This week we started our concept of 'life' by looking at the life of things. Where do things we use and buy come from, and what happens to them when we no longer want them?
We looked at a variety of clothing items and investigated what they were made of and where they were made. We noticed that many of them were made in Bangladesh and China. We discussed why this might be.
Then we looked at the life cycle of a t-shirt. There is a good TED-Ed talk about the process of making a cotton t-shirt. It's eye-opening to think about the environmental impacts of a simple t-shirt - the chemicals, transport, energy and labour that goes in to making clothes. There are ideas for how to minimise this.
Being aware of where items come from is part of 'conscious consumerism' - having the knowledge to decide what to buy based on how it will impact the planet.
Among choices for work, kids had the option to write 'a day in the life' stories about inanimate objects. They imagined what it might be like to be an object such as a spoon, toothbrush, ball, car etc.
Some students researched recycling options in NZ, some created animations about the life of things, some explored how various items are made.
