Trend: Eco-Education 2.0

Eco-Education encourages children and young people to make a change.

Eco-Education 2.0 offers new, fun ways to integrate environmental education in the curriculum and at home and helps kids explore ways of how they can help.

Children and young people are naturally interested in their environment. According to a poll by US-publisher Scholastic “only about one in seven voters felt the planet’s environmental woes were not their problem. The rest were eager to accept the challenges by giving up bottled water, volunteering their time, or helping their schools to be more “green” in their approaches to waste reduction and energy use.”

Cases:

Markmakers wants to enable kids to “make a mark in the world.” An interactive map lets kids search for goods and services, which are needed around the world. Using “gift cards,” supplied and bought by parents and friends (minimum US$10), they can shop at the Markmakers store to make a variety of donations. Kids can choose to protect animals, the environment, to help fight hunger, to prevent diseases, or to support peace and justice projects. Each store features different projects and organizations, which are explained in a kid-friendly way. On the site, kids can help protect endangered species, donate money to purchase vaccines to immunize children in need, or purchase a cow or goat to help a nomadic Kenyan family, The projects are plenty, the kids can learn a lot and feel empowered to make a change. In 2007 almost 50 organizations listed on markmakers were provided with grants of a total of US$70,088. Markmakers is a nonprofit organization, but 7% of the donation is charged as a service fee.

My Sust House is a game aimed at promoting to environmentalism, exposing
kids and teenagers to issues of sustainability in design and planning. The interactive game is narrated by two cartoon characters and helps kids explore what sustainability means and how it relates to our homes. After an introduction explaining sustainability, there are two games. The first game lets kids explore ways to create a more sustainable environment, while the second game lets children build a sustainable house. The games are an outgrowth of Sust.org, Scotland`s first website to be dedicated to sustainable design in architecture.

Trend Impact
There are almost a dozen small eco-colleges, most offering a mix of hands-on, experiential learning, outdoor adventures, and liberal art in the US. And there increasing numbers of prospective students interested in this field. But eco-education can start at an even younger age. Most children are interested in their environment and more than willing to make changes. But when they start hearing about endangered species about pollution about hunger, poverty, and war, this overwhelming amount of information is usually not only hard to understand but also discourages children to do anything, simply because nobody shows them ways of how they really can make a change. The new “eco-“ and “enviro-cation” websites have a different approach. They not only teach kids about the issues of the world, they show them different ways to help.

Links:
Markmakers

My Sust House

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