to have extra stuff to throw away. The more we use, the worse it is. Anna nodded. I thought we had a mutual understanding.

But, in the months since that first conversation, we have discussed the concept of waste again and again...when I found that our giant stack of napkins vanished in one morning, when the toilet was filled with enough absorbent toilet paper that you could barely see water, when Anna had one bite of yogurt and decided to throw away the rest - you get the picture.

What I have been struggling with since, especially now that I am self-employed, is HOW can I convey the importance of not wasting things to this smart little girl? I can't tell if she gets it and has fun wasting things anyway, or if she really doesn't understand the importance of the lesson. I suspect she understands that it's not a good thing to do, but doesn't get the reason why or the degree of importance.


Photo from facops.wsu.edu/recycling

Thoughts, anyone?

I really want her to understand why we conserve things, not just for the instant reason of, oh crap, we don't have enough money to replace all those wipes right now, but also for the broader idea of sparingly using things and recycling because it's good for the environment.

The blog from which I borrowed the toilet paper picture, This Parenting Adventure, offered two suggestions for the toilet paper issue. One was limiting kids to a certain number of squares, and another was having the toilet paper go under when it's pulled instead of over because it may be harder to waste that way. Personally, for some reason I've always disliked the paper going under, but if it saves us money on toilet paper, I'm willing to deal.

Those are potentially useful ideas. But what about the other popular things to waste in our house - other paper products, wipes, pull-ups and food? What will it take to convey the message that we need to conserve and wasting things isn't okay?

While I'm trying to figure out how to handle this, I've turned to online research again in the hope of finding some tools to help. I came across some educational material that I hope will be a good start. I'll keep looking for similar things. All I know is that I want Anna to care about the environment....and I don't want our paper product budget to grow exponentially!


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