Recycling
Hey Kids!
 Did you know that the fleece jacket you've been wearing is most
likely made out of recycled pop bottles and milk jugs? Even the plastic pellets
inside your Beanie Babies come from milk jugs! The plastic hanger that's holding
your fleece jacket is likely made from recycled juice boxes! And your bike is probably
made up of a bunch of old steel cans.
Sounds a little crazy, doesn't it? This is the magic
of recycling, and it can help save our natural resources.
Our natural resources are the things that we take
from the Earth to make all of the things that we need. When those things get worn
out we throw them out, and they become garbage. Did you know that we make 250 million
tonnes of garbage each year? That's a lot of garbage!
You can help save our natural resources and create
less garbage by practicing the 3 Rs: Reduce, Reuse and Recycle!
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REDUCE
Did you know that 1/3 of all garbage is packaging? Try to reduce how much garbage
you create.
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- Buy things that are in packages that can be recycled
or are made of recycled materials.
- When you buy something small, say "No thanks"
to a bag.
REUSE
Many things can be reused before you throw them out or recycle them.
- Use coffee cans and yoghurt containers for storage
- Use backs of paper or backs of used envelopes for jotting
notes
- Refill your water bottle with water or juice from home
- Have a garage sale or donate clothes, books or toys that
you don't use anymore
- Libraries and second-hand stores are good examples of
how items are reused
- Use old clothes as rags for cleaning instead of using
paper towels
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RECYCLE
Take something old and turn it into something new! Each year we use:
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- 25 billion plastic containers
- 30 billion bottles and jars
- 65 billion aluminum cans
- 100 billion pounds of paper
Do you recycle at home or at school? If not, talk
to your parents or teacher about setting up a recycling program. Common items you
can recycle are:
- Tin cans (soup cans, Zoodle cans, pop cans, etc)
- Juice boxes
- Corrugated cardboard
- Boxboard (cereal boxes, Kleenex boxes, egg cartons, etc)
- Glass jars and bottles
- Newspaper
- Writing paper
- Books & magazines
- No. 2 cloudy plastics (milk jugs, vinegar bottles, etc)
- Phone books
Check out these fun sites on the Internet that will
show you how its all done. There are also games and activities, cool crafts and
contests, and amazing facts about recycling and the earth!
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