Go Green with Your Kids
Tips to teach your children to live earth-friendly at every age
- Water: Teach kids how to wash dishes properly. By hand, use a basin and only a pencil-thin stream of water. By machine, scrape dishes off but do not rinse with water.
- Energy: Make sure they don't keep the refrigerator door open for too long.
- Toxic Exposure: Allow them to use only non-toxic, recycled permanent markers. Find more green school supplies at Greenhome.com.
- Waste: Fix something before buying a new one. If your child's backpack gets a rip or needs a new zipper, check to see if the manufacturer will fix it for free or take it to a local repair shop.
- Food: Focus on healthy choices, and let your children help with the shopping and meal preparation. Introduce them to new foods and explore the advantages of organic food together.
- Transportation: Have your kids use a push mower instead of a gas mower and leave the grass cuttings on the lawn as natural fertilizer.
- Water: Do a beach, river, waterway or park clean-up with your kids each year.
- Energy: Encourage them to unplug their MP3, phone and camera chargers when not in use.
- Toxic Exposure: Wash your pet with organic shampoo, and keep fleas at bay with non-toxic remedies. Try one of the following:
- Diatomaceous Earth (DE). Sprinkle this powder on your pet and the house. It kills fleas by dehydrating them. Use a mask and vacuum the house after four days. Find more solutions at Care2.com.
- Vinegar. Mix 1 teaspoon of vinegar with 1 quart water (per 40 pounds of pet weight). Add to your pet's drinking water.
- Spread leaves or shavings of eucalyptus, fennel, rosemary, red cedar, sassafras or pennyroyal under and around your pet's bed.
- Waste:Take a field trip to a landfill to understand there is no "away" in "throwing things away." This is when we have the opportunity to teach the importance of recycling and reusing.
- Food: Give your high-schooler shopping responsibilities: Take them with you to the local farmer's market and have them develop a shopping list that focuses on balanced, healthy meals using organic, local produce.
- Transportation:Teach your kids to consider their transportation options. Encourage walking, riding bikes and using public transportation. If they need to drive and have a car, encourage them to carpool with friends, and teach them to properly care for their car. Plus, make sure they know the rules to live by: Regularly change the air and oil filter, keep tires inflated, don't top off, don't be a lead foot, reduce drag on the vehicle, keep the car free from extra weight and don't idle the car when waiting for longer than 30 seconds.
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