What You Can Do At School
to Reduce, Reuse, & Recycle

There are many ways to use the 3R's at your school including recycling paper, using the backs of your papers, and reducing the amount of trash thrown away each day.
 

WAYS TO REDUCE GARBAGE AT SCHOOL

  • Write letters to companies asking them to be more environmentally responsible in packaging their products.
  • Write letters to your school district about an alternative to throw-away lunch trays, or the possibility of recycling them.
  • Use less paper.  Ask your teacher if he/she will let students hand in assignments by using email or by handing it in on a computer disk.
  • Ask your teachers to teach every grade about reducing garbage. 
  • Sponsor a waste-free lunch day.

WAYS TO REUSE GARBAGE AT SCHOOL

  • Bring books that you don’t want anymore to your library and see if they can use them.
  • Organize a school-wide rummage sale in order to pass along items that people don't want anymore.  Remember, one person's trash can be another person's treasure!
  • Use the back of paper (both sides).
  • Buy reusable pens and pencils and then refill them during the school year.
  • Bring plastic or cloth lunch bags instead of paper ones.  You can reuse plastic or cloth, but you have to throw away paper bags.
  • Create scratch pads out of paper that has only been used on one side. Bind it on one of the sides and reuse it.
  • Use materials in art class that you would normally throw away.
  • Ask your teachers to teach every grade about reusing things.
  • Use paper grocery bags to make book covers instead of buying cloth ones.

WAYS TO RECYCLE GARBAGE AT SCHOOL

  • Start a recycling program at your school.
  • Buy notebooks and paper that are made from recycled paper.
  • Every class could have a recycling bin and assign two students per class to be in charge of emptying it when it gets full.  Kids should also be assigned to empty bins in non-classroom areas (speech, office, library, music, gym, art).
  • Ask your teachers to teach every grade about recycling.
  • Make displays to remind students about recycling at home and at school.
  • Make displays to increase awareness of garbage that gets thrown away each day.
  • Collect ink-jet cartridges to recycle.

|Create a S.E.E.K. | |Sponsor a Waste-Free Lunch Day | |Earn a Certificate| |Celebrations At School| |3R's At School| |Saving Trees At School|
|Saving Electricity At School|  | Saving Water At School|

Books

Amos, Janine. Waste and Recycling. Austin: Steck-Vaughn Co., 1993.

Blashfield, Jean F. and Wallace B. Black. Recycling. Chicago: Children’s Press, 1991.

Gibbons, Gail. Recycle! Boston: Little Brown and Company, 1992.

James, Barbara. Waste and Recycling. Austin: Steck-Vaughn Co., 1990.

Kalbacken, Joan and Emilie U. Lepthien. Recycling. Chicago: Children’s Press Inc., 1991.

Schwartz, Linda. Earth Book For Kids-Activities to Help Heal the Environment. The Learning Works, 1990.

Online Resources

"Creating Less Trash at School."  Minnesota Pollution Control Agency.  15 March 2007 <http://www.reduce.org/school/index.html>.

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