plastic pollution & ocean pollution

Education Resource Pack Fast Track Fiji

Plastic Pollution

Version 1 21/01/15 Compiled by Alice Forest for Ocean Ambassadors.

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Plastic Pollution School Resource Pack Page 1

Plastic Pollution: Causes & SolutionsThis education pack was developed for teachers to educate children about plastic pollution and marine debris in an island context. It was specifically developed for Fiji, which faces a unique set of problems in regards to plastic waste and management.

It provides basic information on plastic pollution and the associated problems, as well as ways that schools and communities can work together to prevent these issues.

The resource pack is divided into 2 sections – the problem, and possible solutions. Each section contains information, which can be discussed with students or used as a reading or dictation activity. There are also suggested interactive activities and games in each section to help students to remember important concepts and make changes in their schools and lives.

The activities are grouped into curriculum‐related topics (Maths, English) as well as Hands On (games, school projects and activities), Discussion (ideas to discuss in class) and Hand Outs (activities which can be photocopied and handed out).


Part 1: the problem with plastic 3

Single use plastic 4

Where does it come from? 4

Problems for people 4

Why not burn or bury it? 5

Wildlife issues 5

Ocean gyres – plastic soup 6

Plastic statistics 7

Poster: Plastic kills 8

Impacting on your food 9

What is plastic? 10

Poster: Do you like eating plastic? 11

The problem with plastic handouts 14

Find a word 14

What should you do? 14

Trash in the oceans 17

Part 2: what can you do? 20

Reduce 20

No excuse for single use 20

Reuse 20

Recycle 21

Think 7 21

Redesign 22

Put it in the bin 22

Compost 22

Chemical containers 22

Poster: What can you do? 23

What can you do? Activities 24

Be creative 24

What can you do activities 25

Plarn (plastic yarn) 26

Sort your rubbish 26

Clean up your local area 26

Bottle broom 27

Make a compost 28

Make posters 29

Start an environment club 29

Redesign 29

Running game 30

Discussion 31

English 31

Maths 32

The value of recycling 33

The value of reusing 34

What’s the problem? 35

Cleanup data collection sheet 36

Example cleanup data collection sheet 37

Further resources 38

Thank you 38

Contents


Part 1: The problem with plastic? Plastic pollution is threatening our oceans, marine animals and even human health. In the past, throwing rubbish on the ground or in the ocean wasn’t a big problem because the food scraps are biodegradable and break down. Plastic doesn’t break down or go away. When it’s dropped on land it often ends up in our oceans where it disintegrates into small pieces. About 3 metric tonnes of plastic is estimated to be entering the oceans every 15 seconds.

Biodegradable: objects which decompose back into natural elements, like food scraps, wood and leaves

Degradable: objects that break down into smaller pieces due to sunlight, wind action etc. Plastics degrade but do not go away.

Marine debris: human- made objects that end up in the ocean.


Single use plastic

A lot of the plastic in our landfills and oceans is single use – this means it’s made of a material that lasts forever, but often we only use it for a few minutes. At least a third of all plastic is used for packaging – things like chip packets and plastic bags. It’s estimated that we use plastic bags for about 12 minutes before they become rubbish, then the bag can last around 500 years in our oceans. Pretty much every piece of plastic ever made still exists somewhere (apart from a fraction which has been incinerated). The same things that make plastic so useful (durability, strength) make it a nightmare when it ends up in our environment.

Where does it come from?

About 80% of rubbish in the ocean comes from land- based sources. The ocean is downhill from everywhere and all rivers lead to the sea – so plastic dropped on land inevitably ends up in the ocean. About a third of plastic pollution is drink related, like bottles, straws and plastic cups. More than 6 000 000 tonnes of marine debris enters the oceans every year and unlike mango skin or coconuts – the plastic won’t break down.

Problems for people

Litter in the environment causes many problems for people and communities:

➤ Looks dirty – rubbish on streets isn’t nice to look at

➤ Decreases tourism value – tourists don’t want to see streets full of trash

➤ Can block drains – leads to flooding, in India plastic bags are banned due to the huge floods created when they blocked drains

➤ Pollutes swimming areas ➤ Can harm plants & animals, potentially decreasing the amount of healthy food available

➤ Can cause harm & injury to people – broken glass, sharp pieces of plastic, metal

➤ Can entangle boat engines – especially net, rope and bags

➤ Is a lost resource – all the energy and resources used to make plastic bags, bottles, straws etc are lost when these items become trash

➤ Costs time and money to clean up


Why not burn or bury it?

Burning plastic releases harmful chemicals into the air, causing air pollution that is damaging to our atmosphere and us. That terrible smell of melting plastic is actually chemicals, so when we breathe it in it can cause a range of health issues, including cancer. Burying the rubbish means we can’t see it anymore, but is also not a good solution – it’s better to recycle and use the resources as something valuable, not just rubbish. Also, rubbish that ends up in our environment can provide a breeding ground for disease carrying pests like mosquitoes and rats.

Wildlife issues

Plastic pollution and marine debris cause many problems for wildlife.

➤ Entanglement – animals becoming entangled in rubbish risk losing limbs, infection and death.

➤ Ingestion – eating plastic can lead to starvation, and a lot of the plastic in the ocean looks like food to marine animals. A turtle was found dead in Hawaii with over 1000 pieces of plastic in its stomach and intestines.

➤ Chemicals – plastics provide a way for harmful chemicals to enter our food chain.

➤ Invasive species – floating plastic provides a way for animals and plants to ‘hitchhike’ outside their normal habitat, where they can negatively impact ecosystems.

Over 1 000 000 sea birds, 100 000 marine mammals and 1000s of turtles are killed by plastic every year. The fish that we’re eating are also eating plastic. Because plastic comes in so many shapes and sizes, it is impacting on many animals in the ocean at every level of the food chain. Many young seabirds are killed when their parents bring back plastic for them instead of food.


Ocean Gyres – Plastic Soup

Once plastic enters the ocean, it breaks down (degrades) into smaller and smaller pieces. About 80% of the plastic sinks while the rest floats around. A 1 Litre drink bottle could break down into enough tiny pieces to end up on a mile (2.6km) of every beach in the world. Some areas of the ocean, the gyres, have currents that concentrate these tiny pieces, resulting in a plastic ‘soup’. In the North Pacific, there is up to 36 times more plastic than plankton. Plankton (small drifting plants & animals) are a crucial food source for many animals and are necessary for healthy oceans.

Gyre: large system of rotating ocean currents

Image source 5gyres.org


Plastic statistics

➤ Over 46,000 pieces of plastic per square mile (~2.6km) in the ocean (United Nations, 2006)

➤ 90% of all floating ocean trash is plastic (LA Times, 2006)

➤ 36 times more micro plastic than plankton in the North Pacific (Charles Moore, 2009)

➤ Over 1 000 000 sea birds, 100 000 marine mammals and 1000s of turtles are killed by plastic every year (greenpeace.org)

➤ 3.8 million tonnes of waste plastic were generated in 2009 in the United States alone, and only 9.4% of this was recycled (surfrider.org)

➤ About 7.2 million cigarette butts are littered each year in Australia alone – end to end, these could encircle the planet 3.6 times (resourcesmart.voc.gov.au)

➤ Only 5% of the plastic we use is recovered, about 50% ends up in landfill, and the rest is lost in the environment and at sea. (5gyres.org)

➤ 3x as much rubbish is dumped in the ocean each year as the weight of fish caught (noaa.gov)

➤ More than one million plastic bags are used every minute – if you joined them end to end, they could encircle the world 4,200 times. (oceancrusaders.org)

3 metric tonnes of plastic enters the ocean every 15 seconds.

Plastic-Bag Plastic-Bottle Styrofoam-Cup Food-Wrapper Fishing-Line

-20-YEARS 450-YEARS 50-YEARS 300-YEARS 600-YEARS-

CHIPS

http://www.fiji.highcommission.gov.au/suva/home.html


Impacting on your food

Plastic doesn’t go away, it just breaks down into smaller and smaller pieces. Animals at every level of the food chain eat these pieces, which can then release harmful chemicals into their system. Plastic in the ocean acts like a sponge, absorbing chemicals from the seawater like DDT, mercury and other heavy metals. It is also made using a variety of chemicals, some of which are potentially harmful. Humans are at the top of the food chain, so if we are eating fish then we may also be accumulating these chemicals.

5cm

Plastic fragments found in 5-week old rainbow runner on August 13, 2008. Source: www.algalita.org.

Bioaccumulation When toxic substances accumulate in the tissue (e.g. fat, organs) of an organism. This means that animals at the top of the food chain will accumulate chemicals from the animals they have eaten.

Quaternary Consumer

Carnivore

Tertiary Consumer

Carnivore

Secondary Consumer

Omnivore

Primary Consumer

Zooplankton

Primary Producer

Phytoplankton


What is plastic?

Plastics are synthetic materials and are usually made from oil or natural gas, but can also be plant- based (bioplastics). Plastics are made by linking thousands of monomers (single molecules) together in a process called polymerisation. For example PVC (polyvinyl chloride) is made up of linked monomers of vinyl chloride. Some of the monomers that make up plastic, like bisphenol- A (BPA) and vinyl chloride, are known to be harmful and toxic chemicals.

The main types of plastics are:

Type Code # Can be used for

Polyethylene Terephthalate PET 1 Water bottles, soft drink bottles, cooking oil bottles, plastic jars

High Density Polyethylene HDPE 2 Detergent bottles, fuel tanks, hula hoops, bottle caps

Polyvinyl chloride PVC 3 Cling film, shoes, pipes, furniture

Low Density Polyethylene LDPE 4 Plastic bags, food containers, bin bags

Polypropylene PP 5 Bottle caps, drinking straws

Polystyrene PS 6 Packaging pellets, cups

Other - 7 Miscellaneous, CDs, medical storage containers

Further chemicals are added to the plastic to give it certain properties, like flame resistance or flexibility. A common group of chemicals are phthalates (pronounced THA-lates), which make plastic soft and pliable. Some types of phthalates are known to disrupt the body’s natural hormones and can cause other health problems. The problem with these harmful chemicals is that they can leach out of the plastic and end up in our food and water. For this reason, some countries have banned the use of chemicals like BPA and phthalates in plastic manufacturing.

We found that plastics do transfer chemicals to fish, and because fish do eat plastic in nature, there is evidence that plastic may be a contributor of Persistent Organic Pollutants in our seafood.Source: 5gyres.com



Problem with Plastic ActivitiesMake a poster or street sign Activity

Students can make posters showing the impacts that rubbish can have on wildlife, or illustrating the plastic statistics above.

Entanglement example Activity

This is an interactive example to get the children thinking about entanglement and how it impacts on marine animals.

1. Get a rope (or plastic bags, nets etc.) and tie it around a student – they are the ‘turtle’

2. Get 2 other students (also ‘turtles’) to come to the front of the class

3. Tell them they need to rescue their friend. When they go to untie the rope, tell them they can’t use their hands (turtles don’t have hands)

4. Watch them struggle for a couple of minutes.

5. Explain that tangled animals can’t untie themselves and may die.

Craft Activity

Print a cloth bag with your own design about saying no to plastic bags.


Nude your food Activity

Encourage students to bring lunches that are free of single use plastic:

➤ Get a reusable lunch box (or recycle an old container)

➤ Wrap sandwiches or other food in newspaper instead of plastic

➤ Take whole fruit instead of chips or noodles

This could be done with a points system – classes with single use plastic free lunch get points and are rewarded with a prize at the end of term. To introduce the idea, students can collect all of their food waste for a day, then analyse the trash they have produced and discuss alternatives.

Make a brochure Activity

Children can make a brochure – “Say Sega to Plastic Bags” to show people how plastic bags harm the environment and what we can do to use less plastic.

Food chain illustration Activity

Present students with information about food chains and ask them to make an illustration of a simple ocean food chain, including plastic. This could be done as a Science based activity, teaching about the different levels of the food chain, or as an art project in which children make a creative poster or drawing.

Guessing game Activity

Read out different types of rubbish and get students to guess how long they can survive in the ocean. This can be done as a class activity (students can shout out answers and you can tell them higher or lower) or as a team activity (students can be put into teams and write their answers down, then check together as a class at the end).

At the end of the game, talk to the students about how the plastic doesn’t go away, it just breaks down into smaller and smaller pieces. Even though this plastic is degraded, it still exists as tiny pieces. Plastic doesn’t completely go away. You can also talk to them about the problems that plastic causes once it’s in the ocean.

Item Ocean degrade

Apple core 2 months

Aluminum can 200 years

Tin can 50 years

Cardboard box 2 months

Plastic Bag 20 years

Styrofoam 50 years

Nylon fabric 40 years

Plastic bottle 450 years

Discussion questions Activity

These are questions you could use to start class discussions and get the students to think about the different impacts of plastic pollution.

1. What is the difference between degradable and biodegradable? Is plastic biodegradable?

2. Imagine you eat a bowl of bottle caps for breakfast and some plastic bags for dinner every day. After a few weeks, how would you feel? What would happen to you?

3. What happens to plastic when it ends up in the ocean?

4. Why do animals eat plastic?


The problem with plastic HandoutsThe following handouts can be photocopied and completely by students individually or in groups.

Find a word Answers ✓

Photocopy the ‘Find a Word’ handout. Students work individually or in teams to find some of the useful plastic pollution vocabulary. The words can be spelt in any direction – including back to front and diagonal.

E G R H F S E D H T R O S C K BIODEGRADABLE CHEMICAL COMPOST DEGRADE ENTANGLE GYRE OCEAN PLASTIC RECYCLE REDUCE REUSE SORT TURTLE

H L N T A G L P V X G Y B T M

Z W T P H U B A X O U V C H A

E F O R I I A A Q X I Z J I K

U V L X U F D E G R A D E D E

S C V Y X T A C O M P O S T R

P K D U V G R D H U Y N X E E

R B I D Z B G L Q E P Y C Q N

Z E T A R B E W A V S Y J E T

K T D D I S D Y N C C U R N A

N G Q U I V O S J L I G E D N

E A Y N C K I S E C N M J R G

R K E X Y E B U G A R P E Z L

Y O E C B C C I T S A L P H E

G Y X G O R B F T G K F Q W C

What should you do? Answers ✓

A simple way for students to think about how their day- ‐to- ‐day decisions make an impact. This handout is good to do as a lead in to a discussion about how students can make changes in their lives or their school to reduce dependence on single use plastics.

AnswersPacking your lunch: circle the banana, paper bag, apple, sandwich.

Going to the supermarket: circle the paper bag, box, reusable bag.

Making a compost: circle the coconut, cardboard box, paper, food scraps, Weetbix box, newspaper.

Find a word Activity

Students work individually or in teams to find some of the useful plastic pollution vocabulary. The words can be spelt in any direction – including back to front and diagonal.

E G R H F S E D H T R O S C K

H L N T A G L P V X G Y B T M

Z W T P H U B A X O U V C H A

E F O R I I A A Q X I Z J I K

U V L X U F D E D A R G E D E

S C V Y X T A C O M P O S T R

P K D U V G R D H U Y N X E E

R B I D Z B G L Q E P Y C Q N

Z E T A R B E W A V S Y J E T

K T D D I S D Y N C C U R N A

N G Q U I V O S J L I G E D N

E A Y N C K I S E C N M J R G

R K E X Y E B U G A R P E Z L

Y O E C B C C I T S A L P H E

G Y X G O R B F T G K F Q W C

Find these words:

BIODEGRADABLECHEMICAL COMPOST TURTLE

DEGRADE ENTANGLEGYRE

OCEAN PLASTIC RECYCLE

REDUCEREUSE SORT

http://oceanambassadors.org


Write an article English Activity

Students can write a newspaper article about the problems with plastic. It should have a heading and some facts about plastic pollution.

Plastics trivia English Activity

Put students into teams and tell them they are going to be read some information, then asked a series of questions to see how much they can remember. Read them the ‘What’s the Problem with Plastic’ information. Then ask them to write number 1- ‐10 on a piece of paper. Ask them the following questions. The team who gets the most questions right are the winners.

1. What percentage of plastic sinks?

2. What harm can plastic do to animals in the ocean?

3. How many seabirds are killed by plastic every year?

4. How long can plastic bags last in our oceans?

5. Why is burning plastic bad?

6. How much rubbish comes from land based sources and how much from boats?

7. What is a ‘gyre’?

8. True or False: Apple cores take longer to break down in the ocean than plastic bags.

Answers1. About 80% of plastic rubbish sinks and about 20% floats

2. Plastic can entangle animals, causing injury or death. It can also be eaten, which may lead to animals starving to death and also puts chemicals into their bodies.

3. Over 1 million (1 000 000) seabirds are thought to be killed by plastic pollution every year.

4. Plastic bags can last around 500 years in our oceans.

5. Burning plastic releases dangerous chemicals into the atmosphere, causing air pollution and also harming humans who breathe in the toxic smoke.

6. About 80% of marine debris comes from land based sources, while about 20% comes for sea based sources like boats.

7. A ‘gyre’ is a circular current. Often plastic ends up concentrating there.

8. False – plastic bags can take up over 500 years to degrade, while apple cores take about 2 months to biodegrade.




Trash in the oceans Answers ✓

The attached worksheet can be photocopied as a handout, or the exercises can be used on the blackboard.

AnswersHow Much Rubbish?

1. 46000 / 2.6 = 17,692.31 pieces per km2 1129 x 17, 692.31 = 19,974,617.99 Therefore there are about 20 million pieces of plastic on the coastline of Fiji.

2. Example: How old are you now? 12 years & 6 months If you drop some rubbish into the ocean today, how old will you be when it breaks down?

a. An apple core: 12 years & 8 months

b. A plastic bag: 32 years & 6 months

c. A nylon t- shirt: 52 years & 6 months

d. An aluminum can: 212 years & 6 months

Source: NOAA

Type of Rubbish

Apple core

Cardboard box

Nylon fabric

Tin can Aluminum can

Plastic bag

Styrofoam Plastic bottle

2 months 2 months 40 years 50 years 200 years 20 years 50 years 450 years

500 –

400 –

300 –

200 –

100 –

0 –Apple core

Cardboard box

Nylon fabric


Plastic bag


Trash in the oceans Maths Activity

How much rubbish?1. If there are 46,000 pieces of plastic per 2.6km in the ocean, and Fiji’s coastline is 1129 kilometers long, how

many pieces of plastic are there around Fijj?

2. Use the table to determine if you drop some rubbish into the ocean today, how old you will be when it breaks down?

Apple core

Cardboard box

Nylon fabric


Plastic bag


2 months 2 months 40 years 50 years 200 years 20 years 50 years 450 years

How old are you now (years and months)?

a. An apple How old will you be?

b. A plastic bag How old will you be?

c. A nylon t- shirt How old will you be?

d. An aluminum can How old will you be?

Make a bar graph3. Make a bar graph to show how long different types of plastic can last in the ocean.

Use the information from the table to construct the graph. Include headings and labels.

500 –

400 –

300 –

200 –

100 –

0 –Apple core

Cardboard box

Nylon fabric


Plastic bag




What should you do? Activity

Circle the items that help reduce waste and pollution.

Packing your lunch

Going to the supermarket

Making a compost

What are some changes you can make in your day- to-day life to use less plastic?

How can your school use less plastic?


Part 2: What can you do?Reduce

The best thing we can do is use less plastic! If we don’t use it, there’s no way it can end up in our oceans. Try to choose reusable items instead of single use. Also sharing tools and passing things on to friends when you are finished with them is better than buying new things. For example give your old clothes, toys or kitchen equipment away. Reusing saves money and reduces waste.

No excuse for single use

➤ Take your own bag to the supermarket

➤ Eat fruit instead of biscuits or noodles

➤ Grow your own vegetables & fruit

➤ Say no to straws

➤ Get a reusable stainless steel or glass drink bottle

➤ Use reusable cloth diapers instead of plastic ones

Reuse

Try to use items more than once. Plastic is usually made from oil or natural gas, both finite resources, so it makes sense to use plastic items for a long time.

➤ Bottles for drinking water

➤ Bottles as eco bricks

➤ Bottles as plant holders

➤ Plastic boxes (e.g. ice cream containers) as lunch boxes

➤ Plastic bags for shopping

➤ Re- usable diapers are cheaper and better for the planet than plastic ones

➤ Be creative & use your imagination


Recycle

Recycling is taking rubbish and making it into new useful products. Glass can be made into new glass bottles and jars, tins and cans can be melted down and the metal used again. Paper, plastics, glass, metal and textiles can all be recycled.

This means less rubbish ending up in the environment and in landfill.Ocean Ambassadors are recycling plastics in their Fast Track Fiji program. They are collecting bottles and mixed plastics. The bottles can be made into a variety of clothing, as well as yoga mats and other textiles like bags. The other plastics (food packaging, bags, bottle caps etc.) are transferred through gasification and fuel is extracted. This fuel can be mixed with diesel and used to power generators, cars, boats, buses and other machinery. This provides a way to use plastics, so they don’t end up in our environment or oceans.

Think 7

For recycling to work, it’s important to put rubbish in the bins, and sort the rubbish correctly. We encourage people to ‘Think 7’:

1. Clear plastic (bottles) -– take the caps off

2. Other plastic – all other plastic including food packets (noodles, chips & biscuit packaging; bottle caps; plastic bags etc.)

3. Glass

4. Aluminum cans – e.g. Coca Cola cans

5. Steel – e.g. tuna tins

6. Other rubbish – everything else

7. Compost – cardboard, paper, food waste, leaves, manure (anything natural)

Wash & Squash – it’s best to wash and squash bottles and cans before putting them into the bin. This will save on space and help prevent the bins from becoming inhabited by rats or mosquitoes.


Redesign

It’s bad design that products we use for a few minutes, like food wrapping or straws, are made of plastic – a material that can last forever. Ultimately, the best thing we can do is reduce the amount of plastic that we use in products with a short life span. With improved technology, we can redesign old products and replace them with more sustainable options. For example, the plastic used in making food packaging can be made of bio plastics. Some bioplastics can be made using agricultural waste like sugar cane.

Put it in the bin

Rubbish needs to go in the bin, not on the street or beach. Piles of rubbish can create breeding ground for mosquitoes and bacteria, leading to diseases like typhoid and diarrhea. At school and at home you can have separate bins for rubbish and recycling. At home you could put your recycling in a cardboard box then take it to collection points with large bins for different types of rubbish.

Recycling is better for our environment than burning or burying waste. Burning releases chemicals into the atmosphere, and can release dangerous fumes from materials like plastic. Inhaling the smoke from burning plastic is carcinogenic (may cause cancer). Burying rubbish is also not an ideal solution – many of the resources used to create packaging, bottles and other items can be recycled. This means we need to extract fewer resources. For example a 1 Litre plastic bottle requires about 30mL of oil, so by reusing and recycling we can use less oil.

Compost

Compost is easy to make at school and at home. It provides a way to get rid of waste materials like cardboard, paper and food scraps as well as providing a way to help your plants grow.

Chemical containers

Many chemical containers may poison your local environment or river systems, even if they are empty. It’s important to dispose of these containers correctly. Or even better, you can mulch, pull or cut weeds instead of using harmful chemicals.



What can you do? ActivitiesBe creative Activity

Collect plastic bottles, caps, chip packets or bags and use them for craft projects. See the pictures for some ideas to get you started. And use your imagination. You could hold a competition to see who can think of the best way to reuse a bottle or bag.


EcoBrick Activity

Hands onMake an EcoBrick wall Some schools have made walls to surround gardens or water tanks. Other schools have made bins to sort rubbish, or even whole EcoBrick classrooms!


Plarn (plastic yarn) Activity

www.plasticbagcrafts.comPlarn is made by cutting plastic bags into strips and tying them together into one long strand. It can then be used to crochet or knit things like reusable bags, purses, and anything else you can imagine. Check out plasticbagcrafts.com for crochet patterns.

Instructions:1. Lay bag flat and fold it in half lengthwise

2. Fold bag in half again

3. Cut folded bag into loops, discarding handles & bottom

4. Knot loops together to form a single strand

5. Roll the strand into a ball and crochet or knit as you would with yarn

Sort your rubbish Activity

Put bins in place in your school to sort and collect different types of rubbish for recycling. You could transport the rubbish to collection points, or use it for your own projects around the school like making ecoBrick walls or craft.

Clean up your local area Activity

Do a clean up of your playground, local area or beach. You can collect the rubbish then send us the data using the form (included on page ??). Or organise a big clean up event with multiple schools or community groups. Once you have collected the rubbish, you could do an activity to analyse what you’ve found, like the pie chart or questions below. Or students could sort the rubbish into the Think Seven groups to look at what biggest groups are.


Bottle Broom Activity

(by A Rocha Brazil – www.permaculture.co.uk/readers- solutions/recycle- your- plastic- bottles- broom- 0)

What you need20 2L bottles, broomstick, scissors, stylus, awl wire, hammer, nails

Instructions1. Remove the label on the bottle

2. Remove the bottom of the bottle, with the cutting stylus. The bottle will keep strips approximately 0.5 cm

3. Make cuts in the bottle up to the more rounded part

4. Remove the neck with scissors

5. Make 18 pieces without neck and leave 1 with a bottleneck

6. Fitting parts with no neck, one by one over the part with neck. Are you ready base of the broom

7. Cut the top of another bottle and fit over the base of the broom you just prepared

8. Drill two holes and insert the wire through all layers of bottles

9. Pull the wire to the other side and twist the ends to fasten

10. Secure parts with the aid of two nails

11. Your broom is ready!


Make a compost Activity

Start a compost heap in your school or home.


Make posters Activity

Students can make posters to illustrate the key concepts:

➤ Reduce, reuse, recycle

➤ Plastic bottle craft ideas

➤ Ways to reuse common items

➤ Single use plastic (no excuse for single use)

➤ Think seven

➤ Put rubbish in the bin

Start an environment club Activity

Start a group in your school that can be responsible for organising sustainability projects. You can have representatives from different classes who meet weekly to think about ways to improve their school. They could organise tasks like ecoBrick walls, separate bins, making a compost, creative art with trash or anything that will improve the school and the environment.

Redesign Activity

Children can design solutions to some of the major trash problems:

➤ Design a machine to clean the oceans

➤ Design a new type of plastic

➤ Design new products to replace some of the most harmful single use plastics (bottles, bags, nappies)


Running game Activity

Fruit SaladA running game you can use to support the learning of key ideas like recycling and composting.

1. Designate a playing field – have all the students in a line and markers about 25m away that they have to run to.

2. Allocate each student with a type of fruit – the amount of fruits you use depends on how many students are playing.

3. When you shout a fruit, all the students in that group have to run to the opposite line and back. e.g. shout ‘banana’ – all the bananas run

4. The last student back to the start line is out, and gets send to the ‘compost’.

5. If you yell ‘fruit salad’ then everyone runs.

6. The last student left at the end is the winner.

The example here is given as fruit, and can be used as a running game in relation to talking about compost. The game can also be used with other groups – for example, each student is a type of rubbish (plastic, tin, bottle, packaging, can, etc.), slowest student goes into the ‘recycling bin’.

Markers here, about 25m away from start point

Students in a line here Compost

Banana Mango Coconut Banana Mango Coconut Banana


Discussion Activity

Think of solutionsAfter a clean up, students can think of solutions to some of the problems, or you can use these as a class discussion:

For example:

Q: What are the top 3 problem plastics?

A: Usually bags, packaging and bottles

How can we reduce, reuse or recycle these items?

➤ Reduce: say no to plastic bags at the supermarket, drink tap water, eat fruit instead of food packaged in plastic,

➤ Reuse: use the bottles for water or juice, take the bags back to the supermarket for shopping, make the packaging into purses, make bottles into plant holders or fences or other items, make an eco brick wall or building

➤ Recycle: sort the rubbish, put it in the bin, it can become clothes or fuel or other plastic items

How can we stop this rubbish ending up on our playground / beach / river?

Put it in the bin, don’t use the rubbish in the first place, recycle it, teach other people about the problem, have fines for people who litter

English Activity

Write a letterEncourage the children to write letters to their local politicians and newspapers about reducing waste. This could be as simple as pictures from the children or longer letters explaining what the problem means to them and their local community.


Maths Answers ✓

The following are calculations to help show students the cost of plastic pollution, and the value of recycling. The questions can be photocopied as a handout, put on the blackboard or read out to the class. They are also a useful starting or ending point for a discussion about the costs associated with plastic and the value of recycling.

AnswersThe Value of Recycling

1. 220L of fuel per day (which is about 9.2L per hour)

What How much fuel (Litres) 2. How much plastic (kgs) 3. How many days

a. Generator 140 140 140 / 220 = 0.6

b. Car 15 15 15 / 220 = 0.07

c. Boat 300 300 300 / 220 = 1.4

2. 10 kilowatts (11 kilowatts created minus the 1 needed in the process)

3. $72.60 ($0.33 x 220 = 72.6)

4. 2200 kilowatts (220 x 10 = 2200)

5. 7 t- shirts

The Value of Reusing

1. a. 14 (2 x 7) b. 730 (2 x 365)

2. 14,600 (20 x 2 = 40 per day, 40 x 365 = 14,600) a. 7,048,000 per week (881,000 x 8) b. 366,496,000 per year (7,048,000 x 52)

3. 5110 changes (365 x 2 x 7)

4. $4088 (5110 x $0.80)

5. $60 (24 nappies = 2 x $15 = $30 + 6 diapers = 6 x $5 = $30)

For example:

Item Amount Percentage Sector

Plastic bags 50 (50 / 200) = 0.25 (50 / 200) x 360 = 90

Plastic drink bottles 24 (24 / 200) = 0.12 (24 / 200) x 360 = 43.2

Plastic packaging 86 (86 / 200) = 0.43 (86 / 200) x 360 = 154.8

Pieces of hard plastic 26 (26 / 200) = 0.13 (26 / 200) x 360 = 46.8

Plastic cups & plates 14 (14 / 200) = 0.07 (14 / 200) x 360 = 25.2

Total 200 360

Types of plastic:

Plastic bags

Plastic drink bottles

Plastic packaging

Pieces of hard plastic

Plastic cups & plates

The value of recycling Activity

The Ocean Ambassadors are collecting plastic to convert into fuel. Every kilo of plastic can create 1 Litre of fuel. The factory can process 220 kilos of plastic every day.

1. How many litres of fuel can they make per day?

2. How much plastic would we need to run a generator, car and boat (use table below)?

3. How many days to create that much fuel?

What How much fuel (Litres)

2. How much plastic (kgs)

3. How many days

a. Generator for one week 140

b. Car for 100km 15

c. A small boat 100hrs 300

It takes 1 kilowatt of energy to process every 1 kg of plastic. On average, 1 kg of fuel can create 11 kilowatts of electricity.

4. How much electricity is created during this process?

5. A kilowatt of power costs $0.33 in Fiji, how much does it cost to process 220kg of plastic?

6. If the plant is processing 220kg of plastic a day, how much electricity does the plant make per day?

The Ocean Ambassadors are turning plastic bottles into clothes. It takes 8 bottles to make 1 t- shirt. You clean up the beach and collect 56 bottles.

7. How many t- shirts could you make?



The value of reusing Activity

Leon uses 2 plastic bags every day.

1. If he got a reusable bag, how many plastic bags would he save:

a. Per week

b. Per year 2. There are 20 students in Leon’s class. If they all usually use the same amount of bags as Leon,

and they all get reusable bags, how many plastic bags would they all save per year?

3. The average Fijian uses 8 plastic bags per week. The population of Fiji is about 881,000 people. If everyone in Fiji stopped using plastic bags and took their own reusable bags to the supermarket. How many bags would they save

a. Per week? b. Per year?

Cloth diapers are made to be reused many times, and last for about 2 years. Use the costs below to find how much money could you save by using reusable diapers.

A cloth fitted diaper costs $5 and is used with cloth nappies, which cost $15 for 12. You would need 24 nappies and 6 fitted diapers. Synthetic, or plastic diapers cost 80 cents ($0.80) each. Approximately 7 diaper changes are needed per day.

4. How many changes are needed in 2 years?

5. How much will this cost in reusable diapers?

6. How much will this cost in cloth diapers?



What’s the problem? Activity

What types of plastic are the biggest problems for your school or town? Making a pie chart is an easy way to check.

Make a pie chartMake a pie chart showing major types of rubbish, brands or types of plastic. A pie chart is a useful visual tool for making comparisons. You could do a beach clean and use your collected data, or count types of plastic in your home or in the playground.

How to make a pie chart

1. Put your data into a table and add the values to get a total

2. Divide each value by the total to get a percentage.

3. Figure out how many degrees for each sector by multiplying by 360 (a circle has 360 degrees)

4. Use a protractor to measure the degrees of each sector and draw the chart.

Printable protractorIf you don’t have a protractor available, you can photocopy and cut out this one.



Cleanup Data Collection Sheet

Cleanup Details

Location:

State / Island: Country:

Date: Time:

Number of people: Cleanup number:

Contact details

School name:

Name: Phone:

Email:

What were the most common items you found? List any unusual or significant finds.

Item Pieces Notes (common brands, anything else)

Plastic bottles:

Aluminum cans:

Wrappers:

Straws:

Plastic bags:

Total weight of mixed plastics Key items Key brands

P.E.T. (clear plastic bottles): 1. 1.

Aluminum cans: 2. 2.

Other: 3. 3. Submit form to [email protected]

Thank you! Every piece of litter collected helps protect the ocean, save marine life and reduce toxins entering the foodchain. Complete 10 annual cleanups to receive your Ocean Ambassadors Marine Conservation Certificate.

submit form clear form



http://www.ansto.gov.au/

www.oceanambassadors.org



Example: Cleanup Data Collection Sheet

Cleanup Details

Location: Lavena

State / Island: Taveuni Country: Fiji

Date: 13 October 2015 Time: 11-12amNumber of people: Cleanup number: 6

Contact details

School name: Lavena School

Name: Teacher Name Phone: +123 456 789

Email: [email protected]

What were the most common items you found? List any unusual or significant finds.

Item Pieces Notes (common brands, anything else)

Plastic bottles: 23 15 without lidsAluminum cans: 14Wrappers: 55 Mostly noodle and breakfast crackersStraws: 12

Foam Packaging 5

Tins 9

Plastic cups 10

Coffee Lids 7

Tyre 1

Total weight of mixed plastics Key items Key brands

P.E.T. (clear plastic bottles): 6kg 1. Plastic Packaging 1. Coca ColaAluminum cans: 2kg 2. Plastic Bags 2. Breakfast CrackersOther: 1kg 3. Drink Bottles 3. Fiji Water

Submit form to [email protected]

Thank you! Every piece of litter collected helps protect the ocean, save marine life and reduce toxins entering the foodchain. Complete 10 annual cleanups to receive your Ocean Ambassadors Marine Conservation Certificate.

submit form clear form



mailto:admin%40oceanambassadors.org?subject=Cleanup%20data%20submission



Further Resources

For further information about plastic pollution, check out these websites:

➤ www.5gyres.org

➤ www.take3.org.au

For more school resources to help educate about problems & solutions, check out:

➤ Tangaroa Blue collects data about marine debris globally and have a range of resources for all school levels: www.tangaroablue.org/resources

For more information about Ocean Ambassadors and our Fast Track Fiji program, check out:

➤ www.oceanambassadors.org

➤ www.leisureactivistgroup.com/oceanambassadors

➤ www.greenislandproject.org

Thank you

Thank you for your assistance in making this project possible and helping us keep our oceans free of plastic pollution.

Jo Dean, Nel Smit, Keep Taveuni Clean, Sally Williams (EcoBrick), Australian High Commission

Written and compiled by: Alice Forrest (BSc – Biodiversity and Conservation) [email protected]

“There’s something missing about how we’re informing the youngsters coming along about what matters in the world. We teach them the numbers and the letters, but we fail to communicate the importance of our connection to the living world.” Sylvia Earle

Contact info: Managing Director Ocean Ambassadors Capt Adrian Midwood [email protected]

Film content Glen Bowden [email protected]

Presentation and Education Ocean Ambassadors Australia Laura Wells [email protected]

mailto:[email protected]



plastic pollution & ocean pollution

Environment