10 Activities for Toronto Kids honouring Earth Day

Each spring marks two different days in the calendar honouring eco-responsibility: Earth Hour and Earth Day.  Whether you mark either or both days, its a great time to bring a little environmental awareness into your home.

At a very young age kids understand the concepts of appreciating, helping, and taking care of things, so it's never too early to give kids an opportunity to help take care of the planet!

(You can leave warnings and more advanced issues about responsibility until they're older)

Here are some easy ways to celebrate Earth:

1. Love nature - go for walk and talk about the special things we appreciate in nature.

2. Make a poster of all the things that are part of our planet - plants, trees, animals, oceans, people..

3. Teach kids how to do recycling and give them responsibility to be in charge of a certain recycling item (like milk cartons)

4. Choose special stories for reading time that are about the earth, nature, the environment.



5.  Make a craft from recycled materials showing kids how things can be reused.

6.  Sit down as a family and make a poster of things you can do to help the Earth.

7. Plant something and watch it grow.

8. Have energy free family time - turn of the tv, computer and lights.  Tell stories by candlelight, have a sing song, play a game!

9. Give kids their own reusable shopping bags they can take on trips to the store.

10.  Visit a local farmers market and appreciate all the local produce that comes fresh from farms nearby.  *If you're lucky you might be able to convince them to eat a new vegetable too if it comes from somewhere special!