Using the Going Green Song (Animated Music Video), students learn all about ways to reduce, reuse, and recycle and so much more through a catchy video!
Small changes, big planet!
Earth Day, on April 22, is a great time for fourth graders to connect science with real action. They learn how people use natural resources and why some, like oil and coal, can run out. They explore the three Rs, reduce, reuse and recycle, and look at how pollution affects habitats. Then they write persuasively about one change their school or family could make. The click moment is measuring how much trash the class makes in a day and realizing they can shrink it.
We like Earth Day lessons that end with kids doing something real.
Kick off the week with a catchy song about going green and have kids list every tip they hear. Play it again each morning. Music makes the vocabulary stick and sets a happy tone for a big topic.
Why it works: a catchy, repeating tune gives the brain a hook to hang words on, so sung text is remembered better (Wallace, 1994).
Try it withGoing Green Song (Animated Music Video)SongsOpen it →Model a short persuasive letter to the principal: one clear opinion, two reasons with facts and a polite closing. Then kids write their own about lunch waste, recycling bins or turning off lights. Real audiences make writing matter.
Why it works: showing first, practicing together, then letting kids try alone is the "gradual release" model teachers have relied on for decades (Pearson and Gallagher, 1983).
Try it withEarth Day Writing ActivityActivitiesOpen it →Collect one day of classroom trash (no food), put on gloves and sort it into recycle, compost, reuse and landfill. Weigh or count each pile and graph it. Seeing their own data makes the lesson unforgettable.
Why it works: kids understand an idea best when they touch it, then draw it, then write it, the order the U.S. Department of Education recommends for elementary math.
Teacher favorites right now: Going Green Song (Animated Music Video).
Earth Day is celebrated every year on April 22. Many schools celebrate all week with science and service projects.
They learn about natural resources, pollution and the three Rs: reduce, reuse and recycle. Many classes connect it to persuasive writing about real changes.
A classroom trash audit, a recycled-materials invention or a persuasive letter about a school change are all great choices. Each one mixes science with action.
Renewable resources, like sunlight and wind, are replaced naturally. Nonrenewable resources, like coal and oil, take millions of years to form and can run out.
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