PA/20Z-1005
. ..d States Office Of 20Z-1005
Environmental Protection The Administrator April 1990
Agency (A-101ED)
x°/EPA Educators
Earth Day Sourcebook
Grades K — 6
You Can Make A Differenc
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UNITED STATES ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY
WASHINGTON, D C 20460
THE ADMINISTRATOR
An Earth Day Message To Educators
From William K. Reilly
Administrator, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
January, 1990
Dear Educators:
Thank you for your willingness to teach your students about Earth Day and the environment.
Although Earth Day is April 22, all across the U.S.A. and in many places around the world
educational events of all kinds will be held the week before and the week after. We at EPA are
working hard to make sure that Earth Day is not a "one-time" event, but rather that it triggers
long-term education and action to improve the environment.
Many of you, I'm sure, recall Earth Day, 1970. It may be useful to you to have some
background on that event and subsequent activities. In the late 1960s, a series of environmental
horror stories gave rise to the first Earth Day in 1970 as citizens across the land raised the alarm.
Rivers caught on fire. Cities were routinely enshrouded by thick clouds of industrial pollution.
Raw sewage was discharged into rivers. Automobiles released ten times the emissions of today's
cars. Oil spills occurred regularly. And people said, "Enough!"
Soon thereafter, the Environmental Protection Agency was formed to address these and other
problems. By the late 1970s, dramatic progress was evident in water quality, reduced automobile
emissions, and waste disposal. By Earth Day's tenth anniversary in 1980, however, a second
wave of environmental challenges became paramount, often more subtle and difficult to address.
Evidence of toxic chemicals appeared everywhere: in food, water, soil, and the air. Now, as the
twentieth anniversary of Earth Day approaches, environmental threats are even more daunting:
acid rain, global warming, habitat destruction, loss of wildlife, and stratospheric ozone depletion.
What should we do? What can we do? First, we must recognize that, in one way or another,
every sector of the economy — agriculture, housing, transportation, energy — and each of us as
consumers contribute to these problems. As President Bush said, "Through millions of
individual decisions — simple, everyday, personal choices — we are determining the fate of the
earth. So the conclusion is also simple: we're all responsible, and it's surprisingly easy to move
from being part of the problem to being part of the solution."
We cannot succeed without educating all sectors of society and involving people in meeting
the challenges ahead. We must act and we must act together. We must start preventing pollution
before it occurs.
Please urge your students and colleagues to join the Earth Day celebrations that will take place
in your community. Help them become active in meeting the environmental challenges ahead.
Sincerely yours,
William K. Reilly
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Teachers And Librarians
Please help spread the word about Earth
Day 1990 in your school. Earth Day is
vitally important because it focuses the
attention of the nation on the state of
the planet. Our request to you is that
you share this information with all the
administrators, teachers, and students in
your school — and reach out to parents
and the community with your activities
so that everyone can participate and do
something NOW to protect the
environment.
Environmental issues often seem
overwhelming. Yet some actions can be
taken by students and their families
which are not difficult but which can be
very helpful; they may even result in
habits which will endure. This booklet
provides many ideas for activities
covering all subject areas of the
curriculum plus home and community
activities in which students from
kindergarten through sixth grade can
participate to bring their attention to the
prevention of pollution. These activities
emphasize recycling, tree planting,
water conservation and energy
conservation. Here are some important
facts everyone should know:
• Why recycle? Garbage . . . solid
waste . . . refuse . . . trash! The waste we
produce in our homes and businesses
adds up to a massive pile of waste — a
total for the nation of about 160 million
tons a year. And the garbage problem is
growing steadily; if we don't change the
way we deal with garbage, we could be
producing 193 million tons a year by
the year 2000. Usually, in making and
using products, three things happen that
affect the environment: the amount of
the Earth's limited supply of valuable
natural resources is reduced, the energy
used to produce and distribute the
products may contribute to air
pollution, acid rain, and global
warming, and these products can
become part of the garbage that has to
be buried in overflowing landfills or
burned in expensive incinerators. To
help prevent pollution, the
Environmental Protection Agency has
set a goal of reducing the amount of
waste we dispose in 1992 to
three-fourths of today's volume. You
can help by not using disposable items
and by recycling. Recycling means
making further use of something you
would otherwise throw away. Today,
about 80% of what Americans throw
away is recyclable. Here is how many
things are recycled:
• By adding water, most used paper can
be turned into a mush that is then made
into new paper.
• Aluminum cans, other metals and
glass can all be melted down and made
into new products. Recycling aluminum
cans uses only 5% of the energy
required to make new ones.
• The oil used in the engines of cars
and trucks wears out; it can be filtered
and re-refined for use again. Just one
gallon of used oil can be recycled into
the same amount of motor oil that it
takes 42 gallons of virgin oil to make.
• Lawn clippings and garden weeds can
be put in a compost pile, where they are
broken down by tiny organisms; the
rotted result can improve your garden's
soil. Yard wastes make up almost 20%
of all landfill trash.
We can all contribute to solving our
nation's increasing garbage problem by
cutting down on the number of things
we have to throw away, which will
reduce the pollution caused by the
production of new items and the
disposal of old ones. At home and at
school, you can do your part to win the
war against waste by buying recycled
products and by recycling products
instead of throwing them away.
• Why plant trees? Trees provide us
with wood, paper, fruit, nuts, shade,
natural beauty and a buffer against
noise. They also play an important role
in Earth's natural cycles. Trees remove
carbon dioxide, a gas, from the
atmosphere and store it until they die
and decompose or are burned. Since
carbon dioxide is responsible for half of
the gas build-up which causes the
greenhouse effect, trees act as a natural
control against global warming. A
typical healthy tree removes between 25
and 45 pounds of carbon from the air
every year. Trees also help prevent
flooding and help control soil erosion.
Although trees are necessary for our
survival, forests are being destroyed at a
rate far faster than our current efforts to
replace them. In American cities, four
trees are removed for every one planted.
• Why conserve water? Water is central
to all life and life activities. Plants and
animals must have water to survive.
Water represents about 75% of a
person's body weight and covers nearly
75% of the earth's surface. Nearly
everything on earth can be directly or
indirectly traced to a connection with
water. Rocks channel water into
streams; streams and rivers carry water
across the land. Ponds, lakes, marshes
and swamps often hold water in place.
Trees draw water from the soil and
transport it up into the leaves and out
again into the air. Clouds are airborne
carriers of water across the sky. People,
plants, wildlife need water for survival.
The water must be clean, free of toxic
contamination. Humans use water for
many purposes other than drinking.
Care must be taken to protect water
quality. Water is a source of beauty and
recreation. It is the basis of a massive
planetary transportation system. Water
helps our food grow, cools our cars, and
is one of the first things on the list of
substances the astronauts take into
space. There are about 320,000,000
cubic miles of water in the oceans. The
tiny plants that live in the earth's
oceans (phytoplankton) produce
one-third or more of our oxygen, a gas
vital to breathing. Conserving water
saves energy and money and preserves
fresh water habitat. Much energy goes
into transporting water to our
residences, and then more is used to
heat water for bathroom and kitchen
uses and still more in cleaning the
water after use, for reuse by others. By
conserving water it is possible to
prevent some of the pollution caused by
excessive energy use, such as global
warming and acid rain.
• Why conserve energy? It is hard to
imagine the world today without the
use of energy. But our dependence on
energy — especially that which comes
from fossil fuels such as oil, coal and
natural gas — is aggravating global
environmental problems such as habitat
destruction, acid rain, and global
warming. Every time we switch on a
light, turn on the heat, cook a meal, or
drive in our cars, we contribute to these
problems. Habitat is damaged as new
energy sources are tapped. Cars and
power plants pollute the air and water
and contribute to the greenhouse effect.
Furthermore, our supply of fossil fuels
is dwindling. As energy consumption
rises and energy supply falls, it will cost
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us more and more to do the hundreds of
things we do every day that use energy.
Thus, we must all limit our energy use
and find ways to use energy more
efficiently. Reducing the demand for
energy will reduce the need to build
more power plants. Fewer power plants
mean less pollution — the cheapest and
least polluting power plant is the one
that is never built! And, as we conserve
energy to extend the use of our
decreasing fossil fuel supply, we will
have more time to develop cost-effective
technologies for using renewable energy
sources, such as solar and wind power.
Suggested Activties Across
The Curriculum K-3
The following activities on the theme
of pollution prevention are designed to
work across the entire curriculum, so
please share these suggestions with
other science, English, mathematics,
social studies, art, drama, music,
physical education, and special
education teachers. If we've left anyone
out, please include them too!
Arts Activities
• Have students create an exhibit of the
pollution problems by cutting pictures
from magazines.
• Have students bring in photographs
from magazines that show water, its
uses, and how it can be polluted. Ask
them to look especially for pictures that
show how living things depend upon
water. Display these photographs and
use them as a basis for a discussion on
the role water plays in our lives.
• Have students illustrate their ideas
generated under the English Activities
and create a class book.
• Make a paper tree on the classroom
wall with each leaf giving a tip on how
to protect the environment.
• Make nature cards to wish parents
and friends a happy Earth Day.
English Activities
• Make a list of water words. Have
students brainstorm about water words,
make word trees with those words and
write poetic statements about water.
• Have students list at least 100 words
that have something to do with water.
Ask them to think of words about water,
including its importance to people and
wildlife. Keep students stretching into
new areas by suggesting examples and
categories of ideas if they get bogged
down. Using the words that were
recorded, ask the students to create
word trees of water-related words. After
finishing several word trees, have them
look at what they have done and create
poetic definitions of water or
water-related concepts. These could
begin: "Water . . ." or "Water is . . ." For
example, using the word tree
"condensation" - "cloud" - "rain" -
"storm", you might get: "Water is gray
clouds causing a loud summer storm."
After ompleting their poetic statements,
have them write them onto various
shades of construction paper cut to
graphically fit the feeling of their ideas.
Arrange these cut-outs on a wall or
window in an aesthetic fashion. The
same process can be used to explore
such concepts as "energy" or
"recycling".
• Have children portray through
creative dramatics such concepts as loss
of wildlife due to oil spills or water
pollution, stories about their favorite
endangered species, or other
environmental themes.
• Have students perform a play or
puppet show with an environmental
theme.
• Read stories with environmental
themes such as The Lorax by Dr. Seuss,
or CharJotte's Web and The Trumpet of
the Swan by E. B. White (both give
excellent descriptions of animal
habitats), or poems such as "Sarah
Cynthia Sylvia Stout Would Not Take
the Garbage Out", a humorous treatment
by Shel Silverstein of what happens
when you don't take care of garbage.
These can form the basis of discussion
or motivate students in their writing
assignments.
Science Activities (Trees As An
Example)
• Students can participate in
community tree planting activities.
• To develop long range thinking skills,
pose the following situation to your
students: We have six fully grown trees
on our land. We have no other trees
around our house or anywhere else on
our land. We need firewood and are
trying to decide whether to cut all the
trees down during next winter to use
them for firewood. Given the
information, try to decide what seems t
be the best action to take. Consider:
What will happen next summer when i
gets hot. (No shade) What might happei
the following winter when more
firewood is needed to keep warm? (No
fuel for cooking and heating.) What
problems might there be for animals?
(Fewer places for some birds and
squirrels to live.) What might a person
do to be sure that there are trees left for
the future? (For example, each time a
tree is cut two could be planted)
Through the discussion, emphasize to
the students the differences between th<
short-term and the long-term effects of
actions they recommend.(Each year 2.3
billion seedlings are planted in the
United States, covering 3.4 million
acres. Even with that effort, the annual
net loss of forest in the United States is
about 900,000 acres. In tropical forests,
27 million acres are cleared for farms
and other uses each year - a loss of
500,000 trees every hour of every day!)
Music Activities
• Listen to songs about nature and
wildlife such as Walt Disney's Burl Ives
Animal Folk Songs and Pete Seeger's
"How Does Your Garden Grow".
• Encourage students to make up their
own lyrics to popular songs.
Social Science Activities
• Have students list actions that can be
taken in support of pollution preventior
and decide what they will do.
Physical Education Activities:
• Have students join with other
community groups to celebrate Earth
Day through such recreational programs
as Earth Day runs, nature hikes, bicycle
races or rallies with an environmental
protection theme. Such races could be
held in local, state, or national parks.
• Participate in an all-school Bike to
School Day for students and teachers.
• Create a dance performance in honor
of the environment.
Field Trips
• Visit a dump and a recycling center
to learn about two different methods of
waste management.
• Visit a nature center, a natural history
museum or a wilderness area.
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Library Activties
Please consider having your school
library participate in Earth Day
activities for the period of two weeks
before, and a week or so after April 22,
1990. Some things your school library
can do are:
• Create displays about environmental
pollution and actions that can be taken
to improve our environment, using
items such as: posters, newspaper
clippings, and books on the
environment.
• Develop reading lists of books and
articles in your library on the
environment.
• Develop a "reader's guide" on how to
use library resources about the
environment.
• Promote reading a book on an
environmental theme during this time
period.
• Hold discussion groups with classes
of students in the library by the display
(Discussion topics might include
pollution prevention or any of the
concepts listed below in the vocabulary
section.)
• Librarians, journalism teachers, or
other interested teachers and students
could write a newsletter for the school
reporting on student activities on Earth
Day, as well as activities in the
community, nation and the world.
• Librarians and teachers can invite
knowledgeable scientists or persons
who have written books, articles, or
newspaper articles about environmental
problems to speak or to make
themselves available to students in the
classroom, library, or assembly.
School Outreach Activities
• Urge your local park system and local
business offices to have students' art
displays on Earth Day, April 22, and the
week after. Students could participate
with other community groups such as
community art classes, photography
programs, after school programs, Head
Start programs, and others.
• Work with your ]oca] zoos and nature
centers to do a "wildlife protection"
program.
• Have students contact the area library
system urging a display of books,
posters, and art work at all libraries in
your community.
• Contact local government officials
responsible for protecting and
improving trees, flower beds, and other
vegetation about local forestry and tree
planting efforts and request them to
publicize their efforts and needs during
the Earth Day program.
• Encourage use of consumer power —
suggest students use their money as
votes for environmental betterment.
• Classes can write a letter to the local
newspaper, signed by all students,
urging concern about the environment
and calling on the community to
participate in local Earth Day activities.
Seeing their names in the paper can
have a lasting effect on the students and
cause them to remember Earth Day
1990.
Vocabulary (Here are some selected
vocabulary words associated with
environmental awareness which
everyone should know. You can add to
this list.)
abatement
abiotic
acid precipitation
adaptation
advanced waste
treatment
aerobic
aerosol
ambient
anadromous fish
anaerobic
aquifer
assimilation
atmosphere
bacteria
benthic
biodegradable
biome
biosphere
biota
bog
brackish water
buffer zone
canopy
carbon dioxide
carcinogen
carnivore
carrying capacity
chlorinated
hydrocarbons
climatic
climax
coastal zone
community
competition
composting
coniferous
conservation
decomposition
detergent
detritus
dissolved solids
distillation
diversity
drainage basin
dredging
dump
ecology
ecosystem
effluent
emission
endangered species
environment
erosion
ethics
eutrophication
evapo-transpiration
extinction
finite
food chain
fossil fuels
fresh water
fungi
fungicide
green belts
greenhouse effect
groundwater
habitat
heavy metals
herbicide
herbivore
hydrocarbons
hydrologic cycle
multiple use
natural selection
niche
noise
nonrenewable
resource
nuclear power plant
nutrient
oil spill
omnivore
open space
organic
organism
oxidation
ozone
particulates
pathogenic
percolation
pesticide
ph
phytoplankton
point source
pollen
pollution
population
potable water
preservation
radiation
reclamations
recycling
reservoir
resource recovery
runoff
salt marsh
septic tank
sewage
sewer
sludge
species
stagnation
synergism
thermal pollution
threatened species
toxicity
troposphere
understory
urban runoff
Activities Across The
Curriculum Grades 4—6
The following activities on the theme
of pollution prevention are designed to
work across the entire curriculum, so
please share these suggestions with
other science, English, mathematics,
social studies, art, drama, music,
physical education, and special
education teachers. If we've left anyone
out, please include them, too!
Arts Activities
• Organize an environmental picture
contest, dramatizing the best (beauty)
and worst (pollution) of nature.
• Have a poster contest on themes such
as pollution prevention or endangered
species. Acknowledge the winners in an
all-school meeting. Display posters in
public areas.
• Have students make reusable canvas
grocery bags as a craft project.
English Activities
• Have an essay contest on the theme of
pollution prevention or any
environmental theme. Read winning
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essays on the public address system or
at an all-school assembly. Try to get
essays printed in local papers.
• Have students write and recite poems
about the environment.
• Have students write a play and read
or produce it for the class on an
environmental theme, focusing on a
crisis that develops in a family or
community because of serious pollution
problems. Bring out the depth of
feelings that are experienced by the loss
of wildlife, open space, forests, clean
air, or water.
• Read books on environmental themes
such as Ray Bradbury's short story "The
Green Morning" in the Martian
Chronicles. Use this to open a
discussion on air pollution and its effect
on trees and human health.
• Have students give speeches to fellow
students and other classes to inform
them about the dangers of pollution or
about any other environmental issue.
Have them include requests for specific
actions.
• Show movies about nature such as
National Geographic specials, "Never
Cry Wolf", or "Call of the Wild".
Science Activities
• Students can conduct a street or area
tree inventory to determine
opportunities in the community for
planting new trees.
• Children in urban areas can conduct
an inventory of the effects of air
pollution on trees, shrubs, and
especially evergreen trees. Which trees
should be growing in your area that are
not there now? Note pollution effects
like loss of leaves, high rates of insect
infestation and, on evergreens, whether
or not the needles have turned brown
during the growing season (spring and
summer). Analyze your findings and
discuss the implications for the future.
• Students can adopt a local wetland,
or observe and identify the variety of
wildlife there.
Music Activities
• Celebrate your appreciation of the
planet by listening to classical
compositions such as Beethoven's
Symphony #6 (The Pastoral); Richard
Strauss's An Alpine Symphony; Ferde
Grofe's Grand Canyon Suite; Smetana's
The Mouldau, and folksongs such as
Woody Guthrie's "This Land Is Your
Land" and "Roll On Columbia" and
John Denver's "Rocky Mountain High".
Folksingers recordings about the
dangers of pollution include: Pete
Seeger's "Sailing Up My Muddy
Stream", Peter, Paul, and Mary's "What
Have They Done with the Rain", Tom
Paxton's "There Goes the Mountain",
John Denver's "Whose Garden Was
This?", and Malvina Reynolds's "God
Bless the Grass ".Contemporary rock
singer Sting sings of saving the rain
forests in "Don't Bungle the Jungle" and
"Save the Rain Forest". Peter Gabriel
sings of the dangers of acid rain in "Red
Rain".
• Encourage students to sing songs
about nature and, using the melodies of
popular songs, write their own lyrics
expressing environmental concerns. (An
environmental songbook of lyrics set to
popular songs has been put together by
the Citizens Clearinghouse for
Hazardous Waste, P.O. Box 926,
Arlington, VA 22216, (703) 276-7070,
$9.95)
Social Science Activities
• Explore the terms "consumerism" and
"conservation" through class
discussions and written assignments.
• Have students list actions that can be
taken in support of pollution prevention
and have them each decide what they
will be responsible for doing.
• Write to the U.S. Department of
Interior, Washington, D.C. 20240,
requesting any available information
about threatened and endangered
animals, poster-making materials, or
writing materials available from state
and federal agencies.
Physical Education Activities
• Have students join with other
community groups to celebrate Earth
Day through such recreational programs
as Earth Day runs, nature hikes, bicycle
races or rallies with an environmental
protection theme. Such races could be
held in local, state, or national parks.
• Join in a whole school system Bike to
School Day for students and teachers.
• Create a dance in honor of the
environment.
Classroom Discussion
Plan
This panel can be reproduced for
students so they can follow your
discussion and questions.
YOU CAN HELP
Teach Your Friends And Family Abou
Preventng Pollution By Your Example
Action by the President, Congress ar
state legislatures, rulings by the courts
speeches by public leaders, or your
wishing it — as important as they are
cannot, by themselves, clean up the
environment or keep it from becoming
more polluted than it is.
Millions of people cause pollution.
Many people contribute to unsightly
and unsafe neighborhoods, litter on
highways, schools and in our homes,
but millions of people can also help
plant trees, create parks, save wildlife,
and improve our oceans, rivers, strearr
and wetlands.
You can help. You can become a vei
important person in this effort.
Here are some things you and your
family can do: Please look at the
following page titled YOU CAN HELP.
Selected Quotes About Th
Environment
"We travel together, passengers on a
little space ship . . . preserved from
annihilation only by the care, the worl
and, I will say, the love we give our
fragile craft." — Adlai Stevenson
"The need is not really for more brains
the need now is for a gentler, a more
tolerant people than those who won fo
us against the ice, the tiger, and the
bear." — Loren Eiseley
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YOU CAN HELP
You can teach your friends and
family by your example to help
prevent pollution. Share this
information with them.
One use is not enough. Recycle paper,
glass, plastic, aluminum, scrap
metal, motor oil, and yard wastes.
Reuse, repair, and recycle as often as
possible. Don't throw away what can be
used again. Avoid creating excess
garbage by using wasteful disposables.
Consider using reusable mugs, glasses,
dishes, cloth towels, or sponges. Save
your leaves, grass, and bush clippings to
use as compost. Participate in a
recycling program. Encourage your
community and your school to begin
recycling. Maintain and repair clothes
and products. Donate usable clothes and
materials to thrift shops.
Use less energy. Set b'ack your
thermostat, insulate your water
heater, and buy energy-efficient
appliances. Setting back the thermostat
not only saves money, it also saves
energy. It's an investment in yourself
and your environment.
Cars — Buy energy-efficient vehicles
and keep them tuned. Carpool, bike,
walk, or use mass transit when possible.
A well-tuned internal combustion
engine makes your car, boat, or tractor
safer for you and the environment.
Carpooling and using mass transit,
biking, and walking result in less
pollution being emitted. Disposal of
auto waste is another significant
problem: used oil can contaminate
water supplies and used auto batteries
contain lead, lead sulfate, and sulfuric
acid which can leak into soil. Take used
oil, batteries, and auto tires to a
recycling center or to an appropriate
disposal facility.
Apply pesticides and herbicides
carefully if they must be used.
Follow instructions carefully. Use
natural control materials whenever
possible. Pesticides and herbicides can
pollute air, ground, and water and they
harm beneficial insects as well as
wildlife, pets, and people. If improperly
applied, they can spread beyond the
area in which they are applied and run
into local water supplies. Purchase only
the amount needed and follow
instructions carefully, minimize use,
and reduce runoff with good grass cover
and shrubs,
Noxious air (indoor air pollution)
pollutes our homes and workplaces.
Reduce tobacco smoke, radon, asbestos,
and other indoor air pollutants.
Americans spend more than 85% of
their time indoors, so this is one of the
most important areas where you can
protect yourself from environmental
hazards. One of the most harmful
hazards is radon, a naturally occurring
colorless and odorless gas that seeps
into homes through cracks in
foundations or floors. It is the second
leading cause of lung cancer — leading
to 20,000 deaths a year. Commercial
testing kits are helpful if directions are
followed carefully. Another indoor air
pollutant, tobacco smoke, which causes
problems for both smokers and
nonsmokers, further increases one's
chances of developing lung cancer,
especially when combined with radon.
Formaldehyde in new furniture and
carpets, pesticides, aerosols, household
cleaners, and solvents from dry-cleaning
are other common indoor pollutants.
Household hazardous waste — Buy
only as much potentially toxic
materials or products as you need.
Dispose of remnants and containers
properly. Be alert to labels. Materials
that are toxic to people must be labeled
Dangerous, medium toxicity products
are labeled Warning, and low-toxicity
products are labeled Caution. Store such
materials carefully and use them up. If
you must throw them out, check your
local community's policy on hazardous
waste disposal. Encourage your local
community to institute a hazardous
waste disposal plan if one is not in
effect.
Environmental shopping — Buy
recycled or recyclable products. Seek
out biodegradable, reusable, or
returnable packages. Look for the
recycling symbol on products you buy.
Such symbols identify recycled or
recyclable products. For home and
work, buy products that are made of
recycled or recyclable material. Buy
durable products — don't buy throw
aways. Borrow or rent things you use
infrequently. Avoid buying products
which use unnecessary plastic or paper
packaging. Use returnable or reusable
containers. Look for pump rather than
aerosol sprays Buy rechargeable
batteries for flashlights, toys, and
household items. Consider carrying your
own reusable shopping bag.
Lead — Be careful around surfaces
covered with lead-based paint and be
cautious when children are near
renovation or rehabilitation of old
buildings. Be concerned about lead in
drinking water. Recycle auto batteries
that contain lead. Older homes,
especially those in poor repair or in
need of painting, may contain old
lead-based paint. The fine dust from
deteriorating old paint and that created
during renovation or rehabilitation of
older buildings may contain lead
particles. This dust can travel
throughout the house and even outside.
Keep children away from such areas.
Your family might consider contacting
an expert before undertaking such
renovations.
EPA has found unhealthy
contaminants in drinking water in some
areas. Because lead and other
contaminants may cause a health
problem, consider having your water
tested if your house has lead pipes. Two
drinking water precautions are to run
water until it changes temperature —
and use only the cold-water tap for
drinking and cooking, especially for
making baby formula. Lead can slow
children's physical and nervous system
development and cause other
neurological, reproductive, and
circulatory problems. Auto batteries
contain lead and should be recycled or
disposed of at appropriate disposal sites
to help reduce the amount of lead in the
environment.
Plant trees, shrubs, and indoor plants.
They replenish the earth's oxygen
supply and provide habitat for wildlife.
Plant trees or bushes in your yard or
neighborhood. Trees in your yard may
save you money in heating and cooling.
They beautify your property and
increase its value, ind provide habitat
for wildlife.
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