PITCH-IN CANADA
Resource Centre

Re-Think Activities
An educational Unit for children up to Grade 4
Written by Valerie Thom, B.Ed. and edited by Allard W. van Veen, APR, Fellow, CPRS

This unit has six chapters, each filled with information, ideas and projects. Words in bold and in italics are featured in the glossary which you can reach by clicking here

Skills: counting using a number line

Time: one class period

Learning Objective: students will understand the purpose of the garbage truck and sanitation personnel; students will use a number line to illustrate the number of garbage cans in their neighbourhood.

NOTE: This Activity can be carried out in conjunction with OUR GARBAGE: ACTIVITY 4, OUR GARBAGE: ACTIVITY 5 and REUSING AND RECYCLING: ACTIVITY 7.

Materials and Equipment: cutouts representing garbage cans or bags; number line.

Activity:

1. On garbage pick-up day, take students for a short walk to observe the garbage bags and cans waiting for pick-up and, if possible, the garbage trucks at work.
   
2. Together, count the number of cans and bags observed.
   
3. Students observe the work done by the sanitation personnel—the driver, the pick-up people.
   
4. Students watch and listen to the garbage truck. Observe the compactor crushing the garbage, if a compactor truck is used.
   
5. In the classroom, discuss:
   
• Describe what the workers do
• What does the truck do the to the garbage? (Crushes it)
• Why is compacting (crushing) the garbage useful?
• Where will this truck go when it is full?
• Why do we need this truck and the workers?
6. Using cutouts to represent the number of garbage cans/bags counted, have students make a number line to show the number. Then, using cutouts, show students how many cans/bags would be collected in one month from the area they surveyed.

RE…Think

Discuss:

• Did we count all of the garbage cans/bags collected in our neighbourhood?
• Whose house (of the students present) did we miss?
• Where else might the trucks pick up garbage? (Local shopping centres, businesses, other homes, etc.)

Help students to realize that a huge amount of garbage is collected weekly in their community, and that the amount of garbage we throw away is causing serious problems, both in finding places to dump it, and the problems the dumps cause to the environment.

For Older Students:

Multiply the cans/bags collected in one month by 12, to show how many cans/bags are collected in one year in the area surveyed.

On average, EACH Canadian throws out 80 garbage cans of garbage per year. Help students compute how many cans/bags of garbage per year, on average, are thrown out by the students in the class (class number X 80).

Click here to return to the Index for Chapter 4 and more activities

Click here to return to the Index for Re-Think