Date of event :2^nd April 2014

Venue : My grandmother's house in Panchkula , Punjab, India.

Subject :Climate Change

Audience:

My grandmother Mrs. Leela Arora

My aunt Mrs Manjula Arora

My cousin Miss Archie Arora

My younger cousin Miss Pareena Arora

My mother who was recording the event and also attending.

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Last week during my short vacation to India, I went to my maternal grandmother's house for 2 days. There I have my grandmother , my uncle (mother's brother) , his wife my aunt , his 2 daughters -2.5 years old little one and elder one 9 years old. During my stay I noticed that they use plastic carry bags a lot , not only for grocery shopping but also for packing lunch for office and school . Also I noticed that my 9 year old cousin is careless about water , she keeps  water tap on while brushing teeth and she is also fond of taking long showers. I was bit hesitant to eat strawberries offered to me when I was told by my aunt that these are imported from Spain(it immediately struck to me that it has travelled very long miles so is not a Eco food for me) . Then I thought of advising them to improve their daily life styles to reduce their carbon footprint. Later in the evening , they asked me what all I do in UAE. I told them about my studies and various environment protection events and activities I do in UAE. When they came to know about my efforts towards environment protection in UAE , my aunt wondered and asked me various questions like :

Why do you do these environment related educative events ?

Do you think these are needed ?

Will these benefit anyone?

Why it is important and what exactly is global warming and is it really needed to mitigate it ?Is it really harmful?

 

That was the time I stood up and requested all of them to gather and listen to me for half an hour. I quickly opened the Eco Generation school kit on "Climate Change" and started by telling them about my favourite season . Then I asked each of them their favourite seasons. Then I told them how important it is to have variety of seasons not only for our personal favourites but also for natural processes like migration of birds , maturing/ripening of crops , blooming of flowers etc. They agreed with me on that. Then I told them that for past few years , falling of seasons is out of sync and there is an increasing trend of hurricane , floods, melting of polar ice caps, un seasonal rains , extreme heat waves etc all attributed to climate change which is due to Global warming. While going through different slides of Eco Gen school kit on "Climate Change"I , then , explained them what exactly is Global warming . I  told them about carbon footprint and the dire need for all of us to reduce our carbon footprints to curb global warming which is the root cause of all disturbances in climate etc. All of them listened to me very patiently and with interest. My aunt asked me "what are the ways to reduce carbon footprint"?. I told them about increased carbon emissions by private cars , sprays , use of plastics. I told them few simple tips to reduce carbon footprint like use of public transport /car pool/bicycle,  minimise use of plastic bags(they take 450-500 years to decompose/biodegrade), eat locally grown food with least food miles,prevent waste (as mentioned in school kit of Eco gen). I also made them realize that they need to improve their daily life style to reduce their carbon footprint. I told them about carbon buster as the ones which reduce carbon emission & carbon boosters as the one which enhance/increase carbon emission.

In the end, to make it more interactive , As an activity(as advised in Eco Gen school kit ) , I gave blank A4 size sheets to each of them and asked them to draw and show one carbon booster and one carbon buster.

I was glad to see what they drew and that showed how well they understood the stuff on climate change. They were very happy to learn and realize that they have many things in their control which can contribute to reducing their carbon footprints . They promised me to adopt eco living in their daily habits.

 

My Feedback :

 

1)      I found Eco Generation school kit very easy to understand and interesting. It's "Setting the tone-seasonal challenge"(part d of  "Understanding the Climate Change") gave me a good idea of starting the discussion on climate change by asking everyone's favourite season. This  was a very strong and convincing point to emphasise the importance of various seasons and their regular/timely arrival which is disturbed and out of sync due to global warming.

 

2)      There is a slide on "Individual actions for reducing the impact of climate change" which I found very helpful while answering to listener's question "How can individuals contribute to reduce  the impact of climate change"?

 

 

3)      Slide on "Cut down the usage of fossil fuel" has very nice picture showing crowded /busy/full of traffic road. I found it very handy while explaining how use of public transport would reduce traffic congestion , reduce the use of fossil fuel and would thereby reduce the overall carbon footprint.

 

 

4)      "Carbon Sequestration" diagram is good and symbolic but should have been explained clearly for easy understanding and teaching.

 

 

5)      There should some sort of quiz in the end mentioning various activities /processes and asking the students whether each activity is carbon booster or carbon buster.

 

 

6)      It would have been more exciting if there was a certificate (template ) provided to us with name of student to be filled , so that at the end , certificates can be given to these students who attended this school.

 

Students' feedback  and Volunteer's feedback forms as per school kit format are being sent to Eco gen by email .

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