Staying Green For The Kids

Eco-awareness: for most people, it’s not something that happens overnight. It usually takes a long process of cultivation and understanding, and just growing up in a green household isn’t always enough. As with most things, it takes real meaningful interaction with your children to help them understand why and how you live the way you do, and the earlier the stage is set the better. In this vein of thought, Marisa Belger of the Today Show has come up with ten great tips on raising your children to be eco-friendly in your footsteps.

Introduce your child to the source of the food she eats.
Tending a garden or visiting a farmers market can help your little one understand that vegetables don’t grow on supermarket shelves. From here you can begin to emphasize the importance of choosing organic foods.

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Play naturally.
Though the occasional plastic toy has made its way into our lives, I’ve made a concerted — though often mocked — effort to limit W.’s toys to those that are made from natural materials — wood, fabric and nontoxic paint. A good handful of my family members think I’m crazy to shun the Technicolor world of plastic playthings, but I’ve found that these toys are not only free from potential toxins like PVCs and phthalates, but they also last longer and allow more room for imaginative play. When a toy isn’t singing songs, flashing lights and wiggling across the floor, it seems that a child actually has to use his imagination when playing with it. Go figure.

Big points for her emphasizing the importance of recycling, reducing, and using reusable bags as well. But the most important advice she imparts? The very first on the list — set a good example. “The quickest way to teach your kid to recycle or to conserve energy,” she says, “is to do those things yourself.”

Wednesday, April 15th, 2009 at 12:43 pm and is filed under The Daily. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.