Educate our Children about Environmental issues

  • by: Louella p
  • recipient: Florida usa Parents

A few weeks ago my daughter came home from school upset. Apparently the classroom had a visitor that day . He was representative from the local phosphate mining and fertilizer company. He was there to express to the children that his company was not " Poisoning our Drinking Water " . As an adult I know that this was a form of Damage Control on behalf of the company the visitor represented .
Our community is a small town located in central FL. We recently experienced a local incident that makes us fear our own drinking water .A local company had an environmental occurance that caused our water to be contaminated when a phosphogypsumstack collapsed in a sinkhole.
The fact that my daughter is also a young aware environmentalist and is fully aware of her local environment is the only reason she did not take the visitor at his word .
It upset her that he would come to her class and tell her and her classmates things that she knows are not the truth .
I was upset because the school allowed the visitor to enter a classroom and speak of things , true or not , to a classroom full of young impressionable minds . Minds that have no knowledge of whats really going on in our word and want to believe the man and what he said . I'm upset because parents were not notified or even invited to attend the class while he visited .My daughter said she knew better than to believe him . I was proud of her . But like I told her , shes lucky  because she knows whats real . But her classmates only know what the man says and would believe his words .
When I met with her teacher to discuss the issue , I brought to her attention that my daughter was the crew chief of a group of youths who made environmental efforts in our community . She started the only Environmental crew of its type in our county . I asked the teacher what her teaching agenda was pertaining to our environment .Did she have any plans that would show the children a way to help our environment .I mean why have some guy come to class and be allowed to mis-inform our kids about issues they probably knew nothing about , yet not herself teach the children about serious environmental problems or ways that they can learn to help our environment . She agreed to do a project in the spring . Saving their juice cartons and planting seeds. Flowers or a tree .
As parents , issues of the environment should not be left for parents alone to teach their children . If as children we had been submitted to facts and solutions about our environment and what was happening , maybe then we would not have grown up with practically no awareness of whats going on around us .
I feel that the school system should place more importance on the subject of environmental issues and hazards. It has to start somewhere . Our youth are the ones that will grow up to adulthood to a world in worse shape that it is now . Our children should have the knowledge of how to survive in the mess that we have created for them , as well as how to fix the problems we created . It should be a requirement that the schools teach them environmental awareness and preventative solutions .
Any small projects that our children learn from will benefit them in a big way .
I would like to present this petition to our local school and ask them to participate in classroom hands on projects . Planting trees or flowers . Recycling , or maybe a Garden . Organic food products and the health benefits of eating organic foods . Little things like these will make a big difference in their little lives . As well as teaching them self reliance and work skills . Teaching them how a seed grows by watching it and not just reading about it .
This is a petition that will be presented to our local elementary school Principal and my childrens classroom teachers .Baby steps for now . Thanks for helping.

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