Do you remember being outside for one of your school lessons? Given the way the outdoors is a fun way of translating classroom theory into real life, the chances are you will!
The theme of the 2017 edition of World Environment Day - the United Nations’ biggest awareness-raising event of the year for our planet and its resources - was ‘connecting people with nature.
For the day, UN Environment’s Europe Office issued a call together with the naturalist and documentary-maker David Attenborough for schools to connect pupils with nature outdoors for one of their lessons around 5 June.
“This World Environment Day, I encourage you to enrich your curiosity and enjoy a lesson in the nature. We are very much a part of it - wherever you are from and whatever you are studying,” Sir David underlined in the call.
As a result, dozens of schools have celebrated the day by lighting children’s passion to care for the environment.
The 11th grade students from Vocational School of Economics and Management “ Elias Canetti”, in Ruse, Bulgaria, celebrated the Day by having their English lesson in the open. The students shared their ideas of protecting the environment and raised awareness of this global issue by reading self-written essays on the problem.
In Obolon elementary and high school in Kiev, Ukraine, teachers gave an English lesson amidst nature. The students were reminded of the benefits nature provides, such as food, clothing and shelter. “Nature’s gifts are often hard to value in monetary terms, like clean air, they are often taken for granted,” they concluded.
The elementary school students discussed the importance of preserving wildlife, while secondary school students focused on how to make their nearby surroundings safe and clean to enjoy a safer, cleaner and more prosperous future. At the end of the lesson the students agreed that everyone was responsible for saving their environment.
Biology was meanwhile taught outdoors in Gomel Gymnasia, Belarus “as a gesture of solidarity with our planet and its resources”, as well as in the Gheorghe Sincai school in Salaj, Romania.
San Lawrenz school in Malta set up a reading corner in the school orchard. There, children “either read, have lessons or just enjoy the chirping of birds in this quiet corner,” said Professor Saviour Tabone.
The Helen Keller Resource Centre in Malta and El Meridj , also brought children outdoors for a memorable lesson amid nature, as did the E-Matthieu Institute in Brazzaville, Républic of the Congo; the Zespół Szkół 3 in Legionowo, Poland.
We know that - if touched by nature early on in their lives - children can be spurred to protect our world and help ensure its sustainability as they grow up.
“There isn’t a child that doesn't get filled by wonder by nature, even from a very early age,” Sir David underlined.
