Teacher Preparation

Students will...

... explore a range of waste issues
... build their thinking and questioning skills.

Students can...

... work independently to think critically and respond to a series of questions.

Make the learning intentions and success criteria visible for students throughout this lesson.

Teacher content information: Recycling and reusing rubbish is the best way in which we can reduce landfill waste and conserve resources. It provides a way to manage solid waste while reducing pollution, conserving energy, creating jobs and building more competitive manufacturing industries.

Natural resources simply will not last forever. In Australia, there are 20 billion fewer trees than when Europeans first settled here in 1788. Paper accounts for a large part of the rubbish found in Australia. Paper rubbish is not only unsightly in the environment it can also be very harmful to animals and marine life, as can other forms of rubbish such as plastic and glass.

So, why is recycling important?

Waste that is recycled can save a lot of energy. For example, making glass from recycled material only requires 40% of the energy necessary to make glass from sand.
Glass takes one million years to break down naturally!
Recycling one tonne of plastic saves enough energy to run a refrigerator for a month.
One standard aluminium can recycled will save 767 grams of CO2e which is the equivalent of 1 ¾ wheelie bins in size, so If every household in Australia recycled just one more aluminium drink can each week over the year we would save more than 300 thousand tonnes of CO2e. Recycled aluminium requires 95% less energy to re-manufacture.
Ensuring that a small old car is recycled can save more than the average per capita carbon footprint of the world; more than four tonnes of CO2e emissions.
An individual who lets their newspapers go to landfill will unnecessarily cause 350 kgs of extra CO2e each year.
Recycling all of the top five selling Australian newspapers would save in excess of 20000 Tonnes of CO2e.
Recycling all recyclable waste can reduce your carbon footprint in excess of one Tonne CO2e.

Extra resources:

Waste factsheet

The Flipped Lesson

This lesson provides the opportunity for students to explore/build their current knowledge, attitudes and values about waste. While working independently, students are to view the video and complete the table on the Student Worksheet. Teachers will also gain insight from students’ responses which can be used to plan follow up lessons from the Clean Up Day unit.

Cool Australia presents Waste - (https://vimeo.com/77933477/18b2e391a3)

Clean Up Australia - Flipped Classroom - Tuning Into Waste

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Success criteria:

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